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both as it is called the heir, and as called the infant, either according to its substance, or according to [dispositionem] the dispensation and economy suitable to those times. According to the former of these respects, the church was under the promise or the covenant of promise: And according to the latter respect, she was under the law and under the Old Testament; in regard to which, that people is called servile, or in bondage, and the infant heir "differing in nothing from a servant;" as, in regard to the promise, the same people are denominated free, born of a free woman, and according to Isaac "counted for the seed" to whom the promise was made.

IX. According to the promise, the church was a willing people; according to the Old Testament, a carnal people. According to the former relation, the heir of spiritual and heavenly blessings; according to the latter, the heir of spiritual and earthly blessings, especially of the land of Canaan and of its benefits. According to the former relation, the church was endowed with the Spirit of adoption; according to the latter, she had this Spirit intermixed with that of bondage [durante] as long as the promise continued.

X. The open consideration of these relations, and a suitable comparison and opposition between the covenant of promise, and the law or the Old Testament, contributes much to the [correct] interpretation of several passages of Scripture, which otherwise can scarcely be at all explained, or at least with great difficulty.

COROLLARIES.

I. Because the Old Testament [debuit] was forced to be abrogated, therefore it was to be confirmed not by the blood of a Testator or Mediator, but of brute animals.

II. "The Old Testament" is never used in the Scriptures for the covenant of grace.

III. The confounding of the promise and of the Old Testament is productive of much obscurity in Christian theology, and is the cause of more than a single error.

DISPUTATION LII.

ON THE CHURCH OF THE NEW TESTAMENT, OR UNDER THE

GOSPEL.

I. THE Church of the New Testament is that which, from the time when that. Testament was confirmed by the blood of Christ the Mediator of the New Testament, or from the period of his ascension into heaven, began to be called out from a state of sin

which was plainly manifested by the word of the Gospel, and by the Spirit that was suited to the heirs who had attained to the age of adults,—to a participation of the righteousness of faith and of salvation, through faith placed in the Gospel, and to render worship to God and Christ in the unity of the same Spirit: And this church will continue to be called out in the same manner to the end of the world, to the praise of the glory of the grace of God and of Christ.

II. The Efficient Cause is the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has now most plainly manifested himself to be Jehovah and the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ; and it is Christ himself, elevated to the right hand of the Father, invested with full power in heaven and on earth, and endowed with the word of the Gospel and with the Spirit beyond measure. The Antecedent or Inly-moving Cause is the grace and mercy of God the Father and of Christ, and even the justice of God, to which through the good pleasure of the Father the fullest satisfaction has now been made in Jesus Christ, and which is clearly manifested in the Gospel.

III. The Spirit of Christ is the Administering Cause according to the economy, as He is [Vicarius] the Substitute of Christ and receives of that which is Christ's, to glorify Christ by this calling forth in his church; with only a full power to administer all things [prout vult] according to his own pleasure. The Spirit uses the word of the Gospel placed in the mouth of his servants, which immediately executes this vocation, and the word of the Law whether written or implanted in the mind; the Gospel serves both antecedently that a place may be made for this vocation, and consequently when it has been received by faith.

IV. The Object of this evocation is, not only Jews, but also Gentiles, the middle wall of partition which formerly separated the Gentiles from the Jews being taken away by the flesh and blood of Christ; that is, the object is all men generally and promiscuously without any difference, but it is all men actually sinners, whether they be those who acknowledge themselves as such and to whom the preaching of the Gospel is [statim] constantly exhibited, or those who are yet to be brought to the acknowledgment of their sins.

V. Because this church is of adult age, and because she no longer requires a tutor and governor, she is free from the economical [servitute] bondage of the law, and is governed by the Spirit of full liberty, which is by no means intermixed with the spirit of bondage; and therefore she is free from the use of the

ceremonial law, so far as it served [obsignandis] for testifying of sins, and as it was "the hand-writing which was against us."

VI. This church also with unveiled or open face beholds the glory of the Lord as in a glass, and has the very express image of heavenly things, and Christ, the image of the invisible God, the express image of the Father's person and the brightness of his glory, and the very body of things to come which is of Christ. She therefore does not need the law, which has the shadow of good things to come; on which account, she is free from the same ceremonial law, by which it typically prefigured Christ and good things to come.

VII. The church of the New Testament [sensit] has not experienced, does not now experience, and will not to the end of the world experience, in the whole of its course, any change whatever with regard to the word itself or the Spirit: For in these last times, God has spoken to us in his Son, and by those who have heard him.

VIII. This same church is called "Catholic," in a peculiar and distinct sense in opposition to the church which was under the Old Testament, so far as she has been diffused through the whole world, and has embraced within her boundary all nations, tribes, people and tongues. This universality is not hindered by the rejection of the greater part of the Jews, as they will also be added to the church, some time hence, in a great multitude and like an army formed into columns.

IX. We may denominate, not unaptly or inappropriately, the state of the church, as she existed from the time of John until the ascent of Christ into heaven, [inconsistentem] "a temporary or intermediate one" between the state of the Promise and of the Gospel, or that of the Old Testament and of the New.

X. On which account, we place the ministry of John between the ministry of the Prophets and that of the Apostles, and plainly and in every respect conformable to neither of them: Hence also John is called " a greater prophet," and is said to be "less than the least in the kingdom of heaven."

COROLLARY.

The baptism of John has to the present time been the same with that of Christ, that there might be afterwards no need for it to be restored.

DISPUTATION LIII.

ON THE HEAD AND THE MARKS OF THE CHURCH.

I. THOUGH the head and the body be of one nature, and though according to nature they properly constitute one subsistence; yet He who, according to nature, is the Head of the church, cannot have communion of nature with her; for she is his creature.

II. But it has been the good pleasure of God, who is both the Head of the church according to nature, and her Creator, to bestow on his church his Son Jesus Christ, made man, as her Head; by whom likewise it has been his will to create his church; that is, a new creature, that the union between the church and her Head might be closer, and the communication more free and confiding.

III. But a three-fold relation exists between the church and her Head (1.) That the Head contains in himself, in a manner the most perfect, all things which are necessary and sufficient for salvation. (2.) That He is fitly united to the church his body, by "the joints and bands" of the Spirit and of faith. (3.) That the Head can [influere] infuse the virtue of his own perfection into her, and she can receive it from Him according to the order of pre-ordination and subordination fitly corresponding with it according to the difference of both.

IV. But these three things belong to Christ alone: Nay, not one of the three agrees with any person or thing except with Christ. Wherefore He only is the Head of the church, to whom she immediately coheres according to her internal and real essence.

V. But no one can, according to this relation, be vicar or substitute to Him; neither the apostle Peter, nor any Roman Pontiff. Nay, Christ can have no one among men as his vicar, according to the external administration of the church; and, what is still more, He cannot have an Universal Minister who is less than the name of a Vicar.

VI. Yet we do not deny, that those persons who are constituted by this Head as his Ministers, perform such functions as belong to the Head; because it has been his pleasure to gather his church to himself, and to govern it by human means.

VII. But, according to her internal essence, this church is known to no one except to her Head: She is likewise made known to others by signs and indications which have their origin VOL. II.

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from her true internal essence itself, if they be real, and not counterfeit and deceptive in their appearance.

VIII. These signs are, the profession of the true faith, and the institution or conducting of the life according to [præscriptum] the direction and [instinctum] the instigation of the Spirit,-a matter that belongs to external acts, about which alone a judgment can be formed by mankind.

IX. We say that these are the marks of a church which outwardly [bene habentis] conducts herself with propriety. But it may come to pass, that a mere profession of faith may obtain in this church through the public preaching and hearing of the word, through the administration and use of the sacraments, and through prayers and thanksgivings; and yet in her whole life she may degenerate from the profession; and, lastly, she may in her deeds deny Christ, whom she professes to know in word: In which case, she does not cease to be a church as long as it is the pleasure of God and Christ to bear with her and her ill manners, and not to send her a bill of divorcement.

X. But it has happened that in her profession itself, she begins to intermix falsehoods with truth, and to worship at the same time Jehovah and Baal: Then, indeed, her condition is very bad, and "nigh to destruction;" and all those who adhere to her are commanded to desert her, so far at least as not to become partakers of her abominations and to contaminate themselves with the pollutions of her idolatry: Nay, they are commanded to accuse their mother of being a harlot, and of having violated the marriage compact with her husband.

XI. In such a defection as this, those who desert her are not the cause of the dissension, but she who is justly deserted; because she first declined from God and Christ, to whom all believers, and each of them in particular, must adhere by [individuo] an inseparable connection.

XII. The Roman Pontiff is not the head of the church; and because he boasts himself of being that head, the name of “ Antichrist" on this account most deservedly belongs to him.

XIII. The marks of the church of which the Papists boast,Antiquity, Universality, Duration, Amplitude, the uninterrupted Succession of teachers, and Agreement in doctrine,—have been invented beyond those which we have laid down, because they are accommodated to the present state of the church of Rome.

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