40. But besides all other senses of this word, it is certain, by the whole frame of the place, and the very analogy of the Gospel, that this impossibility here mentioned, is not an impossibility of the thing, but only relative to the person. It is impossible to restore him, whose state of evil is contrary to pardon and restitution, as being a renouncing the Gospel, that is, the whole covenant of pardon and repentance. Such is that parallel expression used by St. John: "He that is born of God, sinneth not; neither indeed can hek;" that is, it is impossible; he cannot sin,' for the seed of God remaineth in him.' Now this does not signify, that a good man cannot possibly sin, if he would; that is, it does not signify a natural, or an absolute impossibility; but such as relates to the present state and condition of the person, being contrary to sin: the same with that of St. Paul; "Be ye led by the Spirit; for the Spirit lusteth against the flesh; so that ye cannot do the things which you would'," viz., which the flesh would fain tempt you to. A good man cannot sin, that is, very hardly can he be brought to choose or to delight in it; he cannot sin without a horrible trouble and uneasiness to himself: so on the other side, such apostates as the Apostle speaks of, "cannot be renewed;" that is, without extreme difficulty, and a perfect contradiction to that state, in which they are, for the present, lost. But if this man will repent with a repentance proportioned to that evil, which he hath committed, that he ought not to despair of pardon in the court of heaven, we have the affirmation of Justin Martyr. Τοὺς δὲ ὁμολογήσαντας καὶ ἐπιγνόντας τοῦτον εἶναι τὸν Χριστὸν, καὶ ἡτίνοῦν αἰτίᾳ μεταβάντας ἐπὶ τὴν ἔννομον τολίτειαν, ἀρνησαμένους ὅτι οὗτός ἐστιν ὁ Χριστὸς, καὶ πρὶν τελευτῆς μὴ μεταγνόντας, οὐδόλως σωθήσεσθαι ἀποφαίνομαι. "They that confess and acknowledge him to be Christ, and for whatsoever cause go from him to the secular conversation," (viz., to heathenism or Judaism, &c.) " denying that he is Christ, and not confessing him again before their death, they can never be saved"." So that this impossibility concerns not those that return and do confess him; but those that wilfully and maliciously reject this only way of salvation as false and deceitful, and never return to the confession of it 1 Gal. v. 17.

k John, iii. 9.

m Dial. contr. Tryph.

again; which is the greatest sin against the Holy Ghost, of which I am, in the next place, to give a more particular

account.

SECTION V.

41. "He that speaketh against the Holy Ghost, it shall never be forgiven him in this world, nor in the world to come;" so said our blessed Saviour".-Origen, and the Novatians after him,-when the scholars of Novatus, to justify their master's schism from the church, had changed the good old discipline into a new and evil doctrine,-said, that all the sins of Christians committed after baptism, are sins against the Holy Ghost, by whom in baptism they have been illuminated, and by him they were taught in the Gospel, and by him they were consigned in confirmation, and promoted in all the assistances and conduct of grace: and they gave this reason for it,-Because the Father is in all creatures; the Son only in the reasonable, and the Holy Spirit in Christians; against which if they prevaricate, they shall not be pardoned; while the sins of heathens, as being only against the Son, are easily pardoned in baptism.-I shall not need to refute this fond opinion, as being already done by St. Athanasius, in a book purposely written on this subject; and it falls alone; for that to sin against the Holy Ghost is not proper to Christians, appears in this, that Christ charged it upon the Pharisees: and that every sin of Christians is not this sin against the Holy Ghost, appears, because Christians are perpetually called upon to repent: for to what purpose should any man be called from his sin, if by returning he shall not escape damnation? or if he shall, then that sin is not against the Holy Ghost, or if it be, that sin is not unpardonable; either of which destroys their fond affirmative.

42. St. Austin makes final impenitence to be it: against which opinion though many things may be opposed, yet it is openly confuted in being charged upon the Pharisees, who were not then guilty of final impenitence. But the instance clears the article. The Pharisees saw the light of God's Spirit manifestly shining in the miracles which Christ did, and

Matt. xii. 32.

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they did not only despise his person and persecute it, which is speaking against the Son of man,' that is, sinning against him, for speaking against,' is sinning' or 'doing against' it, in the Jews' manner of expression; but they also spitefully and maliciously blasphemed that Spirit, and that power of God, by which they were convinced, and by which such miracles were done. And this was that ¿ñμa ágyòv, that ‹ idle and unprofitable word' spoken of in the following verses, by which Christ said they should be judged at the last day°; such which whosoever should speak, he should give account thereof in that day.

43. Now this was ever esteemed a high and an intolerable crime; for it was not new, but an old crime; only it was manifested by an appellative relating to a power and a name now more used than formerly. This was the sin, for which Corah and his company died, who did despise and reproach the works of God, his power and the mightiness of his hand manifested in his servant: it is called sinning with a high hand,' that is, with a hand lift up on high against God. Corah and his company committed the sin against the Holy Spirit, for they spake against that Spirit and power, which God had put into Moses, and proved by the demonstration of mighty effects it is a denying that great argument of credibility, by which God goes about to verify any mission of his, to prove, by mighty effects of God's Spirit, that God hath sent such a man. When God manifests his Holy Spirit by signs and wonders extraordinary,-not to revere this good Spirit, not to confess him, but to revile him, or to reproach the power, is that which God ever did highly punish.

44. Thus it happened to Pharaoh; he also sinned against the Holy Ghost, the good Spirit of God: for when his magicians told him, that the finger of God was there, yet he hardened his heart against it, and then God went on to harden it more, till he overthrew him; for then his sin became unpardonable in the sense I shall hereafter explicate. And this passed into a law to the children of Israel, and they were warned of it with the highest threatening, that is, of a capital punishment; "The soul that doth aught presumptuously," or with a high hand," the same reproacheth the Lord; that soul shall be cut off from among his people":" and this is trans

o Matt. xii. 36.

P Numb. xv. 30.

lated into the New Testament, "They that do despite to the Spirit of grace, shall fall into the hands of the living God." That is the sin against the Holy Ghost.

45. Now this sin must, in all reason, be very much greater under the Gospel than under the Law. For when Christ came, he did such miracles, which never any man did, and preached a better law, and with mighty demonstrations of the Spirit, that is, of the power and Spirit of God, proved himself to have come from God, and therefore men were more convinced; and he that was so, and yet would oppose the Spirit, that is, defy all his proofs, and hear none of his words, and obey none of his laws, and at last revile him too, he had done the great sin; for this is to do the worst thing we can,- —we dishonour God in that, in which he intended most to glorify himself.

46. Two instances of this we find in the New Testament, though not of the highest degree; yet because done directly against the Spirit of God, that is, in despite or in disparagement of that Spirit, by which so great things were wrought, it grew intolerable. Ananias did not revere the Spirit of God, so mightily appearing in St. Peter and the other apostles, and he was smitten and died. Simon Magus took the Spirit of God for a vendible commodity, for a thing less than money, and fit to serve secular ends; and he instantly fell into the gall of bitterness, that is, a sad bitter calamity: and St. Peter knew not, whether God would forgive him or no.

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47. But it is remarkable, that the Holy Scriptures note various degrees of this malignity; 'grieving the Holy Spirit,' ' resisting' him, 'quenching' him, 'doing despite' to him: all sin against the Holy Ghost, but yet they that had done so, were all called to repentance. St. Stephen's sermon was an instance of it; and so was St. Peter's; and so was the prayer of Christ upon the cross, for the malicious Jews, the Pharisees, his betrayers and murderers.'-But the sin itself is of an indefinite progression, and hath not physical limits and a certain constitution, as is observable in carnal crimes, theft, murder, or adultery: for though even these are increased by circumstances, and an inward consent and degrees of love and adhesion; yet of the crime itself we can say,-this is murder, and this is adultery,—and therefore the punishment is proper and certain. But since there are so many degrees of the sin

against the Holy Ghost, and it consists not in an indivisible point: but according to the nature of internal and spiritual sins, it is like time or numbers, of a moveable being, of a flux, unstable, immense constitution, and may be always growing, not only by the repetition of acts, but by its proper essential increment; and since, in the particular case, the measures are uncertain, the nature secret, the definition disputable, and so many sins are like it, or reducible to it, apt to produce despair in timorous consciences, and to discourage repentance in lapsed persons, it will be an intolerable proposition, that affirms the sin against the Holy Ghost to be absolutely unpardonable.

48. That the sin against the Holy Ghost is pardonable, appears in the instance of the Pharisees: to whom, even after they had committed the sin, God was pleased to afford preaching, signs and miracles, and Christ upon the cross prayed for them; but in what sense also it was unpardonable, appears in that case; for they were so far gone, that they would not return; and God did not, and at last would not, pardon them. For this appellative is not properly subjected, nor attributed to the sin itself, but it is according as the man is. The sin may be, and is at some time, unpardonable, yet not in all its measures of progression; as appears in the case of Pharaoh, who, all the way from the first miracle to the tenth, sinned against the Holy Ghost; but at last he was so bad, that God would not pardon him. Some men are come to the greatness of the sin, or to that state and grandeur of impiety, that their estate is desperate; that is, though the nature of their sins is such, as God is extremely angry with them, and would destroy them utterly, were he not restrained by an infinite mercy, yet it shall not be thus for ever; for, in some state of circumstances and degrees, God is finally angry with the man, and will never return to him.

49. Until things be come to this height, whatsoever the sin be, it is pardonable. For if there were any one sin distinguishable in its whole nature and instance from others, which, in every of its periods, were unpardonable, it is most certain it would have been described in Scripture with clear characters and cautions, that a man might know, when he is in and when he is out. Speaking a word against the Holy Spirit,' is by our blessed Saviour called this great sin; but it is cer