ART. XIV. course of life in which he thinks he may do the best services to God and man: nor are these free to him to choose or not: he is under obligations, and he sins if he sees a more excellent thing that he might have done, and contents himself with a lower or less valuable thing. St. Paul had wherein to glory; for whereas it was lawful for him as an apostle to suffer the Corinthians to supply him in temporals, when he was serving them in spiritual things; yet he chose rather for the honour of the gospel, and to take away all occasion of censure from those who sought for it, 'to work with his own hands, and not to be burdensome to them.' But in that state of things, though there was no law or outward obligation upon him to spare 2 Cor. xii. them; he was under an inward law of doing all things to the glory of God: and by this law he was as much bound, as if there had been an outward compulsory law lying upon him. Acts xx. 34. 1 Cor. ix. 18. 13. James iii.2. This distinction is to be remembered, between such an obligation as arises out of a man's particular circumstances, and such other motives as can be only known to a man himself, and such an obligation as may be fastened on him by stated and general rules: he may be absolutely free from the latter of these, and yet be secretly bound by those inward and stronger constraints of the love of God, and zeal for his glory. Enough seems to be said to prove that there are no counsels of perfection in the gospel; that all the rules set to us in it are in the style and form of precepts; and that though there may be some actions of more heroical virtue, and more sublime piety, than others, to which all men are not obliged by equal or general rules; yet such men, to whose circumstances and station they do belong, are strictly obliged by them, so that they should sin, if they did not put them in practice. This being thus made out, the foundation of works of supererogation is destroyed. But if it should be acknowledged that there were such counsels of perfection in the scripture, there are still two other clear proofs, to shew that there can be no such thing as supererogating with God. First, every man not only has sinned, but has still so much corruption about him, as to feel the truth of that of St. James, in many things we offend all.' Now unless it can be supposed that, by obeying those counsels, a man can compensate with Almighty God for his sins, there is no ground to think that he can supererogate. He must first clear his own score, before he can imagine that any thing upon his account can be forgiven or imputed to another: and if the guilt of sin is eternal, and the pretended merit of obeying counsels is only temporary, no temporary merit can take off an eternal guilt. So that it must first be supposed, that a man both is and has been perfect as to the precepts of obligation, before it can be thought that he should have an overplus of merit. The other clear argument from scripture against works of supererogation is, that there is nothing in the whole New XIV. Testament that does in any sort favour them; we are always ART. taught to trust to the mercies of God, and to the death and intercession of Christ, and to work out our own salvation Phil. ii. 12. with fear and trembling:' but we are never once directed to look for any help from saints, or to think that we can do any thing for another man's soul, in this way. The Psalm has it, "No man can by any means give a ransom for his brother's Ps. xlix. 7. soul' the words of Christ cited in the Article are full and express against it. Matt. xxv. 9. The words in the parable of the five foolish virgins and the five wise, may seem to favour it, but they really contradict it; for it was the foolish virgins that desired the wise to give them of their oil; which if any will apply to a supposed communication of merit, they ought to consider that the proposition is made by the foolish, and the answer of the wise virgins is full against it: Not so, lest there be not enough for us and you.' What follows, of bidding them 'go to them that sell, and buy for themselves,' is only a piece of the fiction of the parable, which cannot enter into any part of the application of it. What St. Paul says of his filling up that Col. i. 24 which was behind of the afflictions of Christ in his flesh, for his body's sake, which is the church,' is, as appears by the words that follow, whereof I am made a minister,' only applicable to the edification that the church received from the sufferings of the apostles; it being a great confirmation to them of the truth of the gospel, when those who preached it suffered so constantly and so patiently for it; by which they both confirmed what they had preached, and set an example to others, of adhering firmly to it. And since Christ is related to his church, as a head to the members, it is in some sort his suffering himself, when his members suffer: and that conformity which they ought to express to him as their head was necessary to make up the due proportion, that ought to be between the head and the members. So St. Paul rejoiced in his being made conformable to him: and this, as it is a sense that the words will well bear, so it is certain they are capable of no other sense; for if the sufferings of the apostles were meritorious in behalf of the other Christians, some plain account must have been given of this in the New Testament, at least to do honour to the memory of such apostles as had then died for the faith. If it is suggested, that the living apostles were too modest to claim it to themselves, that will not satisfy; all runs quite in a contrary style: the mercies of God and the blood of Christ being always repeated, whereas these are never once named. Now to imagine that there can be any thing of such great use to us, in which the scripture should be not only silent, but should run in a strain totally different from it, is not conceivable for if in any thing, the gospel ought to be full and explicit in all that which : ART. concerns our peace and reconciliation with God, and the XIV. means of our escaping his wrath, and obtaining his favour. Mark xi. 17. There is another doctrine that does also belong to this head, which is purgatory, that is not to be entered on here, but is referred to its proper place. Thus it appears, how ill this doctrine of works of supererogation is founded; and upon how many accounts it is evidently false; and yet upon it has been built not only a theory of a communication of those merits, and a treasure in the church, but a practice of so foul a nature; that in it the words of our Saviour spoken to the Jews, 'My house is a house of prayer, but ye have made it a den of thieves,' are accomplished in a high and most scandalous manner. It has been pretended that this was of the nature of a bank, of which the pope was the keeper; and that he could grant such bills and assignments upon it as he pleased:* this was done in so base and so crying a manner, that all who had any sense of probity in their own church were ashamed of it. In the primitive church there were very severe rules made, obliging all that had sinned publicly (and they were afterwards applied to such as had sinned secretly) to continue for many years in a state of separation from the sacrament, and of penance and discipline. But because all such general rules admit of a great variety of circumstances, taken from men's sins, their persons, and their repentance, there was a power given to all bishops by the council of Nice, to shorten the time, and to relax the severity, of those canons; and such favour as they saw cause to grant was called indulgence. This was just and necessary, and was a provision without which no constitution or society can be well governed. But after the tenth century, as the popes came to take this power in the whole extent of it into their own hands, so they found it too feeble to carry on the great designs that they grafted upon it. They gave it high names, and called it a plenary remission, and the pardon of all sins: which the world was taught to look on as a thing of a much higher nature, than the bare excusing of men from discipline and penance. Purgatory+ Upon the whole then it is evident, that the doctrine of purgatory is of heathen original; that the fire of it is, like the thunder of the Vatican, a harmless thing, which no wise man would be afraid of, were it not too often attended with church thunderbolts, persecutions, and massacres; and that it only serves to cheat the simple and ignorant out of their money, by giving them bills of exchange upon the other world for cash paid in this, without any danger of the bills returning protested.' Meagher's Popish Mass. A just exposure of this iniquitous traffic.-[ED.] The doctrine of purgatory is the mother of indulgences, and the fear of that hath introduced these: for the world happened to be abused like the countryman in the fable, who, being told he was likely to fall into a delirium in his feet, was advised for remedy to take the juice of cotton. He feared a disease that was not, and looked for a cure as ridiculous.' Bishop Taylor.—[ED.] was then got to be firmly believed, and all men were strangely ART. possessed with the terror of it: so a deliverance from pur- XIV. gatory, and by consequence an immediate admission into heaven, was believed to be the certain effect of it. And to support all this, the doctrine of counsels of perfection, of works of supererogation, and of the communication of those merits, was set up; and to that this was added, that a treasure made up of these, was at the pope's disposal, and in his keeping. The use that this was put to, was as bad as the forgery itself. Multitudes were by these means engaged to go to the Holy Land to recover it out of the hands of the Saracens afterwards they armed vast numbers against the heretics to extirpate them: they fought also all those quarrels which their ambitious pretensions engaged them in with emperors and other princes, by the same pay; and at last they set it to sale with the same impudence, and almost with the same methods, that mountebanks use in the venting of their secrets. This was so gross even in an ignorant age, and among the ruder sort, that it gave the first rise to the Reformation: and as the progress of it was a very signal work of God, so it was in a great measure owing to the scandals that this shameless practice had given the world. And upon this single reason it is that this matter has been more fully examined than was necessary; for the thing is so plain, that it has no sort of difficulty in it. ART. Heb. vii. 26. ARTICLE XV. Of Christ alone without Sin. Christ in the truth of our nature was made like unto us in all things (sin only except) from which he was clearly boid both in his flesh and in spirit. He came to be a Lamb without spot, who, by sacrifice of himself once made, should take away the sins of the World: and sin, as St. John saith, was not in him. But all we the rest (although baptized and born again in Christ) yet offend in many things; and if we say we habe no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. THIS Article relates to the former, and is put here as another foundation against all works of supererogation: for that doctrine, with the consequences of it, having given the first occasion to the Reformation, it was thought necessary to overthrow it entirely; and because the perfection of the saints must be supposed, before their supererogation can be thought on, that was therefore here opposed. That Christ was holy, without spot and blemish, harm1Pet. ii. 22. less, undefiled, and separate from sinners; that there was Acts x. 38. no guile in his mouth; that he never did amiss, but 'went 1 Pet. i. 19. about always doing good,' and was as a lamb without spot,' is so oft affirmed in the New Testament, that it can admit of no debate. This was not only true in his rational powers, the superior part called the spirit, in opposition to the lower part, but also in those appetites and affections that arise from our bodies, and from the union of our souls to them, called the flesh. For though in these Christ, having the human nature truly in him, had the appetites of hunger in him, yet the Devil could not tempt him by that to distrust God, or to desire a miraculous supply sooner than was fitting: he overcame even that necessary appetite, whensoever there was Johniv.34. an occasion given him to do the will of his heavenly Father:' he had also in him the aversions to pain and suffering, and the horror at a violent and ignominious death, which are planted in our natures; and in this it was natural to him to wish and to pray that the cup might pass from him. But in this his purity appeared the most eminently, that though he felt the weight of his nature to a vast degree, he did, notwithstanding that, limit and conquer it so entirely, that he Matt. xxvi. resigned himself absolutely to his Father's will: 'Not my will, but thy will be done.' 37-39. Besides all that has been already said upon the former Articles, to prove that some taint and degree of the original |