good; but if a man repent of it only because it did not succeed, or because he missed of the gain, or pleasure, or honour, which he expected by it, thus he makes it a greater sin; and if he repent but because his pleasure is gone, or because he is brought to poverty or disgrace by his sin, this is but a natural thing, and deserves not the name of a virtue. So to love God is in itself good, and the highest duty; but if a man love God as one that he thinks hath prospered him in his sin, and helped and succeeded him in his revenge, unjust blood-shed, robbery, sinful rising and thriving, thanking God, and loving him for his pleasure in lust, drunkenness, gluttony, or the like, as the most men that idolise their flesh-pleasure do, when they have ease and honour, and all at will, that they may offer a full sacrifice to their flesh, and say, 'Soul, take thine ease,' then they thank God for it, and may really love him under this notion. This is to make God a pander or servant to our flesh, and so to love him for serving and humouring it; and this is so far from being a virtue, that it is one of the greatest of all sins; and if another man love God in a better notion a little, and love his lusts more, this is no saving love, as I shall more fully show you. So that you see a man hath more to look after than the mere honesty, virtue, or moral goodness of his action; or else all actions that are virtuous, would be saving.

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The third thing to be inquired after is, the sincerity of grace considered as saving. This is much more than the two former, and, indeed, is the greater matter in self-examination to be looked after here is the work; here is the difficulty; here it is that we are now inquiring, how far marks may be multiplied; how far they may be useful; and wherein this sincerity doth consist. The two former will not denominate a man a sincere Christian, nor prove him justified, and in a state of salvation, without this. Wherein this consisteth, I shall show you in the following propositions: now, I have first showed you what it is that you must inquire after; and I hope no wise Christian will judge me too curious and exact here, seeing it is a work that nearly concerns us, and is not fit to be done in the dark: our cause must be thoroughly sifted at judgment, and our game then must be played above-board; and therefore it is desperate to juggle and cheat ourselves now; only, before I proceed, let me tell you, that according to this threefold truth or sincerity, so { Пpóσkαpol sancti dicuntur, et quodammodo sunt, sed sine radice et soliditate, ut Rivet. Disp. de Persev. Sanct. sect. iii. p. 203.

there is a threefold self-delusion or hypocrisy; taking hypocrisy for a seeming to be what we are not, either to ourselves or others, though, perhaps, we have no direct dissembling intent. 1. To take on us to repent, believe, love Christ, &c., when we do not at all: this is the grossest kind of hypocrisy, as wanting the very natural truth of the act.

2. To seem to believe, repent, love God, &c., virtuously, according to the former description, and yet to do it but in subserviency to our lusts and wicked ends, this is another sort of gross hypocrisy; yea, to do it in mere respect to fleshly prosperity, as to repent because sin hath brought us to sickness and poverty, to love God merely because he keeps up our flesh's prosperity, &c.; this is still gross hypocrisy.

It may be a great question, which of these is the greater sin : to repent and love God in subserviency to our sin, or not to do it at all?

Answ. It is not much worth the thinking on, they are both so desperately wicked; therefore I will not trouble the reader with a curious resolution of this question, only thus: Though to deny God's being, be a blasphemous denial of his natural excellency, and so of his attributes, which are the first platform of that which we call morality in the creature; yet to deny these his attributes, and, withal, to ascribe sin and positive wickedness to the blessed, holy God, seems to me the greater sin; Sicut esse diabolum est pejus (quoad ipsum) quam non esse.

3. The next kind of hypocrisy, and the most common, is, when men want the sincerity of grace as saving only, but have both the truth of it as an act or habit, and as a virtue. When men have some repentance, faith, hope, love, &c., which is undissembled, and hath good ends, but yet is not saving; this is the unsoundness which most among us in the church perish by, that do perish, and which every Christian should look most to his heart in. This, I think, is discerned by few that are guilty of it, though they might all discern it, if they were willing and diligent.

Sect. VII. Prop. 6. As it is only the precepts of Christ that can assure us that one action is virtuous, or a duty more than another; so it is only the tenor of the covenant of grace, bestowing justification or salvation upon any act, which makes that act, or grace, justifying or saving, and can assure us that it is so.

s Ita sincere, tam resipiscentiam quam fidem, conditionem ad salutem adipiscendam prorsus necessariam sta tuimus.-Friglandius de Grat. p. 997.

By the precepts, I mean any divine determination concerning our duty, what we ought to do or avoid. It is the same sacred instrument which is called God's testament, his covenant, and his new law, the several names being taken from several respects, as I have opened elsewhere, and cannot now stand to prove; this law of God hath two parts, the precept and the sanction. The precept may be considered either as by itself, 'Do this or do that,' and so it maketh duty: this constitutes the virtue of actions, regulating them; and so the second kind of sincerity, whether an action be good or bad,' must be tried by the precepts as precepts. What God requireth, is a virtue: what he forbiddeth, is a vice: what he neither requireth nor forbiddeth, is indifferent, as being not of moral consideration for the popish doctrines of divine counsels is vain.

2. And then these precepts must be considered not only as they stand by themselves, and constitute duty simply, saying 'Do this; but also as they stand in conjunction with the sanction, and say, 'Do this or that, and be saved, or else perish,' as 'Believe and be saved, else not.' And in this respect and sense, they constitute the conditions of the covenant; and so they are the only rule by which to know what is saving grace, and what not: and only in this respect it is that they justify or condemn men. They may justify or condemn the action, as bare precepts and prohibitions; but they justify not, nor condemn the person himself, but as precepts conjoined with the sanction; that is, with the promise or threatening.

So that it is hence evident, that no human conjecture can gather what is a saving grace or duty, and what not, either from a bare precept, considered disjunct from the promise, or from any thing in the mere nature and use of the gracious act itself. The nature of the act is but its aptitude to its office; but the consequents (for I will not call them effects), justification and salvation, proceed from or upon them only as conditions on which the free promise bestoweth those benefits directly. Those, therefore, which make the formal reason of faith's justifying to lie in its apprehension, which they call its instrumentality, being indeed the very nature and being of the act, do little know what they say, nor how derogatory to Christ, and arrogating to themselves, their doctrine is, as I have elsewhere manifested.

I conclude, then, that it is only the Scripture that can tell you what is justifying or saving grace, by promising and annexing salvation thereto.

Sect. VIII. Prop. 7. Whatsoever therefore is the condition which the covenant of grace requireth of man, for the attaining of justification and salvation, and upon which it doth bestow them, that only is a justifying and saving act. And inferior duties are no further marks to try by, nor are justifying and saving, than as they are reducible to that condition.

This is it which I have asserted in the last foregoing chapter, and this is the reason why I laid down but two marks there. Though, in the first part, in the description of God's people, I laid down the whole description, which must needs contain some things common, and not only special properties, yet now I am to give you the true points of difference, I dare not number so many particulars. The performance of the proper condition of the new covenant, promising justification or salvation, then, is the only mark of justification or salvation, direct and infallible; or is the only justifying and saving grace properly so called. Now, you must understand that the covenant of life hath two parts, as the condition for man to perform, if he will receive the benefits. The first is, the natural part concerning the pure Godhead, who is the first and the last, the principal, efficient, and ultimate end of all; who is our Creator, Preserver, Governor, happiness, or rest. This is the taking the Lord only for our God,' in opposition to all idols visible or invisible. As the end, as such, is before and above all the means, and the Father, or mere Godhead, is above Christ the Mediator as such, (as he saith, John xiv. 28, "The Father is greater than I,") so this is the first and greater part of the condition of the covenant and so idolatry and atheism are the greatest and first condemning sins. The second part of the condition is, ' That we take Jesus Christ only for the Mediator and our Redeemer, and so as our only Saviour and supreme Lord, by the right of redemption.' This is the second part, consisting in the choice of the right and only way and means to God, as he is the end: for Christ, as Mediator, is not the ultimate end, but the way to the Father. These two parts of the condition are most evident in the word, both in their distinction and necessity. The former was part of that covenant made with Adam, which is not repealed, nor ever will be, though the rest of that covenant may be laid by. It was afterwards still fully expressed to the church before Christ's coming in the flesh in all the people's covenanting, this was still the sum, that they took the Lord only to be their God. But the latter part was not in the covenant with

Adam: nor was it openly and in full plainness put into the covenant of grace in the beginning, but still implied, and more darkly intimated, the light and clearness of revelation still increasing till Christ's coming. Yet so, as that at the utmost they had but the discovery of a Saviour to be born of a virgin, of the tribe of Judah, at such a time, but never that this Jesus was the Christ. And so it was only in a Saviour so to be revealed that they were to believe before: but after Christ's coming, and his miracles, and resurrection, at utmost, he tells them," If ye believe not that I am he, you shall die in your sins.' So that to them to whom he was revealed, at least it was of necessity to believe that this Jesus is he, and not to look for another. Now, to us Christians under the New Testament, this latter part of the covenant (concerning the Mediator) is most fully expressed, and most frequently inculcated: not as if the former part (concerning God the Creator and end) were become less necessary than before, or ever the less to be studied by Christians, or preached by the ministers of the Gospel, but on the contrary, it is still implied, as being fully revealed before, and a thing generally received by the church; yea, and confirmed and established by the adding of the Gospel, and preaching of Christ; for the end is still supposed and implied, when we determine of the means; and the means confirm and not deny the excellency and necessity of the end. Therefore, when Paul (Acts xvii. &c.) was to preach to the Athenians or other heathens, he first preacheth to them the Godhead, and seeks to bring them from their idols, and then preacheth Christ. And therefore it is said, " He that comes to God (as the end and his happiness, or Creator and Preserver) must first believe that God is, and that he is (in the Redeemer) a rewarder of them that diligently seek him." (Heb. xi.) And, therefore, the apostles preached "repentance towards God, and faith towards our Lord Jesus Christ." (Acts xx. 21.) The first is, "the turning from idols to the true God," and so repentance is in order of nature before faith in the Mediator, and more excellent in its nature, as the end is than the way; but not before faith in the Godhead. The second is the only highway to God. Therefore, Paul was by preaching, to turn men from darkness to light; both from the darkness of atheism and idolatry, and the darkness of infidelity, but first from the power of Satan, and worshipping devils, to God; that so next, by faith in Christ, they might receive remission of sin, and inheritance among them that are