Richard Baxter's dying thoughts upon Phil. I, 23 written for his own life and…

§ 10. It is true, that some that know not of an Incarnate Saviour, have much in them that is very laudable; whether it be real sa•ing Holiness, and whether Abraham were erroneous in thinking that even the Sodom's of the World were likely to have had fifty righteous Persons in them, I am not now to enquire: But it is sure, 1. That the World had really a Saviour, about Four thousand Years before Christ's Incarnation; even the God of pardoning Mercy, who promised and undertook what after was performed, and shall be to the end. 2. And that the Spirit of this Saviour did Sanctify God's Elect from the beginning: and gave them the same holy and heavenly dispositions (in some degree) before Christ's Incarnation, as is given since: yea it is called, The Spirit of Christ, which was before given, 1 Pet. 1. 11. 3. That this Spirit was then given to more than the Jews. 4. That Christ hath put that part of the World that hear not of his Incarnation, into no worse a Condition than he found them in: That as the Jews Covenant of Peculiarity was no repeal of the Universal Law of Grace, made by God with fallen Mankind in ⟨p. 53⟩Adam and Noah; so the Covenant of Grace of the Second Edition made with Christ's peculiar People, is no repeal of the foresaid Law in the first Edition, to them, that hear not of the second. 5. That all that wisdom and Goodness, that is in any without the Christian Church, is the work of the Spirit of the Redeemer; as the light which goeth before Sun rising, and after Sun setting, and in a cloudy day, is of the same Sun which others see, even to them that see not the Sun itself. 6. That the liker any without the Church are to the Sanctified Believers▪ the better they are; and the more unlike the worse; so that all these six things being undeniable, it appeareth, that it is the same Spirit of Christ, which now giveth all men what real goodness is any where to be found. But it is notorious that no part of the World, is in Heavenliness and Virtue comparable to true and serious Christians.

§ 10. It is true, that some that know not of an Incarnate Saviour, have much in them that is very laudable; whether it be real sa•ing Holiness, and whether Abraham were erroneous in thinking that even the Sodom's of the World were likely to have had fifty righteous Persens in them, I am not now to enquire: But it is sure, 1. That the World had really a Saviour, about Four thousand Years before Christ's Incarnation; even the God of pardoning Mercy, who promised and undertook what after was performed, and shall be to the end. 2. And that the Spirit of this Saviour did Sanctifie God's Elect from the beginning: and gave them the same holy and heavenly dispositions (in some degree) before Christ's Incarnation, as is given since: yea it is called, The Spirit of Christ, which was before given,