(1.) That God's covenant with Abraham, Gen. xvii. was the same covenant for substance we Gentile believers are now under; and they substantially prove it from Luke i. from the 54th to the 74th verse ; which place evidently shews the sameness of the covenant of grace they were, and we are now under; and from Matth. xxi. 41, 43. the same vineyard and kingdom the Jews then had, is now let out to us Gentiles; and from Rom. xi. that the Gentile Christians are grafted into the same olive-tree, from which the Jews were broken off for
their unbelief; and that the blessing of Abraham cometh now upon the Gentiles, Gal. iii. 8, 14, 16. And in a word, that the partition- wall bet\\axt them and us is now pulled down ; and that we, through faith, are let into the self-same covenant, and all the privileges they then enjoyed, Eph. ii. 13.
(2.) They assert and prove, that in Abraham's covenant the infant- seed were taken in with their parents, and that in token thereof, they were to have the sign of the covenant applied to them, Gen. xvii. 9.
(3.) They affirm and prove. That the promise of God to Abra- ham and his seed, with the privileges thereof to his children, do, for the substance of them, descend to believers now, and their seed, Actsii. 38, 39. and though the external sign, viz. circumcision^ be changed, yet baptism takes its place under the gospel. Col. ii. 11, 12.
(4.) They constantly affirm, that none of those grants or privileges made to the infant-seed of Abraham's family, were ever repealed or revoked by Christ or his apostles; and therefore believers children are now in the rightful possession of them ; and that therefore there needed no new command or promise : In Abraham's covenant we find our duty to sign our children ^vith the sign of the covenant ; and in Abraham's promise we find God's gracious grant to our children, as well as his, especially since the apostle directs us, in this very re- spect, to the covenant of God with Abraham, Acts ii, 38, 39.
These, sir, are the principles on which we lay (as you say) great stress, and which to this day you have never been able to shake down; here therefore you attempt a new method to do it, by proving this covenant is now abolished ; and this is your method, in which you promise yourself great success : Three things yon pretend to prove ;
(1.) That the Sinai covenant, Exod. xx.
(2.) That Abraham's covenant, Gen. xvii. are no gospel-cove- nants ; and that because,
(3.) The gospel-covenant is absolute and unconditional.
How you come to hook in the Mosaic covenant into this controver- sy, is not very evident, unless you think it were easy for you to prove that to be a covenant ofucorks ; and then Abraham's covenant, Gen. xvii. being an Old Testament covenant, were the more easily proved to be of the same nature. I am obliged to examine your three posi- tions above noted, and if I evidence to the world the falsity of tliem, the cause you manage is so far lost, and the right of believers infants to baptism stands firm upon its old and sure foundation. I begin therefore with your
That the covenant made with Israel, on mount Sinai, is the very same covenant qficorks made zcith Adam in innocency, p. 122. and divers other places of your book, the very same.
A REPLY TO WR. CAllY^S SOLEMN CALL. 331
Now, if you prove that this assertion of yours doth naturally and re- gularly drawmany false and absurd consequents upon vou, which yoii are, and must be Ibrced to own, then this your ^067^7o/? cannot be true; for from true premises, nothing but truth can naturally and regularly follow ; but I shall make it plain to you, that this your position regu- larly draws many false conclusions, and gross absurdities, upon you ; some of which vou own expressly, and others you as good as own, be- ing able to return nothing rational or satisfactory in your own de- fence against thtm.
(1.) From this assertion, that the Sinai covenant was a pure cove- nant o/'zcorJis, the very same with Adam's covenant^ it regularly and necessarily follows, that either Moses and all Israel were damned, there being no salvation possible to be attained by that first cove- nant ; or else, that there was a covenant of grace at the same time running parallel with that covenant of works ; and so the elect peo- ple of God were at one and the same time under the first, as a cove- nant of death and condemnation ; and under the second, as a cove- nant of grace and justification.
This dilemma pinches you. To assert, that Moses, and all the elect of God, under that dispensation, were damned, you dare not ; and if you had, you must have expunged the eleventh chapter to the He- brews, and a great part of the New Testament, together with all your hopes of sitting down with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, in the kingdom of heaven. The latter, therefore, (seeing you cannot avoid) you are forced upon, and in plain words yield it, p. 174, 175. ' That Moses and the whole body of the children of Israel, without exception of any, were under, yea, absolutely under the severest penalties of a dreadful curse ; that the covenant they were under, could be no other than a covenant of works, a ministration of death and condemnation ; when yet it is also evident from the same holy scriptures of truth, that at the same time both Moses and all the elect among that people were under a pure covenant of gospel-grace; and that these two covenants were just the opposite the one to the other; but to this you have nothing to say, but with the apostle in another case, O the depth !'
Here, sir, you father a pure and perfect contradiction upon the holy scriptures, that it speaks things just opposite and contradictory- one to the other, and of necessity one part or member of a contradic- tion must be false : this all the rational world knows ; but so it is, say you, and fly to the infinite wisdom to reconcile them ; for you say, You know not what to say to it. Just so the papists serve us in the confroversy about tr an substantiation, when they cannot reconcile one thing with another, they fly to the omnipotent power to do it.
But, sir, I wonder how you hold and hug a principle that runs na- turally into such gross absurdities: Do you see wh.at follows from hence by unavoidable consetjuences? You must, according to thisprin- ciple, hold, That Moses, and all God's pecidiar elect people in Israel,
352 A KEPLY TO MR. CARY*S SOLEMN CALL.
most, during their life, hang mid- way between justification and con- demnation ; and, after death, between heaven and hell.