A89732:1232
A discussion of that great point in divinity, the sufferings of Christ; and the…
A discussion of that great point in divinity, the sufferings of Christ; and the question about his righteousness active, passive : and the imputation thereof. Being an answer to a dialogue entitled The meritorious price of redemption, justification, &c. / By John Norton teacher of the church at Ipswich in New-England. Who was appointed to draw up this answer by the general court.A discussion of that great point in divinity, the sufferings of Christ; and the question about his righteousnesse active, passive : and the imputation thereof. Being an answer to a dialogue intituled The meritorious price of redemption, justification, &c. / By John Norton teacher of the church at Ipswich in New-England. Who was appointed to draw up this answer by the generall court.
London: printed by A.M. for Geo. Calvert, 1653
Title page typeset from the transcription.
Letter: The Copy of a Letter written from New England, in Answer to a Letter which they had rec…
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.
The Copy of a Letter written from New England, in Answer to a Letter which they had received from some Brethren in Old England, in the behalf of Mr Pinchin.
Reverend and Beloved Brethren in our Lord Jesus,
WE see by your Letters you have thought it meet to address your selves to us (the Elders of these Churches) in behalf of Mr Pinchin and his Book, to incline us to a favourable construction of the Tenets held forth in it as Disputable, and (and to some of note) probable; and for himself to move us to intercede with our Magistrates to deal favourably with him as a Gentleman pious and well deserving. In both which we shall give you a just account of our Proceedings.
VVE see by your Letters you have thought it meet to address your selves to us (the Elders of these Churches) in behalf of Mr Pinchin and his Book, to incline us to a favourable construction of the Tenets held forth in it as Disputable, and (and to some of note) probable; and for himself to move us to intercede with our Magistrates to deal favourably with him as a Gentleman pious and well deserving. In both which we shall give you a just account of our Proceedings.
When Mr Pinchin's Book came over to us, it was the time of the itting of our General Court, wherein both the Magistrates and Deputies of every Town in the Country, do assemble together to consider and determine of the chiefest affairs which concern this Colony: At the same time a Ship in the Harbour was ready to set sail for England. Now the Court (both parts of them, the Magistrates and Deputies) perceiving by the Title Page that the Contents of the Book were unsound, and Derogatory, both to the Justice of God and the Grace of Christ, which being published in England might add to the heap of many Errors and Heresies already too much abounding, and this Book being published under the name of a New English Gentleman, might occasion many to think, that New England also concurred in the allowance of such Exorbitant Aberrations: They therefore judged it meet, not to stay till the Elders could be gathered together; but whilst the Ship yet stayed, to declare their own Judgement against the Book, and to send a Copy of their Declaration to England by the Ship, then ready to depart: Had the Tenets therein seemed to them to be matters, either of doubtful disputation, or of small moment, we doubt not, they would either not at all have declared themselves against the Book, or if they had; they would have stayed for some opportunity of previous consultation with the Elders; but some of the Tenets seemed to them so directly to shake the Fundamentals