more conducing unto Piety, than the tenets of the rigid Calvinists, that they quickly found a cheerful reception and great multitudes of followers in the Belgic Churches. Hereupon their adversaries, (having so passionately espoused the contrary opinions, and being so vehemently carried on with a prejudice against these,) that they might the more effectually decry and suppress the propugnators of them, caused some of their confidants to represent them and their doctrine under such odious characters as were indeed proper to their own opinions. It was given out that, among their heresies, they held: First, "That God was the author of sin," and Secondly, "That He created the far greatest part of mankind, only of purpose to glorify himself in their damnation," with several others of like nature; which indeed are not only the consequence and results of Calvin's doctrine, but positively maintained and propagated by some of his followers. Examination of Tilenus.

SIR HENRY WOTTON.-1616.

AND to another that spake indiscreet and bitter words against Arminius, I heard him (Sir Henry Wotton,) reply to this purpose: In my travel toward Venice, as I past through Germany, I rested almost a year at Leyden, where I entered into an acquaintance with ARMINIUS, (then the Professor of Divinity in that University,) a man much talked of in this age, which is made up of opposition and controversy: And, indeed, if I mistake not Arminius in his expressions, (as so weak a brain as mine is, may easily do,) then I know I differ from him in some points; yet I profess my judgment of him to be, that he was A MAN OF MOST RARE LEARNING; and I knew him to be of A MOST STRICT LIFE, and of A MOST MEEK SPIRIT. And that he was so mild, appears by his proposals to our Master Perkins, of Cambridge, from whose book, Of the order and causes of salvation, (which was first writ in Latin,) Arminius took the occasion of writing some queries to him concerning the consequents of his doctrine; intending them (it is said) to come privately to Mr. Perkins' own hands, and to receive from him a like private and a like loving answer; but Mr. Perkins died before those queries came to him; and it is thought Arminius meant them to die with him for though he lived long after, I have heard he forbore to publish them (but since his death, his sons did not). And it is pity, if God had been so pleased, that Mr. Perkins did not live to see, consider, and answer those proposals himself; for he was also of a most meek spirit, and of great and sanctified learning. And though since their deaths, many of high parts and piety, have undertaken to clear the controversy, yet, for the most part, they have rather satisfied themselves, than convinced the dissenting party. And doubtless, many middle-witted men, (which yet may mean well,) many scholars that are not in the highest form for learning, (which yet may preach well,) men that are but preachers, and shall never know, till they come to heaven, where the questions stick between Arminius and the Church of England, (if there be any,) will yet in this world be tampering with, and thereby perplexing the controversy, and do therefore justly fall under the reproof of St. Jude, for being busybodies, and for meddling with things they understand not. — ISAAC WALTON'S Life of Sir Henry Wotton.

END OF TESTIMONIES.

;

THE DUTCH EDITOR'S

ADDRESS

TO THE CHRISTIAN READER.

WE HERE present to thee, Christian Reader, the small treatises of JAMES ARMINIUS, Doctor of Divinity, all comprised in one volume. It was necessary to satisfy the desires of those persons whom the author pleased, as well as those whom he displeased. Of both these descriptions there àre some in this country and elsewhere, who, that they may not be thought to have loved or condemned the man without proper consideration, wish to hear him speak in his own works. It is the lot of all writers to be blamed by some men, and to receive commendation from others. The same dainties are not equally relished by all palates; nor have the most dogmatical doctors been able satisfactorily to prove to every one the truth of their sentiments. There are those who, by too great an attachment to their teachers, are so blinded, as to admire nothing but what is dictated by them, and to regard their opinions with the same veneration as they would look upon a sacred shield sent down from heaven. There are also those in whom prejudices and preconceived opinions pervert a good understanding; and they estimate what is true, not by reason, but by persons, by times, and (may I add?) by their own private interest. The two faults of which I here complain, are not peculiar to our times, but belong to former ages. I dissent from both these classes; and Arminius would himself, while he lived, much sooner have had a hearer divested of all bias, than one who was

a violent partizan. The exercise of his own liberty

VOL. I.

B

is as proper an act in a citizen of the Celestial Republic, as in a member of political society in an earthly commonwealth. In a state of servitude all things are hard and difficult; but wherever there is permission granted to understand and perceive those things which God, reason, and pious antiquity have taught, and to profess and declare them to the glory of God and for the edification of the churches,-there piety without guile, religion unaccompanied by superstition, and truth divested of hypocrisy, make rapid advances towards maturity. Read and consider the sentiments of the author's mind, with a freedom similar to that which inspired him when he taught them. We here present every work which he either published in his life-time, or of which he approved. His remarks on the prophet Malachi, which were delivered with great effect from the chair in the University of Leyden, as public exercises, against Popery and Socinianism, are preserved in various places in the notes of his pupils. Every one would scruple to publish loose papers of this kind; because, being noted down in haste as they proceeded from the mouth of the speaker, they might, by a defect in the hearer or by his carelessness in writing, subject the unconscious professor to a punishment which he had not merited.

Prefixed to the work stands the Funeral Oration of the very learned P. BERTIUS, in which he spoke much in favour of the author, and of those churches which were afterwards the objects of his aversion. The work itself commences with four discourses founded on strong scriptural reasoning, which, to the delight of the auditors, were pronounced as inaugural orations when the author first occupied the chair of Divinity Professor: Their titles are (1) On the priesthood of Christ; (2) The Object of Theology; (3) Its Author and its End; and (4) its certainty.-To these succeeds a fifth, On

reconciling religious differences among Christians, the mode and theory of which might, he believed, be proposed with much greater ease than the practice could be enforced.-To this discourse is appended a Declaration, in which he professes his sentiments on Predestination, the Providence of God, Free-will, the Grace of God, the Divinity of the Son of God, and the Justification of man before God; in which he contends that while he neither confined himself to the opinions of other men nor implicitly. adopted their phrases, he was yet removed far from the boundaries of Pelagianism and Socianism. -Next comes his Apology for the thirty-one Articles which were dispersed abroad; and it acts the part of an arbitrator between a pleader and a person accused. After these follows a compendium of nearly the whole of Theology, comprehended in various Disputations, in which the sacred meaning is defended by passages of scripture, selected with much judgment and inserted in the margin.-To these are subjoined his Private Disputations, which, in a learned and appropriate manner, treat on the economy of our salvation, and complete the series of the divine actions. We add to these the Friendly Conference on Predestination which he held by letter with that respectable and famous divine, Francis Junius. This production excels in the ingenuity of its interpretations, and the number and weight of its arguments: By it two of the greatest divines, discordant indeed in sentiment but harmonious in spirit, have afforded an example to their followers of the possibility of discussing the maxims of the schools without the least breach of friendship or affection. -The same method of conducting a dispute is taught in his Examination of a Pamphlet by Perkins, than whom Great Britain did not contain a theologian of deeper learning or greater candour.-The Analysis of the Ninth Chapter of the Epistle to the

Romans, treats on those high and adorable counsels of God which relate to men's eternal salvation and damnation; and the discriminating marks adduced in that chapter, which some authors have been pleased to apply simply to persons, he teaches us to apply to believers and unbelievers.

At the end of the book stands a Dissertation on the true and genuine sense of the Seventh Chapter of the Epistle to the Romans: in which our author exhibits the appearance of a regenerate and an unrenewed man, and depicts with the greatest fidelity the degrees through which the former must pass in completing his course. It also shews what a great distance there is between THE LAW and GRACE, between RIGHTEOUSNESS and THE LAW; and how REASON and DESIRE, THE FLESH and THE SPIRIT differ from each other in their dispositions and pursuits. Indeed, throughout the whole work the reader will soon acknowledge the sentiments propounded, to be those which received the approbation of the ancient Fathers.-The Articles which conclude the volume, contain what cannot be deemed in every instance the fixed opinions of the author, but such conjectural propositions as might perhaps have been discussed with some profit by those who are skilled in sacred subjects.

This is a summary of the whole volume. The copies of these small treatises had been published in detached parts and were all sold off, when I incorporated them into one volume, and thus relieved the purchaser at once of part of the price which he otherwise must have paid, and of the inconvenience of having a number of separate treatises. Whoever thou art, look favourably on my labour. If thou hadst any knowledge of the author, retain the judgment which thou hast formed of him and his opinions; but, if thou hast not had that pleasure, learn, from these his writings, the man, his doctrines, and his purposes.