o The Covenant of Works Chap. 3. The Covenant of works was to mans prefer - vation The Covenant of grace was to mans reflitu- tion. The Cotenant of works was firft in time. The Covenant of grace in or. der of time followed after. difabled from yeelding obedience, of this there is no controver- fie; and therefore I need not to make no more words about it. And from hence all other differences which I ihall obferve , or which (asI firppofe) are obfervable, have their rife , which are thefe following. The Covenant of Works, or (as learned Camero calls it) the Covenant of Nature was for prefervation of man in life, in pre - fent blífe and happineffe, to hold him in the condition in which it found him, which is implied in the penalty threatened , as was before noted, man muff not die till fin enter, and expreft in that promife of God, Do this and live, his life muff be continued as long as his obedience lafted, his happineffe muft have been per- petuated, though not necefrarily in the fame degree; God might have tranflated him from a life on earth to a life in heaven, and kept to the termes of the Covenant. The Covenant of Grace is for mans reftitution,reconciliation and recovery ; he was be- fore in bliffe and bleffed, if he had fo abode, he might with good reafon have taken up Peters words, It 14 good for us to be here.. Now he is in mifery, and muft be reftored if ever he be blef- fed, and fo a farther difference doth arife. The Covenant of Works had its precedency, was firít in time; The Covenant of Grace in order of time follows after : This muff needs follow mans eftate in integrity being before his fall, the Covenant made in his integrity muff needs precede the Cove- nant entred into in his fallen condition, unief e we will place the third of Gene /is before the firft,the fall of man before his creation; And therefore that is utterly a miftake in MafterPowell,who in the very entrance upon his Treatife of the two Covenants, gives the Covenant of Grace the precedency in time, giving this as his rea- fon why he places the Covenant of Grace before the Covenant of Works, becaufe the Covenant of Grace was °n being before the Co- venant of Workf. His Scripture in the Margin, Gal. 3. 17. (rhe Covenant which was made before of God in Chrifi, the Law Which n'tu four hundred and thirty yeerer after cannot difanfl.) can by no means ferve his purpofe, unleffe we Ihould conclude that the Covenant of Works had its beginning in Mount Sinai at the giving of the Law by ' %' "oJ'es , and the Covenant of Grace of only four hundred and thirty yeers more ancient ftanding, And that will as little ferve his purpofe which he after brings in, that there
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