A39697:255
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 3 › Argument 5: Argument V.
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.
(4.) We find in this place two sorts of Branches growing upon this Root Abraham; some natural Branches, namely Jews by Nature, embracing Christ by Faith; others wild and foreign Branches, viz. Gentiles by Nature, but ingrafted by Faith, and by their Ingrafture growing among the natural Branches, and with them partaking of the Root and Fatness of the Olive-tree, vers. 17. that is, the rich Privileges of the Covenant, and Promise to Abraham, Gen. 17. I will be a God to thee, and to thy Seed. This is the sweet Juice or Fatness of the Olive-tree, which both sorts of Branches live upon, vers. 17. some on the external, others on the internal, some on both.
(4.) We find in this place two sorts of Branches growing upon this Root Abraham; some natural Branches, namely Jews by Nature, embracing Christ by Faith; others wild and foreign Branches, viz. Gentiles by Nature, but ingrafted by Faith, and by their Ingrafture growing among the natural Branches, and with them partaking of the Root and Fatness of the Olive-tree, vers. 17. that is, the rich Priviledges of the Covenant, and Promise to Abraham, Gen. 17. I will be a God to thee, and to thy Seed. This is the sweet Juice or Fatness of the Olive-tree, which both sorts of Branches live upon, vers. 17. some on the external, others on the internal, some on both.
(5.) These naturally wild, but now engrafted Branches, viz. the Believing Gentiles, being grafted by Faith amongst the natural Branches, and with them sucking the Fatness of the same Root and Olive, that is to say, the Privileges, Ordinances and Franchises of the Church; we cannot but judge it to be a natural, clear and necessary Consequent, that the same Privileges the natural Branches once had, and the remaining Branches, amongst whom the Gentile Believers were ⟨p. 112⟩ingrafted, then had; the very same the Gentile Believers and their Children do now enjoy, by virtue of their Interest in the same Root; else we cannot understand how we should be said to partake with them of the root and fatness of the Olive: Certainly the Sap is the same, which the Root sends into all the Branches, whether they be natural, or ingrafted ones; and is as plentifully communicated to the ingrafted, as to the natural Branches: For the watering of this Olive with the more rich and plentiful Grace of the Gospel, must make the Olive-tree as st and flourishing as er it was to supply all its Branches, and ore than ever before.