A26872:308
A Call to the Unconverted
A call to the unconverted to turn and live and accept of mercy while mercy may be had as ever they would find mercy in the day of their extremity from the living God / by his unworthy servant, Richard Baxter ; to be read in families where any are unconverted.
London: printed by R.W. for Nevil Simmons, 1658
A CALL TO THE Unconverted. › Use.A CALL TO THE Unconverted. › Vse.
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
Object. But you seem to intimate all this while that man hath free will.
Answer. The dispute about free-will is beyond your capacity; I shall therefore now trouble you with no more but this about it. Your will is naturally a free, that is, a self-determining faculty, but it is viciously inclined, and backward to good, and therefore we see by sad experience that it hath not a virtuous moral freedom. But that is the wickedness of it, which deserveth the punishment. And I pray you let us not befool our selves with opinions. Let the case be your own. If you have an enemy so malicious, that he falls upon you, and beats you every time he meets you, and takes away the lives of your children, will you excuse him because he saith, [I have not free will, it is my nature; I cannot choose unless God give me grace.] If you have a servant that robbeth you, will you take such an answer ⟨p. 233⟩from him? Might not every Thief and Murderer that is hanged it the Assize give such an answer, [I have not free-will; I cannot change my own heart: what can I do without Gods grace?] and shall they therefore be acquit? If not, why then should you think to be acquit for a course of sin against the Lord?
Answer. The dispute about free-will is beyond your capacity; I shall therefore now trouble you with no more but this about it. Your will is naturally a free, that is, a self-determining faculty, but it is vitiously inclined, and backward to good, and therefore we see by sad experience that it hath not a vertuous moral freedom. But that is the wickedness of it, which deserveth the punishment. And I pray you let us not befool our selves with opinions. Let the case be your own. If you have an enemy so malicious, that he falls upon you, and beats you every time he meets you, and takes away the lives of your children, will you excuse him because he saith, [I have not free will, it is my nature; I cannot choose unless God give me grace.] If you have a servant that robbeth you, will you take such an answer ⟨p. 233⟩