Baxter - Houston-Packer Collection BT70 .B397 1675

andDecrees ofgod, &c. thefe fame naturalfaculties are commanded to all men, even the unrege- nerate, under the names ofFaithand Repentance ; And fo thefe are their, duties. And it is certain, that a Courfe of Moral means ( preaching, reading, meditating, conference, threatnings , promifes, mercies, afflieti- ons ) are appointed andufed to the procuring the Paid faculties toperform thefe commanded as : It is certain that these Means have an Aptitude to their end : And that God worketh by his own means : And appointeth not man to ufe them in vain; And that in working Grace, God preferv- eth and reformeth Nature, and worketh on Man asMan : and according to the Nature of his means. 249. And I think none dare deny, but that God is Able by his Spirits powerful operation, without any Antecedent newHabit or dilpofirion, to fet home thefe fame means fo effeétually on the Natural powers of the foul, as (hall excite them CO the firft Alts of Faith and Repentance : And by them imprint a Habit, as is faid, and fhall be faid again inPart 3. And if hecan dofo, andCan do otherwife, which then is likeft to be his ordi- nary way, I leave tothe obfervers of Scripture and Experience. 450. This is the Common fenfe ofDivines, who place Vocation, ex- citing the firft a& of Faith and Repentance, before Union with Chrift, and before Sanótification, which giveth the habit, till Mr. Pemble vinci. Grat. taught otherwife, whom Bithop G.Domname confuted in the Appen- dix to his Treatife ofPerfeverance. a51. As to the queftion, How this Grace is called Infufed,andnot Na- tural ? I anfwer, It is called infufedand Supernatural, becaufe, r. It is not wrought by anyNatural-moral means only, but by supernatural-moral means, viz. Revelation, in andby the Gofpel ofChrift. a. Andthis fuper- natural Revelation cannot workit, without the /pedal extraordinary ope- ration and imprefonby the Holy Ghofl, above the common concurfe of God with all his Creatures, as he isfonsnatures. This the Schools have Metaphoricallycalled Infufion. 252. But it may be called Natural, r. In that mans Naturalfaculties receiveCods Influx, a. And perform the ad : 3. And .areperfelted.by it as the Natural body is by Health. 253. And what the difference isexparse Dei agentis (6- ex parte Ice- ) between Gods Natural and Gracious operations, I (hall after open. in the thirdPart. 254. TheSchoolmen, efpecially thescotiffs and Ockam, and many Fran- cifcans, Benedit-fines, and other Fryers, (yea, filchOratorians as Gibieuf) have lied fo high inmakingGrace fupernatural, ( feigning a fiateofpure Naturals that had none) and talk fo phanatically of the Deification of the foul, as I think bath enfnared force Sectaries among us to imitate them, feigning that the firft Covenant isMoral as a Law, and the fecond Covenant is thevery in-being of a DivineNature, which they ( though obfcurely) feem to defcribe as fomewhat above all Habits and Inclinati- ons, put intoour own nature, like anotherform orfoul: Whichover-doing tendeth to temptmen to Infidelity, by doubting whether mans Nature was made by the Creator to enjoy God in Heaven or nor, when it mutt be made another thing to attain it. SECT; 41

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