revealed, belong unto us," Deut. xxix. 29. Neither does your warrant to believe and to lay hold on the covenant, any manner of way depend on it: for the reprobate have as good and fair a revealed warrant to believe and take hold of the covenant of grace as the elect have, else they could not be condemned for unbelief, and not taking hold of the covenant. Be what you will, since you are certainly a sinner of mankind, your warrant is uncontestable, according to the word: "For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him, should not perish, but have everlasting life," John iii. 16. "This is his commandment, that we should believe on the name of his Son Jesus Christ," 1 John iii. 23. Wherefore believe ye, and take hold of the covenant for yourselves; so shall ye know your election, and your representation in the covenant, by the effects thereof.

This difficulty cast in the way of a sinner sensible of his need of Christ, to beat him off from believing on Christ, is a dangerous device and temptation of the devil. But do you repel it, saying, O enemy of my salvation, it is true, I do not know whether Christ represented me or not, in the eternal covenant; neither am I obliged nor concerned to know it, in order to my taking hold of that covenant but one thing I know assuredly, namely, that the covenant, in the free promise of life and salvation, upon the ground of Christ's obedience and death allenarly, is held out to me, even to me, to be believed, trusted to, and rested upon, by me, even by me; and therefore I will believe, and lay hold on it; and, upon the infallible ground of the faithfulness of God in the promise, "Whosoever believeth, shall not perish, but have everlasting life," I will assuredly conclude, that it shall be made out to me.

QUESTION. But are there no marks or signs whereby a poor sinner may know himself to be one of those who were represented by Christ in the second covenant, and whose names he put in the bond of suretiship that he gave to his Father from eternity? ANSWER. Yea, there are but then they are such, as although the having of them will prove a man to have been represented by Jesus Christ in the eternal covenant; yet the want of them will not prove a man not to have been represented therein, forasmuch as what one bas not now, he may come to have afterwards. And, under this limitation, I offer these two marks of the thing in question.

Mark 1. A deliberate and cordial complacency in the covenant. As it was with the representative from eternity; so it is in time, in that matter, with the represented, when once by grace they become capable of personal consenting: there is a deliberate and cordial complacency in the covenant being proposed, Psalm xl. 7, "Then

said I," ver. 8, "thy law is within my heart." The children of men discover themselves to be Adam's natural seed, represented by him in the covenant of works, by the inclination and bent of their hearts towards that covenant. There is such a bias to that covenant hung upon the minds of men naturally, that do and live, or work and win, is the religion of all natural men, so far as they have any practical religion at all: and they cannot be brought off from it but by the power of renewing grace. Even so the elect of God discover themselves to be Christ's spiritual seed, represented by him in the covenant of grace, by their deliberate and cordial complacency in this covenant. The heart touched with divine grace says of it, "This is all my salvation, and all my desire," 2 Sam. xxiii. 5. The new bias hung on their minds by renewing grace, carries them to a hearty approbation, relish and liking of the new covenant held forth in the gospel; they are well pleased with the parties-contractors, the representative and representation in it; the conditions and promises of it; the administrator, the administration, and order thereof. In a word, the covenant is in their eyes a faultless contrivance; there is nothing in it they would have out, and there is nothing out of it they would have in. So there they cast anchor for their own souls. But it is not so with others: 1 Pet. ii. 7, "Unto you therefore which believe he is precious: but unto them which be disobedient, the stone which the builders disallowed, the same is made the head of the corner;" ver. 8, “and a stone of stumbling, and a rock of offence, even to them which stumble at the word, being disobedient, whereunto also they were appointed.

Mark 2. The image of Christ begun to be drawn on the soul, together with a longing for the perfecting thereof; 1 Cor. xv. 48. "As is the heavenly, such are they also that are heavenly." Ver. 49, “And as we have borne the image of the earthy, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly." Like as all whom Adam represented, when he entered into the covenant of works in paradise, do afterwards, every one in his time, personate Adam, looking as like him as ever child was like a father, acting even as he acted, as I shewed elsewhere: so all whom Christ represented in the covenant of grace from eternity, do in time put on Christ, Gal. iii. 27, personating him, and representing him in another sense, namely, bearing his image, and "walking even as he walked," 1 John ii. 6. It is a promise of the covenant to our Lord Jesus, Isa. liii. 10, "He shall see his seed," to wit, as one sees a new-born babe. But do not others so see them too? Yea, indeed they do. Satan and wicked men see them, as rebels and traitors do with grudge and hatred see

a new-born prince heir to the crown. The godly see them, as in that case the princesses do with a particular satisfaction see their new-born brother. But our Lord Jesus Christ himself sees them, as the king, the father of the babe, does with a peculiar satisfaction see him as his own son, and his own picture. Meanwhile, as Adam's children do not open out all at once what of old Adam is in them, but by degrees as they grow up; but they are still longing for the perfection thereof, when they shall be grown men, so Christ's children are but imperfect in this life as in the state of childhood; but they are longing to arrive at "perfection, at the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ, the principle of which they have in them, Eph. iv. 13.

Thus far of the first head, the parties in the covenant of grace.

HEAD II.

THE MAKING OF THE COVENANT OF GRACE.

council of the And this is a not able fully

HAVING Considered the parties in the covenant of grace, we come
now to take a view of the making of that covenant betwixt the
parties contracting therein. And here we find ourselves at the
fountain-head of the salvation of lost sinners, the origin and rise of
the glorious plan, laid from eternity in the secret
ever-blessed Trinity, for remedy of man's misery.
manifold mystery, the several folds of which we are
to discover. With God it was all one piece, if I may so phrase it;
for with all things are together and at once; and not one thing be-
fore, and another after, as with us. Howbeit, we cannot conceive of
it but in parcels; first one piece of the mystery and then another;
and that because of the weakness of our capacity, as we are crea-
tures; and much more, as we are creatures under much spiritual
darkness. Wherefore we must of necessity address ourselves to the
consideration of it in parcels; but still remembering, we are in the
eternal mystery, transacted in the eternal decree of the holy Trinity
all at once, by one eternal act of the divine will; in which, never-
theless, we are allowed to conceive a certain order, since otherwise
we cannot take up the mystery.

We have already seen, that the Father, the party-contractor on Heaven's side, is in that matter to be considered as an offended God; but purposing to manifest the glory of his mercy in the salvation of

some of mankind lost; yet withal as a just God, who cannot but give sin a just recompense: and also, that Jesus Christ, the partycontractor on man's side, is to be considered therein as the last or second Adam, representative of a seed. Wherefore, first of all, we are to inquire, How Christ the Son of God became second Adam? and then, How the covenant was made with him as such? the former being as it were preliminary to the latter.

First, How Christ the Son of God became second Adam? This we may take up in two things.

1. The Father willed and designed, that his own Son, the eternal Word, should, for the purpose of mercy towards mankind lost, take on their nature, and become man. He saw that sacrifice and offering would not answer the case; the debt was greater than to be paid at that rate; the redemption of souls could not be managed but by a person of infinite dignity: wherefore, having purposed that the darling attribute of mercy should be illustrated in the case of lost mankind, he willed the human nature to be united in time to the divine nature, in the person of the Son.

And hereunto the Son, as the eternal Word, the second person of the glorious Trinity, having no nearer relation to man than as his sovereign Lord Creator, readily agreed: Heb. x. 5, "Sacrifice and offering thou wouldst not, but a body hast thou prepared me."-Ver. 7, "Then said I, Lo, I come (in the volume of the book it is written of me) to do thy will, O God." The eternal Word consented to be made flesh, that all flesh might not perish: he consented to become man, to take unto a personal union with himself a human nature, to wit, a true body and a reasonable soul, according to the eternal destination of his Father. This was an instance of amazing condescension. The highest monarch's consent to lay aside his robes of majesty, to clothe himself with rags, and become a beggar, is not to be compared with it. Nay the highest angel's consent to become a worm, is not to be named in one day with the eternal Son of God, the Father's equal, his consenting to become man for the distance between the divine nature and the human is infinite; whereas the distance between the angelic nature, and the nature of worms of the earth, is but finite.

Now, the effect of this was, that hereby the Son of God was constituted substantial Mediator, or Mediator in respect of nature, between God and man. Being from eternity God equal with the Father, he so stood related to heaven and having from eternity consented to become man, he so stood related to earth for though he did not actually take on him the nature of man until the fulness of time appointed by the Father; yet, VOL. VIII.

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forasmuch as he had from eternity consented to take it on, and it was impossible that his consent should miss to take effect, he was recokened in law, to all intents and purposes thereof, as if he had actually been incarnate. A type of this his substantial mediation was Jacob's ladder, which was "set upon the earth, and the top of it reached to heaven," Gen. xxviii. 12. A clear emblem of the divine and human nature in Christ, through whom, as substantial Mediator, there was a way opened towards a communication for peace between heaven and earth. Accordingly our Lord Jesus applies it to himself: John i. 51, "Hereafter you shall see heaven open, and the "angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of man;" to wit, as on Jacob's ladder, Gen. xxviii. 12.

2. The Father chose him to be head of the election; to be the last Adam, federal head and representative of such as sovereign pleasure should pitch upon to be vessels of mercy, and inrolled in the book of life; a head and representative with whom he might make the new covenant for life and salvation to them.

And to this also he readily agreed, consenting to be the last or second Adam, head and representative of the election; to sustain their persons, and transact in their name: Isa. xliii. 1, "Beholdmine elect in whom my soul delighteth." Psalm lxxxx. 19, “I have exalted one chosen out of the people." 1 Cor. xv. 47, "The second man is the Lord from heaven." The breach between God and man was greater than to be done away by a mere intermessenger, who travelling between parties at variance, reconciles them with bare words. There could be no covenant of peace betwixt God and sinners without reparation of damages done to the honour of God through sin, and without honouring of the holy law by an exact obedience but these things being quite beyond their reach, Christ the Son of God saith, "Lo, I come; I am content to take their place, and put myself in their room as a second Adam."

Now, the effect of this was, that hereby he was constituted last Adam, or the second man, 1 Cor. xv. 47; and official Mediator, or Mediator in respect of office, between God and man, 1 Tim. ii. 5, 6, "There is one God, and one Mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus; who gave himself a ransom for all." Being called of his Father unto that office, and having embraced the call thereto, he was invested with the office, and treated with as such, before the world began, Tit. i. 2. And indeed he, and he only, was fit for it. The two families of heaven and earth being at war, there could be no peace between them but through a Mediator. But where could a mediator be found to interpose between such parties, who would not either have been too high, or else too low, in respect