Letter 9.
LETTER 9.
To Mr. Rowland Hill.
DEAR SIR, — Your uncommon zeal for God, so far as it is guided by knowledge, entitling you to the peculiar love and reverence of all that fear the Lord; I should be wanting in respect to you, if I took no notice of the arguments with which you are come from Cambridge to the help of your pious brother. In the Friendly Remarks that you have directed to me, you say with great truth, (page 31,) “the principal cause of controversy among us is the doctrine of a second justification by works. Thus much you indicate throughout, that a man is justified before the bar of God a second time by his own good works.”
So I do, dear sir; and I wonder how any Christian can deny it, when Christ himself declares, “In the day of judgment, by thy words shalt thou be justified,” &c. Had he said “By my words imputed to thee thou shalt be justified,” you might indeed complain. But now, what reason have you to assert, as you do, that I “have grossly misrepresented the Scriptures,” and “made universal havoc of every truth of the Gospel?” The first of these charges is heavy, the second dreadful. Let us see by what arguments they are supported.
After throwing away a good part of your book in passing a long, Calvinian, juvenile sentence upon my spirit as a writer, you come at last to the point, and attempt to explain some of the scriptures, which you suppose I have “misrepresented.”
I. Page 32, “‘Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven, but he that doeth the will of my Father,’” Matthew 7:21. “And what is this (say you) more than a description of those who are to be saved?”
What, sir, is it nothing but a description? Is it not a solemn declaration, that no practical Antinomian shall be saved by faith in the last day? And that Christ is really a Lord and a King, who has a law, which he will see obeyed? Had he not just before, (verse 12,) admitted the law and the prophets into his Gospel dispensation, saying, “All things which ye would that men should do unto you, do ye even so unto them, for this is the law and the prophets?” Are we not under this law to him? And will he not command his subjects, who obstinately violate it, to be brought and slain before him?
Again: when he declares that they who “hate a brother, and call him, Thou fool! are in danger of hell fire as murderers!” do we not expose his legislative wisdom, as well as his paternal goodness, by intimating, that, without having an eye to the murder of the heart or the tongue, he only describes certain wretches whom he unconditionally designs for everlasting burnings?
What I say of a punishment threatened is equally true of a reward promised, as you may see by the following illustration of our controverted text. A general says to his soldiers, as he leads them to the field of battle, “Not every one that calls me, Your honour, your honour, shall be made a captain; but he that fights manfully for his king and country.” You say, “What is this more than a description of those that shall be promoted?” And I reply, If warlike exploits have absolutely nothing to do with their promotion; and if the general’s declaration is only a description of some favourites, whom he is determined to raise at any rate; could he not as well have described them by the colour of their hair, or height of their stature? And does he not put a cheat upon all the soldiers, whom he is absolutely determined not to raise; when he excites them to quit themselves like men, by the fond hope of being raised? Apply this simile to the case in hand, and you will see, dear sir, how frivolous, and injurious to our Lord is your intimation, that one of his most awful royal proclamations is nothing but an empty description. O Calvinism! is this thy reverence for Jesus Christ? Hast thou no way of supporting thyself but by turning the Lord of glory into a Virgil? The supreme Lawgiver of men and angels into a maker of descriptions?
II. Much of the same nature is the observation which you make (p. 37) upon these words of our Lord. “They that have done good shall go into life everlasting; and they that have done evil into everlasting punishment.” You say “What does this text prove more than has been granted before? What does it more than characterize those that shall be saved?” Nay, sir, it undoubtedly characterizes all those that shall be damned; and this too by as essential a character, as that according to which the king would appoint some of his servants for a gracious reward, and others for a capital punishment, if he said to them, “They that serve me faithfully shall be richly provided for; and they that rob me shall be hanged.” If such characterizing as this passes at Geneva for a bare description of persons whom royal humour irrespectively singles out for reward, I hope the time is coming when at Cambridge it will pass for a clear declaration of the reason why some are rewarded, or punished, rather than others; and for a proof that the king is no more a capricious dispenser of rewards, than a tyrannical inflicter of punishments.
III. Page 33. After mentioning these words of St. Paul, “Without holiness no man shall see the Lord;” and those words which St. James wrote to believers, “Be ye doers of the word and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves;” you say, “What is this to the purpose respecting a second justification? Just about as much as, ‘Now an omer is the tenth part of an ephah.’” Now, sir, although I do not immediately rest the cause upon such scriptures, I maintain, that they are much more to the purpose of our second justification by works than Moses’ definition of an omer. Will you dare to say, dear sir, that impious Jezebel, and unconverted Manasses, were persons “just about as” properly qualified for justification in the great day, because they had an omer in their palace, as pious Deborah, and holy Samuel, who had holiness in their hearts, and were doers of the word in their lives? And when the apostle declares that “Christ is the author of eternal salvation to them that obey him,” does he mean, that to obey is a thing just about as important to eternal salvation, as to know that a bushel holds four pecks, and an ephah ten omers? Were ever holiness and obedience inadvertently set in a more contemptible light? For my part, if “by our words we shall be justified in the day of judgment,” I believe it shall be by our words springing from holiness of heart; and therefore I cannot but think that holiness will be more to the purpose of our justification by works in the great day, than all the omers and ephahs, with all the notions about imputed righteousness and finished salvation, in the world.
IV. Page 33. After quoting that capital passage, “Not the hearers of the law are just before God, but the doers shall be justified,” Romans 2:13, you say, “This certainly proves that the doers of the law shall be justified.” Well, then, it directly proves a justification by works. But you immediately insinuate the “impossibility of salvation by the law.” I readily grant, that in the day of conversion, we are “justified by faith,” not only “without the deeds of the ceremonial law,” but even without a previous observance of the law of love. But the case is widely different in the day of judgment; for then “by thy words shalt thou be justified.” Now, sir, it remains for you to prove, that the apostle did not speak of the text under consideration, with an eye to our final justification by works.
In order to this, (p. 33,) you appeal to “the place which this text stands in, and the connection in which the words are found.” I answer,
1. This text stands in the Epistle to the Romans, to whom the apostle says, “Love is the fulfilling of the law: he that loveth another hath fulfilled the law,” Romans 13:8, 10. Now, if “he that loveth another hath fulfilled the law,” you must show that it is impossible to “love another,” or acknowledge that there are persons who “fulfil the law;” and consequently persons who can be justified as “doers of the law.” Nay, in the very chapter such persons are thus mentioned, “If the uncircumcision keep the righteousness of the law, and fulfil the law, shall it not judge thee who dost transgress the law?” That is, shall not a Cornelius, an honest heathen, that “fears God and works righteousness,” rise in judgment against thee who “committest adultery;” vainly supposing that Abraham’s chastity is imputed to thee? Romans 2:22, 27. But,
2. Going back to the beginning of the chapter where our controverted text stands, I affirm that “the connection in which it is found” establishes also justification by works in the great day: and to prove it I only lay the apostle’s words before my judicious readers. “Thou art inexcusable, O Jew, whosoever thou art that judgest, or condemnest the heathens, who do such things, and doest them thyself. The judgment of God is according to truth,” and not according to thy Antinomian notions, that thou wast unconditionally elected in Abraham; that thou standest complete in his righteousness; and that thy salvation was finished when he had offered up Isaac. Be not deceived, “God will render to every man according to his deeds: [and not according to his notions:’] to them who by patient continuance in well doing, seek for immortality, he will render eternal life: anguish to every man that doeth evil; but glory to every man that worketh good: for not the hearers of the law are just before God, but the doers of the law shall be justified — in the day when he shall judge the secrets of men by Jesus Christ, according to my Gospel,” Romans 2:1-16. Now, sir, is it not evident from “the connection” to which you appeal, that Mr. Henry did not pervert the text, when he had the courage to say upon it, “It is not hearing but doing that will save us” in the great day? Hearing, mixed with faith, saves us indeed instrumentally in the day of conversion; but in the day of judgment, neither hearing nor faith will do it; but “patient continuance in well doing,” from the principle of a living faith in Christ, will have that honour.
V. Page 34. After criticising in the same frivolous manner as your brother on Revelation 22:14, “Blessed are they that keep his commandments,” &c, you add, “This is his commandment, That we should believe on the name of his Son Jesus Christ,” and omitting what follows, “and love one another, as he gave us commandment,” you ask, “What then is the conclusion? To believe is the great New Testament command of God.” No, sir; according to 1 John 3:23, the text you have quoted by halves, that commandment is to believe and to love, or to believe with a “faith working by love.” Our Lord informs us, that on the grand commandment of love “hang all the law and the prophets.” St. Paul says, “Though I have all faith, yet if I have not love, I am nothing.” “Devils believe,” says St. James. To believe, then, without loving, is not “doing God’s commandments,” but doing the devil’s work. Because the word commandments, being in the plural number, denotes more than one, and therefore is incompatible with Solifidianism.
To add, as you do, “They that believe will and must obey,” as if they could not help it, is supporting one mistake by another. That they may, can, and should obey, we grant: but that they will and must, are two articles of Calvin’s creed, to which we cannot subscribe; for, to say nothing of daily experience, we read in the Scripture dismal accounts of those fallen believers, who, instead of “adding to their faith virtue,” &c, proceeded so far “in wilful disobedience,” as to “worship the abomination of the Zidonians, shed innocent blood,” forswear themselves, and defile their father’s bed.
It follows then still from Revelation 22:14, that although “upon believing, not for obeying, we are initiated into all the new covenant blessings” in the day of conversion; yet in the great day, only upon persevering in faith and obedience, shall we have right, or, if you please, “privilege, power, and authority, through our Surety, to partake of the tree of life.” For “he that endureth unto the end, the same shall be saved;” and “Christ is the author of eternal salvation to none but them that obey him.” VI. Page 36. You quote, against yourself, Revelation 14:13, “‘Blessed are the dead that die in the Lord.’ Their blessedness arises from their dying in the Lord.” Granted. But how shall it be known they died in the Lord? The Spirit says, “Their works [not their faith] do follow them,” namely, in order to their final justification. To this you reply, “Their works do not go before them — but follow after, to prove that they were in the Lord, whose prerogative alone is to ‘justify the ungodly.’” I answer,
1. When you grant that works prove that we are in the Lord, if they are good, or in the wicked one if they are evil, you give up the point.
2. Do you not confound truth and error? Because in the day of conversion “God justifies the ungodly,” who renounces his ungodliness to believe in Jesus, does it follow that Jesus will justify the ungodly in the day of judgment? Is not the insinuation as unscriptural as it is dangerous? Does not our Lord himself say, that, far from justifying them, he will bid them “depart from him into everlasting fire?”
3. Your observation, that works follow the righteous, and “do not go before them,” is frivolous: for what matters it, whether the witnesses, by whose evidence a prisoner is to be acquitted, follow him to the bar, or are there before him? Is their following him a proof that he is not justified by their instrumentality? To support your cause by such arguments will do it no service.
VII. Page 37. You think to set aside these words of Solomon, “Keep God’s commandments, for this is the whole [duty] of man; for God shall bring every work into judgment, whether it be good or bad,” by just saying, “This passage asserts, that we are to be accountable for our actions.” Then it asserts the very thing for which it was produced: for how can those be really accountable for their actions, who can never be justified or condemned by their words, never be rewarded or punished according to their works? Here, then, again you grant what we contend for. VIII. Page 38. “Circumcision is nothing — but the keeping the commandments of God,” 1 Corinthians 7:19. “This passage (say you) would equally as well prove the supremacy of the pope, as your doctrine of a second justification by works.”
I answer,
(1.) If you compare this text with Ecclesiastes 12:13, 14; Revelation 22:14, and Matthew 12:37, you will see it is very much to the purpose.
(2.) Love is keeping of the commandments. If I have not love, which is “the keeping of the commandments, I am only a tinkling cymbal.” Now, sir, you must prove that God will justify tinkling cymbals by imputed righteousness in the great day; or acknowledge that the keeping of the commandments, or, which is the same, love, makes more toward our final justification than toward placing his holiness the pope in the pretended chair of St. Peter.
(3.) If the doers of the law shall be finally justified, and none but they; and if keeping the commandments is the same thing as being a doer of the law, you boldly hoist the Geneva flag when you insinuate that the keeping of the commandments has no more to do with our final justification than with the supremacy of the pope. Lastly, If keeping the commandments will have nothing to do with our justification in the last day, by a parity of reason, breaking of them will have nothing to do with our condemnation. Thus we are insensibly come to the dreadful counterpart of your comfortable doctrine, that is, absolute reprobation, free wrath, and finished damnation. And when the apostle says, “God shall judge the world in righteousness,” should he not rather, according to your plan, have said, in unrighteousness? IX. Instead of answering such passages as these: “Behold; I come quickly, and my reward is with me, to give to every man as his work shall be.” He that knoweth the heart, “shall render to every man according to his works. We shall all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that every one may receive the things done in the body, according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad. The Father, without respect of persons, judgeth according to every man’s work. The dead were judged out of the things written in the books, according to their works.” Instead, I say, of answering such passages, you leap over fifty pages of my book, to blame me (p. 35) for saying after St. Peter, Acts 2:40, “SAVE YOURSELVES from this untoward generation!”
Granting you, sir, that the Greek word means literally, “Be ye saved;” yet you wrong our translation when you say that its language is “glaringly inconsistent.” The words that immediately precede, “He exhorted them, saying, Save yourselves,” &c, convinced our translators of the absurdity of exhorting people to be saved, that could absolutely do nothing in order to salvation. And you make Calvinism ridiculous before all Cambridge, when (p. 36) you make swqhte, “Be ye saved;” or when spoken in a way of exhortation, “Save yourselves,” to mean, “Know that ye cannot save yourselves.”
Page 35, you say, “Let the context illustrate this: Thousands ‘were pricked to the heart;’ they ask ‘what they shall do?’ doubtless meaning ‘to be saved.’ The apostle directs them immediately to Jesus for salvation.” What! without doing any thing toward it? No such thing. To the overthrow of your criticism, and of Calvinism, he sets them immediately upon doing. Their question was, “What shall we do to be saved?” and the immediate answer is, “Repent and be baptized.” Just as if he had said, Be ye saved, or, Save yourselves by repenting and coming to Christ: or, to use the words of Christ to the people of Capernaum, and those of St. Paul to the jailer of Philippi, “Do the work of God,” i.e. the work which God first calls for; “believe in the Lord Jesus, and you shall be saved.”
You add, “This language (‘Save yourselves’) ill becomes the mouth of inspiration.” I am sorry, sir, you should be so exceedingly positive. I rather think, that your “language ill becomes the mouth of” modesty. Does not St. Jude say, “Save some with fear?” Does not St. Paul mention his endeavours to “save some of his own flesh,” Romans 11:14, and his “becoming all things to all men, that he might save some?” 1 Corinthians 9:22.
Does he not speak of a husband “saving his wife,” and of a wife “saving her husband?” 1 Corinthians 7:16. Does he not write to the Philippians, “Work out your own salvation;” and to Timothy, “In doing this, thou shalt save thyself and them that hear thee?” 1 Timothy 4:16. You are too good a scholar, sir, to say, that Greek swseiv seauton “is passive:” and too modest a divine to insinuate, upon second thoughts, that St. Paul speaks like a heretic, and you like an apostle.
X. After opposing our doctrine of justification by the evidence of works in the last day, as warmly as your pious brother, you give yore public assent to it as well as he. Page 34, speaking of the day that shall declare every man’s work, and the fire that shall try of what sort it is, you say, “Who that reads the Bible denies, that every man’s works shall be examined as a proof of his faith, and that upon their evidence the Judge will pass sentence?” Undoubtedly you mean sentence of absolution or condemnation, according to our Lord’s words, “By thy words shalt thou be justified or condemned,” Matthew 12:37.
Now, sir, this is the very doctrine which we maintain; as you may see, Second Check, pp. 83, 85; the very doctrine for which you represent me to the world as a Papist, and fierce enemy to the Gospel. Gentle reader, take notice of my capital crime. I have dared to vindicate a truth, which, my opponent himself being judge, “no man that reads the Bible denies!” Is this a dreadful heresy? O sir, when this shall be known in our universities, will not Oxford cry to Cambridge, and Cambridge echo back to Oxford, the substance of your book, and the title of mine? Logica Genevensis! XI. Now that you have granted the doctrine of justification by the evidence of works in the day of judgment, let us see how you endeavour to keep your system in countenance. Page 34, you say, contrary to your own concession, “Though works have not the least to do in justifying our persons, yet they will appear to the justifying of that faith, as sound, by which alone we are to be saved.”
To cut you off from this last subterfuge, I observe,
(1.) That works will have as much to do in justifying our persons in the last day, as faith in justifying them at our conversion.
(2.) This doctrine of faith, being justified by works in the day of judgment, is irrational: for faith shall then be no more; and common sense dictates, that Christ, the wisdom of God, will not lose time in justifying or condemning a grace which shall not exist.
(3.) It is quite unscriptural. Our Lord says, “By thy words shalt thou [not by faith] be justified.” St. Paul says, “The doers of the law [not their faith] shall be justified.” And St. James declares, that “Rahab [not her faith] and Abraham [not his faith] were justified by works,” in the day of trial.
(4.) Your scheme fathers nonsense upon that apostle: for if faith is justified by works, and not a man, it follows, that when St. James says “Ye see then how that by works a man is justified, and not by faith only,” it is just as if he said, “Ye see then how that by works faith is justified, and not by faith only.”
(5.) If the believer’s faith is justified in the last day, and not the believer himself; by a parity of reason, the unbeliever’s unbelief will be condemned, and not the unbeliever himself.
(6.) We have as good ground to assert, that the faith of believers shall be saved in the last day, and not their persons; as you to maintain, that the faith of believers shall be justified, and not their persons. Thus, according to your curious doctrine, faith, not believers, shall go to heaven; and unbelief, not unbelievers, shall depart into hell. Lastly: If “ works have not the least to do in justifying our persons” in the great day; it follows, they will not have the least to do in condemning them. Thus are we come again to the doctrine of finished damnation; and thus you point blank contradict your own Scriptural concession, “Upon the evidence of works the Judge will pass sentence.”
From the preceding pages it appears, if I am not mistaken, that justification by works, i.e. by the works of faith, in the last day, is a solid anvil, which the twelve strokes of your hammer have settled more than ever upon its firm basis, “The word of God, that abideth for ever.” To this anvil I shall, by and by, bring Calvinian Antinomianism, and endeavour to work it, in meekness of wisdom, with a hammer, I hope, a little heavier than your own.
Having answered your objections to what you justly call “the principal cause of controversy among us,” I may make one or two observations upon the friendliness of your Friendly Remarks.
Candid reader, if thou hast read my Checks without prejudice, and attentively compared them with the word of God, wouldst thou ever think that the following lines contain an extract from the friendly sentence, which my young opponent passes upon them? “Hard names, banter, sarcasm, sneer, abuse, bravado, low arts of slander, slanderous accusations, opprobrious names, ill-natured satire — odious, deformed, detestable colours — unfair and ungenerous treatment, terms void of truth, unmerciful condemnations, false humility, irritating spirit — provoking, uncharitable style — continual sneers, most odious appellations, abusive words, notorious scandalizing — lines too dreadful to be transcribed, unworthy of an answer, beneath contempt — most indecent ridicule — a wretched conclusion, as bitter as gall — and slanders, which ought even to make a Turk blush!”
If thou canst not yet see, gentle reader, into the nature of Mr. Rowland Hill’s Remarks, peruse the following friendly sentences. “In regard to the fopperies of religion, you certainly differ from the Popish priest of Madeley. You have made universal havoc of every truth of the Gospel. You have invented dreadful slanders. You plentifully stigmatize many with the most unkind language. You have blackened our principles, and scandalized our practice. You place us in a manner among murderers. It shocks me to follow you. Our characters lie bleeding under the cruelty of your pen, and complain loudly against your great injustice. Blush for the characters you have injured by the rashness and bitterness of your pen. You have invented a set of monsters; and raised a hideous ghost by your own spells, and incantations of banter and contempt. Numberless sneers, taunts, and sarcasms dreadfully decorate the whole of your performance: they are nothing better than infernal terms of darkness, which it is hateful to transcribe. Your Second Check, I fear, must prove the concluding bar of separation,” that is, of excommunication.
When I cast my eye upon this extract, I cannot help crying out, If this is my antagonist’s friendliness, alas! what will be his displeasure? And what have I done to deserve these tokens of Calvinian benevolence? Why are these flowers of Geneva rhetoric so plentifully heaped upon my head? And why? But I must not complain; for my friendly opponent has patiently stayed till the publication of the Second Check, to talk of a “concluding bar of separation.” But if I am a reprobate, upon his scheme of unconditional election and gratuitous reprobation, Calvin’s God put “the concluding bar of separation” between me and himself, not only before I wrote the Second Check, but thousands of years before I drew my first breath. When I consider this, far from feeling the least resentment against Mr. Hill, I see it my duty to thank him for showing much greater patience toward me than the God whom he worships; and I wonder that his severe principles should not be productive of more unfriendly Remarks, than those which he is pleased to call friendly.
Yes, sir, though I thought at first that the title of your book was ironical, I now believe it literal, and am persuaded you really meant to show me much friendliness. For a temporary excommunication, yea, a “concluding bar of separation,” must appear an act of grace to one who truly relishes the doctrines of limited grace and unprovoked wrath.
I do not hereby intimate that I have done nothing displeasing to you. Far from insinuating it, I shall present my readers with a list of the manifold, but well-meant provocations, which have procured me your public correspondence. I say well-meant provocations; for all I want to provoke any one to is love and good works. And may not a minister use even the rod for that purpose? If you think not, please to inform me what the apostle meant, when he said “What will ye? Shall I come unto you with the rod, or in love, and in the spirit of meekness?”
1. I have written my Checks with the confidence with which the clear dictates of reason, and the full testimonies of Scripture, usually inspire those who love what they esteem truth more than they do their dearest friends.
2. After speaking most honourably of many Calvinists, even of all that are pious, I have taken the liberty to insinuate, that the schemes of finished salvation, and imputed righteousness, will no more save a Calvinist guilty of practical Antinomianism, than the doctrine of general redemption will save an ungodly Remonstrant. Thus I have made no difference between the backsliding elect of the Lock, and the apostates of the Foundery, when death overtakes them in their sins and in their blood.
3. I have maintained that our Lord did not speak an untruth, when he said, “In the day of judgment, by thy words shalt thou be justified;” and that St. Paul did not propagate heresy, when he wrote, “Work out your own salvation!”
4. I have sprinkled with the salt of irony f41 your favourite doctrine. (Friendly Remarks, page 39,) “Salvation wholly depends upon the purpose of God according to election, without any respect to what may be in them,” that is, the elect. Now, sir, as by the doctrine of undeniable consequences, he who receives a guinea with the king’s head on the one side, cannot but receive the lion’s on the other side; so he that admits the preceding proposition, cannot but admit the inseparable counterpart, namely, the following position, which every attentive and unprejudiced person sees written in blood upon that side of Calvin’s standard which is generally kept out of sight, “Damnation wholly depends upon the purpose of God according to reprobation, without respect to what may be in the reprobates.” Here is no “inventing a monstrous creed,” but merely turning the leaf of your own, and reading what is written there, namely, Damnation finished, evidently answering to finished salvation.
5. You have done more, says my opponent, (p. 47,) “You scarce write a page without unjust reflections. To follow you through all your accusations would be endless. One passage, however, which seems to me to shine conspicuous among the rest for calumny and falsehood, as the moon does among the stars, shall be the last we will notice.”
I say, in the Second Check, “How many intimate, that Christ has fulfilled all righteousness, that we might be the children of God with hearts full of unrighteousness!” And you reply,” How many? There are a generation it seems of these black blasphemers. [I would say, of these mistaken Calvinists.] Produce but a few of them.”
Well, sir, I produce first the author of Pietas Oxoniensis, next yourself, and then all the Calvinists who admire your brother’s Fourth Letter, where he not only insinuates, but openly attempts to prove, that David was “a man after God’s own heart,” a “pleasant child” of God, and that he stood absolved and complete in the everlasting righteousness of Christ, while his eyes were full of adultery, and his hands full of blood: consequently, while his heart was full of all unrighteousness. Now if this was the case of David, it may not only be that of many, but of all the elect. They may all be the children of God, not only with hearts full of unrighteousness, but even while they cloak adultery with deliberate murder.
Now, pray sir, do you not show yourself completely master of Geneva logic, when you assert that what is so abundantly demonstrated by your brother’s Letters, and the well-known principles of all sound Calvinists, is a calumny and a falsehood as conspicuous as the luminary that rules the night? This imaginary moon of calumny, which you discover through the telescope of Calvinian prejudice, will help my judicious readers to guess at the magnitude of the stars of falsehood, with which, you say, almost all the pages of my book are bespangled.
I conclude by entreating you not to put any longer a wrong construction upon the Helvetic bluntness with which I continue to expose barefaced Antinomianism. Do not account me an enemy, because I tell you the truth as it is in the Epistle of St. James: and deprive me not of an interest in your valuable friendship, merely because I follow the word of God, and the dictates of my conscience.
I can with truth assure you, dear sir, that your groundless charges of “calumny, falsehood, bitterness, injustice,” &c, instead of putting “a concluding bar of separation” between us, only give me an opportunity of fulfilling delightfully that precept of the evangelical law, according to which we shall be justified in the great day, “Forgive one another, even as God for Christ’s sake hath forgiven you.” I confirm my love toward you, by rejoicing in all your pious labours, and sincerely wishing you the most unbounded success, whenever you do not give up the “right foundation,” or substitute Dr. Crisp to St. James, and Calvin’s narrow election to the free Gospel of Jesus Christ. And if I may trust the feelings of my own heart, which continues quite open toward you, I remain just as if you were not my opponent, dear sir, your affectionate friend, and obedient servant, in a pure Gospel,
J. FLETCHER.