But if those things cannot be kept by us which are commanded by God, that comes not to pass through any default of his, but through our default; who being at first created by him very good, brought this disability upon ourselves, and threw ourselves into that state of sinning. And then, what if it so seemed good to his omnipotent wisdom, to do thus for a declaration of his own righteousness? as St. Paul teaches, Rom. iii. for this purpose that he should be righteous; that is, that his righteousness might by this means become the more evident through our unrighteousness, which could not otherwise have been, unless he only had been declared to be righteous, and we upon the same account unrighteous, according to works. Which if it had not been so, what need had there been why he should justify us by faith, whom he had seen to be righteous and perfect by works?

Yea, you say there is very great need of faith, and you add a reason: "Because all the means of destroying and restraining lust consist in the grace of God alone, which must be obtained by faith; and there is no other way showed to extinguish and destroy it. Therefore faith, as you say, prepares the mind for righteousness, and makes it fit, that the great Author of all good things should bring into it the seed of righteousness."*

But does faith nothing but prepare us for righteousness? And now, what way does it prepare? Because, say you, the grace of God is obtained by faith and the merit of Christ. What follows? "For it is God only, by whose almighty power and bounty we break the force of lust, and restrain all its importunity, and maintain the perfect offices of virtue," &c. Who ever denied, that it is God only that can do those things? But is our whole salvation and righteousness in the sight of God, contained only in driving out of the mind those little heats of all evil lusts whereof you speak, in abolishing the roots of all vices, and in maintaining duly and constantly the office of perfect virtue?

20. How far the works of human life are from the perfection of righteousness.

But now, do you yourself perform all these things, which you require in us for the perfection of righteousness? Hath the great Husbandman watered the happy ground of your mind, with so great a vigour and verdure of his

* Osor. de Just iv. 90. 105.

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bounty, that no wild vines or briers do any where appear in all your life? That no lust draws you aside from your duty? No perturbation of affections throws you down from your state of constancy? No concupiscence of the eyes defiles the purity of your mind? What if a man is accounted unchaste before God, if so much as his eyes are adulterous; if he is next to a murderer that is so much as rashly angry at his brother; if he that calls his brother Raca, or bespatters the name of his neighbour with the smallest reproach is in danger of the council, Matt. v. what shall be said to him, who hath poured forth so much virulency and gall of bitterness? So that I need not go through all the precepts of the divine law, as concerning loving God above. all, concerning the strictest love to our neighbour; concerning shunning offences, putting up with injuries, praying for enemies; the abdication of this world, the framing the life to a dove-like simplicity, and other such-like things. Which things, seeing they are so various in kind, and so difficult to observe, we may ask of you, not what ought to be done, but what you yourself do express in deeds? Not what the divine grace is able to do in you, but what it does in effect? Whether he heaps you up with so many and such great gifts of his, that you are able to perform all things, that are written in the royal law. Which if you can avouch so to be, I willingly congratulate your happiness, and am not at all against your obtaining by way of merit that which your works do merit, but that you may go up to the kingdom, and may take yourself unpinioned wings, as Arnobius saith, wherewith you may go happily to heaven, and may fly to the stars, where you may reign with Christ; and you only, all other sinners being shut out, may overcome with God when you are judged! But in the interim here it comes into my mind to ask you a thing, How will this consist with that which the church sings in a holy hymn, and sings so aright: "Thou only art holy?" For how shall he only have the praise of that thing, as saith Jerome, which he hath common to himself with many? What if you think there is no difference between his righteousness and ours; and you suppose there is no righteousness but what proceeds chiefly from works; either let your life show to us the same works which Christ wrought, or if you cannot, let him only have the honour of this title, that Christ only may be righteous, and Osorio may confess himself to be unrighteous and a sinner; that now the

saying may truly have place here, which just now I cited out of Augustine, "Let man, take sin to himself, which is his own, and leave righteousness to God."

But, you will say, What then, is there no righteousness which belongs to men? It is not denied that there is; but it is such a righteousness as must be sought elsewhere than in works. But you may say, Where then? Not only I, but also St. Paul will tell you, The righteousness of God, saith he, to all, and upon all that believe. And again in the same epistle; The Gentiles which followed not after righteousness, laid hold on righteousness, namely, the righteousness of faith. On the contrary, Israel which followed after the law of righteousness, attained not unto the law of righteousness. Why so? Because they sought it not by faith, but as by the works of the law. And writing to the Galatians, Knowing, saith he, that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but by the faith of Jesus Christ, we also believe in Jesus Christ, that we may be justified by the faith of Jesus Christ, and not by the works of the law, because no flesh shall be justified by the works of the law, &c. Who is so dim-sighted but he may clearly see what the meaning of the apostle is in these words? Wherefore, it is the more to be wondered at, how great a stupidity darkens the minds of some of our own countrymen, and especially those jesuits, who in a thing so perspicuous yield not unto apostolic authority, so that they seem to have sallied out of some Trophonian den, for no other purpose, but that waging war with St. Paul, they may differ wholly from him in their opinion. For what things can more fiercely encounter than such an opposition as this-Christ is our righteousness? . Faith is imputed for righteousness? If of work, then grace is not grace? The just lives by faith?* And after this manner doth the apostle and prophet instruct us. they? We are justified by works, and yet grace is no less grace. The just doth not live by faith, but the believer liveth by the righteousness of works. And whereas Paul doth so attribute our righteousness to faith only, that he attributes nothing to works, so often repeating these exclusive words without works, apart from works, not according to works. If it is grace, then it is not of works. That I may be found in him, not having my own righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is of the

* 1 Cor. i. Rom. iv. xi. Hab. ii.

What say

+ Gal. iii. 2 Tim. i. Eph. ii. Tit. iii. Phil. iii. Rom. iv. ix. xi.

faith of Jesus Christ. To him that believeth in Him that justifies the ungodly, faith is imputed unto righteouness. Also placing Jews and Gentiles as in a scheme, that by experience itself it may be evident how hazardous it is to seat the hope of salvation any otherways than in the faith of Christ only. On the contrary, those men overthrowing all these sayings of Paul, endeavour this only by all the means they can, that they may measure the whole sum of our justification by the performance of works, and not by faith; that they may take away all imputation of the righteousness of another from us; that faith may no more contribute any thing to righteousness, but that it may render us worthy and fit, on whom the divine grace should confer freely for the merit of Christ the first infusion of inherent righteousness.* By which new qualities being received for the merit of Christ, now man himself, by that inherent righteousness, as their words express it, merits a greater and fuller righteousness, reconciliation and adoption, and at length life eternal! Moreover, they proceed so far that they assert there is no righteousness at all, but that which is peculiar to every man, and they so define it, that in all the nature of righteousness there is no place at all for faith, and there appears not so much as any mention thereof. For thus they define it, "The righteousness of God, which is revealed in the gospel, is a virtue in God, which distributes to every one according to their deserving." Alphonsus adds, " Evangelical righteousness is an equal proportion of merits to rewards."+

Will any man suppose that those who profess such vile and absurd things have been exercised with serious meditation at any time in the Holy Scriptures? or that they have not rather bestowed their whole time and understanding in heathenish and Aristotelian trifles? But now it will not be amiss to take notice with what props of reason they confirm these their opinions.

21. Against the Jesuits and their arguments, whereby they confirm inherent righteousness out of Aristotle. What, say they, have you not at any time read that form of reasoning in Aristotle? "He is righteoustherefore he is endued with righteousness. Such a man

*Concil. Trident. Sess. 6.

A definition of righteousness according to the Jesuits of Cologne Censur. Coloniensis, 186. Frat. Alphonsus Philip, iv. p. 34.

is learned—therefore he hath learning?" We have read it, say they, in the topics of Aristotle. That is true, indeed. But have ye not also at any time read in the epistles of Paul, these forms of speaking, Christ is our righteousness? We are made the righteousness of God by him; faith is imputed unto righteousness; the just shall live by faith?* What then? Shall we believe Aristotle more than Paul?" We believe fishermen," saith Ambrose, "not logicians." And should we translate our faith which we owe to God, with faithful Abraham, unto men that are sophisters?

But lest those jesuits should say that they are not answered, let us look more nearly into the force of their argument, and pierce them through with their own dart. They "deny that ever this external attribution was heard of since the world was; that a thing should receive a name extrinsically from qualities, that can be within, so that they should be accounted righteous before God, not by inherent qualities, but the righteousness of another, namely, Christ's, which is applied to us by faith," &c. And indeed this reason, taken out of Aristotle, might perhaps be of some force, if they had omitted these words, "before God." But seeing there is a twofold and diverse righteousness, the one which is called the righteousness of the law, the other which is called the righteousness of faith; and seeing the judgments of God and the judgments of men differ, they foolishly and ridiculously argue from human things to divine, from the righteousness of the law to the righteousness of faith; for men are not justified in the sight of God upon the same account that they are esteemed righteous before men. Yea, ofttimes it happens otherways, that those whom this world does most cry up, and judges to be just by their inherent qualities, God condemns the same men of unrighteousness, chiefly out of those very same qualities: and so on the contrary part. This may easily appear evident by the example of the pharisee and the publican, if either of which were to be valued according to the inherent merits of their life, what cause was there, why the publican should go home more righteous than the pharisee?

Even as with a like diversity the Scripture sometimes names those dead, whom human philosophy would judge to be alive, and in perfect health. Suffer ye, saith Christ,

FOX.

* 1 Cor. i. 2 Cor. v. Rom. iv. &c.
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