Joshua Redivivus, or Mr. Rutherford's Letters

It is in a manner as natural to us to leap when we see the new Jerusalem, as to laugh when we are tickled, joy is not under command, or at our nod when Christ kisseth: but O how many of us would have Christ divided in two halves, that we might take the half of him only & take his office Jesus & salvation, but Lord is a cumbersome word, & to obey & work out our own salvation & to perfect holiness, is the cumbersome & stormy north-side of Christ, & that we eschew & shift. 6. For your question, the access that reprobates have to Christ [which is none at all, for to the Father in Christ neither can they, nor will they come, because Christ dyed not for them; & yet by law, God & justice overtaketh them] I say, First, there are with you more worthy & learned then I am Mrs Dickson, Blair, & Hamilton who can more fully satisfy you; but I shall speak in brief what I think of it in these assertions. 1. All God's justice toward man & Angels floweth from an act of the absolute sovereign free-will of God, who is our former & potter, & ⟨p. 140⟩we are but clay; for if he had forbidden to eat of the rest of the trees of the Garden of Eden, & commanded Adam to eat of the tree of knowledge of good & evil, that command no doubt had been as just as this, Eat of all the trees, but not at all of the tree of knowledge of good & evil: The reason is, because his will is before his justice by order of nature, & what is his will, is his justice, & he willeth not things without himself because they are just: God cannot, God needeth not to hunt sanctity, holiness or righteousness from things without himself, & so not from the actions of men or Angels; because his will is essentially holy and just, & the prime rule of holiness & justice: as the fire is naturally light, and inclineth upward & the earth heavy, & inclineth downward. The 2 assertion then is, that God saith to reprobates believe in Christ [who hath not dyed for your salvation] & ye shall be saved, is just & right, because his eternal & essentially just will, hath so enacted & decreed: Suppose natural reason speak against this, this is the deep & special mystery of the Gospel. God hath obliged hard and fast all the reprobates in the visible Church to believe his promise, he that believeth shall be saved, & yet in God's decree and secret intention, there is no salvation at all decreed and intended to reprobates;

It is in a manner as naturall to us to leap when we see the new Jerusalem, as to laugh when we are tickled, joy is not under command, or at our nod when Christ kisseth: but O how many of us would have Christ divided in two halves, that we might take the half of him onely & take his office Iesus & salvation, but Lord is a cumbersome word, & to obey & work out our own salvation & to perfect holyness, is the cumbersome & stormy north-side of Christ, & that we eshew & shift. 6. For your question, the accesse that reprobats have to Christ [which is none at all, for to the Father in Christ neither can they, nor will they come, because Christ dyed not for them; & yet by law, God & justice overtaketh them] I say, First, there are with you more worthy & learned then I am Mrs Dickson, Blair, & Hamilton who can more fully satisfie you; but I shall speak in brief what I think of it in these assertions. 1. All God's justice toward man & Angels floweth from an act of the absolut soveraign free-will of God, who is our former & potter, &