ated; that the day of judgment is already come; that all the children of God in the world are now actually fhining in their robes of glory, and triumphing at the right hand of Chrift: Or, if you will, that I wrote this letter to you before the world began; or at least above feventeen hundred years ago. There is juft the fame foundation of truth in the one, as in the other. For all these things were as truly the objects of the divine counfel, as our juftification; and in that refpect as actually true from eternity, or from the time of Chrift's death, as that would be.

How inconfiftent and abfurd is the ftrange apprehenfion, that finners are actually juftified, reconciled to God, and inftated in his favour, while yet habituaily indulging their lufts, and going on boldly and impenitently in fin and enmity against God; as is the cafe of all men before converfion and faith in Chrift; Are men's hearts and lives contrary to God; and yet God pleafed with them at the fame time? Are they condemned already, the children of wrath; and yet reconciled to God, and at peace with him? Are they of their father the devil, whofe works they do; and yet the children of God, and heirs of eternal glory? Can heaven and hell be blended together? Is the fervice of Chrift and of Belial equally agreeable to a pure and holy God and the greatest practical, as well as fpeculative contradictions, reconcileable to truth? What a ftrange medley is here! What a door to all manner of licentiousness is here fet open!

In fhort, how wild and chimerical are their notions on the article of our juftification by faith! If we are indeed in the favour of God, our fouls are in the fame de gree of fafety, whether we are perfuaded of this, or not. If we are not in the favour of God, our perfuafion of a ftate of fafety will not influence him to treat us as his favourites; nor to confider that as true, which in its own nature is falfe. All therefore that is left for faith to do, according to them, is to give us eafe and comfort in our own minds. And is this all we are to understand by our being justified by faith? Is this all we are to under. ftand by the repeated declarations in holy fcripture, that the believer fhall be faved; while the unbeliever

hall be damned? If fo, the gofpel falvation is no more than merely the comfort flowing from a perfuafion of the fafety of our prefent ftate. But I need not enlarge in oppofition to a doctrine fo apparently repugnant to the whole defign of the gofpel, fo manifeftly unreafo nable, and fo directly fubverfive of all practical godliness. Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid! Yea, we establish the law, Rom. iii. 31.

;

It is infinitely your concern, Sir, to experience in your own heart fomething more than a mere Antinomian or Moravian faith. It is of infinite importance that you receive the Lord Jefus Chrift, and that you walk in him that you experience the fanctifying efficacy of faith, and exemplify the obedience of faith, in the exercife of all the graces and fruits of the Holy Spirit; and thereby evidence to yourself, at once, the fincerity of your faith, and the reality of your juftification before God. Now, that the Lord may direct you fafe in the way of truth and righteousness, to the kingdom of his glory, is the prayer of,

Sir,

Yours, &c.

LETTER XII. Wherein the Doctrine of a finner's JUSTIFICATION, by the IMPUTED RIGH TEOUSNESS of CHRIST, is explained and vin, dicated.

SIR,

I'

T is indeed as you reprefent it, A matter of the greatest confequence, to have a right view of the way and means by which God will be reconciled to you, and by which you may have a title to eternal life.' I am glad, that you fo kindly accept the pains I have taken, to fet the Antinomian doctrine of juftification in its proper colours. For though you did not give me that trouble (as you are pleased to exprefs it) because you had any favourable opinion of their ichemes, but to know whether I was (as is pretended) of their opinion; and to know how I could, confiftent with my declared fentiments, fleer clear of their wild notions?

Yet I rejoice, that your defires are gratified, and that you are fet right in that matter.'

But you are yet, as you have all along been, in great difficulties on the other fide of the question: and cannot fee into the doctrine of a finner's justification by the imputed righteoufness of CHRIST. You have been lately reading upon that fubject; and find ⚫ many arguments against it, that you cannot get over. Your author reprefents it as unscriptural, and unreafonable: you therefore defire me to give you a right "view of that doctrine, and to answer your objections ⚫ against it.'

There is indeed, Sir, no caufe for you to fufpect, that you fhail wear out my patience." I gladly embrace the opportunity, to do any thing in my power to give you fatisfaction; and to affift you in your greatest concern, which you have reason to be moft follicitous about. I fhall therefore, according to your defire, endeavour in the first place, to give you a brief view of the doctrine of our juftification by the imputed righte oufnefs of Chrift; before I proceed to confider your objections against it.

I fhall firft confider what we are to understand by jus tification; and in what fenfe that expreffion is used in fcripture. Should I herein follow fome of our wrangling difputants, I know not how many distinct meanings of the word Juftification I might fet before you. But this would be to darken counfel by words without knowledge; the term having one invariable meaning, throughout the whole Bible. It always (as far as I have been able to obferve) constantly fignifies being esteemed, declared, manifefted, or pronounced righteous. This is what the original word, both in the Old and New Teftament, naturally fignifiés: and in this fenfe only, it is always ufed. I need not therefore undertake, to give inftances of the use of the word in this fense, since in all inftances it is used in this fenfe only. This, I be lieve, must be acknowledged by every one, that will thoroughly and impartially examine the cafe. I think, there can no text be found, where justification is used for making us inherently righteous.

But though this word has one invariable fignification,

it is ufed in fcripture in a threefold refpect; either for our present justification in the fight of God, for our juftification before men and our own confciences, or for our justification at the tribunal of our judge at the last dav. It is the first of these, that falls under our prefent confideration which is to be confidered as our acquit tance from guilt, and our acceptance with God as righteous in his fight. It is to be confidered as a sentence of abfolution and acceptation, by the great judge of the world. As juftification therefore is always confidered in fcripture as a forenfick or judicial fentence, it should be carefully distinguished from the infufion of a principle of grace, or inherent righteoufnefs. Juftification is ufually in fcripture opposed to condemnation. As this latter therefore does not imply the rendering men wicked and guilty, but pronouncing them fo; even fo the former likewife cannot mean rendering men righteous, but fententially declaring and pronouncing them so. Were this duly attended to, many of the objections made against our doctrine of juftification by the righteoufnefs of Chrift, would vanith of courfe. You will be pleased therefore all along to carry this in your mind, that I am not confidering how we fhould become inherently righteous, by a renovation of our nature: but how we may be acquitted from guilt, and accepted as righteous, by the fentence of our glorious Judge.

I proceed to confider what we are to understand by the imputation of Chrift's righteousness.

To impute, is to judge or esteem any matter, character or quality, whether good or evil, to belong to a perfon as his. And may either refer to what was originally his, antecedently to fuch imputation; or to what was not antecedently his, but becomes fo by virtue of fuch imputation only. The fcriptures abound with instances of both these forts of imputation.

We have many inftances in fcripture of imputing that to a perfon, which was originally his own, and performed by him antecedently to fuch imputation. Thus fin is faid to be imputed to the finner, when he is judged or treated as an offender. Let not my Lord (fays Shimei) impute iniquity unto me, 2 Sam. xix. 19. And thus righteousness is imputed to the faint, when he is judged

or acknowledged righteous (in a qualified fenfe) with relation to a particular fact, done in conformity to the preceptive part of the divine law. Then ftood up Phinehas, and executed judgment, and it was imputed to him for righteousness, Pfalm cvi. 31. But this is not the imputation now to be confidered, which refpects a juf tification, that is propofed as the relief of a finful perishing world, against the penalty of the condemning law, and implies a change of the finner's ftate from guilt to grace, from death to life, in a relative sense.

I proceed then to obferve, that alfo may be faid to be imputed to a perfon, which was not his own originally or antecedently; but is judged and efteemed to belong to him, and is his on account of fuch imputation only. Thus, a debt is imputed to a furety; and the furety's payment of a debt is imputed to the principal debtor, and is pleadable by him in discharge from his creditor's demands.

If he have wronged thee, or oweth thee ought (fays Paul of Onefimus) put that on my account (TOTTO EMOI EAAOTEI) impute it unto me. Thus our fins are imputed unto Chrift; inasmuch as he in the character of our furety, has undertaken to discharge those debts to the justice of God. And thus his righteousness is imputed unto us; it having been wrought out in our place and ftead, and given to God in payment on our behalf.

These things being premifed, we are to understand the imputation in queftion, to be God's gracious dona、 tion of the perfect righteousness of Chrift to believers, and his acceptation of their perfons as righteous, on the account thereof. Their fins being imputed to him, and his obedience being imputed to them, they are in virtue hereof both acquitted from guilt and accepted as righteous before God.

We are not therefore to understand our juftification by the imputed righteousness of Chrift, as implying and fuppofing, that God does efteem believers to be what indeed they are not. He efteems them to be poor finful imperfect men, who have no otherwife fatisfied the claims of his justice, and the demands of the law, than by the obedience of their furety: which is really by a