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…

In the second place, if we would speak exactly and properly; We cannot say, in any good sense, that the Moral Law is abrogated ¹at all. It is true indeed, our learned Writers show, that the Law in abrogated in respect of justification, condemnation, and rigour of obedience; all which I shall instance in afterwards: but if a man would speak rigidly, he cannot say, it is abrogated We may say, it's mitigated, as to our persons, though Christ our surety did fully undergo its: for if God had taken away the Law so, that man nor his surety had been under the curse of it, or should have obeyed it, then had it been properly abrogated: whereas now, seeing our surety was bound to satisfy it, and perfectly to obey it and we still obliged to conform unto it, we cannot so properly in the general say, it was abrogated. Therefore we may more properly say that there is a change and alteration in us towards the Law, then that the ⟨p. 213⟩Law is changed or abrogated. Hence observe, though the Apostle denieth that he doth [Greek or Hebrew] make void the Law, yet he useth this expression Rom. 7. 6. [Greek or Hebrew] we are freed or abrogated from the Law, rather then that is abrogated. Thus it is, if we would speak properly: yet, because the satisfaction and obedience is by Christ, and not by us, we may say, that it is abrogated to us, so that we may not look for remission of sins, or justification by it. But you must still distinguish, when we speak of the Law, some parts of it from the whole: some parts of the Law may be abolished, and yet not the whole nature of it: for there is in the Law these parts; First the Commands. ²Secondly, the Promises of life to him that doth them; and thirdly, the threatenings of eternal wrath to him that faileth in the least. Now the Moral Law, though it be abrogated in respect of the two later to a believer, yet in respect of the former it doth still abide; yea, and will continue in Heaven it self. And we have already proved against the Antinomians, that one part of the Law may abide, when the other doth not.³

In the second place, if we would speake exactly and properly; We cannot say, in any good sense, that the Morall Law is abrogated