A strange silence on the error of Duty-faith - William Styles

"Among the strict and Particular Baptists there is at present a strange silence on the error of Duty-faith, which strongly contrasts with the opposition it received from our predecessors. John Steven's Help for the true Disciples of Emmanuel was designed to refute it. John Foreman's Duty-Faith fully shows it's unscriptural character. james Wells rarely preached without denouncing it, and his Letters to Theophilus cogently disprove it. William Palmer was writing a series of Tracts which expose its evils, when his death brought them to a sudden termination in 1873... Several living ministers who once denied Duty-faith, now hold and preach it, and thus, "build again that which they destroyed," (Gal 2:18)... It is sometimes urged that-even granting that Duty-faith has no direct support in the Word of God-it is practically harmless, and often appears to be attended with good results in the more rapid conversion of sinners. But, good men, with holy David, should "hate and abhor lying," (Psa 119:163)-and the substitution of falsehoods for the Gospel is surely the worst form of untruthfulness... The late John Andrews Jones, in the Earthen Vessel for September 1863, conclusively shows that the Fullerian system of Duty-Faith "tends to overthrow the distinguishing and glorious doctrines of the Gospel." History substantiates this. The churches which adopted it at the close of the nineteenth centuries never contemplated abandoning the truths of the sovereignty of God in the election, redemption, and effectual calling of saving sinners. In how many of these churches, however, are these truths held to-day? The Down-grade is the natural and inevitable result of the departure from the truth which Andrew Fuller inaugurated." - William Styles (1902)