N21487:242
A call to the unconverted, to turn and live
A call to the unconverted, to turn and live; and accept of mercy, while mercy may be had; as they ever would find mercy, in the day of extremity from the living God. / By his unworthy servant, Richard Baxter.
Philadelphia: printed for Matthew Carey, 1795Philadelphia: printed for Mathew Carey, 1795
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.
Object. But you seem to intimate all this while, that man hath free will.
Answ. The dispute about free-will is beyond your capacity; I shall therefore now trouble you with no more but this about it. Your will is naturally a free, that is, a self-determining faculty, but it is viciously inclined, and backward to do good; and therefore we see by sad experience, that it hath not a virtuous moral freedom; but that it is the wickedness of it that deserveth the punishment; and I pray you, let us not befool ourselves with opinions. Let the case be your own. If you had an enemy that was so malicious that he sails upon you, and beats you every time he meets you, and takes away the lives of your children, will you excuse him, because he saith, I have not free-will, it is my nature, I cannot choose, unless God give me grace. If you have a servant that robbeth you, will you take such an answer from him? Might not every thief and murderer that is hanged at the assize give such an answer? I have not free-will; I cannot change my own heart; what can I do without God's grace. And shall they therefore be acquitted? If not, why then should you think to be acquitted for a course of sin against the Lord?
Answ. The dispute about free-will is beyond your capacity; I shall therefore now trouble you with no more but this about it. Your will is naturally a free, that is, a self-determining faculty, but it is viciously inclined, and backward to do good; and therefore we see by sad experience, that it hath not a virtuous moral freedom; but that it is the wickedness of it that deserveth the punishment; and I pray you, let us not befool ourselves with opinions. Let the case be your own. If you had an enemy that was so malicious that he sails upon you, and beats you every time he meets you, and takes away the lives of your children, will you excuse him, because he saith, I have not free-will, it is my nature, I cannot chuse, unless God give me grace. If you have a servant that robbeth you, will you take such an answer from him? Might not every thief and murderer that is hanged at the assize give such an answer? I have not free-will; I cannot change my own heart; what can I do without God's grace. And shall they therefore be acquited? If not, why then should you think to be acquited for a course of sin against the Lord?