Wesley Corpus

Wesley's sermon on Jeremiah xxiii. 6, have a very evangelical appearance, yet all their excellency vanisheth away, when we are told in the same sermon, that the righteousness he contends for is not the divine righteousness of Christ, but his human righteousness. When we consider the express words of the text, ‘The Lord our Righteousness,” one might wonder (if anything is to be wondered at that Mr. Wesley affirms) how he could possibly fall into an error, which at once not only destroys the meritorious efficacy of the Redeemer’s righteousness, but undermines the virtue of his atoning blood.” This is home; Mr. Hill has broke my head sadly. But he will soon give me a plaster: “How ever, if Mr. Wesley will acknowledge, that by Christ’s human righteousness, he means that mediatorial righteous ness which was wrought by God in the human nature, I entirely acquiesce with him on the point.” This is truly marvellous! Why, what could Mr. Wesley mean beside? So this error proves to be no error at all ! And “all the excellency” which “vanisheth away,” appears again in statu quo ! But we are not come to the end of the note yet; it contains another dreadful objection: “Mr. Wesley is unwilling” (truly I am) “to be ranked among the Diabolonians, and therefore, with more prudence than candour, has left the whole passage concerning the election-doubters out of the ‘Holy War.” And if Mr. Hill had omitted it too, it would have been no more an impeachment of his prudence, than it was of my candour, to omit, in all the tracts I abridged, whatever I dis approved of. This was what I professed at my setting out: “I have endeavoured” (these are my very words) “to preserve a consistency throughout, that no part might contradict any other. But in order to this, I have been obliged to omit the far greatest part of several authors. And in a design of this nature, I apprehend myself to be at full liberty so to do.” (Preface, p. 5.) The “abridged Bunyan” is not therefore “the counterfeit Bunyan.” This is a flourish of Mr. Hill's pen. 19. This instance sets nothing against nothing, the “Christian Library” against John Goodwin. 20.