And though it be true, thaf after the first edition of the covenant of grace, the matter of the first covenant was represented to the Israelites in the moral law ; yet that representation was intended and designed to be subservient, and added to the promise. Gal. iii. 19- and so (as an acute and learned divine * speaks) the very decalogue or moral law itself pertained to the covenant of grace ; yea, in some sort flowed out of this covenant, as it was promulged by the counsel of God to be sei-viceable to it ; both antecedently to lead men by the conviction of sin, fear of wrath, and self-despair, to the covenant of grace ; and also consequently as it is a pattern of obedience and rule of holiness. For had it been published as a covenant designed intentionally to its primitive use and end, it had totally frustrated the covenant of graces
Thesis 3. llioitgh the primordial tight or first glimmerings of this covenant of grace ^ were comparatively loeak arid ohscurc ; yet from the first publication of it to Adarn^ God in all ages hath been amplifying the privileges^ and heightening the glory of this second covenant in all the after expressures and editions of it unto this day, and will more and more amplify and illustrate it to the end of the zmrld.
That first promise, Gen. iii. 15. is like the first small spring or head of a great river, which the farther it runs, the bigger it grows by the accession of more waters to it. Or like the sun in the heavens, which the higher it mounts, the more bright and glorious the day still grows.
In that period of time, betwixt Adam and Abraham, we find no token of God's covenant ordered therein to be ap]:)lied to the infant seed of believers. But in that second edition of the covenant to Abraham, the privileges of the covenant were amplified, and his infant-t:eed not only taken into the covenant (as they were
* Turretini Pars 2aa ivc. V2.p. i H.
50 VIXBICIARIIM VINDEX.
before) but also added to the visible church, by receiving the token of the covenant, which then was circumcision ; and so here is a great addition made to the visible church, even the whole infant off-spring of adult believers.
From that period, until the coming of the Messiah in the flesh, the Jewish church, and their infant-seed, except only some few proselytes out of the Gentile nations, made up the visible church of God, and the poor Gentiles were without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope, and without God in the world, Eph. ii. 12. but in this glorious third period the covenant again enlarges itself more than before, and the privileges of it are no longer limited, and restrained t© the Jewish believers, and their infant- seed ; but the Gentiles also are taken into the covenant, and the door of faith was opened unto thefti, Acts xiv. 27. the partition- wall was now broken down, which separated the church from the Gentile world, Epb. ii. 14. This was a glorious enlargement of tlie covenant, and many glorious prophecies and promises were ful- filled in it ; such as those, Isa. xi. 10. and xlii. 1, 6. xlix. 22. liv. 3. Ix. 3, 5, 11, 16. Ixii. 2, S^c.
And though the covenant, as to its external part, seems to have lost ground in the breaking off of the Jewish nation from the church ; yet, like the sea, what it loses in one place, it gains vvith advantage upon another: The addition of many Gentile nations to the church, more than recompenses for the present breaking off of that one nation of the Jews. And indeed they are broken off but for a time, for God shall graff them in again, Rom. xi. 23. This therefore being the design of God, and steady course of his covenant of grace, more and more to enlarge itself in all ages ; no- thing can be more opposite to the nature of this covenant, than to narrow and contract its privileges in its farther progress, and cut off a whole species from it, which it formerly took in.
Thesis 4. It is past all doubt and contradiction, that the infant- seed of Abraham, under the second edition of the covenant of grace, were taken with their believing parents into God's gracious cove- nant, had the seal of that covenant applied to them, and were thereby added to the visible church. Gen. xvii. 7, 8, 9, 10, 11. which was a gracious privilege of the covenant superadded to all the former, and such as sweeps away all the frivolous and ground- less cavils and exceptions of those that object the incapacity of in- fants to ^nter into covenant with God, or receive benefit from the external privileges of the visible church. Nor can the subtlest e- nemy to infant-baptism give us a convincing reason why the in- fants of Gentile behevers are not equally capable of the same be- Befits tliat the infants of Jewish believers were, if they still stand
VINDICIARUM VINDEX. fJio
wnder the same covenant that the former stood undei* ; and God hath no where repealed the gracious grant formerly made to the in- fant-seed of his covenant-people.
Thesis 5. It is to me clear, beyond all contradiction, from Rom. xi. 17. " If some of the branches be broken off, and thou being a " wild olive-tree, wert grafted in amongst them, and with them " partakest of the root and fatness of the olive-tree :"" I say I can scarce desire a clearer scripture-light than this text gives, to satisfy my understanding in this case, that when God, brake off tlie unbe- lieving Jews from the church, both parents and children together, the believing Gentiles, which are as truly Abraham's seed as they were. Gal. iii. 29. yea, the more excellent seed of Abraham, were implanted or ingrafted in their room, and do as amply enjoy the privileges of that covenant, both internal and external, for them.- selves and for their infant-seed, as ever any members of the Jewish church did or could do.