A39697:93
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 1: I Position.
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.) That which more amazes me, is the strange Answer you give to Mr. Sedgwick, Page 132, 133. in your return to his Argument, That if the Law and the Promise can consist, then the Law cannot be set up as a Covenant of Works. You answer, That the Law and the Promise ⟨p. 23⟩having divers ends, it doth not thence follow, that there is an inconsistence betwixt them, and that the Law, even as it is a Covenant of Works, instead of being against the Promise, tends to the Establishment of it. And Page 133. That by convincing Men of the Impossibility of obtaining Rest and Peace in themselves, and the necessity of betaking themselves to the Promise, &c. the Law is not against the Promise, having so Blessed a Subserviency towards the Establishment thereof. Here you own a Subserviency, yea, a Blessed Subserviency of the Law to the Promise, which is that Mr. Sedgwick and my self have urged, to prove it cannot be so, as it is a pure Adam's Covenant; but that therefore it must come under another Consideration; only here we differ, you say it hath a Blessed Subserviency to the Promise, as it is the same with Adam's Covenant, we say it can never be so as such, but as it is either a Covenant of Grace, though more obscure, as he speaks; or though the matter of it should be the same with Adam's Covenant, yet it is subserviently a Covenant of Grace as others speak; and under no other Consideration can it be reconciled to the Promise. But will you ⟨p. 24⟩stand to this, that the Law hath no Hostile Contradiction to the Promise, but a Blessed Subserviency to it, as you speak, Page 173. where you say, That if we preach up the Law as a Covenant of Life, or a Covenant of Faith and Grace (which are equipollent Terms) let us distinguish as we please, between a Covenant of Grace Absolutely and Subserviently such; then we make an ill use of the Law; by perverting it to such a Service as God never intended it for, and are guilty of mingling Law and Gospel, Life and Death together.
(4.) That which more amazes me, is the strange Answer you give to Mr. Sedgwick, Page 132, 133. in your return to his Argument, That if the Law and the Promise can consist, then the Law cannot be set up as a Covenant of Works. You answer, That the Law and the Promise ⟨p. 23⟩