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           Title: The Death of Death in the Death of Christ
      Creator(s): Owen, John (1616-1683)
     Print Basis: The Banner of Truth Trust, Edinburgh, 1967.
   CCEL Subjects: All; Theology; Classic;
      LC Call no: BT775.09
   LC Subjects:

   Doctrinal theology

   Salvation
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   Salus electorum, sanguis Jesu;

   or,

   the death of death in the death of Christ:

   a treatise of the redemption and reconciliation that is in the blood of
   Christ;

   with

   the merit thereof, and the satisfaction wrought thereby:

   wherein

   the proper end of the death of Christ is asserted; the immediate effects and
   fruits thereof assigned, with their extent in respect of its object;

   and the

   whole controversy about universal redemption fully discussed.

   In four parts.

   1. Declaring the eternal counsel and distinct actual concurrence of the holy
   Trinity unto the work of redemption in the blood of Christ; with the
   covenanted intendment and accomplished end of God therein.

   2. Removing false and supposed ends of the death of Christ, with the
   distinctions invented to solve the manifold contradictions of the pretended
   universal atonement; rightly stating the controversy.

   3. Containing arguments against universal redemption from the word of God;
   with an assertion of the satisfaction and merit of Christ.

   4. Answering all considerable objections as yet brought to light, either by
   the Arminians or others (their late followers as to this point), in the
   behalf of universal redemption; with a large unfolding of all the texts of
   scripture by any produced and wrested to that purpose.
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   The Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and to give
   his life a ransom for many. — Matt. xx. 28.

   In whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins,
   according to the riches of his grace. — Eph. i. 7.

   Imprimatur, John Cranford.

   Jan. 22, 1647.
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Prefatory note.

   In the testimonies from the ancient fathers, which Owen appends to the
   following treatise, he quotes Augustine and Prosper as authorities in
   support of his own view of a definite and effectual atonement. Though these
   fathers, in opposition to the Pelagians and semi-Pelagians of their day,
   held this view, the point did not emerge into commanding prominence in the
   controversy with which their names are chiefly and honourably associated. It
   was by no means a subject of special controversy, or the key of their
   position in the field on which their polemical laurels were won. It was
   otherwise in the dispute which prevailed between Hincmar and Gottschalc,
   exactly four centuries later. The discussion on the extent of the atonement
   then assumed a distinct and positive shape. The decisions of the different
   councils which sat in judgment upon their conflicting principles will be
   found in the appendix to this treatise. The same controversy was renewed in
   Holland between the Gomarists and the Arminians, when the Synod of Dort, in
   one of its articles, condemned the Remonstrant doctrine of a universal
   atonement. Cameron, the accomplished professor of divinity at Saumur,
   originated the last important discussion on this point before Owen wrote his
   treatise on it. The views of Cameron were adopted and urged with great
   ability by two of his scholars, Amyraut and Testard; and in the year 1634 a
   controversy arose, which agitated the French Church for many years. Amyraut
   had the support of Daillé and Blondell. He was ably opposed by Rivet,
   Spanheim, and Des Marets.

   In the last two instances in which discussion on the extent of the atonement
   revived in the Reformed Churches, there was an essential distinction, very
   commonly overlooked, between the special points upon which the controversies
   respectively turned. The object of the article on the death of Christ,
   emitted by the Synod of Dort, was to counteract the tenet that Christ by the
   atonement only acquired for the Father a plenary right and freedom to
   institute a new procedure with all men, by which, on condition of their own
   obedience, they might be saved. The divines of Saumur would not have
   accepted this tenet as a correct representation of their sentiments.
   Admitting that, by the purpose of God, and through the death of Christ, the
   elect are infallibly secured in the enjoyment of salvation, they contended
   for an antecedent decree, by which God is free to give salvation to all men
   through Christ, on the condition that they believe on him. Hence their
   system was termed hypothetic universalism. The vital difference between it
   and the strict Arminian theory lies in the absolute security asserted in the
   former for the spiritual recovery of the elect. They agree, however, in
   attributing some kind of universality to the atonement, and in maintaining
   that, on a certain condition, within the reach of fulfilment by all men, —
   obedience generally, according to the Arminians, and faith, according to the
   divines of Saumur, — all men have access to the benefits of Christ’s death.
   To impart consistency to the theory of Amyraut, faith must, in some sense,
   be competent to all men; and he held, accordingly, the doctrine of universal
   grace: in which respect his theory differs essentially from the doctrine of
   universal atonement, as embraced by eminent Calvinistic divines, who held
   the necessity of the special operation of grace in order to the exercise of
   faith. The readers of Owen will understand, from this cursory explanation,
   why he dwells with peculiar keenness and reiteration of statement upon a
   refutation of the conditional system, or the system of universal grace,
   according to the name it bore in subsequent discussions. It was plausible;
   it had many learned men for its advocates; it had obtained currency in the
   foreign churches; and it seems to have been embraced by More, or Moore, to
   whose work on “The Universality of God’s Free Grace,” our author replies at
   great length.

   Thomas Moore is described by Edwards, in his “Gangræna,” part ii. p. 86, as
   “a great sectary, that did much hurt in Lincolnshire, Norfolk, and
   Cambridgeshire; who was famous also in Boston, Lynn, and even in Holland,
   and was followed from place to place by many.” His work, in a quarto volume,
   was published in 1643; and in the same year a reply to it appeared from the
   pen of Thomas Whitefield, “Minister of the Gospel at Great Yarmouth.” Mr
   Orme remarks, “He takes care to inform us on the title-page that ‘Thomas
   Moore was late a weaver at Wills, near Wisbitch.’ ” And he adds, in regard
   to Moore’s production, “Without approving of the argument of the work, I
   have no hesitation in saying that it is creditable to the talents of the
   weaver, and not discreditable to his piety.” The weaver, it should be added,
   was the author of some other works: “Discovery of Seducers that Creep into
   Houses,” “On Baptism,” “A Discourse about the Precious Blood and Sacrifice
   of Christ,” etc.

   In 1650, Mr Horne, minister at Lynn in Norfolk, a man, according to Palmer
   (Nonconf. Mem., iii. pp. 6, 7), “of exemplary and primitive piety,” and
   author of several works, published a reply to Owen’s work, under the title,
   “The Open Door for Man’s Approach to God; or, a vindication of the record of
   God concerning the extent of the death of Christ, in answer to a treatise on
   that subject by Mr John Owen.” Horne had considerable reputation for skill
   in the oriental languages, and “some of his remarks and interpretations of
   Scripture,” in the judgment of Mr Orme, “were not unworthy of Owen’s
   attention.” Owen, however, in his epistle prefixed to his “Vindiciæ
   Evangelicæ,” expresses his opinion that the work of Horne did not deserve a
   reply.

   Two years after the following work had been published, its author had to
   defend some of the views he had maintained in it against a more formidable
   and celebrated adversary. Richard Baxter, in an appendix to his “Aphorisms
   on Justification,” took exception to some of the views of Owen on
   redemption. Owen answered him in a treatise which may be regarded as an
   appendix to his “Death of Death.” In the discussions between them, so much
   of scholastic subtilty appears on both sides that little interest is likely
   to be felt in that department of the general question on which they were at
   variance.

   It may be necessary to state precisely what opinion Owen really held on the
   subject of the extent of the atonement. All opinions on this point may, in
   general terms, be reduced to four. There are a few who hold that Christ died
   so as ultimately to secure the salvation of all men. There are others who
   maintain the view condemned by the Synod of Dort, that by the death of
   Christ God is enabled to save all or any, on condition of their obedience.
   There is a third party, who, while they believe that Christ died so as
   infallibly to secure the salvation of the elect, hold that inasmuch as
   Christ, in his obedience and sufferings, did what all men were under
   obligation to do, and suffered what all men deserved to suffer, his
   atonement has a general as well as a special aspect and reference, in virtue
   of which the offer of the gospel may be freely tendered to them. Lastly,
   there are those, and Owen amongst the number, who advocate a limited or
   definite atonement, such an atonement as implies a necessary connection
   between the death of Christ and the salvation of those for whom he died,
   while the actual bearing of the atonement on the lost is left among the
   things unrevealed, save only that their guilt and punishment are enhanced by
   the rejection of that mercy offered in the gospel. Hagenbach, in his
   “History of Doctrines,” vol. ii. p. 255, strangely asserts, that “as regards
   the extent of the atonement, all denominations, with the exception of the
   Calvinists, hold that salvation was offered to all.” It would be difficult
   to specify any Calvinists worthy of the name who hold that salvation should
   not be offered to all; and it seems needful to state that Owen at least, a
   very Calvinist of Calvinists, held no such view. On the contrary, among
   Calvinists that adhere to the doctrine of a definite atonement, it has been
   matter of debate, not whether the gospel should be universally offered, but
   on what basis, — the simple command and warrant of the Word, or the
   intrinsic and infinite sufficiency of the atonement, — the universal offer
   of the gospel proceeds. Perhaps this point was never formally before the
   mind of our author, but he intimates that the “innate sufficiency of the
   death of Christ is the foundation of its promiscuous proposal to the elect
   and reprobate.”

   Among the editions of this valuable work, that printed in Edinburgh, 1755,
   under the superintendence of the Rev. Adam Gib, deserves honourable mention.
   It is printed with some care; considerable attention is paid to the
   numeration; and a valuable analysis of the whole work is prefixed to it. We
   have not felt at liberty to adopt the numeration in all respects, as rather
   more of freedom is used with the original than is consistent with the
   principles on which this edition of Owen’s works has been issued. We
   acknowledge our obligations to it in the preparation of the subjoined
   analysis, which is mostly taken from it.
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  Analysis.

   BOOK I. declares the eternal counsel and distinct actual concurrence of the
   holy Trinity unto the work of redemption in the blood of Christ; with the
   covenanted intendment and accomplished end of God therein.

   Chapter I. treats in general of the end of the death of Christ, as it is in
   the Scripture proposed:— I. What his Father and himself intended in it. II.
   What was effectually fulfilled and accomplished by it:— 1. Reconciliation;
   2. Justification; 3. Sanctification; 4. Adoption; 5. Glorification. III. A
   general view of the opposite doctrine.

   Chapter II. Of the nature of an end in general, and some distinctions about
   it:— I. The general distinction of end and means. II. Their mutual
   relation:— 1. In a moral sense; 2. In a natural sense. III. A twofold end
   noticed, viz.:— 1. Of the work; 2. Of the worker. IV. The end of every free
   agent is either that which he effects, or that for the sake of which it is
   effected. V. The means of two sorts, viz.:— 1. Such as have a goodness in
   themselves; 2. Such as have no goodness, but as conducing to the end. VI. An
   application of these distinctions to the business in hand.

   Chapter III. considers, — I. The Father as the chief author of the work of
   our redemption; II. The acts ascribed to the person of the Father:— 1. The
   Father sending his Son into the world for the work of redemption:— (1.) By
   an authoritative imposition of the office of mediator upon him:— [1.] The
   purposed imposition of his counsel. [2.] The actual inauguration of Christ
   as mediator. (2.) By furnishing him with a fulness of all gifts and
   graces:— [1.] Christ had a natural all-sufficient perfection of his deity;
   [2.] He had a communicated fulness. (3.) By entering into covenant with him
   about his work:— [1.] With a promise of assistance; [2.] With a promise of
   success. 2. The Father laying upon him the punishment of sin.

   Chapter IV. Of those things which, in the work of redemption, are peculiarly
   ascribed to the person of the Son:— I. His incarnation; II. His oblation;
   III. His intercession.

   Chapter V. The peculiar actings of the Holy Spirit in this business:— I. As
   to the incarnation of Christ; II. As to the oblation or passion of Christ;
   III. As to the resurrection of Christ.

   Chapter VI. The means used by the fore-recounted agents in this work:— I.
   The means used is that whole dispensation from whence Christ is called a
   Mediator:— 1. His oblation; 2. His intercession. II. His oblation not a mean
   good in itself, but only as conducing to its end, and inseparable from his
   intercession; as, — 1. Both intended for the same end; 2. Both of the same
   extent, as respecting the same objects; 3. His oblation the foundation of
   his intercession.

   Chapter VII. contains reasons to prove the oblation and intercession of
   Christ to be one entire mean respecting the accomplishment of the same
   proposed end, and to have the same personal object:— I. From their
   conjunction in Scripture; II. From their being both acts of the same
   priestly office; III. From the nature of his intercession; IV. From the
   identity of what he procured in his oblation with what results from his
   intercession; V. From their being conjoined by himself, John xvii.; VI. From
   the sad consequence of separating them, as cutting off all consolation by
   his death.

   Chapter VIII. Objections are answered, being a consideration of Thomas
   More’s reply to the former arguments for the inseparable conjunction of
   Christ’s oblation and intercession, viz.:— I. As to Christ being a double
   mediator, both general and special, alleged from 1 Tim. ii. 5, iv. 10; Heb.
   ix. 15. II. As to the tenor of Christ’s intercession, according to Isa.
   liii. 12; Luke xxiii. 34; John xvii. 21–23; Matt. v. 14–16; John i. 9. III.
   As to Christ being a priest for all in respect of one end, and for some only
   in respect of all ends, alleged from Heb. ii. 9, ix. 14, 15, 26; John i. 29;
   1 John ii. 2; Matt. xxvi. 28.

   BOOK II. removes false and supposed ends of the death of Christ, with the
   distinctions invented to salve the manifold contradictions of the pretended
   universal atonement, rightly stating the controversy.

   Chapter I. Some previous considerations to a more particular inquiry after
   the proper end and effect of the death of Christ:— I. The supreme end of
   Christ’s death in respect of God; II. The subordinate end of his death in
   respect of us.

   Chapter II. removes some mistaken ends assigned to the death of Christ:— I.
   It was not his own good. II. It was not his Father’s good, to secure for him
   a right to save sinners.

   Chapter III. More particularly of the immediate end of the death of Christ,
   with the several ways whereby it is designed. The immediate end of the death
   of Christ particularly asserted from the Scriptures, viz.:— I. From those
   scriptures which hold out the intention and counsel of God with our
   Saviour’s own mind in this work, Matt. xviii. 11, etc. II. From those
   scriptures which state the actual accomplishment or effect of his oblation,
   Heb. ix. 12, 14, 26, etc. III. From those scriptures that point out the
   persons for whom Christ died, viz., Matt. xxvi. 28; Isa. liii. 11, etc. The
   force of the word “many” in several of these texts, and the argument taken
   from them, in comparison with other texts, vindicated from the exceptions of
   Thomas More. Who are meant by Christ’s sheep, and who not, John x. 15; and
   his objections answered.

   Chapter IV. Of the distinction between impetration and application:— I. The
   sense wherein this distinction is used by the adversaries, and their various
   expressions about it. II. The distinction itself handled:— 1. The true
   nature, meaning, and use thereof:— (1.) It has no place in the intention of
   Christ; (2.) The will of God in this business is not at all conditional;
   (3.) All the things obtained by Christ are not bestowed upon condition, and
   the condition on which some things are bestowed is absolutely purchased;
   (4.) Impetration and application have the same persons for their objects. 2.
   The meaning of those who seek to maintain universal redemption by that
   distinction; with a discovery of their various opinions on this head. III.
   The main question rightly stated.

   Chapter V. Farther of application and impetration:— I. That these, though
   they may admit of a distinction, cannot admit of a separation, as to the
   objects thereof, is proved by sundry arguments. II. The defence made by the
   Arminians on this head (alleging that Christ purchased all good things for
   all, to be bestowed upon condition; which condition not being performed,
   these good things are not bestowed), overthrown by sundry arguments.

   BOOK III. contains arguments against universal redemption from the word of
   God; with an assertion of the satisfaction and merit of Christ.

   Chapter I. Arguments against the universality of redemption. The first two
   from the nature of the new covenant, and the dispensation thereof:— Arg. i.
   From the nature of the covenant of grace, as being made in Christ, not with
   all, but only some. Arg. ii. From the dispensation of the covenant of grace,
   as not extended to all, but only some.

   Chapter II. Three other arguments:— Arg. iii. From the absolute nature of
   Christ’s purchase for all the objects thereof. Arg. iv. From the distinction
   of men into two sorts by God’s eternal purpose. Arg. v. From the Scripture
   nowhere saying that Christ died for all men.

   Chapter III. Two other arguments, from the person which Christ sustained in
   this business:— Arg. vi. From Christ having died as a sponsor. Arg. vii.
   From Christ being a mediator.

   Chapter IV. Of sanctification, and of the cause of faith, and the
   procurement thereof by the death of Christ:— Arg. viii. From the efficacy of
   Christ’s death for sanctification. Arg. ix. From the procurement of faith by
   the death of Christ. Arg. x. From the antitype of the people of Israel.

   Chapter V. Continuance of arguments from the nature and description of the
   thing in hand; and, first, of redemption:— I. Arg. xi. From redemption by
   the death of Christ.

   Chapter VI. Of the nature of reconciliation, and the argument taken from
   thence:— II. Arg. xii. From reconciliation by the death of Christ.

   Chapter VII. Of the nature of the satisfaction of Christ, with arguments
   from thence:— III. Arg. xiii. From satisfaction by the death of Christ:— 1.
   What satisfaction is:— (1.) Christ made satisfaction, and how; against
   Grotius. (2.) Acts exercised by God in this business:— [1.] Of severe
   justice, as a creditor; against Grotius. [2.] Of supreme sovereignty and
   dominion. Consequences of these acts as to those for whom Christ satisfied.
   2. Inconsistency of all this with universal redemption.

   Chapter VIII. A digression, containing the substance of an occasional
   conference concerning the satisfaction of Christ:— I. Its consistency with
   God’s eternal love to his elect. II. Necessity of it for executing the
   purposes of that love.

   Chapter IX. Being a second part of the former digression, containing
   arguments to prove the satisfaction of Christ:— Arg. i. From Christ bearing
   sin, and the punishment thereof. Arg. ii. From his paying a ransom for
   sinners. Arg. iii. From his making atonement and reconciliation. Arg. iv.
   From the nature of his priestly office as exercised on earth. Arg. v. From
   the necessity thereof unto faith and consolation. Arg. vi. From 2 Cor. v.
   21, and Isa. liii. 5.

   Chapter X. Of the merit of Christ, with arguments from thence:— IV. Arg.
   xiv. From the merit ascribed to the death of Christ. V. Arg. xv. From the
   phrases “dying for us,” “bearing our sins,” being our “surety,” etc.

   Chapter XI. The last general argument:— VI. Arg. xvi. From some particular
   places of Scripture, viz.:— 1. Gen. iii. 15; 2. Matt. vii. 23, etc.

   BOOK IV. — All considerable objections are answered as yet brought to light,
   either by the Arminians or others, in the behalf of universal redemption,
   with a large unfolding of all the texts of Scripture by any produced and
   wrested to that purpose.

   Chapter I. Things to be considered previously to the solution of
   objections:— I. The infinite value of the blood of Christ. II. The
   administration of the new covenant under the gospel. III. The distinction
   between man’s duty and God’s purpose. IV. The error of the Jews about the
   extent of redemption. V. The nature and signification of general terms
   used:— 1. The word “world” of various significations. 2. The word “all” of
   various extent. VI. Persons and things often spoken of according to their
   appearance. VII. Difference between the judgment of charity and verity.
   VIII. The infallible connection of faith and salvation. IX. The mixture of
   elect and reprobates in the world. X. The different acts and degrees of
   faith.

   Chapter II. An entrance to the answer unto particular objections. Answer to
   objections from Scripture, viz.:— I. From the word “world” in several
   scriptures:— 1. John iii. 16 largely opened and vindicated.

   Chapter III. An unfolding of the remaining texts of Scripture produced for
   the confirmation of the first general objection or argument for universal
   redemption. 2. 1 John ii. 1, 2, largely opened and vindicated. 3. John vi.
   51 explained. 4. A vindication of other texts produced by Thomas More,
   viz.:— (1.) 2 Cor. v. 19. (2.) John i. 9. (3.) John i. 29. (4.) John iii.
   17. (5.) John iv. 42; 1 John iv. 14; John vi. 51.

   Chapter IV. Answer to the second general objection or argument for the
   universality of redemption. II. From the word “all” in several scriptures,
   viz.:— 1. 1 Tim. ii. 4, 6. 2. 2 Pet. iii. 9. 3. Heb. ii. 9. 4. 2 Cor. v. 14,
   15. 5. 1 Cor. xv. 22. 6. Rom. v. 18.

   Chapter V. The last objection or argument from Scripture answered. III. From
   texts which seem to hold out a perishing of some for whom Christ died,
   viz.:— 1. Rom. xiv. 15. 2. 1 Cor. viii. 11. 3. 2 Pet. ii. 1. 4. Heb. x. 29.

   Chapter VI. An answer to the twentieth chapter of the book entitled “The
   Universality of God’s Free Grace,” etc., being a collection of all the
   arguments used by the author (Thomas More) throughout the whole book, to
   prove the universality of redemption:— Answers to Arg. i. From the absolute
   literal sense of Scripture. Arg. ii. From an alleged unlimitedness of
   Scripture phrases. Arg. iii. From Christ’s exaltation to be Lord and Judge
   of all, Rom. xiv. 9, 11, 12. Arg. iv. From the proposal of Christ’s death to
   all by the gospel. Arg. v. From the confession to be made of Christ by all.
   Arg. vi. From Scripture assertions and consequences. Answers to the proofs
   of this sixth argument:— 1. From 1 John iv. 14; John i. 4, 7; 1 Tim. ii. 4.
   2. From some texts before vindicated. 3. From Ps. xix. 4; Rom. x. 18; Acts
   xiv. 17, etc. 4. From John xvi. 7–11, etc. 5. From Ezek. xviii. 23, 32,
   xxxiii. 11, etc. 6. From Matt. xxviii. 19, 20; Mark xvi. 15; Isa. xlv. 22,
   etc. 7. From Acts ii. 38, 39, etc. 8. From 1 Cor. xv. 21, 22, 45–47; Rom.
   iii. 22–25, etc. 9. From Matt. xxviii. 19, 20; 2 Cor. v. 19, etc. 10. From
   Matt. v. 44, 48; 1 Tim. ii. 1–4, etc. 11. From 1 Tim. ii. 3, 8, etc. 12.
   From 1 Cor. vi. 10, 11, etc. 13. From Tit. ii. 11, 13, iii. 4, 5, etc. 14.
   From John iii. 19, etc. 15. From Scripture expostulations with men. 16. From
   Jude 4, 12, 13, etc. 17. From Rom. xiv. 9–12, etc. 18. From Jude 3–5.

   Chapter VII. Other objections from reason are removed:— Answers to Objection
   i. From men being bound to believe that Christ died for them. Obj. ii.
   Alleging that the doctrine of particular redemption fills the minds of
   sinners with doubts and scruples whether they ought to believe or not; the
   objection retorted. Obj. iii. That this doctrine disparages the freedom of
   grace; the objection retorted. Obj. iv. That this doctrine disparages the
   merit of Christ; the objection retorted. Obj. v. That this doctrine mars
   gospel consolation; in answer whereto it is proved that, — 1. The doctrine
   of universal redemption affords no ground of consolation; 2. That it quite
   overthrows the true ground of consolation; 3. That the doctrine of
   particular redemption is not liable to any just exception as to this matter;
   4. That this doctrine is the true, solid foundation of all durable
   consolation. — Ed.
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To the Right Honourable Robert, Earl of Warwick, [1] etc.

   My Lord,

   It is not for the benefit of any protection to the ensuing treatise, — let
   it stand or fall as it shall be found in the judgments of men; nor that I
   might take advantage to set forth any of that worth and honour which, being
   personal, have truly ennobled your lordship, and made a way for the
   delivering over of your family unto posterity with an eminent lustre added
   to the roll of your worthy progenitors, — which, if by myself desired, my
   unfitness to perform must needs render unacceptable in the performance;
   neither yet have I the least desire to attempt a farther advancement of
   myself into your lordship’s favour, being much beneath what I have already
   received, and fully resolved to own no other esteem among the sons of men
   but what shall be accounted due (be it more or less) to the discharge of my
   duty to my master, Jesus Christ, whose wholly I would be; — it is not all,
   nor one of these, nor any such as these, the usual subjects and ends of
   dedications, real or pretended, that prevailed upon me unto this boldness of
   prefixing your honoured name to this ensuing treatise (which yet, for the
   matter’s sake contained in it, I cannot judge unworthy of any Christian
   eye); but only that I might take the advantage to testify (as I do) to all
   the world the answering of my heart unto that obligation which your lordship
   was pleased to put upon me, in the undeserved, undesired favour of opening
   that door wherewith you are intrusted, to give me an entrance to that place
   for the preaching of the gospel whither I was directed by the providence of
   the Most High, and where I was sought by his people. In which place this I
   dare say, by the grace of God, that such a stock of prayers and thankfulness
   as your heart, which hath learned to value the least of Christ, in
   whomsoever it be, will not despise, is tendered to and for your lordship,
   even on his behalf who is less than the least of all the saints of God, and
   unworthy the name which yet he is bold to subscribe himself by, — Your
   honour’s most obliged servant in the service of Jesus Christ,

   John Owen.
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   [1] This nobleman is represented by Neal as having been “the greatest patron
   of the Puritans.” He was admiral of the parliamentary fleet. He seized on
   the ships belonging to the king, and during the whole course of the war made
   use of them against the royal interest. Owen had received the presentation
   to Coggeshall from this nobleman, whose upright and amiable character was
   celebrated long after his death under the designation of The Good Earl of
   Warwick. — Ed.
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Two attestations touching the ensuing treatise.
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   Reader,

   There are two rotten pillars on which the fabric of late Arminianism (an egg
   of the old Pelagianism, which we had well hoped had been long since chilled,
   but is sit upon and brooded by the wanton wits of our degenerate and
   apostate spirits) doth principally stand.

   The one is, That God loveth all alike, Cain as well as Abel, Judas as the
   rest of the apostles.

   The other is, That God giveth (nay is bound, “ex debito,” so to do) both
   Christ, the great gift of his eternal love, for all alike to work out their
   redemption, and “vires credendi,” power to believe in Christ to all alike to
   whom he gives the gospel; whereby that redemption may effectually be applied
   for their salvation, if they please to make right use of that which is so
   put into their power.

   The former destroys the free and special grace of God, by making it
   universal; the latter gives cause to man of glorying in himself rather than
   in God, — God concurring no farther to the salvation of a believer than a
   reprobate. Christ died for both alike; — God giving power of accepting
   Christ to both alike, men themselves determining the whole matter by their
   free-will; Christ making both savable, themselves make them to be saved.

   This cursed doctrine of theirs crosseth the main drift of the holy
   Scripture; which is to abase and pull down the pride of man, to make him
   even to despair of himself, and to advance and set up the glory of God’s
   free grace from the beginning to the end of man’s salvation. His hand hath
   laid the foundation of his spiritual house; his hand shall also finish it.

   The reverend and learned author of this book hath received strength from God
   (like another Samson) to pull down this rotten house upon the head of those
   Philistines who would uphold it. Read it diligently, and I doubt not but you
   will say with me, there is such variety of choice matter running through
   every vein of each discourse here handled, and carried along with such
   strength of sound and deep judgment, and with such life and power of a
   heavenly spirit, and all expressed in such pithy and pregnant words of
   wisdom, that you will both delight in the reading and praise God for the
   writer. That both he and it may be more and more profitable shall be my
   hearty prayers. — The unworthiest of the ministers of the gospel,

   Stanley Gower. [2]
     _________________________________________________________________

   [2] A Puritan divine of considerable eminence, and a member of the
   Westminster Assembly. He was at first minister of Brampton Bryan,
   Herefordshire. Latterly he was a minister at Dorchester, where he seems to
   have been alive about 1660. — Ed.
     _________________________________________________________________

   Christian Reader,

   Unto such alone are these directed. If all and every one in the world in
   this gospel-day did bear this precious name of Christian, or if the name of
   Christ were known to all, then were this compellation very improper, because
   it is distinguishing. But if God distinguish men and men, choose we or
   refuse we, so it is, and so it will be; there is a difference, — a
   difference which God and Christ doth make of mere good pleasure.

   This book contends earnestly for this truth against the error of universal
   redemption. With thy leave I cannot but call it an error; unless it had
   been, it were, and while the world continueth it should be, found indeed
   that Adam and all that come of him, in a natural way of generation, are
   first set by Christ, the second Adam, in an estate of redeemed ones and made
   Christians, and then they fall, whole nations of them, and forfeit that
   estate also, and lose their Christendom, and thereby it is come to pass that
   they are become atheists, without God in the world, and heathen, Jews, and
   Turks, as we see they are at this day.

   The author of this book I know not so much as by name; it is of the book
   itself that I take upon me the boldness to write these few lines. It being
   delivered unto me to peruse, I did read it with delight and profit:— with
   delight, in the keenness of argument, clearness and fulness of answers, and
   candour in language; — with profit, in the vindication of abused Scriptures,
   the opening of obscure places, and chiefly in disclosing the hid mystery of
   God and the Father and of Christ, in the glorious and gracious work of
   redemption. The like pleasure and profit this tractate promiseth to all
   diligent readers thereof, for the present controversy is so managed that the
   doctrine of faith, which we ought to believe, is with dexterity plentifully
   taught; yea, the glory of each person in the unity of the Godhead about the
   work of redemption is distinctly held forth with shining splendour, and the
   error of the Arminians smitten in the jaw-bone, and the broachers of it
   bridled with bit and curb.

   When, on earth, the blood can be without the water and the Spirit, — can
   witness alone, or can witness there where the water and the Spirit agree not
   to the record; when, in heaven, the Word shall witness without the Father
   and the Holy Ghost, — when the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost shall
   not be one, as in essence, so in willing, working, witnessing the redemption
   of sinners; — then shall universal redemption of all and every sinner by
   Christ be found a truth, though the Father elect them not, nor the Spirit of
   grace neither sanctify nor seal them. The glory of God’s free and severing
   grace, and the salvation of the elect through the redemption that is in
   Jesus Christ (which is external, or none at all), are the unfeigned desires
   and utmost aims of all that are truly Christian. In pursuit of which desire
   and aims, I profess myself to be for ever to serve thee. — Thine in Christ
   Jesus,

   Richard Byfield. [3]
     _________________________________________________________________

   [3] Richard Byfield was ejected by the Act of Uniformity from Long Ditton,
   in the county of Surrey. Besides some sermons and tracts, he was the author
   of a quarto volume, “The Doctrine of the Sabbath Vindicated,” etc. He
   suffered suspension and sequestration for four years for not reading the
   Book of Sports. He was a member of the Westminster Assembly. During the time
   of Cromwell, a difference occurred between him and the patron of the parish,
   Sir John Evelyn, about the repairs of the church. Cromwell brought them
   together, succeeded in reconciling them, and, to cement the reconciliation,
   generously advanced £100, one-half of the sum needed for the repairs.
   Byfield did not know Owen, even by name, when he gave his recommendation to
   this work. It was then of some importance to our author that he should have
   the sanction of Byfield’s name; and the favour is requited when the latter
   owes most of his own reputation with posterity to the countenance which he
   gave to the young and rising theological author of his day. — Ed.
     _________________________________________________________________
     _________________________________________________________________

To the reader.

   Reader,

   If thou intendest to go any farther, I would entreat thee to stay here a
   little. If thou art, as many in this pretending age, a sign or title gazer,
   and comest into books as Cato into the theatre, to go out again, — thou hast
   had thy entertainment; farewell! With him that resolves a serious view of
   the following discourse, and really desireth satisfaction from the word and
   Christian reason, about the great things contained therein, I desire a few
   words in the portal. Divers things there are of no small consideration to
   the business we have in hand, which I am persuaded thou canst not be
   unacquainted with; and therefore I will not trouble thee with a needless
   repetition of them.

   I shall only crave thy leave to preface a little to the point in hand, and
   my present undertaking therein, with the result of some of my thoughts
   concerning the whole, after a more than seven-years’ serious inquiry
   (bottomed, I hope, upon the strength of Christ, and guided by his Spirit)
   into the mind of God about these things, with a serious perusal of all which
   I could attain that the wit of man, in former or latter days, hath published
   in opposition to the truth; which I desire, according to the measure of the
   gift received, here to assert. Some things, then, as to the chief point in
   hand I would desire the reader to observe; as, —

   First, That the assertion of universal redemption, or the general ransom, so
   as to make it in the least measure beneficial for the end intended, goes not
   alone. Election of free grace, as the fountain of all following
   dispensations, all discriminating purposes of the Almighty, depending on his
   own good pleasure and will, must be removed out of the way. Hence, those who
   would for the present (“populo ut placerent, quas fecere fabulas,”)
   desirously retain some show of asserting the liberty of eternally
   distinguishing free grace, do themselves utterly raze, in respect of any
   fruit or profitable issue, the whole imaginary fabric of general redemption,
   which they had before erected. Some of these make the decree of election to
   be “antecedaneous to the death of Christ” (as themselves absurdly speak), or
   the decree of the death of Christ: then frame a twofold election; [4] — one,
   of some to be the sons; the other, of the rest to be servants. But this
   election of some to be servants the Scripture calls reprobation, and speaks
   of it as the issue of hatred, or a purpose of rejection, Rom. ix. 11–13. To
   be a servant, in opposition to children and their liberty, is as high a
   curse as can be expressed, Gen. ix. 25. Is this Scripture election? Besides,
   if Christ died to bring those he died for unto the adoption and inheritance
   of children, what good could possibly redound to them thereby who were
   predestinated before to be only servants? Others [5] make a general
   conditionate decree of redemption to be antecedaneous to election; which
   they assert to be the first discriminating purpose concerning the sons of
   men, and to depend on the alone good pleasure of God. That any others shall
   partake of the death of Christ or the fruits thereof, either unto grace or
   glory, but only those persons so elected, that they deny. “Cui bono” now? To
   what purpose serves the general ransom, but only to assert that Almighty God
   would have the precious blood of his dear Son poured out for innumerable
   souls whom he will not have to share in any drop thereof, and so, in respect
   of them, to be spilt in vain, or else to be shed for them only that they
   might be the deeper damned? This fountain, then, of free grace, this
   foundation of the new covenant, this bottom of all gospel dispensations,
   this fruitful womb of all eternally distinguishing mercies, the purpose of
   God according to election, must be opposed, slighted, blasphemed, that the
   figment of the sons of men may not appear to be “truncus ficulnus, inutile
   lignum,” — an unprofitable stock; and all the thoughts of the Most High,
   differencing between man and man, must be made to take “occasion,” say some,
   to be “caused,” say others, by their holy, self-spiritual endeavours.
   “Gratum opus agricolis,” — a savoury sacrifice to the Roman Belus, a sacred
   orgie to the long-bewailed manes of St Pelagius.

   And here, secondly, free-will, “amor et deliciæ humani generis,” corrupted
   nature’s deformed darling, the Pallas or beloved self-conception of darkened
   minds, finds open hearts and arms for its adulterous embraces; yea, the die
   being cast, and Rubicon passed over, “eo devenere fata ecclesiæ,” that
   having opposed the free distinguishing grace of God as the sole sworn enemy
   thereof, it advanceth itself, or an inbred native ability in every one to
   embrace a portion of generally exposed mercy, under the name of free grace.
   “Tantane nos tenuit generis fiducia vestri?” This, this is Universalists’
   free grace, which in the Scripture phrase is cursed, corrupted nature.
   Neither can it otherwise be. A general ransom without free-will is but
   “phantasiæ inutile pondus,” — “a burdensome fancy;” the merit of the death
   of Christ being to them as an ointment in a box, that hath neither virtue
   nor power to act or reach out its own application unto particulars, being
   only set out in the gospel to the view of all, that those who will, by their
   own strength, lay hold on it and apply it to themselves may be healed. Hence
   the dear esteem and high valuation which this old idol free-will hath
   attained in these days, being so useful to the general ransom that it cannot
   live a day without it. Should it pass for true what the Scripture affirms,
   namely, that we are by nature “dead in trespasses and sins,” etc., there
   would not be left of the general ransom a shred to take fire from the
   hearth. Like the wood of the vine, it would not yield a pin to hang a
   garment upon: all which you shall find fully declared in the ensuing
   treatise. But here, as though all the undertakings and Babylonish attempts
   of the old Pelagians, with their varnished offspring, the late Arminians,
   were slight and easy, I shall show you greater abominations than these, and
   farther discoveries of the imagery of the hearts of the sons of men. In
   pursuance of this persuasion of universal redemption, not a few have arrived
   (whither it naturally leads them) to deny the satisfaction and merit of
   Christ. Witness P― H―, who, not being able to untie, ventured boldly to cut
   this Gordian knot, but so as to make both ends of the chain useless. To the
   question, Whether Christ died for all men or no? he answers, “That he died
   neither for all nor any, so as to purchase life and salvation for them.” Ō
   tan poion se epos phugen herkos odontōn? Shall cursed Socinianism be worded
   into a glorious discovery of free grace? Ask now for proofs of this
   assertion, as you might justly expect Achillean arguments from those who
   delight akinēta kinein, and throw down such foundations (as shall put all
   the righteous in the world to a loss thereby), “Projicit ampullas et
   sesquipedalia verba,” huperonka mataiotētos, great swelling words of vanity,
   drummy expressions, a noise from emptiness, the usual language of men who
   know not what they speak, nor whereof they do affirm, is all that is
   produced. Such contemptible products have our tympanous mountains! Poor
   creatures, whose souls are merchandised by the painted faces of novelty and
   vanity, whilst these Joabs salute you with the kisses of free grace, you see
   not the sword that is in their hands, whereby they smite you under the fifth
   rib, in the very heart-blood of faith and all Christian consolation. It
   seems our blessed Redeemer’s deep humiliation, in bearing the chastisement
   of our peace and the punishment of our transgressions, being made a curse
   and sin, deserted under wrath and the power of death, procuring redemption
   and the remission of sins through the effusion of his blood, offering
   himself up a sacrifice to God, to make reconciliation and purchase an
   atonement, his pursuing this undertaking with continued intercession in the
   holy of holies, with all the benefits of his mediatorship, do no way procure
   either life and salvation or remission of sins, but only serve to declare
   that we are not indeed what his word affirms we are, — namely, cursed,
   guilty, defiled, and only not actually cast into hell. “Judas, betrayest
   thou the Son of man with a kiss?” See this at large confuted, lib. iii. Now,
   this last assertion, thoroughly fancied, hath opened a door and given an
   inlet to all those pretended heights and new-named glorious attainments
   which have metamorphosed the person and mediation of Christ into an
   imaginary diffused goodness and love, communicated from the Creator unto the
   new creation; than which familistical fables Cerdon’s two principles were
   not more absurd; the Platonic numbers nor the Valentinian Æones, [6] flowing
   from the teeming wombs of Plērōma, Aiōn, Teleios, Buthos, Sigē, and the
   rest, vented for high glorious attainments in Christian religion, near
   fifteen hundred years ago, were not less intelligible. Neither did the
   corroding of Scriptures by that Pontic vermin Marcion equalize the contempt
   and scorn cast upon them by these impotent impostors, exempting their
   whispered discoveries from their trial, and exalting their revelations above
   their authority. Neither do some stay here; but “his gradibus itur in
   cœlum,” heaven itself is broke open for all. From universal redemption,
   through universal justification, in a general covenant, they have arrived
   (“haud ignota loquor”) at universal salvation; neither can any forfeiture be
   made of the purchased inheritance.


   “Quare agite, ô juvenes, tantarum in munere laudum,

   Cingite fronde comas, et pocula porgite dextris,

   Communemque vocate Deum, et date vina volentes.” [7]


   “March on, brave youths, i’ th’ praise of such free grace,

   Surround your locks with bays; and full cups place

   In your right hands: drink freely on, then call

   O’ th’ common hope, the ransom general.”

   These and the like persuasions I no way dislike, because wholly new to the
   men of this generation; that I may add this by the way:— Every age hath its
   employment in the discovery of truth. We are not come to the bottom of vice
   or virtue. The whole world hath been employed in the practice of iniquity
   five thousand years and upwards, and yet “aspice hoc novum” may be set on
   many villainies. Behold daily new inventions! No wonder, then, if all truth
   be not yet discovered. Something may be revealed to them who as yet sit by.
   Admire not if Saul also be among the prophets, for who is their father? Is
   he not free in his dispensations? Are all the depths of Scripture, where the
   elephants may swim, just fathomed to the bottom? Let any man observe the
   progress of the last century in unfolding the truths of God, and he will
   scarce be obstinate that no more is left as yet undiscovered. Only the
   itching of corrupted fancies, the boldness of darkened minds and lascivious
   wanton wits, in venting new-created nothings, insignificant vanities, with
   an intermixed dash of blasphemy, is that which I desire to oppose; and that
   especially considering the genius (if I may so speak) of the days wherein we
   live; in which, what by one means, what by another, there is almost a
   general deflection after novelty grown amongst us. [8] “Some are credulous,
   some negligent, some fall into errors, some seek them.” A great suspicion
   also every day grows upon me, which I would thank any one upon solid grounds
   to free me from, that pride of spirit, with an Herostratus-like design to
   grow big in the mouths of men, hath acted many in the conception and
   publication of some easily-invented false opinions. Is it not to be thought,
   also, that it is from the same humour possessing many, that every one of
   them almost strives to put on beyond his companions in framing some singular
   artifice? To be a follower of others, though in desperate engagements, is
   too mean an undertaking.


   “Aude [9] aliquod brevibus Gyaris, et carcere dignum,

   Si vis esse aliquis: probitas laudatur et alget.” [10]

   And let it be no small peccadillo, no underling opinion, friends, if in
   these busy times you would have it taken notice of. Of ordinary errors you
   may cry, —


   “Quis leget hæc? ― nemo hercule nemo,

   Vel duo, vel nemo.” [11]

   They must be glorious attainments, beyond the understanding of men, and
   above the wisdom of the word, which attract the eyes of poor deluded souls.
   The great shepherd of the sheep, our Lord Jesus Christ, recover his poor
   wanderers to his own fold! But to return thither from whence we have
   digressed:—

   This is that fatal Helena, a useless, barren, fruitless fancy, for whose
   enthroning such irksome, tedious contentions have been caused to the
   churches of God; a mere Rome, a desolate, dirty place of cottages, until all
   the world be robbed and spoiled to adorn it. Suppose Christ died for all,
   yet if God in his free purpose hath chosen some to obtain life and
   salvation, passing by others, will it be profitable only to the former, or
   unto all? Surely the purpose of God must stand, and he will do all his
   pleasure. Wherefore, election either, with Huberus, by a wild contradiction,
   must be made universal, or the thoughts of the Most High suspended on the
   free-will of man. Add this borrowed feather to the general ransom, that at
   least it may have some colour of pompous ostentation. Yet if the free grace
   of God work effectually in some, not in others, can those others, passed by
   in its powerful operation, have any benefit by universal redemption? No more
   than the Egyptians had in the angel’s passing over those houses whose doors
   were not sprinkled with blood, leaving some dead behind him. Almighty,
   powerful, free grace, then, must strike its sail, that free-will, like the
   Alexandrian ships to the Roman havens, may come in with top and top-gallant;
   for without it the whole territory of universal redemption will certainly be
   famished. But let these doctrines of God’s eternal election, the free grace
   of conversion, perseverance, and their necessary consequents, be asserted,
   “movet cornicula risum, furtivis nudata colouribus;” it hath not the least
   appearance of profit or consolation but what it robs from the sovereignty
   and grace of God. But of these things more afterward.

   Some flourishing pretences are usually held out by the abettors of the
   general ransom; which by thy patience, courteous reader, we will a little
   view in the entrance, to remove some prejudice that may lie in the way of
   truth:—

   First, The glory of God, they say, is exceedingly exalted by it; his
   good-will and kindness towards men abundantly manifested in this enlargement
   of its extent; and his free grace, by others restrained, set out with a
   powerful endearment. This they say; which is, in effect, “All things will be
   well when God is contented with that portion of glory which is of our
   assigning.” The princes of the earth account it their greatest wisdom to
   varnish over their favours, and to set out with a full mouth what they have
   done with half a hand; but will it be acceptable to lie for God, by
   extending his bounty beyond the marks and eternal bounds fixed to it in his
   word? Change first a hair of your own heads, or add a cubit to your own
   statures, before you come in with an addition of glory, not owned by him, to
   the Almighty. But so, for the most part, is it with corrupted nature in all
   such mysterious things; discovering the baseness and vileness thereof. If
   God be apprehended to be as large in grace as that is in offence (I mean in
   respect of particular offenders, for in respect of his he is larger), though
   it be free, and he hath proclaimed to all that he may do what he will with
   his own, giving no account of his matters, all shall be well, — he is
   gracious, merciful, etc; but if once the Scripture is conceived to hold out
   his sovereignty and free distinguishing grace, suited in its dispensation to
   his own purpose according to election, he is “immanis, truculentus, diabolo,
   Tiberio tetrior (horresco referens).” The learned know well where to find
   this language, and I will not be instrumental to propagate their blasphemies
   to others. “Si deus homini non placuerit, deus non erit,” said Tertullian of
   the heathen deities; and shall it be so with us? God forbid! This pride is
   inbred; [12] it is a part of our corruption to defend it. If we maintain,
   then, the glory of God, let us speak in his own language, or be for ever
   silent. That is glorious in him which he ascribes unto himself. Our
   inventions, though never so splendid in our own eyes, are unto him an
   abomination, a striving to pull him down from his eternal excellency, to
   make him altogether like unto us. God would never allow that the will of the
   creature should be the measure of his honour. The obedience of paradise was
   to have been regulated. God’s prescription hath been the bottom of his
   acceptation of any duty ever since he had a creature to worship him. The
   very heathen knew that that service alone was welcome to God which himself
   required, and that glory owned which himself had revealed that he would
   appear glorious in it. Hence, as Epimenides [13] advised the Athenians in a
   time of danger to sacrifice Theō prosēkonti, “to him to whom it was meet and
   due,” — which gave occasion to the altar which Paul saw bearing the
   superscription of Agnōstō Theō, “To the unknown God,” — so Socrates tells us
   in Plato, [14] that every god will be worshipped tō malista autō areskonti
   tropō, “in that way which pleaseth best his own mind;” and in Christianity,
   Hierome sets it down for a rule, that “honos præter mandatum est dedecus,”
   God is dishonoured by that honour which is ascribed to him beyond his own
   prescription: and one wittily on the second commandment, “Non imago, non
   simulachrum damnatur, sed non facies tibi.” Assigning to God any thing by
   him not assumed is a making to ourselves, a deifying of our own
   imaginations. Let all men, then, cease squaring the glory of God by their
   own corrupted principles and more corrupted persuasions. The word alone is
   to be arbitrator in the things of God; which also I hope will appear, by the
   following treatise, to hold out nothing in the matter in hand contrary to
   those natural notions of God and his goodness which in the sad ruins of
   innocency have been retained. On these grounds we affirm, that all that
   glory of God which is pretended to be asserted by the general ransom,
   however it may seem glorious to purblind nature, is indeed a sinful
   flourish, for the obscuring of that glory wherein God is delighted.

   Secondly, It is strongly pretended that the worth and value of the
   satisfaction of Christ, by the opposite opinion limited to a few, are
   exceedingly magnified in this extending of them to all; when, besides what
   was said before unto human extending of the things of God beyond the bounds
   by himself fixed unto them, the merit of the death of Christ, consisting in
   its own internal worth and sufficiency, with that obligation which, by his
   obedience unto death, was put upon the justice of God for its application
   unto them for whom he died, is quite enervated and overthrown by it, made of
   no account, and such as never produced of itself absolutely the least good
   to any particular soul: which is so fully manifested in the following
   treatise, as I cannot but desire the reader’s sincere consideration of it,
   it being a matter of no small importance.

   Thirdly, A seeming smile cast upon the opinion of universal redemption by
   many texts of Scripture, with the ambiguity of some words, which though in
   themselves either figurative or indefinite, yet seem to be of a universal
   extent, maketh the abettors of it exceedingly rejoice. Now, concerning this
   I shall only desire the reader not to be startled at the multitude of places
   of Scripture which he may find heaped up by some of late about this business
   (especially by Thomas More, in his “Universality of Free Grace”), as though
   they proved and confirmed that for which they are produced, but rather
   prepare himself to admire at the confidence of men, particularly of him now
   named, to make such a flourish with colours and drums, having indeed no
   soldiers at all; for, notwithstanding all their pretences, it will appear
   that they hang the whole weight of their building on three or four texts of
   Scripture, — namely, 1 Tim. ii. 5, 6; John iii. 16, 17; Heb. ii. 9; 1 John
   ii. 2, with some few others, — and the ambiguity of two or three words,
   which themselves cannot deny to be of exceeding various acceptations. All
   which are at large discussed in the ensuing treatise, no one place that hath
   with the least show or colour been brought forth by any of our adversaries,
   in their own defence, or for the opposing of the effectual redemption of the
   elect only, being omitted, the book of Thomas More being in all the strength
   thereof fully met withal and enervated.

   Fourthly, Some men have, by I know not what misprision, [15] entertained a
   persuasion that the opinion of the Universalists serves exceedingly to set
   forth the love and free grace of God; yea, they make free grace, that
   glorious expression, to be that alone which is couched in their persuasion,
   — namely, that “God loves all alike, gave Christ to die for all, and is
   ready to save all if they will lay hold on him;” — under which notion how
   greedily the hook as well as the bait is swallowed by many we have daily
   experience, when the truth is, it is utterly destructive to the free
   distinguishing grace of God in all the dispensations and workings thereof.
   It evidently opposeth God’s free grace of election, as hath been declared,
   and therein that very love from which God sent his Son. His free
   distinguishing grace, also, of effectual calling must be made by it to give
   place to nature’s darling, free-will; yea, and the whole covenant of grace
   made void, by holding it out no otherwise but as a general removing of the
   wrath which was due to the breach of the covenant of works: for what else
   can be imagined (though this certainly they have not, John iii. 36) to be
   granted to the most of those “all” with whom they affirm this covenant to be
   made? Yea, notwithstanding their flourish of free grace, as themselves are
   forced to grant, that after all that was effected by the death of Christ, it
   was possible that none should be saved, so I hope I have clearly proved that
   if he accomplished by his death no more than they ascribe unto it, it is
   utterly impossible that any one should be saved. “Quid dignum tanto?”

   Fifthly, The opinion of universal redemption is not a little advantaged by
   presenting to convinced men a seeming ready way to extricate themselves out
   of all their doubts and perplexities, and to give them all the comfort the
   death of Christ can afford before they feel any power of that death working
   within them, or find any efficacy of free grace drawing their hearts to the
   embracing of Christ in the promise, or obtaining a particular interest in
   him; which are tedious things to flesh and blood to attend unto and wait
   upon. Some boast that, by this persuasion, that hath been effected in an
   hour which they waited for before seven years without success. To dispel
   this poor empty flourish, I shall show, in the progress, that it is very
   ready and apt to deceive multitudes with a plausible delusion, but really
   undermines the very foundations of that strong unfailing consolation which
   God hath showed himself abundantly willing that the heirs of promise should
   receive.

   These and the like are the general pretences wherewith the abettors of a
   general ransom do seek to commend themselves and opinion to the affections
   of credulous souls; through them making an open and easy passage into their
   belief, for the swallowing and digesting of that bitter potion which lurks
   in the bottom of their cup. Of these I thought meet to give the reader a
   brief view in the entrance, to take off his mind from empty generals, that
   he might be the better prepared to weigh all things carefully in an equal
   balance, when he shall come to consider those particulars afterward insisted
   on, wherein the great strength of our adversaries lies. It remaineth only
   that I give the Christian reader a brief account of my call unto, and
   undertaking in, this work, and so close this preface. First, then, I will
   assure thee it is not the least thirst in my affections to be drinking of
   the waters of Meribah, nor the least desire to have a share in Ishmael’s
   portion, to have my hand against others, and theirs against me, that put me
   upon this task. I never like myself worse than when faced with a vizard of
   disputing in controversies. The complexion of my soul is much more pleasant
   unto me in the waters of Shiloah:—


   “― Nuper me in littore vidi,

   Cum placidum ventis staret mare.” [16]

   What invitation there can be in itself for any one to lodge, much less
   abide, in this quarrelsome, scrambling territory, where, as Tertullian [17]
   says of Pontus, “omne quod flat Aquilo est,” no wind blows but what is sharp
   and keen, I know not. Small pleasure in those walks which are attended with
   dangerous precipices and unpleasing difficulties on every side:—


   “Utque viam teneas, nulloque errore traharis;

   Per tamen adversi gradieris cornua Tauri,

   Hæmoniosque arcus, violentique ora Leonis.” [18]

   No quiet nor peace in these things and ways, but continual brawls and
   dissensions:—


   “― Non hospes ab hospite tutus,

   Non socer a genero: fratrum quoque gratia rara est.” [19]

   The strongest bonds of nearest relations are too commonly broken by them.
   Were it not for that precept, Jude 3, and the like, of “contending earnestly
   for the faith once delivered unto the saints,” with the sounding of my
   bowels for the loss of poor seduced souls, I could willingly engage myself
   into an unchangeable resolution to fly all wordy battles and paper combats
   for the residue of my few and evil days.

   It is not, then (that I may return), any salamandrian complexion that was
   the motive to this undertaking. Neither, secondly, was it any conceit of my
   own abilities for this work, as though I were the fittest among many to
   undertake it. I know that as in all things I am “less than the least of all
   saints,” so in these I am


   ― oute tritos oute tetartos

   Oute duōdekatos oud’ en logō oud’ en arithmō

   Abler [20] pens have had, within these few years, the discussing and
   ventilating of some of these questions in our own language. Some have come
   to my hands, but none of weight, before I had well-nigh finished this heap
   of mine own, which was some twelve months since and upwards. In some of
   these, at least, in all of them, I had rested fully satisfied, but that I
   observed they had all tied up themselves to some certain parts of the
   controversy, especially the removing of objections, neither compassing nor
   methodizing the whole; whereby I discerned that the nature of the things
   under debate, — namely, satisfaction, reconciliation, redemption, and the
   like, — was left exceedingly in the dark, and the strong foundation of the
   whole building not so much as once discovered. It was always upon my desires
   that someone would undertake the main, and unfold out of the word, from the
   bottom, the whole dispensation of the love of God to his elect in Jesus
   Christ, with the conveyance of it through the promises of the gospel, being
   in all the fruits thereof purchased and procured by the oblation and
   intercession of Jesus Christ; by which it could not but be made apparent
   what was the great design of the blessed Trinity in this great work of
   redemption, with how vain an attempt and fruitless endeavour it must needs
   be to extend it beyond the bounds and limits assigned unto it by the
   principal agents therein. That arguments also might be produced for the
   confirmation of the truth we assert, in opposition to the error opposed, and
   so the weak established and dissenters convinced, was much in my wishes. The
   doctrine of the satisfaction of Christ, his merit, and the reconciliation
   wrought thereby, understood aright by few, and of late oppugned by some,
   being so nearly related to the point of redemption, I desired also to have
   seen cleared, unfolded, vindicated, by some able pen. But now, after long
   waiting, finding none to answer my expectation, although of myself I can
   truly say, with him in the Comedian, “Ego me neque tam astutum esse, neque
   ita perspicacem id scio,” that I should be fit for such an undertaking, the
   counsel of the poet also running much in my mind, —


   “Sumite materiam vestris, qui scribitis, æquam

   Viribus; et versate diu, quid ferre recusent,

   Quid valeant humeri.” [21]

   Yet, at the last, laying aside all such thoughts, by looking up to Him who
   supplieth seed to the sower, and doth all our works for us, I suffered
   myself to be overcome unto the work with that of another, “Ab alio quovis
   hoc fieri mallem quam a me; sed a me tamen potius quam a nemine;” — “I had
   rather it should have been done by any than myself, of myself only rather
   than of none;” especially considering the industrious diligence of the
   opposers of truth in these days:—


   “Scribimus indocti doctique, ―

   Ut jugulent homines, surgunt de nocte latrones;

   Ut teipsum serves non expergisceris?” [22]

   Add unto the former desire a consideration of the frequent conferences I had
   been invited unto about these things, the daily spreading of the opinions
   here opposed about the parts where I live, and a greater noise concerning
   their prevailing in other places, with the advantage they had obtained by
   some military abettors, with the stirring up of divers eminent and learned
   friends, and you have the sum of what I desire to hold forth as the cause of
   my undertaking this task. What the Lord hath enabled me to perform therein
   must be left to the judgment of others. Altogether hopeless of success I am
   not; but fully resolved that I shall not live to see a solid answer given
   unto it. If any shall undertake to vellicate and pluck some of the branches,
   rent from the roots and principles of the whole discourse, I shall freely
   give them leave to enjoy their own wisdom and imaginary conquest. If any
   shall seriously undertake to debate the whole cause, if I live to see it
   effected, I shall engage myself, by the Lord’s assistance, to be their
   humble convert or fair antagonist. In that which is already accomplished by
   the good hand of the Lord, I hope the learned may find something for their
   contentment, and the weak for their strengthening and satisfaction; that in
   all some glory may redound to Him whose it is, and whose truth is here
   unfolded by the unworthiest labourer in his vineyard,

   J. O.
     _________________________________________________________________

   [4] T. M., Universality of Free Grace. [He refers to an author of the name
   of Thomas More. See page 153 of this preface. — Ed.]

   [5] Camero, Amirald, etc.

   [6] Iren. lib. ii., cap. 6, 7, 14, 15, etc.; Clem. Strom. iii.; Epiph.
   Hæres. xxxi.; Tertul. ad Valen.

   [7] Virg. Æn. viii. 273, et seq.

   [8] “Quidam creduli, quidam negligentes sunt, quibusdam mendacium obrepit,
   quibusdam placet.”

   [9] “In tam occupata civitate fabulas vulgaris nequitia non invenit.” — Sen.
   Ep. 120.

   [10] Juv. Sat. i. 74.

   [11] Pers. Sat. i. 2.

   [12] “Natura sic apparet vitiata ut hoc majoris vitii sit non videre.” —
   Aug.

   [13] Laert. in Vit. Epimen.

   [14] Plato de Legib., lib. vii.

   [15] The word is here used in the obsolete sense of “mistake,” and has no
   reference so the legal offence of evasion or concealment now understood by
   the term. — Ed.

   [16] Virg. Buc. Ecl. ii. 25.

   [17] Ad. Mar.

   [18] Ovid. Met. ii. 79.

   [19] Ovid. Met. i. 144.

   [20] Vindic. Redempt., by my reverend and learned brother, Mr John Stalham;
   Mr Rutherford, Christ Drawing Sinners.

   [21] Hor. De Art. Poet., ver. 38.

   [22] Hor. Epist. lib. ii. Epist. i. 117; lib. i. Epist. ii. 32.
     _________________________________________________________________

   The

   Death of Death in the Death of Christ.

   A treatise of the redemption and reconciliation that is in the blood of
   Christ, with the merit thereof, and satisfaction wrought thereby.
     _________________________________________________________________

                                    Book I.
     _________________________________________________________________

Chapter I.

   In general of the end of the death of Christ, as it is in the Scripture
   proposed.

   By the end of the death of Christ, we mean in general, both, — first, that
   which his Father and himself intended in it; and, secondly, that which was
   effectually fulfilled and accomplished by it. Concerning either we may take
   a brief view of the expressions used by the Holy Ghost:—

   I. For the first. Will you know the end wherefore, and the intention
   wherewith, Christ came into the world? Let us ask himself (who knew his own
   mind, as also all the secrets of his Father’s bosom), and he will tell us
   that the “Son of man came to save that which was lost,” Matt. xviii. 11, —
   to recover and save poor lost sinners; that was his intent and design, as is
   again asserted, Luke xix. 10. Ask also his apostles, who know his mind, and
   they will tell you the same. So Paul, 1 Tim. i. 15, “This is a faithful
   saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world
   to save sinners.” Now, if you will ask who these sinners are towards whom he
   hath this gracious intent and purpose, himself tells you, Matt. xx. 28, that
   he came to “give his life a ransom for many;” in other places called us,
   believers, distinguished from the world: for be “gave himself for our sins,
   that he might deliver us from this present evil world, according to the will
   of God and our Father,” Gal. i. 4. That was the will and intention of God,
   that he should give himself for us, that we might be saved, being separated
   from the world. They are his church: Eph. v. 25–27, “He loved the church,
   and gave himself for it; that he might sanctify and cleanse it with the
   washing of water by the word, that he might present it to himself a glorious
   church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing; but that it should
   be holy and without blemish:” which last words express also the very aim and
   end of Christ in giving himself for any, even that they may be made fit for
   God, and brought nigh unto him; — the like whereof is also asserted, Tit.
   ii. 14, “He gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity,
   and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works.” Thus
   clear, then, and apparent, is the intention and design of Christ and his
   Father in this great work, even what it was, and towards whom, — namely, to
   save us, to deliver us from the evil world, to purge and wash us, to make us
   holy, zealous, fruitful in good works, to render us acceptable, and to bring
   us unto God; for through him “we have access into the grace wherein we
   stand” Rom. v. 2.

   II. The effect, also, and actual product of the work itself, or what is
   accomplished and fulfilled by the death, blood-shedding, or oblation of
   Jesus Christ, is no less clearly manifested, but is as fully, and very often
   more distinctly, expressed; — as, first, Reconciliation with God, by
   removing and slaying the enmity that was between him and us; for “when we
   were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son,” Rom. v. 10.
   “God was in him reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their
   trespasses unto them,” 2 Cor. v. 19; yea, he hath “reconciled us to himself
   by Jesus Christ,” verse 18. And if you would know how this reconciliation
   was effected, the apostle will tell you that “he abolished in his flesh the
   enmity, the law of commandments consisting in ordinances; for to make in
   himself of twain one new man, so making peace; and that he might reconcile
   both unto God in one body by the cross, having slain the enmity thereby,”
   Eph. ii. 15, 16: so that “he is our peace,” verse 14. Secondly,
   Justification, by taking away the guilt of sins, procuring remission and
   pardon of them, redeeming us from their power, with the curse and wrath due
   unto us for them; for “by his own blood he entered into the holy place,
   having obtained eternal redemption for us” Heb. ix. 12. “He redeemed us from
   the curse, being made a curse for us,” Gal. iii. 13; “his own self bearing
   our sins in his own body on the tree,” 1 Pet. ii. 24. We have “all sinned,
   and come short of the glory of God;” but are “justified freely by his grace
   through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God hath set forth to
   be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness
   for the remission of sins” Rom. iii. 23–25: for “in him we have redemption
   through his blood, even the forgiveness of sins,” Col. i. 14. Thirdly,
   Sanctification, by the purging away of the uncleanness and pollution of our
   sins, renewing in us the image of God, and supplying us with the graces of
   the Spirit of holiness: for “the blood of Christ, who through the eternal
   Spirit offered himself to God, purgeth our consciences from dead works that
   we may serve the living God,” Heb. ix. 14; yea, “the blood of Jesus Christ
   cleanseth us from all sin,” 1 John i. 7. “By himself he purged our sins,”
   Heb. i. 3. To “sanctify the people with his own blood, he suffered without
   the gate,” chap. xiii. 12. “He gave himself for the church to sanctify and
   cleanse it, that it should be holy and without blemish,” Eph. v. 25–27.
   Peculiarly amongst the graces of the Spirit, “it is given to us,” huper
   Christou, “for Christ’s sake, to believe on him,” Phil. i. 29; God “blessing
   us in him with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places,” Eph. i. 3.
   Fourthly, Adoption, with that evangelical liberty and all those glorious
   privileges which appertain to the sons of God; for “God sent forth his Son,
   made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were under the law,
   that we might receive the adoption of sons,” Gal. iv. 4, 5. Fifthly, Neither
   do the effects of the death of Christ rest here; they leave us not until we
   are settled in heaven, in glory and immortality for ever. Our inheritance is
   a “purchased possession,” Eph. i. 14: “And for this cause he is the mediator
   of the new testament, that by means of death, for the redemption of the
   transgressions that were under the first testament, they which are called
   might receive the promise of eternal inheritance,” Heb. ix. 15. The sum of
   all is, — The death and blood-shedding of Jesus Christ hath wrought, and
   doth effectually procure, for all those that are concerned in it, eternal
   redemption, consisting in grace here and glory hereafter.

   III. Thus full, clear, and evident are the expressions in the Scripture
   concerning the ends and effects of the death of Christ, that a man would
   think every one might run and read. But we must stay: among all things in
   Christian religion, there is scarce any thing more questioned than this,
   which seems to be a most fundamental principle. A spreading persuasion there
   is of a general ransom to be paid by Christ for all; that he died to redeem
   all and every one, — not only for many, his church, the elect of God, but
   for every one also of the posterity of Adam. Now, the masters of this
   opinion do see full well and easily, that if that be the end of the death of
   Christ which we have from the Scripture asserted, if those before recounted
   be the immediate fruits and products thereof, then one of these two things
   will necessarily follow:— that either, first, God and Christ failed of their
   end proposed, and did not accomplish that which they intended, the death of
   Christ being not a fitly-proportioned means for the attaining of that end
   (for any cause of failing cannot be assigned); which to assert seems to us
   blasphemously injurious to the wisdom, power, and perfection of God, as
   likewise derogatory to the worth and value of the death of Christ; — or
   else, that all men, all the posterity of Adam, must be saved, purged,
   sanctified, and glorified; which surely they will not maintain, at least the
   Scripture and the woeful experience of millions will not allow. Wherefore,
   to cast a tolerable colour upon their persuasion, they must and do deny that
   God or his Son had any such absolute aim or end in the death or
   blood-shedding of Jesus Christ, or that any such thing was immediately
   procured and purchased by it, as we before recounted; but that God intended
   nothing, neither was any thing effected by Christ, — that no benefit ariseth
   to any immediately by his death but what is common to all and every soul,
   though never so cursedly unbelieving here and eternally damned hereafter,
   until an act of some, not procured for them by Christ, (for if it were, why
   have they it not all alike?) to wit, faith, do distinguish them from others.
   Now, this seeming to me to enervate the virtue, value, fruits and effects of
   the satisfaction and death of Christ, — serving, besides, for a basis and
   foundation to a dangerous, uncomfortable, erroneous persuasion — I shall, by
   the Lord’s assistance, declare what the Scripture holds out in both these
   things, both that assertion which is intended to be proved, and that which
   is brought for the proof thereof; desiring the Lord by his Spirit to lead us
   into all truth, to give us understanding in all things, and if any one be
   otherwise minded, to reveal that also unto him.
     _________________________________________________________________

Chapter II.

   Of the nature of an end in general, and some distinctions about it.

   I. The end of any thing is that which the agent intendeth to accomplish in
   and by the operation which is proper unto its nature, and which it applieth
   itself unto, — that which any one aimeth at, and designeth in himself to
   attain, as a thing good and desirable unto him in the state and condition
   wherein he is. So the end which Noah proposed unto himself in the building
   of the ark was the preservation of himself and others. According to the will
   of God, he made an ark to preserve himself and his family from the flood:
   “According to all that God commanded him, so did he,” Gen. vi. 22. That
   which the agent doth, or whereto he applieth himself, for the compassing his
   proposed end, is called the means; which two do complete the whole reason of
   working in free intellectual agents, for I speak only of such as work
   according to choice or election. So Absalom intending a revolt from his
   father, to procure the crown and kingdom for himself, “he prepared him
   horses and chariots, and fifty men to run before him,” 2 Sam. xv. 1; and
   farther, by fair words, and glossing compliances, “he stole the hearts of
   the men of Israel” verse 6; then pretends a sacrifice at Hebron, where he
   makes a strong conspiracy, verse 12; — all which were the means he used for
   the attaining of his fore-proposed end.

   II. Between both these, end and means, there is this relation, that (though
   in sundry kinds) they are mutually causes one of another. The end is the
   first, principal, moving cause of the whole. It is that for whose sake the
   whole work is. No agent applies itself to action but for an end; and were it
   not by that determined to some certain effect, thing, way, or manner of
   working, it would no more do one thing than another. The inhabitants of the
   old world desiring and intending unity and cohabitation, with perhaps some
   reserves to provide for their safety against a second storm, they cry, “Go
   to, let us build us a city, and a tower whose top may reach unto heaven; and
   let us make us a name, lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the
   whole earth,” Gen. xi. 4. First, They lay down their aim and design, and
   then let out the means in their apprehension conducing thereunto. And
   manifest, then, it is, that the whole reason and method of affairs that a
   wise worker or agent, according to the counsel, proposeth to himself is
   taken from the end which he aims at; that is, in intention and contrivance,
   the beginning of all that order which is in working. Now, the means are all
   those things which are used for the attaining of the end proposed, — as meat
   for the preservation of life, sailing in a ship for him that would pass the
   sea, laws for the quiet continuance of human society; and they are the
   procuring cause of the end, in one kind or another. Their existence is for
   the ends sake, and the end hath its rise out of them, following them either
   morally as their desert, or naturally as their fruit and product. First, In
   a moral sense. When the action and the end are to be measured or considered
   in reference to a moral rule, or law prescribed to the agent, then the means
   are the deserving or meritorious cause of the end; as, if Adam had continued
   in his innocency, and done all things according to the law given unto him,
   the end procured thereby had been a blessed life to eternity; as now the end
   of any sinful act is death, the curse of the law. Secondly, When the means
   are considered only in their natural relation, then they are the
   instrumentally efficient cause of the end. So Joab intending the death of
   Abner, “he smote him with his spear under the fifth rib, that he died,” 2
   Sam. iii. 27. And when Benaiah, by the command of Solomon, fell upon Shimei
   the wounds he gave him were the efficient of his death, 1 Kings ii. 46. In
   which regard there is no difference between the murdering of an innocent man
   and the executing of an offender; but as they are under a moral
   consideration, their ends follow their deservings, in respect of conformity
   to the rule, and so there is chasma mega between them.

   III. The former consideration, by reason of the defect and perverseness of
   some agents (for otherwise these things are coincident), holds out a twofold
   end of things, — first, of the work, and, secondly, of the workman; of the
   act and the agent: for when the means assigned for the attaining of any end
   are not proportioned unto it, nor, fitted for it, according to that rule
   which the agent is to work by, then it cannot be but that he must aim at one
   thing and another follow, in respect of the morality of the work. So Adam is
   enticed into a desire to be like God; this now he makes his aim, which to
   effect he eats the forbidden fruit, and that contracts a guilt which he
   aimed not at. But when the agent acts aright, and as it should do, — when it
   aims at an end that is proper to it, belonging to its proper perfection and
   condition, and worketh by such means as are fit and suitable to the end
   proposed, — the end of the work and the workman are one and the same; as
   when Abel intended the worship of the Lord, he offered a sacrifice through
   faith, acceptable unto him; or as a man, desiring salvation through Christ,
   applieth himself to get an interest in him. Now, the sole reason of this
   diversity is, that secondary agents, such as men are, have an end set and
   appointed to their actions by Him which giveth them an external rule or law
   to work by, which shall always attend them in their working, whether they
   will or no. God only, whose will and good pleasure is the sole rule of all
   those works which outwardly are of him, can never deviate in his actions,
   nor have any end attend or follow his acts not precisely by him intended.

   IV. Again; the end of every free agent is either that which he effecteth, or
   that for whose sake he doth effect it. When a man builds a house to let to
   hire, that which he effecteth is the building of a house; that which moveth
   him to do it is love of gain. The physician cures the patient, and is moved
   to it by his reward. The end which Judas aimed at in his going to the
   priests, bargaining with them, conducting the soldiers to the garden,
   kissing Christ, was the betraying of his Master; but the end for whose sake
   the whole undertaking was set on foot was the obtaining of the thirty pieces
   of silver: “What will ye give me, and I will do it?” The end which God
   effected by the death of Christ was the satisfaction of his justice: the end
   for whose sake he did it was either supreme, or his own glory; or
   subordinate, ours with him.

   V. Moreover, the means are of two sorts:— First, Such as have a true
   goodness in themselves without reference to any farther kind; though not so
   considered as we use them for means. No means, as a means is considered as
   good in itself, but only as conducible to a farther end; it is repugnant to
   the nature of means, as such, to be considered as good in themselves. Study
   is in itself the most noble employment of the soul; but, aiming at wisdom or
   knowledge, we consider it as good only inasmuch as it conducteth to that
   end, otherwise as “a weariness of the flesh,” Eccl. xii. 12. Secondly, Such
   as have no good at all in any kind, as in themselves considered, but merely
   as conducing to that end which they are fit to attain. They receive all
   their goodness (which is but relative) from that whereunto they are
   appointed, in themselves no way desirable; as the cutting off a leg or an
   arm for the preservation of life, taking a bitter potion for health’s sake,
   throwing corn and lading into the sea to prevent shipwreck. Of which nature
   is the death of Christ, as we shall afterward declare.

   VI. These things being thus proposed in general, our next task must be to
   accommodate them to the present business in hand; which we shall do in
   order, by laying down the agent working, the means wrought and the end
   effected, in the great work of our redemption; for these three must be
   orderly considered and distinctly, that we may have a right apprehension of
   the whole: into the first whereof, sun Theō, we make an entrance in [chapter
   third.]
     _________________________________________________________________

Chapter III.

   Of the agent or chief author of the work of our redemption, and of the first
   thing distinctly ascribed to the person of the Father.

   I. The agent in, and chief author of, this great work of our redemption is
   the whole blessed Trinity; for all the works which outwardly are of the
   Deity are undivided and belong equally to each person, their distinct manner
   of subsistence and order being observed. It is true, there were sundry other
   instrumental causes in the oblation, or rather passion of Christ but the
   work cannot in any sense be ascribed unto them; — for in respect of God the
   Father, the issue of their endeavours was exceeding contrary to their own
   intentions, and in the close they did nothing but what the “hand and counsel
   of God had before determined should be done,” Acts iv. 28; and in respect of
   Christ they were no way able to accomplish what they aimed at, for he
   himself laid down his life, and none was able to take it from him, John x.
   17, 18: so that they are to be excluded from this consideration. In the
   several persons of the holy Trinity, the joint author of the whole work, the
   Scripture proposeth distinct and sundry acts or operations peculiarly
   assigned unto them; which, according to our weak manner of apprehension, we
   are to consider severally and apart; which also we shall do, beginning with
   them that are ascribed to the Father.

   II. Two peculiar acts there are in this work of our redemption by the blood
   of Jesus, which may be and are properly assigned to the person of the
   Father:— First, The sending of his Son into the world for this employment.
   Secondly, A laying the punishment due to our sin upon him.

   1. The Father loves the world, and sends his Son to die: He “sent his Son
   into the world that the world through him might be saved,” John iii. 16, 17.
   He “sending his Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned
   sin in the flesh, that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in
   us,” Rom. viii. 3, 4. He “set him forth to be a propitiation through faith
   in his blood,” chap. iii. 25. For “when the fulness of the time was come,
   God sent forth his Son, made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them
   that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons,” Gal.
   iv. 4, 5. So more than twenty times in the Gospel of John there is mention
   of this sending; and our Saviour describes himself by this periphrasis, “Him
   whom the Father hath sent,” John x. 36; and the Father by this, “He who sent
   me,” chap. v. 37. So that this action of sending is appropriate to the
   Father, according to his promise that he would “send us a Saviour, a great
   one, to deliver us,” Isa. xix. 20; and to the profession of our Saviour, “I
   have not spoken in secret from the beginning; from the time that it was,
   there am I: and now the Lord God, and his Spirit, hath sent me,” Isa.
   xlviii. 16. Hence the Father himself is sometimes called our Saviour: 1 Tim.
   i. 1, “According to the commandment Theou sōtēros hēmōn,” — “of God our
   Saviour.” Some copies, indeed, read it, Theou kai sōtēros hēmōn, — “of God
   and our Saviour;” but the interposition of that particle kai arose,
   doubtless, from a misprision that Christ alone is called Saviour. But
   directly this is the same with that parallel place of Tit. i. 3, Kat’
   epitagēn tou sōtēros hēmōn Theou, — “According to the commandment of God our
   Saviour,” where no interposition of that conjunctive particle can have
   place; the same title being also in other places ascribed to him, as Luke i.
   47, “My spirit hath rejoiced in God my Saviour.” As also 1 Tim. iv. 10, “We
   trust in the living God, who is the Saviour of all men, specially of them
   that believe;” though in this last place it be not ascribed unto him with
   reference to his redeeming us by Christ, but his saving and preserving all
   by his providence. So also Tit. ii. 10, iii. 4; Deut. xxxii. 15; 1 Sam. x.
   19; Ps. xxiv. 5, xxv. 5; Isa. xii. 2, xl. 10, xlv. 15; Jer. xiv. 8; Micah
   vii. 7; Hab. iii. 18; most of which places have reference to his sending of
   Christ, which is also distinguished into three several acts, which in order
   we must lay down:—

   (1.) An authoritative imposition of the office of Mediator, which Christ
   closed withal by his voluntary susception of it, willingly undergoing the
   office, wherein by dispensation the Father had and exercised a kind of
   superiority, which the Son, though “in the form of God,” humbled himself
   unto, Phil. ii. 6–8. And of this there may conceived two parts:—

   [1.] The purposed imposition of his counsel, or his eternal counsel for the
   setting apart of his Son incarnate to this office, saying unto him, “Thou
   art my Son; this day have I begotten thee. Ask of me, and I shall give thee
   the nations for thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for
   thy possession,” Ps. ii. 7, 8. He said unto him, “Sit thou at my right hand
   until I make thine enemies thy footstool;” for “the Lord swore, and will not
   repent, Thou art a priest for ever after the order of Melchizedek,” Ps. cx.
   1, 4. He appointed him to be “heir of all things,” Heb. i. 2, having
   “ordained him to be Judge of quick and dead,” Acts x. 42; for unto this he
   was “ordained before the foundation of the world,” 1 Pet. i. 20., and
   “determined, horistheis, to be the Son of God with power,” Rom. i. 4, “that
   he might be the first-born among many brethren,” chap. viii. 29. I know that
   this is an act eternally established in the mind and will of God, and so not
   to be ranged in order with the others, which are all temporary, and had
   their beginning in the fulness of time, of all which this first is the
   spring and fountain, according to that of James, Acts xv. 18, “Known unto
   God are all his works from the beginning of the world;” but yet, it being no
   unusual form of speaking that the purpose should also be comprehended in
   that which holds out the accomplishment of it, aiming at truth and not
   exactness, we pass it thus.

   [2.] The actual inauguration or solemn admission of Christ into his office;
   “committing all judgment unto the Son,” John v. 22; “making him to be both
   Lord and Christ,” Acts ii. 36; “appointing him over his whole house,” Heb.
   iii. 1–6; — which is that “anointing of the most Holy,” Dan. ix. 24; God
   “anointing him with the oil of gladness above his fellows,” Ps. xlv. 7: for
   the actual setting apart of Christ to his office is said to be by unction,
   because all those holy things which were types of him, as the ark, the
   altar, etc., were set apart and consecrated by anointing, Exod. xxx. 25–28,
   etc. To this also belongs that public testification by innumerable angels
   from heaven of his nativity, declared by one of them to the shepherds.
   “Behold,” saith he, “I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be
   unto all people; for unto you is born this day in the city of David a
   Saviour, which is Christ the Lord,” Luke ii. 10, 11; — which message was
   attended by and closed with that triumphant exultation of the host of
   heaven, “Glory be to God on high, on earth peace, towards men good-will,”
   verse 14: with that redoubled voice which afterward came from the excellent
   glory, “This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well-pleased,” Matt. iii. 17,
   xvii. 5; 2 Pet. i. 17. If these things ought to be distinguished and placed
   in their own order, they may be considered in these three several acts:—
   First, The glorious proclamation which he made of his nativity, when he
   “prepared him a body,” Heb. x. 5, bringing his First-begotten into the
   world, and saying, “Let all the angels of God worship him” chap. i. 6,
   sending them to proclaim the message which we before recounted. Secondly,
   Sending the Spirit visibly, in the form of a dove, to light upon him at the
   time of his baptism, Matt. iii. 16, when he was endued with a fulness
   thereof, for the accomplishment of the work and discharge of the office
   whereunto he was designed, attended with that voice whereby he owned him
   from heaven as his only-beloved. Thirdly, The “crowning of him with glory
   and honour,” in his resurrection, ascension, and sitting down “on the right
   hand of the Majesty on high,” Heb. i. 3; setting “him as his king upon his
   holy hill of Zion,” Ps. ii. 6; when “all power was given unto him in heaven
   and in earth,” Matt. xxviii. 18, “all things being put under his feet” Heb.
   ii. 7, 8; himself highly exalted, and “a name given him above every name,
   that at,” etc., Phil. ii. 9–11. Of which it pleased him to appoint witnesses
   of all sorts; — angels from heaven, Luke xxiv. 4, Acts i. 10; the dead out
   of the graves, Matt. xxvii. 52; the apostles among and unto the living, Acts
   ii. 32; with those more than five hundred brethren, to whom he appeared at
   once, 1 Cor. xv. 6. Thus gloriously was he inaugurated into his office, in
   the several sets and degrees thereof, God saying unto him, “It is a light
   thing that thou shouldest be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob, and
   to restore the preserved of Israel: I will also give thee for a light to the
   Gentiles that thou mayest be my salvation unto the end of the earth,” Isa.
   xlix. 6.

   Between these two acts I confess there intercedes a twofold promise of God;
   — one, of giving a Saviour to his people, a Mediator, according to his
   former purpose, as Gen. iii. 15, “The seed of the woman shall break the
   serpent’s head;” and, “The sceptre shall not depart from Judah, nor a
   lawgiver from between his feet, till Shiloh come; and unto him shall the
   gathering of the people be,” chap. xlix. 10. Which he also foresignified by
   many sacrifices and other types, with prophetical predictions: “Of which
   salvation the prophets have inquired and searched diligently, who prophesied
   of the grace that should come unto you; searching what or what manner of
   time the Spirit of Christ which was in them did signify, when it testified
   beforehand the sufferings of Christ, and the glory that should follow. Unto
   whom it was revealed, that not unto themselves, but unto us they did
   minister the things which are now reported unto you by them that have
   preached the gospel unto you with the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven;
   which things the angels desire to look into,” 1 Pet. i. 10–12. The other is
   a promise of applying the benefits purchased by this Saviour so designed to
   them that should believe on him, to be given in fulness of time, according
   to the former promises; telling Abraham, that “in his seed all the families
   of the earth should be blessed,” and justifying himself by the same faith,
   Gen. xii. 3, xv. 6. But these things belong rather to the application
   wholly, which was equal both before and after his actual mission.

   (2.) The second act of the Father’s sending the Son is the furnishing of him
   in his sending with a fulness of all gifts and graces that might any way be
   requisite for the office he was to undertake, the work he was to undergo,
   and the charge he had over the house of God. There was, indeed, in Christ a
   twofold fulness and perfection of all spiritual excellencies:—

   First, the natural all-sufficient perfection of his Deity, as one with his
   Father in respect of his divine nature: for his glory was “the glory of the
   only-begotten of the Father,” John i. 14. He was “in the form of God, and
   thought it not robbery to be equal with God,” Phil. ii. 6; being the “fellow
   of the Lord of hosts,” Zech. xiii. 7. Whence that glorious appearance, Isa.
   vi. 3, 4, when the seraphims cried one to another, and said, “Holy, holy,
   holy, is the Lord of hosts: the whole earth is full of his glory. And the
   posts of the door moved at the voice of him that cried, and the house was
   filled with smoke.” And the prophet cried, “Mine eyes have seen the King,
   the Lord of hosts,” verse 5. Even concerning this vision the apostle saith,
   “Isaiah saw him, and spake of his glory,” John xii. 41. Of which glory
   ekenōse, he as it were emptied himself for a season, when he was “found in
   the form” or condition “of a servant, humbling himself unto death,” Phil.
   ii. 7, 8; laying aside that glory which attended his Deity, outwardly
   appearing to have “neither form, nor beauty, nor comeliness, that he should
   be desired,” Isa. liii. 2. But this fulness we do not treat of, it being not
   communicated to him, but essentially belonging to his person, which is
   eternally begotten of the person of his Father.

   The second fulness that was in Christ was a communicated fulness, which was
   in him by dispensation from his Father, bestowed upon him to fit him for his
   work and office as he was and is the “Mediator between God and men, the man
   Christ Jesus,” 1 Tim. ii. 5; not as he is the “Lord of hosts,” but as he is
   “Emmanuel, God with us,” Matt. i. 23; as he was a “son given to us, called
   Wonderful, Counsellor, The mighty God, The everlasting Father, The Prince of
   Peace, upon whose shoulder the government was to be,” Isa. ix. 6. It is a
   fulness of grace; not that essential which is of the nature of the Deity,
   but that which is habitual and infused into the humanity as personally
   united to the other; which, though it be not absolutely infinite, as the
   other is, yet it extends itself to all perfections of grace, both in respect
   of parts and degrees. There is no grace that is not in Christ, and every
   grace is in him in the highest degree: so that whatsoever the perfection of
   grace, either for the several kinds or respective advancements thereof,
   requireth, is in him habitually, by the collation of his Father for this
   very purpose, and for the accomplishment of the work designed; which, though
   (as before) it cannot properly be said to be infinite, yet it is boundless
   and endless. It is in him as the light in the beams of the sun, and as water
   in a living fountain which can never fail. He is the “candlestick” from
   whence the “golden pipes do empty the golden oil out of themselves,” Zech.
   iv. 12, into all that are his; for he is “the beginning, the first-born from
   the dead, in all things having the pre-eminence; for it pleased the Father
   that in him should all fulness dwell;” Col. i. 18, 19. In him he caused to
   be “hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge,” chap. ii. 3; and “in him
   dwelt all the fulness of the Godhead sōmatikōs,” substantially or
   personally, verse 9; that “of his fulness we might all receive grace for
   grace,” John i. 16, in a continual supply. So that, setting upon the work of
   redemption, he looks upon this in the first place. “The Spirit of the Lord
   God,” saith he, “is upon me; because the Lord hath anointed me to preach
   good tidings unto the meek; he hath sent me to bind up the broken-hearted,
   to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to them
   that are bound; to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord, and the day of
   vengeance of our God; to comfort all that mourn,” Isa. lxi. 1, 2. And this
   was the “anointing with the oil of gladness” which he had “above his
   fellows,” Ps. xlv. 7; “it was upon his head, and ran down to his beard, yea,
   down to the skirts of his garments,” Ps. cxxxiii. 2, that every one covered
   with the garment of his righteousness might be made partaker of it. “The
   Spirit of the Lord did rest upon him, the spirit of wisdom and
   understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and
   of the fear of the Lord,” Isa. xi. 2; and that not in parcels and beginnings
   as in us, proportioned to our measure and degrees of sanctification, but in
   a fulness, for “he received not the Spirit by measure,” John iii. 34; — that
   is, it was not so with him when he come to the full measure of the stature
   of his age, as Eph. iv. 13; for otherwise it was manifested in him and
   collated on him by degrees, for he “increased in wisdom and stature, and in
   favour with God and man,” Luke ii. 52. Hereunto was added “all power in
   heaven and earth, which was given unto him,” Matt. xxviii. 18; “power over
   all flesh, to give eternal life to as many as he would,” John xvii. 2. Which
   we might branch into many particulars, but so much shall suffice to set
   forth the second act of God in sending his Son.

   (3.) The third act of this sending is his entering into covenant and compact
   with his Son concerning the work to be undertaken, and the issue or event
   thereof; of which there be two parts:—

   First, His promise to protect and assist him in the accomplishment and
   perfect fulfilling of the whole business and dispensation about which he was
   employed, or which he was to undertake. The Father engaged himself, that for
   his part, upon his Son’s undertaking this great work of redemption, he would
   not be wanting in any assistance in trials, strength against oppositions,
   encouragement against temptations, and strong consolation in the midst of
   terrors, which might be any way necessary or requisite to carry him on
   through all difficulties to the end of so great an employment; — upon which
   he undertakes this heavy burden, so full of misery and trouble: for the
   Father before this engagement requires no less of him than that he should
   “become a Saviour, and be afflicted in all the affliction of his people,”
   Isa. lxiii. 8, 9: yea, that although he were “the fellow of the Lord of
   hosts,” yet he should endure the “sword” that was drawn against him as the
   “shepherd” of the sheep, Zech. xiii. 7; “treading the winepress alone, until
   he became red in his apparel,” Isa. lxiii. 2, 3: yea, to be “stricken,
   smitten of God, and afflicted; wounded for our transgressions, and bruised
   for our iniquities; to be bruised and put to grief; to make his soul an
   offering for sin, and to bear the iniquity of many,” Isa. liii.; to be
   destitute of comfort so far as to cry, “My God, my God, why hast thou
   forsaken me?” Ps. xxii. 1. No wonder, then, if upon this undertaking the
   Lord promised to make “his mouth like a sharp sword, to hide him in the
   shadow of his hand, to make him a polished shaft, and to hide him in his
   quiver, to make him his servant in whom he would be glorified,” Isa. xlix.
   2, 3; that though “the kings of the earth should set themselves, and the
   rulers take counsel together, against him, yet he would laugh them to scorn,
   and set him as king upon his holy hill of Zion,” Ps. ii. 2, 4, 6; though the
   “builders did reject him,” yet he should “become the head of the corner,” to
   the amazement and astonishment of all the world, Ps. cxviii. 22, 23; Matt.
   xxi. 42, Mark xii. 10, Luke xx. 17, Acts iv. 11, 12, 1 Pet. ii. 4; yea, he
   would “lay him for a foundation, a stone, a tried stone, a precious
   corner-stone, a sure foundation,” Isa. xxviii. 16, that “whosoever should
   fall upon him should be broken, but upon whomsoever he should fall he should
   grind him to powder,” Matt. xxi. 44. Hence arose that confidence of our
   Saviour in his greatest and utmost trials, being assured, by virtue of his
   Father’s engagement in this covenant, upon a treaty with him about the
   redemption of man, that he would never leave him nor forsake him. “I
   gave,” saith he, “my back to the smiters, and my cheeks to them that plucked
   off the hair: I hid not my face from shame and spitting,” Isa. l. 6. But
   with what confidence, blessed Saviour, didst thou undergo all this shame and
   sorrow! Why, “The Lord God will help me; therefore shall I not be
   confounded: therefore have I set my face like a flint, and I know; that I
   shall not be ashamed. He is near that justifieth me; who will contend with
   me? let us stand together: who is mine adversary? let him come near to me.
   Behold, the Lord God will help me; who is he that condemn me? Lo! they shall
   all wax old as a garment; the moth shall eat them up,” verses 7–9. With this
   assurance he was brought as a “lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before
   her shearers is dumb, so he opened not his mouth,” Isa. liii. 7: for “when
   he was reviled, he reviled not again; when he suffered, he threatened not;
   but committed himself to him that judgeth righteously,” 1 Pet. ii. 23. So
   that the ground of our Saviour’s confidence and assurance in this great
   undertaking, and a strong motive to exercise his graces received in the
   utmost endurings, was this engagement of his Father upon this compact of
   assistance and protection.

   Secondly, [His promise] of success, or a good issue out of all his
   sufferings, and a happy accomplishment and attainment of the end of his
   great undertaking. Now, of all the rest this chiefly is to be considered, as
   directly conducing to the business proposed, which yet would not have been
   so clear without the former considerations; for whatsoever it was that God
   promised his Son should be fulfilled and attained by him, that certainly was
   it at which the Son aimed in the whole undertaking, and designed it as the
   end of the work that was committed to him, and which alone he could and did
   claim upon the accomplishment of his Father’s will. What this was, and the
   promises whereby it is at large set forth, ye have Isa. xlix.: “Thou shalt
   be my servant,” saith the Lord, “to raise up the tribes of Jacob, and to
   restore the preserved of Israel: I will also give thee for a light to the
   Gentiles, that thou mayest be my salvation to the end of the earth. Kings
   shall see and arise, princes also shall worship, because of the Lord that is
   faithful.” And he will certainly accomplish this engagement: “I will
   preserve thee, and give thee for a covenant of the people, to establish the
   earth, to cause to inherit the desolate heritages; that thou mayest say to
   the prisoners, Go forth; to them that are in darkness, Show yourselves. They
   shall feed in the ways, and their pastures shall be in all high places. They
   shall not hunger nor thirst; neither shall the heat nor sun smite them: for
   he that hath mercy on them shall lead them, even by the springs of water
   shall he guide them. And I will make all my mountains a way, and my highways
   shall be exalted. Behold, these shall come from far: and, lo, these from the
   north and from the west; and these from the land of Sinim,” verses 6–12. By
   all which expressions the Lord evidently and clearly engageth himself to his
   Son, that he should gather to himself a glorious church of believers from
   among Jews and Gentiles, through all the world, that should be brought unto
   him, and certainly fed in full pasture, and refreshed by the springs of
   water, all the spiritual springs of living water which flow from God in
   Christ for their everlasting salvation. This, then, our Saviour certainly
   aimed at, as being the promise upon which he undertook the work, — the
   gathering of the sons of God together, their bringing unto God, and passing
   to eternal salvation; which being well considered, it will utterly overthrow
   the general ransom or universal redemption, as afterward will appear. In the
   53d chapter of the same prophecy, the Lord is more express and punctual in
   these promises to his Son, assuring him that when he “made his soul an
   offering for sin, he should see his seed, and prolong his days, and the
   pleasure of the Lord should prosper in his hand; that he should see of the
   travail of his soul, and be satisfied; by his knowledge he should justify
   many; that, he should divide a portion with the great, and the spoil with
   the strong,” verses 10–12. He was, you see, to see his seed by covenant, and
   to raise up a spiritual seed unto God, a faithful people, to be prolonged
   and preserved throughout all generations; which, how well it consists with
   their persuasion who in terms have affirmed “that the death of Christ might
   have had its full and utmost effect and yet none be saved,” I cannot see,
   though some have boldly affirmed it, and all the assertors of universal
   redemption do tacitly grant, when they come to the assigning of the proper
   ends and effects of the death of Christ. “The pleasure of the Lord,” also,
   was to “prosper in his hand;” which what it was he declares, Heb. ii. 10,
   even “bringing of many sons unto glory;” for “God sent his only-begotten Son
   into the world that we live through him,” 1 John iv. 9; as we shall
   afterward more abundantly declare. But the promises of God made unto him in
   their agreement, and so, consequently, his own aim and intention, may be
   seen in nothing more manifestly than in the request that our Saviour makes
   upon the accomplishment of the work about which he was sent; which certainly
   was neither for more nor less than God had engaged himself to him for. “I
   have,” saith he, “glorified thee on earth, I have finished the work which
   thou gavest me to do,” John xvii. 4. And now, what doth he require after the
   manifestation of his eternal glory, of which for a season he had emptied
   himself, verse 5? Clearly a full confluence of the love of God and fruits of
   that love upon all his elect, in faith, sanctification, and glory. God gave
   them unto him, and he sanctified himself to be a sacrifice for their sake,
   praying for their sanctification, verses 17–19; their preservation in peace,
   or communion one with another, and union with God, verses 20, 21, “I pray
   not for these alone” (that is, his apostles), “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;” and lastly,
   their glory, verse 24, “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.” All which several postulata are no doubt grounded upon the
   fore-cited promises which by his Father were made unto him. And in this, not
   one word concerning all and every one, but expressly the contrary, verse 9.
   Let this, then, be diligently observed, that the promise of God unto his
   Son, and the request of the Son unto his Father, are directed to this
   peculiar end of bringing sons unto God. And this is the first act,
   consisting of these three particulars.

   2. The second is of laying upon him the punishment of sins, everywhere
   ascribed unto the Father: “Awake; O sword, against my shepherd, against the
   man that is my fellow, saith the Lord of hosts: smite the shepherd, and the
   sheep shall be scattered,” Zech. xiii. 7. What here is set down
   imperatively, by way of command, is in the gospel indicatively expounded.
   “I will smite the shepherd, and the sheep of the flock shall be scattered
   abroad,” Matt. xxvi. 31. “He was stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted;”
   yea, “the Lord laid upon him the iniquity of us all;” yea, “it pleased the
   Lord to bruise him, and to put him to grief,” Isa. liii. 4, 6, 10. “He made
   him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the
   righteousness of God in him,” 2 Cor. v. 21. The adjunct in both places is
   put for the subject, as the opposition between his being made sin and our
   being made righteousness declareth. “Him who knew no sin,” — that is, who
   deserved no punishment, — “him hath he made to be sin,” or laid the
   punishment due to sin upon him. Or perhaps, in the latter place, sin may be
   taken for an offering or sacrifice for the expiation of sin, hamartia
   answering in this place to the word חַטָּאת in the Old Testament, which
   signifieth both sin and the sacrifice for it. And this the Lord did; for as
   for Herod, Pontius Pilate, with the Gentiles, and the people of Israel, when
   they were gathered together, they did nothing but “what his hand and counsel
   had determined before to be done,” Acts iv. 27, 28. Whence the great
   shakings of our Saviour were in his close conflict with his Father’s wrath,
   and that burden which by himself he immediately imposed on him. When there
   was no hand or instrument outwardly appearing to put him to any suffering or
   cruciating torment, then he “began to be sorrowful, even unto death” Matt.
   xxvi. 37, 38; to wit, when he was in the garden with his three choice
   apostles, before the traitor or any of his accomplices appeared, then was he
   “sore amazed, and very heavy,” Mark xiv. 33. That was the time, “in the days
   of his flesh, when he offered up prayers and supplications with strong
   crying and tears unto him that was able to save him from death,” Heb. v. 7;
   which how he performed the evangelist describeth, Luke xxii. 43, 44: “There
   appeared an angel unto him from heaven, strengthening him. But being in an
   agony he prayed more earnestly: and his sweat was as it were great drops of
   blood falling down to the ground.” Surely it was a close and strong trial,
   and that immediately from his Father, he now underwent; for how meekly and
   cheerfully doth he submit, without any regret or trouble of spirit, to all
   the cruelty of men and violence offered to his body, until this conflict
   being renewed again, he cries, “My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken
   me?” And this, by the way, will be worth our observation that we may know
   with whom our Saviour chiefly had to do, and what was that which he
   underwent for sinners; which also will give some light to the grand query
   concerning the persons of them for whom he undertook all this. His
   sufferings were far from consisting in mere corporal perpessions and
   afflictions, with such impressions upon his soul and spirit as were the
   effects and issues only of them. It was no more nor less than the curse of
   the law of God which he underwent for us: for he freed us from the curse “by
   being made a curse,” Gal. iii. 13; which contained all the punishment that
   was due to sin, either in the severity of God’s justice, or according to the
   exigence of that law which required obedience. That the execration of the
   law should be only temporal death, as the law was considered to be the
   instrument of the Jewish polity, and serving that economy or dispensation,
   is true; but that it should be no more, as it is the universal rule of
   obedience, and the bond of the covenant between God and man, is a foolish
   dream. Nay, but in dying for us Christ did not only aim at our good, but
   also directly died in our stead. The punishment due to our sin and the
   chastisement of our peace was upon him; which that it was the pains of hell,
   in their nature and being, in their weight and pressure, though not in
   tendence and continuance (it being impossible that he should be detained by
   death), who can deny and not be injurious to the justice of God, which will
   inevitably inflict those pains to eternity upon sinners? It is true, indeed,
   there is a relaxation of the law in respect of the persons suffering, God
   admitting of commutation; as in the old law, when in their sacrifices the
   life of the beast was accepted (in respect to the carnal part of the
   ordinances) for the life of the man. This is fully revealed, and we believe
   it; but for any change of the punishment, in respect of the nature of it,
   where is the least intimation of any alteration? We conclude, then, this
   second act of God, in laying the punishment on him for us, with that of the
   prophet, “All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to
   his own way; and the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all,” Isa.
   liii. 6: and add thereunto this observation, that it seems strange to me
   that Christ should undergo the pains of hell in their stead who lay in the
   pains of hell before he underwent those pains, and shall continue in them to
   eternity; for “their worm dieth not, neither is their fire quenched.” To
   which I may add this dilemma to our Universalists:— God imposed his wrath
   due unto, and Christ underwent the pains of hell for, either all the sins of
   all men, or all the sins of some men, or some sins of all men. If the last,
   some sins of all men, then have all men some sins to answer for, and so
   shall no man be saved; for if God enter into judgment with us, though it
   were with all mankind for one sin, no flesh should be justified in his
   sight: “If the Lord should mark iniquities, who should stand?” Ps. cxxx. 3.
   We might all go to cast all that we have “to the moles and to the bats, to
   go into the clefts of the rocks, and into the tops of the ragged rocks, for
   fear of the Lord, and for the glory of his majesty,” Isa. ii. 20, 21. If the
   second, that is it which we affirm, that Christ in their stead and room
   suffered for all the sins of all the elect in the world. If the first, why,
   then, are not all freed from the punishment of all their sins? You will say,
   “Because of their unbelief; they will not believe.” But this unbelief, is it
   a sin or not? If not, why should they be punished for it? If it be, then
   Christ underwent the punishment due to it, or not. If so, then why must that
   hinder them more than their other sins for which he died from partaking of
   the fruit of his death? If he did not, then did he not die for all their
   sins. Let them choose which part they will.
     _________________________________________________________________

Chapter IV.

   Of those things which in the work of redemption are peculiarly ascribed to
   the person of the Son.

   Secondly, The Son was an agent in this great work, concurring by a voluntary
   susception, or willing undertaking of the office imposed on him; for when
   the Lord said, “Sacrifice and offering he would not: in burnt-offerings and
   sacrifices for sin he had no pleasure,” then said Christ, “Lo, I come, (in
   the volume of the book it is written of me,) to do thy will, O God,” Heb. x.
   6, 7. All other ways being rejected as insufficient, Christ undertaketh the
   task, “in whom alone the Father was well pleased,” Matt. iii. 17. Hence he
   professeth that “he came not to do his own will, but the will of him that
   sent him,” John vi. 38; yea, that it was his meat and drink to do his
   Father’s will, and to finish his work, chap. iv. 34. The first words that we
   find recorded of him in the Scripture are to the same purpose, “Wist ye not
   that I must be about my Father’s business?” Luke ii. 49. And at the close of
   all he saith, “I have glorified thee on the earth; I have finished the work
   which thou gavest me to do,” John xvii. 4; calling it everywhere his
   Father’s work that he did, or his Father’s will which he came to accomplish,
   with reference to the imposition which we before treated of. Now, this
   undertaking of the Son may be referred to three heads. The first being a
   common foundation for both the others, being as it were the means in respect
   of them as the end, and yet in some sort partaking of the nature of a
   distinct action, with a goodness in itself in reference to the main end
   proposed to all three, we shall consider it apart; and that is, —

   First, His incarnation, as usually it is called, or his taking of flesh, and
   pitching his tent amongst us, John i. 14. His “being made of a woman,” Gal.
   iv. 4, is usually called his ensarkōsis, incarnation; for this was “the
   mystery of godliness, that God should be manifested in the flesh,” 1 Tim.
   iii. 16, thereby assuming not any singular person, but our human nature,
   into personal union with himself. For, “forasmuch as the children are
   partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself likewise took part of the
   same; that through death he might destroy him that had the power of death,
   that is, the devil,” Heb. ii. 14. It was the children that he considered,
   the “children whom the Lord gave him,” verse 13. Their participation in
   flesh and blood moved him to partake of the same, — not because all the
   world, all the posterity of Adam, but because the children were in that
   condition; for their sakes he sanctified himself. Now, this emptying of the
   Deity, this humbling of himself, this dwelling amongst us, was the sole act
   of the second person, or the divine nature in the second person, the Father
   and the Spirit having no concurrence in it but by liking, approbation, and
   eternal counsel.

   Secondly, His oblation, or “offering himself up to God for us without spot,
   to purge our consciences from dead works,” Heb. ix. 14; “for he loved us,
   and washed us from our sins in his own blood,” Rev. i. 5. “He loved the
   church, and gave himself for it, that he might sanctify and cleanse it,”
   Eph. v. 25, 26; taking the cup of wrath at his Father’s hands due to us, and
   drinking it off, “but not for himself,” Dan. ix. 26: for, “for our sakes he
   sanctified himself,” John xvii. 19, that is, to be an offering, an oblation
   for sin; for “when we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for
   the ungodly,” Rom. v. 6; — this being that which was typified out by all the
   institutions, ordinances, and sacrifices of old; which when they were to
   have an end, then said Christ, “Lo, I come to do thy will.” Now, though the
   perfecting or consummating of this oblation be set out in the Scripture
   chiefly in respect of what Christ suffered, and not so much in respect of
   what he did, because it is chiefly considered as the means used by these
   three blessed agents for the attaining of a farther end, yet in respect of
   his own voluntary giving up himself to be so an oblation and a sacrifice,
   without which it would not have been of any value (for if the will of Christ
   had not been in it, it could never have purged our sins), therefore, in that
   regard, I refer it to his actions. He was the “Lamb of God, which taketh
   away the sin of the world,” John i. 29; the Lamb of God, which himself had
   provided for a sacrifice. And how did this Lamb behave himself in it? with
   unwillingness and struggling? No; he opened not his mouth: “He was brought
   as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so
   he opened not his mouth,” Isa. liii. 7. Whence he saith, “I lay down my
   life. No man taketh it from me, but I lay it down of myself. I have power to
   lay it down, and I have power to take it again,” John x. 17, 18. He might
   have been cruciated on the part of God; but his death could not have been an
   oblation and offering had not his will concurred. “But he loved me,” saith
   the apostle, “and gave himself for me,” Gal. ii. 20. Now, that alone
   deserves the name of a gift which is from a free and a willing mind, as
   Christ’s was when “he loved us, and gave himself for us an offering and a
   sacrifice to God for a sweet-smelling savour,” Eph. v. 2. He does it
   cheerfully: “Lo, I come to do thy will, O God,” Heb. x. 9; and so “his own
   self bare our sins in his own body on the tree,” 1 Pet. ii. 24. Now, this
   oblation or offering of Christ I would not tie up to any one thing, action,
   or passion, performance, or suffering; but it compriseth the whole economy
   and dispensation of God manifested in the flesh and conversing among us,
   with all those things which he performed in the days of his flesh, when he
   offered up prayers and supplications, with strong cries and tears, until he
   had fully “by himself purged our sins, and sat down on the right hand of the
   Majesty on high,” Heb. i. 3, “expecting till his enemies be made his
   footstool,” chap. x. 13, — all the whole dispensation of his coming and
   ministering, until he had given his soul a price of redemption for many,
   Matt. xxvi. 28. But for his entering into the holy of holies, sprinkled with
   his own blood, and appearing so for us before the