The Doctrine of Justification by Faith

It is therefore a manifest mistake of their own which some make the Ground of a Charge on the Doctrine of Imputation. For the say, if our sins were imputed unto Christ, then must he be esteemed to have done what we have done amiss, and so be the greatest sinner that ever was; and on the other side, if his Righteousness be imputed unto us, then are we esteemed to have done what he did, and so to stand in no need of the pardon of sin. But this is contrary unto the nature of Imputation, which proceeds on no such Judgment, but on the contrary, that we our selves have done nothing of what is imputed unto us; nor Christ any thing of what was imputed unto him.

To declare more distinctly the nature of this Imputation, I shall consider the several kinds of it, or rather the several grounds whence it proceeds. For this Imputation unto us, of what is not our own antecedent unto that Imputation, may be either, (1) Ex justitia, or (2) Ex voluntaria sponsione, or (3) Ex injuria, or (4) Ex gratia; all which shall be exemplified. I do not place them thus distinctly, as if they might not some of them concur in the same Imputation, which I shall manifest that they do. But I shall refer the several kinds of Imputation, unto that which is the next cause of every one.

1. Things that are not our own originally, personally, inherently, may yet be imputed unto us ex justitia, by the Rule of Righteousness. And this may be done upon a double Relation unto those whose they are; (1) Federal, (2) Natural. (1) Things done by one may be imputed unto others, propter relationem foederalem, because of a Covenant Relation between them. So the sin of Adam was, and is imputed unto all his Posterity, as we shall afterwards more fully declare▪ And the Ground hereof is, that we stood all in the same Covenant with him, who was our Head and Representative ⟨p. 237⟩