Page:A Treatise of the Covenant of Grace (John Ball).djvu/108

 96 of the Messiah under the shadowes of types and rites: the new doth containe the fulfilling of the tipes and figures. Moses is the typicall Mediatour of the Old Testament: Christ is the true Mediatour of the New. The old is sealed by the blood of Sacrifices: the new is ratified by the blood of the Mediatour the and death of the Testatour. The Old by oblations did not pacifie the wrath of God, nor purge the conscience: the new containes the true propitiation in the blood of Christ. The old was imperfect, intolerable, weake, and therfore to be abolished: the new perfect, easy, and to continue for ever, &c. with other the like before mentioned. And many things herein are spoken truly, but how all these differences should stand, if they be not Covenants opposite in kind, it is not easy to understand. Some few have laboured to reconcile them one of these two wais. First that the Old Testament doth promise life eternall plainly under the condition of morall obedience perfect, that is under a condition altogether unpossible, together with an heavy burden of legall rites and an yoke of most strict pollicie, but covertly under the condition of repentance and faith in the Messias to come prefigured by tipes and ceremonies, that by this forme of doctrine, worship and policie, a proud, grosse, and stiffe-necked people might be more tamed, and convinced of their owne unrighteousnesse: and that by such a pedagogue they might be led to Christ, who was more obscurely manifested under those shadows. The second is, By a distinction of Moses his proposition of the Law from God unto that people: which (as they would) is done either with exaction of perfect obedience deserving eternall life, and threatning eternall curse to all that continue not in every thing of the booke of the Law to doe it, Deut. 27. 26. or in a comfortable moderation and ἐπιεικεία promising blessings to those who doe what they can to performe it. The first is a perfect and exact draught of the Law of prime nature: the second a perswasion and incouragement to corrupt nature to stirre up the relicks of power and the Image of God upon hope of future good. The first is propounded to all mankind, this to the Church, though others, take benefit by it. In the first the Law breaths nothing but wrath to fallen nature, for that hath no grace nor mercy, Joh. 1. 17. In the second Moses speakes Gospell to the Israelites, for the outward happinesse of particulars, and the prosperity of the whole.