410 THE POSITIVE WORE OP TIME SPIRIT least the main parts, if not the whole of religion, con- sists in moral virtue, though it be altogether uncertain what they intend by the one or the other. These are they who scarce think any thing intelligible, when de- clared in the words of the scripture, which one bath openly traduced as a ridiculous jargon. They like not, they seem to abhor the speaking of spiritual things, in the words which the Holy Ghost teachetb, the only reason whereof is, because they understand not the thingsthemselves. Andwhilst they are foolishness unto any, it is no wonder, the terms whereby they are de- clared, seem also so to be. But such as have received the Spirit of Christ, and do know the mind of Christ, (which profane scoffers are sufficiently remote from) do best receive the truth, and apprehend it, when de- clared, not in the words which man's wisdom teacheth, but which aretaught by the Holy Ghost. It is granted, to be the wisdom and skill of men further to explain and declare thetruths thatare taught in the gospel, by sound and wholesomewords of their own, which yet all of them, as to their propriety and significancy, are to be tried and measured by thescripture itself. But we have a new way of teaching spiritual things sprung up among some, who being ignorant of the whole mystery of the gospel, and therefore despising it, would debase all the glorious truths of it, and the declaration made of them, into dry, barren, sapless, philosophical notions and terms, and those the mostcommon,obvious,and vulgar, that ever ob- tained among theheathen of old. Virtuous living, they tell us, is the way to heaven; but what this virtue is, or what is a life of virtue, they have added as little in thedeclaration of, as any persons that ever made such a noise about them. Sect. 79. (2.) That ambiguous term MORAL, bath, by usage, obtained a doable signification, with respect unto an opposition unto other things which either are not so, or are more than so. For sometimes it is applied unto the worship of God, and so is opposed unto insti- tuted. That religious worship, which is prescribed in the Decalogue, or required by the law of creation, is commonly called moral, and that In opposition unto those rites and ordinances which are of a superadded arbitrary institution. Again, it is opposed unto things that are more than merely moral, namely, spiritual, theological, or divine. So the gracesof the Spirit, as faith, love, hope, in all their exercise, whatever they may have of morality in them, or however they may be exercised in and about moral things and duties, yet, because of sundry respects wherein they exceed the sphere of morality, are called graces and ditties, theo- logical, spiritual, supernatural, evangelical, divine, in oppositioñ unto all such habits of the mind and duties, which being required by the law of nature, and as they are so required, are merely moral. In neither sense can it, with any tolerable congruity of speech, be said, that moral virtue is our holiness, especially the whole of its but, because the duties of holiness have, the most of them, a morality in them, as moral, isopposed to instituted, some would have them have nothing also in them, as moral is opposed to supernatural and theo- logical. But that the principle and acts of holiness are of another special nature, bath been sufficiently now declared. Sect, 80...(8.) It is, as was before intimated, some- what uncertain, what the great pleaders for moral vir- tue do intend by it. Many seem to design no more but thathonesty and integrity of lifewhich was found among some of the heathens, in their virtuous lives and actions. And, indeed, it were heartily to be wished, that we might see more of it amongst some thatare called Chris- tians; for, many things they did were materially good, and useful unto mankind; but let it be supposed to be never so exact, and the course of it most diligently at- tended unto, I defy it, as to its being the holiness requir- ed of us in the gospel, according unto the terms of the covenant of grace; and that because it bath none of those qualifications which we have proved essentially to belong thereunto. And I defy all the men in the world to prove, that this moral virtue is the sum of our obe- silence to God, whilst the gospel is owned for a decla- ration of his will and our duty. It is true, all the du- ties of this moral virtue are required of us, but in the exercise of every one of them, there is more required of us than belongs unto their morality, as namely, that they be done its faith, and love to God, through Je- sus Christ; andmany things arerequired of us as ne- cessary parts of our obedience, which belong not there, unto at all. Sect. 8l.(h.) Some give us such a description of morality, as that it should be of the same extent with the light and law of nature, or the dictates ofit, as rec- tified and declared unto usin .thescripture. And this, I
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