The following discourse, wherein he pursues the business in hand, is so pretty as that I cannot but once more present it to the reader. Saith he : " As in a politic or civil corporation, it is better that the governors should permit theraembers respectively to go or be at liberty, that so they may follow their business and occupations in the world upon the better terras, though by occasion of this liberty they may be- have themselves in sundry kinds very unworthily, than it would be to keep them close pi'isoners, though hereby the said inconveniences might certainly be prevented. In like manner, it is much better for the body of Christ, and for the respective members of it, that he should
VOL. XL 35
5 t6 DOCTRINE OF THE saints' PERSEVERANCE. [CHAP.
leave them at liberty to obey and serve God, and follow the impor- tant affairs of their souls freely and without any physical necessita- tion, though some do turn this liberty into wantonness, and so into destruction, than it would be to deprive them of this liberty, and to cause and constrain them to any course whatsoever out of necessity, though it is true the committing of much sin and iniquity would be prevented hereby in many. The dismembering of the body of Christ's apostles by the apostasy of Judas was no disparagement either to Christ himself or it."
Ans. The sum of the whole discourse is, That the Lord Jesus Christ hath no way to keep and secure his members to himself, that none of them perish, but by taking away their liberty; which rather than do, it is more to his honour to let them abuse it to their everlasting destruction. And to this end sundry fine supposals are scattered through the whole discourse; as, — 1. That the liberty of believers is a liberty to sin, which they may abuse to their own destruction. The apostle is of another mind, Rom. vi. 17-19, " God be thanked, that ye were the servants of sin, but ye have obeyed from the heart that form of doctrine which was delivered you. Be- ing then made free from sin, ye became the servants of righteous- ness," etc. 2. That there is no real efiicacy of grace, that will certainly fulfil in believers the good pleasure of God's goodness, and bring forth the fruits of an abiding holiness, but what must needs de- prive them in whom it is of their liberty. And suitably hereunto, 3. That God having, through Christ, made his saints spiritually free from sin unto righteousness, so that, with the utmost liberty that they are capable of as creatures, they shall surely do good, cannot by his Spirit continue them in that condition infallibly with- out the destruction of their liberty. 4. That the spiritual operation of God in and with the wills of men induceth a uecessitation as to their manner of operation, so that they must act on that account as necessary and not as free agents; with such other the like sup- posals, which are so many gross figments, whereof Mr Goodwin shall be able to jn'ove no one to eternity. For the removal, then, of all the fine words here tendered out of our way, it may suffice to tell their author that He who is made redemption to his saints, — that sets them free from their bondage to sin by his Spirit, which is always accom- panied with liberty; and makes them willing, ready, and ft-ee to righteousness and holiness in the day of his power towards them ; whose effectual grace enlargeth and improves all their faculties in their operations, with the choicest attendancies as to the manner of their working, — can and doth, by, in, and with the perfect exercise of their liberty, keep them to himself in their union and communion with him for ever; that this pretended liberty unto sin is a bondage from which Christ frees his saints; neither is any thing that can be
XV.] THE SINS OF BELIEVEKS CONSIDERED. 547
imagined more derogatory to the glory of his grace than to affirm that he cannot keep those committed to him infalhbly to the end, without depriving them of thehberty which they have alone through him. Of physical necessitation enough hath been spoken before. Judas was never a member of the body of Christ, or of Christ, in the acceptation whereof we speak. By the " body of the apostles" is intended only their number, of which Judas (though he was never of that body whereof they were members) was one.
Farther; the wickedness of this apprehension, that Christ should lose any of those who are true and living members of his mystical body, is aggravated upon the account of that state and condition whereinto he parts with them, they being thereby made members of Satan and his kingdom, God and the devil so interchanging chil- dren, to the great dishonour and reproach of his name. To this Mr Goodwin replies in the 28th section: —
" For the interchange of members between Christ and Satan, the Scripture presenteth it as a thing possible, yea, as frequent and ordinary. 'Know ye not,' saith the apostle, 'that your bodies are the members of Christ? Shall I then take the members of Christ, and make them the members of an harlot?' In the original it is, "Apag ovv ra /zsA-jj tou Xpisrou ToirjffMj etc.; that is, 'Taking away the members of Christ, shall I make them,' etc.; meaning that true be- - lievers, who only are the members of Christ, disrelate themselves to him, cease to be members of his body, whilst they live in a course of whoredom and adultery, and make themselves members of another far different relation, namely, of those harlots with whom they sin- fully converse, and consequently, by such a mediation, of the devil."