Reason against railing, and truth against fiction being an answer to those two late pamphlets intituled A dialogue between a Christian and a Quaker, and the Continuation of the dialogue &c. by one Thomas Hicks, an Anabaptist teacher : by W. Penn.

Of JUSTIFICATION.

1. Not every one that saith unto me Lord, Lord, shall enter into the Kingdom of Heaven, but He that doth the Will of my Father.* 1.1 Whosoever heareth these Sayings of mine, and doth them, I will liken him unto a Wise Man which built his House upon a Rock &c. [How very fruitful are the Scrip∣tures of Truth in Testimonies against this absurd and dangerous Doctrine; these Words seem to im∣port a two-fold Righteousness, the first consists in Sacrifice, the last in Obedience; the one makes a Talking, the other a Doing Christian. I in short argue thus, If none can enter into the Kingdom of Heaven, but they that do the Father's Will; then none are ju∣stified, but they who do the Father's Will, because none can enter into the Kingdom, but such as are justified. Since therefore there can be no Admit∣tance had without Performing that Righteous Will, and Doing those Holy and perfect Sayings, Alas! to what Value will an imputative Righteousness amount when a poor Soul shall awake polluted in his Sin, by the hasty Calls of Death to make its Ap∣pearance before the Judgment Seat, where 'tis impossible to justifie the Wicked, or that any should escape uncondemned, but such as do the Will of God.]

* 1.22. For not the Hearers of the Law are just before God, but the Doers of the Law shall be justified. [From whence how unanswer∣ably

may I observe, Unless we become Doers of that Law, which Christ came not to destroy, but, as our Example, to fulfil, we can never be justi∣fied before God; wherefore Obedience is so abso∣lutely necessary, that short of it there can be no Acceptance; Nor let any fancy that Christ hath so fulfill'd it for them, as to exclude their Obedience from being requisite to their Acceptance, but only as their Pattern, For unless ye follow me, saith Christ, ye cannot be my Disciples: And it is not only repug∣nant to Reason, but in this place particularly re∣futed; for if Christ had fulfill'd it on our behalf, and we not enabled to follow his Example, there would not be Doers, but One Doer only of the Law justified before God. In short, if without Obedi∣ence to the Righteous Law none can be justified, then all the Hearing of the Law, with but the meer Imputation of anothers Righteousness, whilst actu∣ally a Breaker of it, is excluded as not justifying before God. If you fulfill the Royal Law, ye do well; so speak ye, and so DO, as they that shall be judg'd thereby.]

3. If ye live after the Flesh, ye shall dye; but if ye through the Spirit do mortifie the Deeds of the Body,* 1.3 ye shall live. [No Man can be dead and justified before God, for so He may be justified that lives after the Flesh; therefore they only can be justified that are alive; from whence this follows, If the Living are justified and not the Dead, and that none can live to God, but such as have mortified the Deeds of the Body through the Spirit, then none can be justified but they who have

mortified the Deeds of the Body through the Spirit; so that * 1.4 justification does not go before, but is subsequential to the Mortification of Lusts, and Sanctification of the Soul through the Spirit's operation.]

4. Was not Abraham our Father justified by Works, when he had offered Isaak his Son upon the Al∣tar?* 1.5 Ye see then how that by Works a Man is justified, and not by Faith only. [He that will seriously peruse this Chapter, shall doubtless find some, to whom this Epistle was writen, of the same Spirit with the Satisfactionists and Imputarians of our t••me; they fain would have found out a Justification from Faith in, and the Imputation of anothers Righteousness; but James an Apostle of the most high God, who experimentally knew what true Faith and Justification meant, gave them to understand from Abraham's self-denying Exam∣ple, that unless their Faith in the Purity and Pow∣er of God's Grace, had that effectual Operation to subdue every beloved Lust, wean from every Dallila, and intirely to resign and sacrifice Isaak himself, their Faith was a Fable, or as a Body without a Spirit; and as Righteousness therefore in one Person cannot justify another from Unrigh∣teousness, so whoever now pretends to be justified by Faith, whilst not led and guided by the Spirit into all the Wayes of Truth, and Works of Righ∣teousness, their Faith they will find at last Fiction.]

Notes

• * 1.1

  Mat 7.21, 24, 25.
• * 1.2

  Rom. 2.13.
• * 1.3

  Rom. 8.13.
• * 1.4

  Justificati∣on is compleatly taken.
• * 1.5

  Jam. 2.21, 24.