A30345:655
A treatise of the covenant of grace wherein the gradual breakings out of Gospel…A treatise of the covenant of grace wherein the graduall breakings out of Gospel…
A treatise of the covenant of grace wherein the gradual breakings out of Gospel grace from Adam to Christ are clearly discovered, the differences betwixt the Old and New Testament are laid open, divers errors of Arminians and others are confuted, the nature of uprightness, and the way of Christ in bringing the soul into communion with himself ... are solidly handled / by that faithful servant of Jesus Christ, and minister of the Gospel, John Ball ; published by Simeon Ash.A treatise of the covenant of grace wherein the graduall breakings out of Gospel grace from Adam to Christ are clearly discovered, the differences betwixt the Old and New Testament are laid open, divers errours of Arminians and others are confuted, the nature of uprightnesse, and the way of Christ in bringing the soul into communion with himself ... are solidly handled / by that faithfull servant of Jesus Christ, and minister of the Gospel, John Ball ; published by Simeon Ash.
London: printed by G. Miller for Edward Brewster, 1645
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.
Certain it is our Saviour from the very1 time that he took our nature was perfectly sanctified, and received the Spirit above measure: but the personal union did not endow the humane nature with the real titles of the divine; otherwise Christs strength as man should have been infinite from the womb: and his body should have been every where. And it would be less unreasonable to say, that his body is at this day infinite, and his humane nature every where, then that his wisdom or knowledge as man, should have been infinite, or as great whilst he was in the womb as now it is. If the divine nature did not communicate his infinity to the humane, nor make the Son of God so complete a man for strength or ability of body from the womb, as at thirty years he was, what reason have we to imagine, that our blessed Lord and Saviour did not as truly grow in wisdom and knowledge, as he did in strength and stature of body. Simple nescience can be no sin in any child, nor in any man, unless it be of those things which2 he is bound to know: but proficiency in wisdom and knowledge is to the Sons of men a praise-worthy perfection: which must not be denied unto our Lord and Saviour in his infancy or his youth, no more then he is to be robbed of any royal attributes now he is made King. That he was without all stain of sin, the most holy Sanctuary of the most holy and blessed God, is steadfastly to be believed. But that he had the same measure of knowledge at his circumcision which he had and gave proof off when his Parents found him in the Temple, or at his Baptism, as since his resurrection and ascension he hath, this the Scripture testifieth not. As man he was ignorant of the day of judgement, which now in heaven he knows, as all other things pertaining to his office. However ⟨p. 313⟩therefore our Saviour had the habit of all knowledge from the beginning, yet he had not the act and use of it. That which some3 answer, that Christ by infused knowledge knew all things, and after attained another kind of knowledge, which they call acquisite is not so fit, because knowledge acquired and infused of the same things is of the same nature and condition, and two forms or qualities of one kind cannot be in the same subject.