Vindiciae legis, or, A vindication of the moral law and the covenants, from the…Vindiciae legis, or, A vindication of the morall law and the covenants, from the…

4. It's good in respect of the sanction of it: for it's accompanied ¹with Promises, and that not only temporal, as Command. 5. but also spiritual, Command. 2. where God is said to pardon to many generations; and therefore the Law doth include Christ secondarily and occasionally, though not primarily, as hereafter shall be showed. It's true, the righteousness of the Law, and that of the Gospel differ toto coelo; we must place one in suprema part coeli, and the other in ima part terrae, as Luther speaks to that effect: and it's one of the hardest tasks in all divinity, to give them their bounds, and then to clear how the Apostle doth oppose them, and how not. We know it was the cursed error ⟨p. 6⟩of the Manichees and Marcionites, that the Law was only carnal, and had only carnal promises; whereas it's evident, that the Fathers had the same faith for substance as we have. It's true, if we take Law and Gospel in this strict difference, as some Divines do, that all the Precepts, wheresoever they are, must be under the Law, and all the Promises be reduced to the Gospel, whether in Old or New Testament; in which sense Divines then say, Lex jubet, & Gratia juvat; the Law commands, and Grace helps; and, Lex imperat, the Law commands, and Fides impetrat, Faith obtaineth; then the Law can have no sanction by Promise: But where can this be showed in Scripture? When we speak of the sanction of the Law by Promise, we take it as in the administration of it by Moses, which was Evangelical; not as it was given to Adam, with a Promise of Eternal life upon perfect obedience: for the Apostle Paul's propositions, To him that worketh, the reward is reckoned of debt; and, the doers of the Law are justified, were never verifiable, but in the state of innocency.

4. It's good in respect of the sanction of it: for it's accompanied ¹with Promises, and that not only temporall, as Command. 5. but also spirituall, Command. 2. where God is said to pardon to many generations; and therefore the Law doth include Christ secondarily and occasionally, though not primarily, as hereafter shall be shewed. It's true, the righteousnesse of the Law, and that of the Gospel differ toto coelo; we must place one in suprema parte coeli, and the other in ima parte terrae, as Luther speakes to that effect: and it's one of the hardest taskes in all divinity, to give them their bounds, and then to cleare how the Apostle doth oppose them, and how not. We know it was the cursed errour