•' the end of the law for righteousness, to every one that believeth,'* Rom. X. 4. Are works and grace more consistent than grace with grace ? Explain your meaning in this paradoxical eocpression, and leave not yourself and others in such a maze. I read, Gal. iii. 19. for what end God published the law 430 years after the promise •was made to Abraham, and tind it zcas added because of ' transgres- sion, rr^cGiTidn, it was put to, not set up by itself alone as a distinct covenant, but added as an appendix to the cove^iajit of grace ; whence it is plain, that God added the Sinai laiv to the profnise, with evaii- gelical ends and purposes. If then I preach the law to the very same evangelical uses and purposes for which God added it to the promise, do I therein make an ill use of the law, and mingle life and death together .'^ But preaching it, as a pure covenant of ivories, as it holds forth justification to sinners by obedience to its precepts, do I thcri make it blessedly subservient (as you speak) to the promise or cove- 'iiant of grace .? The law was added because of transgression, that is. to restrain sin in the world, and to convince sinners under guilt, of tlie necessity of another righteousness than their own, even that of Chri,'3t, and for the same ends God added it to the promise. I always did, and still shall preach it, and I am persuaded, without the least danger of mingling law and gospel, life and death together, in vour sense.
It is plain to me, that in the publication of the law on Sinai, God did not in the least intend to give them so much as a direction how to obtain justification by their most punctual obedience to its precepts, that being to fallen man utterly impossible ; and beside, had he pro- mulged the law to that end and purpose, he had not added it, but di» rectly opposed it to the promise ; which it is manifested he did not ; Gal. iii. 21. " Is the lavr then against the promise of God .? God for-* bid." And verse 18. makes it appear, that had it been set up to that end and purpose, it had utterly disannulled the promise ; for iftln; inheritance he of the law, it is no more hy promise. What then can be clearer, than that the law at Sinai was published with graciou3 gospel-ends and purposes, to lead men to Christ, which Adam's co- venant had no respect or reference to 't And therefore it can never be a pure Adam's covenant, as you falsely call it, neither is it capable of becoming a pure covenant oficorks to any man, but by his own fault, in rejecting the righteousness of Christ, and seeking justifica- tion by the works of the law, as the mistaken carnal Jews did, Rom. X. 3. and other legal justiciaries now do. And upon this account only it is that Paul, who so highly praises the law in its subserviency to Christ, thunders so dreadfully against it, as it is thus set by igno- rant mistaken souls in direct opposition to Christ.
(pthly,) And further, to clear this point, the apostle tells us, Rom. X. 4. " For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth.'' Whence I argue. That if Adam's covenant had an end, namelv, the justification of men by their own personal obe- dience ; and the law at Sinai had a quite contrary end, namely, to
A REPLY TO MR. CARY"*S SOLEMX CALL. 337
Wing sinners to Christ by faith for their rii^hteousncss ; the one to keep him witliin himself, tlie other to take him quite out of himself, and bring liim for his justification to the righteousness of another, even that of Christ ; then that Sinai law cannot possibly be the same thing with Adam's covenant of' Kvrks. But the antecedent is true and plain in the forecited text, therefore so is the consequent.
Christ is the end of the law for righteousness. Take the law here either more strictly, for the moral la:i\ or more largely, as it compre- hends the ceremonial laza, still Christ is the end of the laze. The moral law shuts up every man to Christ for righteousness, by con- vincing him (according to God's design in the publication of it) of the impossibility of obtaining justification in the way of works.
And the ceremonial law many ways prefigured Christ, his death and satisfaction, by blood, in our room, and so led men to Christ their true propitiation ; and all its types were fulfilled and ended in Christ. Was there any such thing in Adam's covenant? You must prove there was, else you will never be able to make them one and the same covenant.
(6thl//,) It seems exceeding probable from Acts vii. 27, 38. that the Sinai cove }ia7it wasdelivercd to Mosesby Jesus Christ, therecalled the ayigel. " This is he that w^as in the church in the wilderness, with the angel that spake to him in the mount Sinai, and with our fathers, who received the lively oracles to give unto us." Now, if Christ himself were the Angel, and tlie precepts of the law delivered by him to Moses were the lively oracles ofGod^ as they are expressly aifirmed to be ; then the law delivered on mount Sinai cannot be a pure Adam's covenant of works : for it is never to be imagined that Jesus Christ himself should deliver to Moses such a covenant, di- rectly opposite to all theends of hisfuture incarnation; and that those precepts (which, if they were of the same nature, and revived to the same end, at which Adam's covenant directly aimed) should be call- ed the lively oracles of God ; when contrariwise, upon your supposi- tion, they could be no other than a ministration of condemnation and death : but that they were lively oracles, viz. in their design and in- tention, is plain in the text ; and that they were delivered to Moses by Jesus Christ, the angel of the covenant, seems more than proba- ble, by comparing it with the former verses.
(7^/%,) Neither is it easy to imagine how such a covenant, which by the fall of Adam had utterly lost all its promises, privileges and bles- sings, and could retain nothing but the curses and punishments an- nexed to it, in case of the least failure, could possibly be numbered among the chief privileges in which God's Israel gloried ; as it appa- rently was, Rom. ix. 4. " Who are Israelites ; to whom pcTtaineth the adoption, and the glory, and the covenants, and the givino- of the law, and the service of God, and the promises."
These things considered, with many more (whicli the intended bre- vity of this discourse will not now admit) I am fully satisfied of the
S38 A RrPLY TO ME. CAR\"s SOLEMN CALL.
falsity of youv position, and so may you too, when you shall review tnc? many gross and palpable absurdities with which I have clogged and loaded it, with many more, regularly and fairly deducible from it ; which I could easily produce, did I not suspect these I have produced, liave already prest your patience a Httle too far ; but if ever I shall see (which I never expect) a fair and scriptural solution of these weighty objections, you may expect from me more arguments against your unsound jjosition^ which, at the present, I judge needless to add.