Discourses upon the Existence and Attributes of God

1. It could not be any merit in the Creature, that might determine God to choose him. If the decree of Election falls not under the merit of Christ's passion, as the procuring cause, it cannot fall under the merit of any part of the corrupted mass. The decree of sending Christ, did not precede, but followed in order of nature the determination of choosing some. When men were chosen as the subjects for Glory, Christ was chosen as the means, for the bringing them to Glory, Eph. 1.4. Chosen us in him, and predestinated us to the Adoption of Children by Jesus Christ. The choice was not merely in Christ, as the moving cause; that the Apostle asserts, to be the good pleasure of his will; but in Christ, as the means of conveying to the chosen Ones the fruits of their Election. What could there be in any man, that could invite God to this act, or be a cause of distinction of one branch of Adam from another? Were they not all hewed out of the same Rock, and tainted with the same corruption in blood? Had it been possible to invest them with a power of merit at the first, had not that venom contracted in their nature, degraded all of power for the future? What merit was there in any but of wrathful punishment, since they were all considered as Criminals, and the cursed brood of an ungrateful Rebel? what dignity can there be in the nature of the purest part of clay, to be made a Vessel of Honour, more than in another part of Clay as pure as that which was ⟨p. 729⟩formed into a Vessel for mean and sordid use? What had any one to move his mercy more than another; since they were all Children of wrath, and equally daubed with Original guilt and filth? Had not all an equal proportion of it, to provoke his Justice? What merit is there in one dry bone more than another, to be inspired with the breath of a spiritual life? Did not all lie wallowing in their own filthy blood, and what could the steam, and noisomeness of that, deserve at the hands of a pure Majesty, but to be cast into a sink furthest from his sight? Were they not all considered in this deplorable posture with an equal proportion of poison in their nature, when God first took his pen, and singled out some Names, to write in the Book of life?

1. It could not be any merit in the Creature, that might determine God to choose him. If the decree of Election falls not under the merit of Christ's passion, as the procuring cause, it cannot fall under the merit of any part of the corrupted mass. The decree of sending Christ, did not precede, but follow'd in order of nature the determination of choosing some. When men were chosen as the subjects for Glory, Christ was chosen as the means, for the bringing them to Glory,