A57966:119
The covenant of life opened, or, A treatise of the covenant of grace
The covenant of life opened, or, A treatise of the covenant of grace containing something of the nature of the covenant of works, the sovereignty of God, the extent of the death of Christ ... the covenant of grace ... of surety or redemption between the by Samuel Rutherford ...The covenant of life opened, or, A treatise of the covenant of grace containing something of the nature of the covenant of works, the soveraignty of God, the extent of the death of Christ ... the covenant of grace ... of surety or redemption between the by Samuel Rutherford ...
Edinburgh: printed by Andro Anderson for Robert Brown, 1655
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.
(3) Suppose the Lord had never imposed the Law penal forbidding the sin against the Holy Ghost, upon the Elect believers, nor any other penal Law,1 but by virtue of the most sufficient ransom of the Blood of God payed for man, he had made them now after the fall▪ as the confirmed Angels, and holy as the Man Christ, and brought them so to glory, should he not have been God in that case, and should he have lost his natural dominion over men in that case? 4. The dominion of God over men is not only in one particular, of penal Laws, it is in remunerative Laws also, in giving predeterminating influences to obey and persevere in obedience,2 in not leading into temptation, in hiring and alluring us to serve God, in terrifying men with examples of the Lords Judgements on others, he spared not the Angels, &c. 2 Pet. 2.4. Jud. 6. and therefore, to say, that God falls from his natural dominion over man, and leaves off to be God, except he impose penal Laws upon men, is first an error in Logic, à negatione speciei ad negationem generis, nulla est consequentia: If God have not a dominion over man, in one particular of penal Laws, he falls from his whole dominion natural, in other things: It is an undue inference. 2. It cannot be but too daring to tie the blessed God-head, and his essential dominion over man, to only making of penal Laws: it smells of Scripturelesse boldness with the most High, and limits the Holy One, that he cannot be God, except he be God in our way: And saith, he hath no way to preserve his glory, but by creating a Hell: And therefore let that stand as an unproven position, since it hath no probation; The reason that is given is as weak as the weak conclusion; Though water may bear up water, yet it cannot support the earth. For 1. it saith, if man be created a reasonable creature under a Law, he may sin, intercidi potuit obedientiâ, and he may be created under a Law, with perfect moral dependence upon God Creator, as the Elect Angels and the Man Christ, and yet never sin, and yet God falls not from his dominion, and leaves not off to be God. (2.)
(3) Suppose the Lord had never imposed the Law penall forbidding the sin against the Holy Ghost, upon the Elect beleevers, nor any other penall Law,