Edward Leigh (1602–1671) on God’s General and Special Mercy

2. He hath great mercy in him; if God be merciful at all, he must needs be merciful in great measure, yea above all measure, beyond all degrees, in all perfection; for the essence of God is infinite, and his wisdom, power, and mercy are infinite.

There is a mercy of God which extends to all his creatures, Psal. 145:9. Luke 6:35. God is merciful unto all men, but especially to some men whom he hath chosen unto himself.

The special mercy of God is offered unto all within the Church, Ezek. 16.6. Acts 13.40. but is bestowed only upon some, viz. such as receive Christ, John 1.11, 12.

This life is the time of mercy, wherein we obtain pardon for sin; after this life there is no remission or place for repentance.

All blessings Spiritual and Corporeal are the effects of God’s mercy. Common blessings of his general mercy, special blessings of his special mercy.

Edward Leigh, A Treatise of Divinity Consisting of Three Books (London: Printed by E. Griffen for William Lee, and are to be sold at his shop at the Turkes-head in Fleetstreet, neer Ram-alley, 1646), 2:88.

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Note: Richard Muller (in PRRD, 3:579) quoted the above portion from Leigh on divine mercy and said, “These effects of mercy, together with the distinction between general and special mercy, correspond closely with the effects and the formal description of God’s grace, just as they overlap somewhat with the analysis of other divine attributes and affections.” General mercy corresponds to general or common grace (Neh. 9:31).

Richard Muller on the Grace and Patience of God in Reformed Orthodoxy

There is also good ground for concluding that the modern conception of "common grace" finds its root more in the period of Reformed orthodoxy that [sic] in the era of Calvin and his contemporaries, given that many of the orthodox theologians were willing to define the gratia Dei as a bounty or graciousness extending to all creation.⁵²⁶ While God is gracious to all, his grace is particularly bestowed upon those who are his in Christ: "God's free favor is the cause of our salvation, and of all the means tending thereunto, Rom. 3:24 & 5:15, 16; Eph. 1:5, 6, & 24; Rom. 9:16; Titus 3:15, Heb. 4:16; Rom. 6:23; 1 Cor. 12:4, 9. The gospel sets forth the freeness, fulness, and the powerfulness of God's grace to his Church, therefore it is called the Gospel of the grace of God, Acts. 20:24." This grace is such that it is given freely without desert and it is "firm and unchangeable, so that those which are once beloved, can never be rejected, or utterly cast off, Psalm 77:10."⁵²⁷
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526. Cf. Maresius, Collegium theol., II.li; Wendelin, Christianae theologiae libri duo, I.i.22; Leigh, Treatise, II.xi (pp. 83-84); but note Heidanus, Corpus theol., II (p. 162), who reserves gratia for the elect and refers benignitas to all creation. For the modern debate, see Abraham Kuyper, De gemeene gratie, 3 vols. (Leiden: Donnet, 1902); Herman Kuiper, Calvin on Common Grace (Goes: Oosterbaan & Le Cointre, 1928); William Masselink, General Revelation and Common Grace: A Defense of the Historic Reformed Faith (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1953); Richard Arden Couch, "An Evaluation and Reformulation of the Doctrine of Common Grace in the Reformed Tradition" (Th. D. diss., Princeton University, 1959).
527. Leigh, Treatise, II,xi (p. 84).

Richard Muller, Post-Reformation Reformed Dogmatics: The Rise and Development of Reformed Orthodoxy, ca. 1520 to ca. 1725 (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2003), 3:572.

Related to God's grace are a series of other affections that appear variously in the Reformed orthodox theology--patience, long-suffering, compassion, condescension. Patience and longsuffering are the willingness of God to moderate "his anger toward creatures, and either defers punishment or for a moment withholds his wrath."⁵³²

God is Patient, Psalm 103.8; Job 21:7. God's patience is that whereby he bears the reproach of sinners and defers their punishments; or it is the most bountiful will of God, whereby he doth long bear with sin which he hateth, sparing sinners, not minding their destruction, but that he might bring them to repentance. See Acts 13:18.⁵³³

Even so God both endures "with much longsuffering" the sins of the reprobate and, at the same time, is patient with the elect prior to their conversion, willing their repentance rather than their immediate destruction because of sin.⁵³⁴ It is, thus, "the most bountiful will of God not suffering his displeasure suddenly to rise against his creatures offending, to be avenged of them, but he doth warn them beforehand, lightly correct and seek to turn them unto him."⁵³⁵ The divine compassion, similarly, is the disposition of God to deliver creatures from their misery. It is manifest when "the object of the divine goodness of love [is] involved in misery, such as man who is a sinner and subject to death."⁵³⁶
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532. Wendelin, Christianae theologiae libri duo, I.i.25; Brakel, Redelijke Godsdienst, I.iii.36.
533. Leigh, Body of Divinity, II. xiii (p.299), citing marginally Nahum 1:3 and Isa. 30:18; cf. Cocceius, Summa theol., III.x.67.
534. Brakel, Redelijke Godsdienst, I.iii.36.
535. Leigh, Treatise, II.xiii (p. 100).
536. Venema, Inst. theol., VIII (p. 185).

Muller, PRRD, 3:573–574.

Note: See also J. Mark Beach, "The Idea of a 'General Grace of God' in Some Sixteenth-Century Reformed Theologians Other Than Calvin," in Church and School in Early Modern Protestantism: Studies in Honor of Richard A. Muller on the Maturation of a Theological Tradition, edited by Jordan J. Ballor, David Sytsma and Jason Zuidema (Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 2013), 97–109; and J. Mark Beach, "Calvin's Treatment of the Offer of the Gospel and Divine Grace," MAJT 22 (2011), 55–76. The first work by Beach covers the views of Bullinger, Musculus, and Vermigli (men "in the era of Calvin") on general grace. Beach says:

...the idea of a general grace of God was a theological concept shared by mid-sixteenth-century Reformed theologians. It is clear that Bullinger, Musculus, and Vermigli (each contemporaries of Calvin), accept to varying degrees some notion of a non-saving divine favor or goodness directed toward the non-elect and unbelievers.

Beach, "The Idea of a 'General Grace of God'...," 108.

There is significant continuity between what Edward Leigh and others say (as quoted by Muller) in the seventeenth-century, and what these earlier Reformed theologians said in the sixteenth-century. The difference is mainly in the extent to which the topic of grace is covered and their willingness to use the terminology, not in their the view of the generalis gratia Dei as such. As Beach says:

The concern of these theologians is to distinguish grace, rightly understood, from synergistic misconceptions and outright Pelagian abuses. Since at that time the locution "general grace" had, for some, a specifically Pelagian aroma, Reformed theologians were guarded in how they used those words. Some, like Vermigli, were hesitant to use the term, whereas others, like Bullinger and Musculus, were careful to define it. Thus we see Bullinger and Vermigli explicitly attacking a notion of "general grace" that identifies grace with nature along Pelagian lines.

Ibid.

Beach continued:

...the idea of a general grace of God is not altogether uncommon in Reformed theology in the middle of the sixteenth century. The gifts that come to fallen humans, the blessings that bedeck their lives, and the benefits that allow the human project--even in its rebellion against God--to move forward are divine gifts, divine blessings, and divine benefits.

Last, the several portraits of grace and common grace as formulated by some of Calvin's contemporaries prove to be, not surprisingly, distinct but also not incongruous with one another. Bullinger, Musculus, and Vermigli hold in common the idea that God acts upon unregenerate persons in a manner that is gracious, being undeserved and kindly, but also non-salvific [not resulting in eternal salvation] in character. This general sort of divine grace, however, remains distinct from grace in its saving operations. All of the above shows that, among the mid-sixteenth-century Reformed theologians, Calvin was not a solitary voice sounding the idea of a general grace of God.

Ibid., 109.

Here's J. Mark Beach's profile at Mid-America Reformed Seminary (click). His doctoral dissertation was on Christ and the Covenant: Francis Turretin's Federal Theology as a Defense of the Doctrine of Grace (Ph.D. diss., Calvin Theological Seminary, 2005).

Edward Leigh (1602–1671) on God's Common and Special Grace

So much in general of God's virtues. Secondly, in special, the virtues which imply not imperfection in the reasonable creature, are attributed to God. The principle of which are:

1. Bounty or Graciousness, by which God shows favor to the creatures freely, and that either commonly or specially; 1. Commonly, when he exercises beneficence and liberality toward all creatures, powering upon them plentifully all goods of nature, body, mind and fortune, so that there is nothing which tastes not of the inexhausted fountain of his blessings and goodness. Matt. 5:44, 45. Psal. 36:5, 6. God's bounty is a will in him to bestow [a] store of comfortable and beneficial things on the creature in his kind. This bounty he showed to all things in the creation, even to all Spirits, all men and all creatures, and does in great part show still, for he opens his hand and fills every living thing with his bounty, he gives all things richly to enjoy.

2. Specially toward the Church, by which he bestows eternal life on certain men fallen by sin, and redeemed in Christ, Titus 2:11 & 3:4. As this is exercised toward the whole Church, so in a special manner toward some members of it, as toward Enoch, Moses, Jacob, David, Paul, and especially Abraham, who is therefore often called the Friend of God; he made with him and his seed a perpetual league of friendship, and he constantly kept his Laws and Statutes, John 15:14, 15.

God's Graciousness is an essential property, whereby he is in and of himself most gracious and amiable, Psa. 145:8. God is only gracious in and of himself, and whatsoever is amiable and gracious, is so from him.

God's Graciousness is that whereby he is truly amiable in himself, and freely bountiful unto his creatures, cherishing them tenderly without any desert of theirs, Psa. 86:15, 111:5. Gen. 43:29.

God is gracious to all, Psa. 145:8, 9, 10. but especially to such whom he does respect in his well-beloved Son, Jesus Christ. Exod. 33:19. Isa. 30:19. Luke 1:30. Gen. 6:8. 1 Cor. 15:10. God's free favor is the cause of our salvation, and of all the means tending thereunto, Rom. 3:24 & 5:15, 16. Eph. 1:5, 6 & 2:4. Rom. 9:16. Titus 3:5. Heb. 4:16. Rom. 6:23. 1 Cor. 12:4, 9. The gospel sets forth the freeness, fulness, and the powerfulness of God's grace to his Church, therefore it is called the Gospel of the grace of God, Acts 20:24.

God's Graciousness is firm and unchangeable, so that those which are once beloved can never be rejected, or utterly cast off, Psa. 77:10.

God bestows, 1. Good things. 2. Freely. 3. Plentifully. Psa. 111:4. 4. In a special manner He is gracious towards the godly.

Love is 1. grounded often on something which may deserve it; the grace of God is that love of his which is altogether free. 2. Grace is such a kind of love as flows from a superior to an inferior; love may be in inferiors toward their superiors.

Edward Leigh, A Treatise of Divinity Consisting of Three Books (London: Printed by E. Griffen for William Lee, and are to be sold at his shop at the Turkes-head in Fleetstreet, neer Ram-alley, 1646), 2:83–84.

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Edward Leigh (1602-1671) on God's Patience and Long-Suffering

"God is Patient, Psalm 103:8. Job 2:17 [?]. God's patience is that whereby he bears the reproach of sinners and defers their punishments; or it is the most bountiful will of God, whereby he doth long bear with sin which he hates, sparing sinners, not minding their destruction, but that he might bring them to repentance.

This is aggravated:

1. In that sin is an infinite injury offered to him, therefore in the Lord's Prayer it is called a Trespass.

2. He is infinitely affected with this; hence in the Scripture he is said to be grieved with our sins, to be wearied, as a cart full of sheaves; he is said to hate sin, for although he be such a perfect God that none of our sins can hurt him, yet because he is a holy and just God, he cannot but infinitely distaste sinners.

3. He can be revenged immediately if he please; men many times are patient perforce, they would be revenged, but they know not how to compass it. He apprehends at the same time what he has done for us, and withal our unthankfulness, unkindness, and yet he endured Cain, Saul, Judas a long time.

4. He beholds the universality of sin, all men injure him, the heathens are given to idolatry, blasphemy among Christians, the profane sort are full of oaths, adulteries, the better negligent, lazy, cold.

5. God not only [does] not punish, but still continues his benefits; the old drunkard is still alive.

6. He sets up a Ministry to invite us to come in, and we have that many years; Forty years long was I grieved with this generation.

7. In Christ patience was visible, there was living patience.

8. He afflicts lightly and mercifully to win us; he makes thee sick and poor, to see if it will make thee leave thy sinning.

9. God is Long-suffering, Exod. 34:6.

It is that whereby he expects and waits a long time for repentance; or it is the most bountiful will of God not suffering his displeasure suddenly to rise against his creatures offending, to be avenged of them, but he does warn them beforehand, lightly correct and seek to turn them unto him. Christ endured Judas till the last."

Edward Leigh, A Treatise of Divinity Consisting of Three Books (London: Printed by E. Griffen for William Lee, and are to be sold at his shop at the Turkes-head in Fleetstreet, neer Ram-alley, 1646), 2:99-100.

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William Perkins (1558–1602) on Matthew 23:37

The first is touching the will of Christ, I would. According to the two natures of Christ: so be there two wills in him, the will of his godhead and the will of his manhood. Some [such as Beza and Turretin] think that these words are meant of the will of his manhood. For they suppose him here to speak as the minister of circumcision, and consequently as a man. This I think is a truth, but not all the truth. Because the thing which he willeth, namely the gathering of the Jews by the ministry of the Prophets, was begun and practiced long before his incarnation. Wherefore (as I take it) here his divine will is meant or the will of his godhead, which is also the will of the Father, and the Holy Ghost.

William Perkins, A Treatise of God's Free Grace, and Man's Free Will (Cambridge: Printed by John Legat And are to be sold at the signe of the Crowne in Pauls Churchyard by Simon Waterson, 1601), 23. Calvin said, "I admit that here [in Matt. 23:37] Christ speaks not only in the character of man, but upbraids them with having, in every age, rejected his grace." See Institutes, 3.24.17. See also Deut. 18:18; John 12:49; 8:26; 14:10; and 17:8 for places that show Jesus spoke the words that the Father gave Him to speak. Also, as Jonathan Edwards said in Miscellany #180, “…the love the human nature [of Christ] had to mankind, and by which he was prompted to undergo so much, it had only by virtue of its union with the Logos; ’twas all derived from the love of the Logos, or else they would not be one person.”

If we compare this text with Isa. 6:10 they seem to be contrary. For here Christ saith, I would have gathered you: there he saith, Harden them that they be not gathered and converted. God therefore seems to will and not to will one and the same thing. Answ. There is but one will in God: yet doth it not equally will all things, but in divers respects it doth will and nill the same thing. He wills the conversion of Jerusalem, in that he approves it as a good thing in itself: in that he commands it, and exhorts men to it: in that he gives them all outward means of their conversion. He wills it not, in that he did not decree effectually to work their conversion. For God doth approve, and he may require many things, which nevertheless for just causes known to himself, he will not do. The confirmation of the Angels that fell, God approved as a thing good in itself, yet did not he will to confirm them. A judge in compassion approves and will the life of a malefactour: and yet withall he wills the execution of justice in his death. Even so God sometimes wills that in his signifying will, which he wills not in the will of his good pleasure.

By this which hath been said, we learn, that where God erects the ministry of his word, he signifies thereby that his pleasure is to gather men to salvation. In this regard the prophet Isaiah saith, that the preaching of the gospel is a banner displayed that all nations may come unto it. All this is verified in this our English nation. For more then forty years hath God displayed this banner unto us, and more then forty years hath he signified in the ministry of his word, that his will is to give mercy and salvation unto us. First therefore we owe unto God all thankfulness & praise for this endless mercy. Secondly we are to reverence the ministry of the word, in as much as God signifies his good will unto us thereby, & we are in all obedience to subject ourselves to it: and for this cause we must suffer our selves to it: and for this cause we must suffer our selves to be converted and gathered by it. Subjects use to reverence the letter of their Prince, how much more then must we reverence the letter of the living God sent unto us, that is, the ministry of the word, & conform ourselves to it. Thirdly, here we may learn to foresee our miserable condition in this lad. For though God for his part have long signified his will unto us touching our everlasting good, yet there is nothing to be found in the most of us, but a neglect or contempt of the gospel: and in most places men are weary of it as the Israelites were of manna. What, weary of the goodness of God, that offers and proclaims mercy unto us? Yea, verily. And the more weary are we of our own happiness, and consequently hasten to our own perdition.

Ibid., 44–47.

In Edward Leigh’s annotations on this text, he mentions Perkins.

Christ speaketh not of the will of his good pleasure, for that cannot be resisted, but of his signified will in the Ministry of the Prophets, and of himself as he was a Prophet and Minister of the Circumcision unto the Jews, for so he might will their conversion and yet they will it not. Perkins.

Edward Leigh, Annotations Upon All the New Testament Philologicall and Theologicall (London: Printed by W. W. and EG. for William Lee, and are to be sold at his Shop at the Turks-Head in Fleetstreet next to the Miter and Phoenix. Anno Dom. 1650), 63.

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