The various thoughts of men concerning the doctrine proposed to consideration — The great concernment of it, however stated, on all hands confessed — Some special causes pressing to the present handling of it — The fearful backsliding of many in these days — The great offence given and taken thereby, with the provision made for its removal — The nature of that offence and temptation thence arising considered — Answer to some arguings of Mr G., chap. ix., from thence against the truth proposed — The use of trials and shakings — Grounds of believers’ assurance that they are so — The same farther argued and debated — Of the testimony of a man’s own conscience concerning his uprightness, and what is required thereunto — 1 John iii. 7 considered — Of the rule of self-judging, with principles of settlement for true believers, notwithstanding the apostasies of eminent professors — Corrupt teachings rendering the handling of this doctrine necessary — Its enemies of old and of late — The particular undertaking of Mr G. proposed to consideration — An entrance into the stating of the question — The terms of the question explained — Of holiness in its several acceptations — Created holiness, original or adventitious, complete or inchoate — Typical by dedication, real by purification — Holiness evangelical, either so indeed or by estimation — Real holiness partial or universal — The partakers of the first, or temporary believers, not true believers, maintained against Mr G. — Ground of judging professors to be true believers — Matt. vii. 20 considered — What is the rule of judging men therein given — What knowledge of the faith of others is to be obtained — What is meant by perseverance: how in Scripture it is expressed — The grounds of it pointed at — What is intended by falling away — Whether it be possible the Spirit of grace may be lost, or the habit of it, and how — The state of the controversy as laid down by Mr G. — The vanity thereof discovered — His judgment about believers’ falling away examined — What principles and means of perseverance he grants to them — The enemies of our perseverance — Indwelling sin in particular considered — No possibility of preservation upon Mr G.’s grounds demonstrated — The means and ways of the saints’ preservation in faith, as asserted by Mr G., at large examined, weighed, and found light — The doctrine of the saints’ perseverance, and way of teaching it, cleared from Isa. iv. — That chapter opened — The 5th verse particularly insisted on and discussed — The whole state and method of the controversy thence educed.
The truth which I have proposed to handle, and whose defence I have undertaken in the ensuing discourse, is commonly called the perseverance of saints; a doctrine whereof nothing ordinary, low, or common, is spoken by any that have engaged into the consideration of it. To some it is the very salt of the covenant of grace, the most distinguishing mercy communicated in the blood of Christ, so interwoven into, and lying at the bottom of, all that consolation which “God is abundantly willing that all the heirs of the promise should receive,” that it is utterly impossible it should be safe-guarded one moment without a persuasion of this truth, which seals up all the mercy and grace of the new covenant with the unchangeableness and faithfulness of God.1 To others it is no grace of God, no part of the purchase of Christ, no doctrine of the gospel, no foundation of consolation; but an invention of men, a delusion of Satan, an occasion of dishonour to God, disconsolation and perplexity to believers, a powerful temptation unto sin and wickedness in all that do receive it.2
A doctrine it is, also, whose right apprehension is on all hands confessed to be of great importance, upon the account of that effectual influence which it hath, and will have, into our walking with God; — which, say some, is to love humility, thankfulness, fear, fruitfulness;3 to folly, stubbornness, rebellion, dissoluteness, negligence, say others. The great confidence expressed by men concerning the evidence and certainty of their several persuasions, whether defending or opposing the doctrine under consideration, — the one part professing the truth thereof to be of equal stability with the promises of God, and most plentifully delivered in the Scripture; others (at least one, who is thought to be pars magna of his companions), that if it be asserted in any place of the Scripture, it were enough to make wise and impartial men to call the authority thereof into question, — must needs invite men to turn aside to see about what this earnest contest is. And quis is est tam potens, who dares thus undertake to remove not only ancient landmarks and boundaries of doctrines among the saints, but “mountains of brass” and the “hills about Jerusalem,” which we hoped would stand fast for ever? The concernment, then, of the glory of God, and the honour of the Lord Jesus Christ, with the interest of the souls of the saints, being so wrapped up, and that confessedly on all hands, in the doctrine proposed, I am not out of hope that the plain discoursing of it from the word of truth may be as “a word in season,” like “apples of gold in pictures of silver.”