we cannot certainly conclude, that such a man is a true Christian, or in the state of salvation, because such things may be found upon him.

II. And, therefore, in the next place, let us see WHAT THESE THINGS ARE, THAT DO ACCOMPANY SALVATION.

And they are of Three sorts:

Certain Principles of Faith in the Understanding.

Certain Gracious Impressions upon the Heart and Will. A certain regular Obedience in the whole course of a man's Life and Conversation.

And here we must, upon every one of these, discover these Two things:

What those principles, habits, and obedience are.

And

then, Whether we have those principles, impressions, and obedience in a saving manner.

i. The FIRST sort of things, that accompany salvation, are 1. Divine Principles of Truth in the understanding.

And these are of two kinds; either doctrinal, or practical: those, whose immediate tendency is information of the judgment; or those, whose immediate effect is the influencing and regulating of our lives and practice.

(1) Doctrinal Principles, are absolutely necessary to salvation.

Such, I mean, as are the vital and fundamental articles of the Christian Faith. It is true, it is not necessary for every private Christian to busy and beat his head about the nice and curious questions of religion, which have always been disputed; but will never be decided, until our imperfect knowledge give place to perfect. Some things in Christian Religion are ornamental ; and such are the more abstruse points, which are not so clearly revealed to us in the Scriptures: these, indeed, those, who are of parts and have competent leisure, ought to search into, as the noblest study and science they can employ themselves about. Other things are fundamental and vital, the ignorance of which excludes men from all possibility of salvation: and these we

ought to know and believe explicitly; as being truths, which are most clearly revealed to us.

And such are,

[1] The doctrine of the Ever-Blessed Trinity: that there is One Infinite Essence, in Three distinct Hypostases or Persons. A mystery, far beyond all the comprehension of reason, and far deeper than the longest line of our understanding can possibly fathom; yet we are bound to adore and believe what we cannot comprehend: yea, and thus far reason itself teacheth us, that such a being cannot be God, which may be comprehended by man. This mystery of Three in One, the Scripture hath expressly declared to us: 1. John v. 7. There are three, that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost: and these three are one: they are one, not only in their record and testimony, as some heretics would gloss the place to evade the clear force of it; but in essence, being, power, nature, and all the divine attributes and perfections: for, were this unity only in testimony, it might well be wondered why the Apostle should, in the very next verse, alter the phrase, and there tell us, that the Spirit, and the Water, and the Blood, agree in one: here, it is evident, from the manner of expression, that these are one only in testimony; but, when it is said, of the Father, and the Word, (that is Jesus Christ, that Word which was made flesh,) and the Spirit, not that they agree in one, but that they are one, it can bear no other signification, but that they are one infinite, eternal, ever-blessed essence, having all the same essential properties and perfections. How far the express belief of this great truth was necessary before the incarnation of our Saviour, I will not now dispute; though there want not sufficient evidences that it was known to the Jews then: but, since our obligation to believe a truth is proportionable to the evidence that can be produced for it; therefore now, since the Scripture is express in this particular, an explicit belief of it is necessary to us, whatsoever it were to them: yea, so far necessary in order to eternal life, that he, who denieth and opposeth it, cannot worship the True God, who is Three in One; cannot worship the Lord Jesus Christ, who is as truly and verily God as he is Man; and therefore cannot be in any capacity of obtaining salvation. For it is the highest idolatry in the world, to worship that for our God, which is not so: now our God is Three in One; and therefore they, who pretend to worship him, whom yet they deny to be so, do but worship an idol of their own

fancying, and not the True God. Yea, our Saviour Jesus Christ makes this to be a fundamental Article of our Faith: John xvii. 3. This is life eternal, that they might know thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent: so that, if we know not God, as he is the True God, we cannot have eternal life; but as he is the True God, so he is Three Persons in One Nature and Essence. But some may say, "This seems rather to make against it for, if the Father be the only True God, then how can Jesus Christ be the True God too?" To this I answer, that the particle only refers not to the Father, but to the True God: now the word God is an essential, and not a personal attribution; and so both God the Father is the only True God, and God the Son is the only True God, and God the Holy Ghost is the only True God, because they are all one and the same only True God : our Saviour saith not that only the father is the True God, but the father is the only True God: and so also is each person in the Ever-Blessed Trinity; for the Godhead is not divided with the Persons, and therefore there is the Father, the Son, and the Spirit, but these are all the only True God.

This is the First Doctrinal Principle.

[2] Another principle, consequent upon the former, is the knowledge and belief of that great mystery of the Two Natures united in One Person of our Lord Christ.

His

This is, likewise, a fundamental truth: truth, as to both parts of it; both that he is God, and that he is man. This we find most clearly asserted by the Apostle, Rom. i. 3, 4. Jesus Christ our Lord, which was made of the seed of David according to the flesh, And declared to be the Son of God with power, according to the Spirit of Holiness, by the resurrection from the dead. divinity is most irrefragably proved, past all the cunning evasions of Socinian perverseness, in many places of Scripture; but, especially, in the first to the Hebrews, v. 8. Unto the Son he saith, Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever: and, vv. 10, 11, 12. speaking of the same Son, Thou, Lord, in the beginning hast laid the foundation of the earth; and the heavens are the works of thy hands: They shall perish, but thou remaïnest.....they shall change: but thou art the same, and thy years shall not fail: not to mention v. 3. Who being the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his Father's person, and upholding all things by the word of his power: nor v. 2. By whom also he made the worlds. Where, I think, we may challenge all the wit of hell to evade the force of this argument. He, certainly, is the only True

God, who is God the Creator: for he, that made all things, is God, saith the Apostle, Heb. iii. 4: but so is the Lord Jesus Christ, as these places do abundantly testify; and therefore he is True God, a God by nature and essence, and not only by authority and donation. Again, if Jesus Christ ought to be served and worshipped by us, then certainly he is a God by nature; but none, who acknowledge the name of Christ, excepting that accursed Blandatra and a few of his adherents, will deny that he ought to be worshipped, whom all the angels in heaven are commanded to worship, Heb. i. 6. Let all the angels of God worship him: therefore he must needs be God by nature, and not by office only. See, for this, Gal. iv. 8. where the Apostle tells the believing Galatians, that, heretofore, when they were Gentiles, they did service unto them, which by nature are no gods; implying, that they were guilty of most gross and stupid idolatry in so doing: but, if Christ be not God by nature, either the Apostle commanded these believers to worship him, or not: if not, then they ought not to worship him; and very choice Christians they are, who should be driven to this: if he did, then he commanded them to be guilty of idolatry, like their former; for he tells them, they were idolaters, in worshipping those, who by nature are not gods.

And, that the owning of both natures in Christ is a Fundamental Article of Faith, appears,

Ist. In that the denying of the Human Nature in Christ, is expressly sentenced as damnable.

"Every

1 John iv. 3. Every spirit, that confesseth not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh, is not of God: and this is that spirit of Antichrist, of which ye have heard that it should come; and even now already is it in the world. The Apostle doth not say, spirit, that confesseth not that Jesus Christ is come into the world;" to prevent the evasion of those heretics, who pretended that he was revealed in the spirit, or in the conscience, or in the gospel: but he saith, come in the flesh, in the assumption of a true human nature: those, who deny this, are not of God. And,

2dly. For the denying of his Divine Nature, that also is in itself damnable.

1 John ii. 22. He is Antichrist; that denieth the Father and the Son. And, certainly, if it be so damnable a heresy to deny the Humanity of Christ, much more then his Divinity; for it was his divine nature, that put worth and value into all the

:

actions and sufferings of his human, and made them truly meritorious and, therefore, if there be no salvation attainable, but through faith in the merits of Jesus Christ; they are utterly excluded from all possibility of being saved, who destroy the very belief of those merits through which alone they can be saved.

That is, therefore, another Fundamental Truth of the Gospel. [3] Justification, in a free gratuitous way, in opposition to the works of the Law, is a Fundamental Article of our Faith.

In confirming this, the Apostle spends eleven whole chapters in his Epistle to the Romans. The denying of this doctrine is utterly inconsistent with a state of salvation. See, for this, Gal. v. 4. Whosoever of you are justified by the Law, Christ is become of no effect unto you: ye are fallen from grace. Indeed, many learned men are at variance concerning the manner of obtaining Justification by the righteousness of Christ; some taking one way and some another, and it is no easy matter to reconcile and accommodate them: but, so long as they hold this foundation, that none can be accepted of God, but only through the merits and righteousness of Jesus Christ; though some may build hay or stubble upon this foundation, they may be safe, though they suffer loss in their superstructure. Only to me, that seems the best and safest way, which makes most for the honour of our Lord Christ; for we cannot easily err in ascribing too much unto him, who is the Author of our Salvation: and therefore, certainly, to make the merits and righteousness of Jesus Christ the very matter of our Justification, and the imputation of them to us the formal cause of it, seems more honourable to him, and, I think, more consonant unto Scripture, than only to make it a remote procatarctical cause, moving God to accept of our faith and obedience, as our righteousness, and thereupon to justify us.

[4] The doctrine of Sanctification, and of the absolute mecessity of a thorough Change and Renovation of our Natures, is a Fundamental Truth, without the acknowledging of which, we can never be saved.

For our Saviour hath told us, John iii. 5. Except a man be born again of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. And, certainly, if our undergoing of such a thorough and universal change be of such absolute necessity, the knowing and believing of it must needs be; for, if we believe it not necessary, we shall never be engaged heartily to endeavour it. And, therefore,