If the preceding account be just, true Protestants are all candid; Christian candour being nothing but a readiness to hear right reason and plain Scripture. Sincerely desirous to "prove all things, to hold fast that which is good, and to approve things which are excellent," Protestants are then never afraid to bring their creed to a reasonable and Scriptural test. And conscious that the mines of natural and revealed religion are not yet exhausted, they think, with the apostle, that if any man supposes he has learned all that he should know, "he is vainly puffed up in his fleshly mind, and knows nothing yet as he ought to know."

Hence it is, that of all the tempers which true Protestants abhor, none seems to them more detestable than that of those Gnostics,-those pretenders to superior illumination, who, under the common pretence of orthodoxy or infallibility, shut their eyes against the light, think plain Scripture beneath their notice, enter their protests against reason, steel their breasts against conviction, and are so rooted in blind obstinacy, that they had rather hug error in an old fantastic dress, than embrace the pure truth, newly emerging from under the streams of prejudice. Impetuous streams these, which "the dragon casts out of his mouth, that he may cause the celestial virgin to be carried away by the flood," Rev. xii, 15. Alas! how many professors are there, who, like St. Stephen's opponents, judges, and executioners, are neither able to resist, nor willing to admit the truth; who make their defence by "stopping their ears, and crying out, The temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord are we!" who thrust the supposed heretic out of their sanhedrim; who, from the press, the pulpit, or the dictator's chair, send forth volleys of hard insinuations or soft assertions, in hope that they will pass for solid arguments; and who, when they have no more stones or snow balls to throw at the supposed Philistine, prudently avoid drawing "the sword of the Spirit," retire behind the walls of their fancied orthodoxy, raise a rampart of slanderous contempt against the truth that besieges them, and obstinately refuse either candidly to give up, or manfully to contend for the unscriptural tenets which they would impose upon others as pure Gospel.

Whether some of my opponents, good men as they are, have not inclined a little to the error of those sons of prejudice, I leave the candid reader to decide. They have neither answered, nor yielded to the arguments of my Checks. They are shut up in their own city. Strong and high are thy walls, O mystical Jericho! Thy battlements reach unto the clouds; but truth, the spiritual ark of God, is stronger, and shall prevail. The bearing of it patiently around thy ramparts, and the blowing of rams' horns in the name of the Lord, will yet shake the very foundation of thy towers. O that I had the honour of successfully mixing my feeble voice with the blasts of the champions who encompass the devoted city! O that the irresistible shout, "Reason and Scripture, Christ and the truth" were universal! If this were the case, how soon would Jericho and Babylon, Antinomianism and Pharisaism, fall together!

Those two antichristian fortresses are equally attacked in the following pages and to you, true Protestants, I submit the inspection of the attack. Direct me where I am wrong, assist me where I am right, nor refuse to support my feebleness by your ardent prayers; for, next to the Captain of our salvation, I look to you for help and comfort.

My opponents and I equally pretend to Protestantism; and who shall

judge between us? Shall it be the men of the world? No: for St. Paul says, "I speak to your shame. Is it so, that there is not a WISE MAN among you? No, not one that shall be able to judge among his brethren?" There are wise men in our despised camp, able to judge between us and ye are the men, honoured brethren; for ye are all willing to hear reason, and ready to weigh Scripture. Therefore, on my part, I sincerely choose you as judges of the present dispute.

And that you may not look upon this office as unworthy of your acceptance, permit me to tell you, that our controversy is one of the most important which was ever set on foot. To convince you of it, I need only remind you, that the grand inquiry, What shall I do to be saved? is entirely suspended on this greater question, Have I any thing to do to be eternally saved? A question this which admits of three answers: (1.) That of the mere Solifidian, who says, "If we are elect, we have nothing to do in order to eternal salvation, unless it be to believe that Christ has done all for us, and then to sing finished salvation; and if we are not elect, whether we do nothing, little or much, eternal ruin is our inevitable portion." (2.) That of the mere moralist, who is as great a stranger to the doctrine of free grace as to that of free wrath; and tells you "that there is no free, initial salvation for us; and that we must work ourselves into a state of initial salvation by dint of care, diligence, and faithfulness." And (3.) That of the reconciler, whom I consider as a rational Bible Christian, and who asserts: (1.) That Christ has done the part of a sacrificing priest and teaching prophet upon earth, and does still that of an interceding and royal priest in heaven, whence he sends his Holy Spirit to act as an enlightener, sanctifier, comforter, and helper in our hearts. (2.) That "the free gift of initial salvation,' and of one or more talents of saving grace, "is come upon all" through the God-man Christ who "is the Saviour of all men, especially of them that believe." And (3.) That our free will, assisted by that saving grace imparted to us in the free gift, is enabled to work with God in a subordinate manner: so that we may freely (without necessity) do the part of penitent, obedient, and persevering believers, according to the Gospel dispensation we are under.

This is the plan of this work, in which I equally fight pro aris et focis, for faith and works, for gratuitous mercy and impartial justice; reconcil. ing all along Christ our Saviour with Christ our Judge, heated Augustine with Pelagius, free grace with free will, Divine goodness with human obedience, the faithfulness of God's promises with the veracity of his threatenings, FIRST with SECOND causes, the original merits of Christ with the derived worthiness of his members, and God's foreknowledge with our free agency.

The plan, I think, is generous; standing at the utmost distance from the extremes of bigots. It is deep and extensive; taking in the most interesting subjects about which professors generally divide, such as the origin of evil, liberty, and necessity, the law of Moses and the Gospel of Christ, general and particular redemption, the apostasy and perseverance of the saints, the election and reprobation maintained by St. Paul, &c. I entirely rest the cause upon Protestant ground, that is, upon reason and Scripture. Nevertheless, to show our antagonists that we are not afraid to meet them upon any ground, I prove, by sufficient testimo

nies from the fathers and the reformers, that the most eminent divines, in the primitive Church and our own, have passed the straits that I point out; especially when they weighed the heavy anchor of prejudice, had a good gale of Divine wisdom, and steered by the Christian mariner's compass, the word of God, more than by the false lights hung out by party men.

If I have in any degree succeeded in the execution of this reconciling plan, I hope that my well meant attempt will provoke abler pens to exert themselves; and will excite more respectable divines to strike heavier blows, and to repeat them, till they have given the finishing stroke to divisions, which harden the world against Christianity, which have torn the bosom of the Church for above twelve hundred years, and which have hurt or destroyed myriads of her injudicious children; driving some into Pharisaic obedience, others into Antinomian immorality, and not a few into open infidelity or fierce uncharitableness.

If a tradesman be allowed to recommend his goods, when he does it in a manner consistent with modesty and truth, shall I be accused of self conceit if I make some commendatory remarks upon the following papers? I venture to do it in the fear of God. And,

1. They are plain. I deal in plain reason and plain Scripture; and when the depth of my subject obliges me to produce arguments that require close attention, I endeavour so to manage them, that they do not rise above the reach of mechanics, nor sink beneath the attention of divines.

2. I have been charged with widening the breaches, which the demon of bigotry has made among religious people; but, if I have done it, I take the Searcher of hearts to witness, that it has been with such a design as made our Lord bring fire upon the earth,—the fire of truth, to burn the stubble of error, and to rekindle the flame of love. However, if I have, in years past, made a wound rashly, (of which I am not yet conscious,) in this book I bind it up, and bring the healing, though (to proud or relaxed flesh) painful balsam. This book is entirely written upon a pacific plan. If I sometimes give the contending parties a keen reproof, in obedience to the apostolic precept, "Rebuke them sharply," it is only to make them ashamed of their contentious bigotry, that I may bring them to reason the sooner. And if prejudiced readers will infer from thence that I am a bad man, and that my pen distils gall, I forgive their hasty conclusion: I once more send them back to the good men of old, who have reproved far less errors with far greater severity than I allow myself to use and I ask, if persons, impatient of control, do not always put wrong constructions upon the just reproofs which they are deter. mined to disregard?

3. I hope that, notwithstanding the outcry raised against my former Checks, they have been of some service to such readers as are not steeled against argument and Scripture; but I flatter myself that, through God's blessing, this tract will be more useful: I prefer it, at least, far before the others, because it has far more of God's word, far less of mine; the Scriptures having so large a place in the following sheets, that you will find whole sections filled with balanced passages, to which, for brevity's sake, I have added nothing but a few illustrations in brackets [ ]

4. My method, so far as I know, is new.. I have seen several Concordances made of Scripture words, but have not yet met with one of Scripture doctrines upon the delicate subjects handled in this book. And I flatter myself that, as whatever throws light upon the Bible has always met with approbation from true Protestants, you will not despise this attempt to make the seeming contradictions of that precious book vanish away, by demonstrating that they are only wise oppositions, not less important in the world of grace, than the distinction of man and wife is in the world of nature.

5. I hope that you will see, in the following pages, many passages placed in such a light, as to have their force heightened, and their obscurity removed by the opposition of the scriptures with which they are balanced; the passages which belong to the doctrine of FREE GRACE, illustrating those which belong to the doctrine of FREE WILL, and vice versa, just as the lights and shades of a picture help to set off each other. I therefore earnestly entreat all my readers, especially those who read much and think little, to take time, and not to proceed to a new pair of scriptures till they have found out the balance of the last pair which they have reviewed. If they deny me this request, my trouble will be lost with respect to them; and, through their hurry, my Scales will degenerate into a dull collection of texts; the very life and spirit of my performance consisting in the harmonious opposition of the scriptures, which prove my capital doctrine, that is, the Gospel marriage of free grace and free will. And that the reader may find out, with ease, in every couple of texts, the hands by which they are joined, and see (if I may carry the allegory so far) the ring, by which their marriage is ascertained, and their gender known, I have generally put in DIFFERENT CHARACTERS the words on which the opposition or connection of the paired texts chiefly depends; hoping to help the reader's mind by giving his eyes a silent call, and by meeting his attention half way. erts his powers, and

"Si callida verbum

Rediderit junctura novum,"*

If he ex

But I

he will, through God's grace, profit by his labour and mine. repeat it, he must find out the delicate connection, and harmonious opposition of the paired scriptures which I produce, or my Scales will be of as little service to him as a pair of scale bottoms without a beam would be to a banker, who wants to weigh a thousand guineas.

6. As I make my appeal to true Protestants, I lay a particular stress upon the Scriptures. And there I find a doctrine which, for a long succession of ages, has been partly buried in the rubbish of popery and Calvinism: I mean the doctrine of the various dispensations of Divine grace toward the children of men; or of the various talents of saving grace which the Father of lights gives to heathens, Jews, and Christians. To the obscurity in which this doctrine has been kept, we may chiefly impute the self-electing narrowness, and the wide-reprobating partiality of the Romish and Calvinian Churches. I make a constant use of this important doctrine. It is it chiefly which distinguishes this tract from most polemical writings upon the same subject. It is my key and my

If a delicate connection renders the word new to him.

sword. With it I open the mysteries of election and reprobation; and with it I attempt to cut the Gordian (should I not say the Calvinian and Pelagian?) knot. How far I have succeeded is yours to decide.

If these general observations, O ye true Protestants, make you cast a favourable look upon my Scales; and if, after a close trial, you find that they contain the reconciling truth, and the ONE complete Gospel of Christ, rent by Zelotes and Honestus to make the Two partial gospels of the day; let me entreat you to show what you are, by boldly standing up for reason and Scripture, that is, for true Protestantism. Equally enter your protest against the Antinomian innovations of Zelotes, and the Pharisaic mistakes of Honestus. These two champions have indeed their thousands, and tens of thousands at their feet; and they may unite their adverse forces to oppose you, as Jews and Gentiles did to oppose the Prince of Peace. But resist them with "the armour of righteousness on the right hand and on the left," and you will in time make them friends to each other and to yourselves; I say in time, because when peaceful men rush between fierce combatants in order to part them, they at first get nothing but blows. The confusion for a time increases ; and idle spectators, who have not love and courage enough to rush into the danger, and to stop the mischief, say that the peace makers only add fuel to the fire of discord. Thus are the courageous sons of peace "hated of all men" but of true Protestants, for treading in the steps of the Divine Reconciler, whom the two rivals, Herod and Pilate, agreed to set at naught-whom Jews and Gentiles concurred to crucify, inve. terate enemies as they were to each other! He died, the loving Reconciler he died! but by his death "he slew the enmity-broke down the middle wall of partition-of twain made one new man; so making peace" between Herod and Pilate, between Jews and Gentiles. And so will you, honoured brethren, between Zelotes and Honestus, between the Calvinists and the Pelagians, between the Solifidians and the moralists; if you lovingly and steadily try to reconcile them. You may indeed be "numbered among transgressors" for attempting it. Your reputation may even die between that of the fool and of the knave-that of the enthusiast and of the felon: but be not afraid. Truth and the Crucified are on your side. God will raise you secret friends. A Joseph, a Nicodemus, will take down "the hand writing that is against you.' Α Mary and a Salome will embalm your name; and if it be buried in oblivion and reproach, yet it will rise again the third day.

If God is for you, fear not then what man can say of you, or even do to you. Smile at Antinomian preterition: triumph in Pharisaic reprobation and when you are reviled for truth's sake, like blunt, resolute, loving Stephen, kneel down, and pray that the sin of your mistaken opposers may not be laid to their charge. O for the Protestant spirit which animated confessors of old, carried martyrs singing to the stake, and there helped them to clap their hands in the flames kindled by the implacable abettors of error! O for a Shadrach's resolution! The rich, glittering image towers toward heaven, and vies with the meridian sun. Nebuchadnezzar, the monarch of the kings of the earth, points at the burning fiery furnace. The princes, governors, captains, judges, counsellors, sheriffs, and rulers of provinces, in all their dazzling magnifi. cence, increase the glory of his terror. The sound of the cornet, flute,