A39697:143
Vindiciæ legis & fœderis
Vindiciæ legis & fœderis: or, A reply to Mr. Philip Cary's Solemn call Wherein he pretends to answer all the arguments of Mr. Allen, Mr. Baxter, Mr. Sydenham, Mr. Sedgwick, Mr. Roberts, and Dr. Burthogge, for the right of believers infants to baptism, by proving the law at Sinai, and the covenant of circumcision with Abraham, were the very same with Adam's covenant of works, and that because the gospel-covenant is absolute. By John Flavel minister of the gospel in Dartmouth
London: printed for M. Wolton, 1690
A REPLY TO Mr. Philip Cary's Solemn Call. › Section 2 › Argument 4: Argument IV.
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.
Argument IV.
That which in its direct and primary end, teacheth Man the Corruption of his Nature by Sin, and the Mortification of Sin by the Spirit of Christ, cannot be a condition of the Covenant of works; but so did Circumcision in the very direct and primary end of it.
This Ordinance supposeth the Fall of Man, points to the Means and Instruments of his Sin and Misery; and also to the Remedy thereof by Christ. (1.) It singles out that Genital part, by which original Sin was propagated, Gen. 17. 11. Psalm 51. 5. to this the Sign of the Covenant is applied in Circumcision, for the Remission of Sins past, and the Extirpation of Sin for the future. (2.) Therefore it was instituted of God, that Men ⟨p. 56⟩might see both the necessity and true way of Mortifying their Lusts, in the virtue of Christ's Death and Resurrection; whereof Baptism, that succeeds it, is a Sign now, as Circumcision was then; as is plain from Col. 2. 11, 12. In whom also ye are circumcised with the Circumcision made without hands, in putting off the body of the Sins of the Flesh, by the Circumcision of Christ, buried with him in Baptism, wherein also ye are risen with him, through the Faith of the operation of God, who raised him from the dead. 'Tis clear then, that Circumcision directed Men to the Death and Resurrection of Christ, as the true and only means of mortifying their Lusts; and if it did so, sure it was not the Covenant of Works, for that gives Fallen Man no hint of a remedy. (3.) It was also a discriminating Sign or Token, betwixt the Church and the World. God's People, and the Heathens, who were accordingly denominated from it, the Circumcision and the Uncircumcision, the Holy Seed and the Gentiles. And now under the New Testament, the Children of Abraham by Faith, and the Children of the Flesh. This also shows it cannot be the Covenant of Works; for in