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GOD'S
ELECTION
OF MEN
IN
JESUS
CHRIST.,
(SEEM. 1I.
ly
in
the common affairs
of this
life,
or
tó'.act,
under
the
influence
of
such arguments
?
You
believe
that
God
has
determined
the time
of your
continuance
in
this
world,
and do
you
live idle,
and refuse
to
procure
food,
or
to
partake of
it,
on this pretence,
that God
will
prolong
your
life
to
his
appointed
hour, and
that
he
will
provide
food for you.
and
make
you
eat
and
drink,
if
he design
you
shall live
?
No
:
You
apply yourselves with
dili-
gence to
obtain your
daily
bread, and
to
partake
of it;
you
take care
to
make
use
of
the
appointed
means to
preserve natural
life,
notwithstanding God's decree
:
and
why
do
you
not practise the
same with
regard
to
your
salvation,'
and
seek
after faith and
holiness
as
the
ap-
pointed
means
?
But it
is
a
sign
you
value,
eternal
life
at
a
very
low
rate,
if
you
will
venture
the
loss
of
it
upon
such
a
weak
pretence,
as
you
dare
not trust
to
in
the
things
óf
this
life.
That
man
that
goes, down to
the
grave, or
goes down
to
hell.
upon
these principles,
pe-
rishes like a
fool,
and
deserves to perish.
,Answer
II.
Electing
grace,
as
it
works
in
calling
and
converting
us
to
faith and
holiness,
generally
operates
in
so
gentle,
só
imperceptible
a
manner, and
so
suitable io
our natural
faculties,
by
awakening them
to seek
after
heaven,
that
we
can hardly distinguish
it
from
the
opera-
tion of our
own
spirits,
but
by
the
blessed
effects
of
it;
and
if
we will
never
stir
up ourselves and
our
natural
powers to seek
after the
salvation
of
Christ,
it
is
a dan-
gerous
sign,
that
we are
not
elected.
For
though divine
grace
be
really
the
first
agent
in
our
salvation,
yet
it
never
doth
violence to
our natural
powers,
nor
will-it
ever
save us
without our
own
activity and diligence in
duty.
Abuse
II.
Another abuse of
this
doctrine
is,
when
per-
sons
indulge despairing
thoughts under
this
pretence:
" If
I.
am never
so
watchful, never
so
diligent,
I.cannot
be
saved, unless
I
am
elected;
and
therefore
it
is
in
vain for
me
to
seek
after salvation:
for the
scripture
tells
me
;
Rom. ix.
16.
"
It
is
not
of
him
that
willeth,
nor of
him
that
runneth,
but
of God that
sheweth
mercy."
Answer.
But remember
also,
O
tempted and despair
-
ig
soul
that
there
was
never any one
who
had
"a
will
to
obey
the
gospel,
and
who
did
run the christian
race,
but
that
he
obtained
the blessed prize
of
salvation.
It
is