1. God gave to Adam a law, as a covenant of works, by which he bound him and all his posterity to personal, entire, exact, and perpetual obedience, promising life upon the fulfillment of it, and threatening death upon the breach of it, and God gave him with power and the ability to keep it.

2. After the fall, this law continued to be a perfect rule of righteousness; as such, it was delivered by God on Mount Sinai, in ten commandments, written in two tables. The first four commandments contain our duty towards God, and the other six, our duty to man.

3. Beside this law, commonly called the moral law, God was pleased to give to the people of Israel, as a church under tutelage, ceremonial laws, containing several typological ordinances, partly of worship, prefiguring Christ, his graces, actions, sufferings, and benefits, and partly presenting various instructions of moral duties. All of these ceremonial laws are now abrogated under the New Testament.

4. He also gave to them, as a corporate body, various judicial laws, which expired together with the nation-state of that people. These are not required of any other people now, other than the general justice of such laws may require.

5. The moral law binds everyone forever, justified believers as well as others, to obedience of it. That is not only in regard to the matter contained in it, but also in respect of the authority of God the Creator, who gave it. Nor does Christ, in the Gospel, in any way dissolve this obligation, but instead much strengthens it.

6. Although true believers are not under the law as a covenant of works, to be justified or condemned by it, yet it is of great use to them, as well as to others, for the following reasons:

• as a rule of life informing them of the will of God and their duty, it directs and binds them to walk accordingly;
• it also shows the sinful pollutions of their nature, hearts, and lives, so that as they examine themselves by it they may come to further conviction of, humiliation for, and hatred of sin, together with a clearer sight of the need they have of Christ and the perfection of his obedience;
• it is likewise of use to the regenerate to restrain their corruptions, because it forbids sin;
• the threats of it serve to show what their sins deserve and what afflictions they may expect in this life from their sins, even though they are freed from the curse threatened in the law;
• the promises of it, similarly, show them God’s approval of obedience and what blessings they may expect from obedience, yet not as though these blessings are due to them by the law as a covenant of works. Therefore a person doing good and refraining from evil, because the law encourages the one and deters from the other, is not evidence of that person being under the law and not under grace.

7. The uses of the law mentioned above are not contrary to the grace of the Gospel, but instead sweetly agree with it. The Spirit of Christ subdues and enables the will of a believer to freely and cheerfully do what the will of God, revealed in the law, requires to be done.