Wesley Corpus

8. To the argument, 'St. Paul says "Abraham was justified by faith,"' you answer, 'St. James says "Abraham was justified by works"' (page 24). True; but he neither speaks of the same justification, nor the same faith, nor the same works. Not of the same justification: for St. Paul speaks of that justification which was five-and-twenty years before Isaac was born (Genesis); St. James of that wherewith he was justified when he offered up Isaac on the altar. It is living faith whereby St. Paul affirms we are justified; it is dead faith whereby St. James affirms we are not justified. St. Paul speaks of works antecedent to justification; St. James of works consequent upon it. This is the plain, easy, natural way of reconciling the two Apostles. The fact was manifestly this: (1) When Abraham dwelt in Haran, being then seventy-five years old, God called him thence: he 'believed God,' and He 'counted it to him for righteousness'--that is, he 'was justified by faith,' as St. Paul strenuously asserts. (2) Many years after Isaac was born (some of the ancients thought three-and-thirty) Abraham, showing his faith by his works, offered him up upon the altar. (3) Here the 'faith' by which, in St. Paul's sense, he was justified long before, 'wrought together with his works'; and he was justified in St. James's sense--that is (as the Apostle explains his own meaning), 'by works his faith was made perfect.' God confirmed, increased, and perfected the principle from which those works sprang. 9. Drawing to a conclusion, you say: 'What pity so many volumes should have been written upon the question whether a man be justified by faith or works, seeing they are two essential parts of the same thing!' (page 25). If by works you understand inward and outward holiness, both faith and works are essential parts of Christianity: and yet they are essentially different, and by God Himself contradistinguished from each other; and that in the very question before us-- 'Him that worketh not, but believeth.' Therefore whether a man be justified by faith or works is a point of the last importance; otherwise our Reformers could not have answered to God their spending so much time upon it. Indeed, they were both too wise and too good men to have wrote so many volumes on a trifling or needless question.