540 DOCTRINE OF THE SAINTS* PERSEVERANCE. [CHAP.
temper, through the violence of temptation and the tumultuating of lusts, the whole new man may be for a season so shattered, and his parts laid out of the way as to such a due answering one to another that the whole may be serviceable to the work of faith (as a disordered army, wherein is all its fundamental strength, as well as when it is rallied in battalia, is altogether unserviceable until it be reduced to order), that sin may take the opportunity to fill their corrupt heart (as far as it is corrupt) with its pleasure and desirableness, and so to set the thoughts of it on work to contrive means for its accomplish- ment.^ Now as, through the goodness of their Father, and supplies of grace, which, through the covenant thereof, they do receive, this distemper seizeth believers but rarely and extraordinarily, so it doth no way prove them to sin with malice, or without hatred of and opposition (secret opposition, which may be as secret as some in- clinations to sin are, — not known to ourselves) to the things they do in and under that condition.
That which follows in this section being suited to the apprehension of some particular men, though of great name and esteem, according to their worth and desert in the church of God, as Ursin, Parseus, and the rest, about reigning sin, wherein, as I have declared, my thoughts fall not in with them, I shall not need to insist any longer npon it. Paraeus, after all his aggravations of the sins of believers, yet adds that they sin not (nor did David) ex contem'ptu Dei, but through a. pre-occupation or surprisal of sin; which I believe to be the persuasion of far the greatest number of saints in the world, what- ever Mr Goodwin is pleased to think or say to the contrary. Nor is their apprehension weakened by Nathan's charging upon David his "despising of the commandment of the Lord" in doing evil, which, as it is virtually done in every sin, and in great sins in an eminent manner, so that it did amount indeed not only to a conse- quential, but a formal voluntary contempt of God, Mr Goodwin shall never prove. A father often and severely chargeth upon his son a de- spising of his command, when he hath been carried out to transgress it, when yet he knows his son honoureth and reverenceth him in his heart, and is exceedingly remote from any resolved contempt of him.
The close of all is a concession of the contra-Remonstrants at the Hague conference, " That believers might fall into such sins as that the church, according to the commandment of Christ, must pro- nounce that they shall no longer abide in her communion, and that they shall have no part in the kingdom of Christ;" which being made an argument for the apostasy of the saints, I shall consider how it is here improved by Mr Goodwin.
> Altered from the original, which runs thiis, affording no sense, " Tliat sin taking
the opportunity to fill their corrupt part, to continue means for its accomplish-
meut." — Ed.
XV.] THE SINS OF BELIEVERS CONSIDERED. 541
" Certainly," saith he, " their sense was, that true believers may sin above the rate of those who sin out of infirmity, inasmuch as there is no commandment of Christ that any church of his should eject such persons out of their communion who sin out of infirmity only. So that, by the confession of our adversaries themselves, even true believers may perpetrate such sins which are of a deeper demerit than to be numbered amongst sins of infirmity; yea, such sins for which the church of Christ, according to the commandment of Christ, stands bound to judge them for ever excluded from the kingdom of God, without repentance. From whence it undeniably follows that they may commit such sins whereby their faith in Christ will be totally lost, because there is no condemnation unto those that are by faith in Jesus Christ, whether they repent or not : and therefore they that stand in need of repentance to give them a right and title to the kingdom of God are no sons of God by faith ; for were they sons, they would be heirs also, and consequently have right and title to the inheritance. So that to pretend that howsoever the saints may fall into great and grievous sins, yet they shall certainly be renewed again by repentance before they die, though this be an assertion without any bottom on reason or truth, yet doth it no ways oppose, but suppose rather, a possibility of the total defection of faith in true believers."
Ans. 1. That " true believers may sin above the rate of sins of in- firmity," because they may so sin as that, according to the appoint- ment of Jesus Christ, they may be cast out of a particular church, is not attempted to be proved. Doth Mr Goodwin think none may be excommunicated but such as have sinned themselves out of the state of grace? That a man may, through infirmity, fall into some such sin as for it to be amoved from a church society (that amotion being an ordinance of Christ for his recovery from that sin), I know not that it can be reasonably questioned. So that our confession, that true believers may so sin as to be righteously cast out of the external, visible society of a particular church, doth no way enforce us to acknowledge that they may sin above the rate of them who are overtaken with or surprised in sin upon the account of their weak- ness or infirmity.