tation of Adam's offence, and the doctrines of justification and predeftination as founded on, and refulting from, human worthiness, were parts of the new herefy, it follows, that the oppofite doctrines of Adam's tranfgreffion imputed to his offspring, and juftification and predeftination by grace alone, must have been branches of the old faith univerfally held by the Church, for the first 400 years after Chrift.

That confummate scholar and hiftorian, Spanhemius the son, treating of Pelagius and his tenets, obferves, that this arch-heretic afferted, "Caufam predeftinationis ad gratiam & gloriam effe prævifionem bonorum operum, & perfeverantiam in illis, ex recto liberi arbitrii ufu, exceptátamen gratiá apoiolatus. Prædeftinationem ad mortem nullam dari; folam dari præfcientiam peccatorum." [Introd. ad Hift. & Antiq. Sacr. pag. 454] i. e. that "The caufe of predeftination to grace and glory was, the forefight of good works, and of preleverance therein, refulting from a right ufe of our free-will: and that there is no fuch thing as predeftination unto death; but only a foreknowledge of what fins men would commit *." That thefe are the doctrines of the Arminians now, as they were of Pelagius then, needs no proof. An Arminian laughs at the imputation of Adam's offence, in order to elude the neceffity of the Meffiah's imputed righteoufnefs: he affirms, that we are not

*If the reader has a mind to fee a compendious, but very fatiffactory account of the first rife and progrefs of Arminianifm in Holland (from whence the contagion fpread into England) about the year 16co, he may confult a very valuable treatife, written by the fame learned foreigner, entitled, Controverfiarum cum Diffidentibus Hodiè Chriftantis, prolixè & cum Judæis, Elenchus HiftoricoTheologicus. Which, in the compafs of a moderate 12mo, traces back all the controverfies, which now divide the religious world, to their original fources; gives the quinteffence of the arguments urged on either fide: and, by a judicious mixture of hiftory with divinity, is, perhaps, the most inftructive and entertaining piece of general Polemics, hitherto extant. There is brevity, without obfcurity; and fulnefs, without redundancy: nor could that excellent performance be either enlarged, or retrenched, with put detracting from its worth.

juftified

juftified without works of our own; and that, if there be any fuch thing as predeftination at all, it is founded on the divine forefight of certain conditions. and qualifications in the perfons predeftinated: that man's will has the cafting vote in the affair of regeneration and that as he may, to-day, confent to be a child of God; fo, to-morrow, he may, by virtue of the fame omnipotent free-will, undo all, and commence a child of the devil again. Who fees not, that Arminianifm is the old Pelagian trump turned up anew? and that the doctrines of conditional grace and precarious falvation, which now go down fo glib with many, are the very things, which, at their first appearance, frightened the primitive Churches, more than a general perfecution would have done? It may further be afked; would an Arminian have drawn up the XVIIth Article?

You yourfelf, fir, feem to have been aware of your miftake, in afferting, fo peremptorily, that predeftination and its concomitant doctrines are points concerning which "wife and good men have always differed:" fince you prefently add, that they "have been difputed in almoft all ages of the Chriftian Church." During the four firft ages of it, they were undifputed, for ought appears to the contrary: but, from the time Pelagius firft broke the ice, quite down to the reformation, they certainly were frequent fubjects of controverfy. The reformers, and reformed Churches, both here and abroad, were univerfally on the fide of abfolute grace, in contradiction, both to the pretended merits, and the boasted free-agency of man. Witness the authentic and valuable collection of articles and confeffions of faith, published by Gafper Laurentius, in 1612. With regard to our own reformers in particular, bifhop Burnet, though far enough from warping to Calvinifm, is yet to honeft as to allow, that, "In England the firft reformers were generally in the Sublap

farian

farian way*:" plainly enough intimating, that all our first reformers were doctrinal Calvinifts, though with fome flight variation; the major part of them being Sublapfarians, or holding that God, in the decree of predeftination, confidered mankind as fallen: the rest of the first reformers having been Supralapfarians, who fuppofe that men were, in that decree, confidered neither as fallen nor as unfallen, but fimply as men, in puris naturalibus. A metaphyfical difquifition, which still obtains among the anti-Arminians; but which affects not the main queftion, and concerning which they ever did and do still agree.

I fhall, at prefent, fir, trouble you with but one more citation from Burnet: a fhort one indeed it is, but full to the point. You will find it in that learned and worthy prelate's abridgment of his Hiftory of the Reformation, fub ann. 1549. His words are thefe: "Another fort of people was much complained of, who built fo much on the received opinion of predeftination, that they thought they might live as they pleased." Whether or no these people really drew this confequence from the doctrine (as there is nothing fo holy as to be exempt from all poffibility of abufe ;) or whether, as is moft probable, it was a flander fastened on them by the disguised Papists of that time; affects not the prefent argument. The paffage proves what I quote for: namely, that, at the fettlement of the reformation, and when the Church of England was in her primitive purity, predeftination was the received opinion. Nor, indeed, need the bishop have told us fo. The articles of religion, published about a year and a half after the time he fpeaks of, put the point beyond all doubt. Thus flood this matter in the reign of king Edward. We fhall come to that of queen Elizabeth by and by. In the mean while,

*On the 17th Art. p. 197, 8vo edit.

From

From England, fir, I follow you to the continent. You are pleased to tell us, p. 69, 70, that thefe doctrines have been difputed "among the Papifts, between the Thomifts and the Scotifts; the Dominicans and the Francifcans:" to which you might alfo have added," and between the Janfenifts and Jefuits." I grant it all. And these points not only have been, but are difputed among them, with abundance of acrimony, to this very day. A moft pregnant proof, by the by, of the infallibility and Catholic unity, which that moft depraved and most impudent of all churches affects to value herfelf upon. Had you stopped here, you had done well: but you add, that the doctrines, in debate between yourfelf and the author of Pietas Oxonienfis, were likewife difputed among the Proteftants, from the first beginning of the reformation, between the Lutherans and the Calvinifts." Here, I apprehend, you have fhot beyond the mark. The æra, or firft beginning of the reformation, is univerfally, and very justly, affigned to the year 1517, when Luther first publicly opposed the fale of the pope's indulgencies at Wittenberg. At this time, Calvin could have had no followers; for he himself was then a boy of but eight years old; being born July 10, 1509. Neither was he fettled to purpofe at Geneva, until the year 1541, i. e. five years before the death of Luther: by which time the reformation had fpread wide and taken deep root on the continent. Hence it is evident, that there were and could have been no difputes, concerning the decrees of God, "between the Lutherans and Calvinifts, from the firft beginning of the reformation:" for the reformation was begun in Calvin's childhood, long enough before he was brought on the ftage of public obfervation.

The plain truth is, Luther himself was an abfolute predeftinarian; and was as able and as refolute a de

Melch, Ad. in Vitâ Calvini, p. 63.

fender

fender of God's eternal, irrefpective decrees, as Calvin or any other. So that even had these two great men been as ftrictly co-atanei, as they were con-temporaries, there would have been no room for diffention between them on that fubject. Bishop Burnet, with all his bias to Arminianifm, was too well read, not to know, and too honeft, not to acknowledge the Calvinifm (if it must be called by that name) of Luther though the bishop's averfion to thefe doctrines made him, very difingenuously, infinuate as if that eminent reformer adopted them, partly, to serve a turn, and, partly, without due examination. “When Luther," fays he, "began to form his opinions into a body, he clearly faw, that nothing did fo plainly destroy the doctrine of merit, and justification by works, as St. Auftin's opinions, He found alfo in his works very exprefs authorities against most of the corruptions of the Roman Church: and being of an order that carried his name, and, by confequence, accustomed to read and reverence his works; it was no wonder, if he, without a strict examining of the matter, efpoufed all his [Auftin's] opinions." [on Art. 17. p. 194] However, not to reft on mere teftimony, which, at beft, is but evidence at fecond hand; as a folid and indifputable proof that I go on fure grounds in averring Luther to have held abfolute predeftination, I appeal to the memorable controverfy between him and Erafmus. The latter had, at the importunate and repeated requefts of king Henry VIII. and cardinal Wolfey, published a treatife in favour of free will, wherein Luther was feverely reflected on for holding the oppofite doctrine. To this Luther published a copious anfwer; drawn up in a very nervous manner, and with a vaft compafs of argument; entitling it, De Servo Arbitrio, or, The Human Will a Slave. If any perfon, after having read a fingle chapter in that mafterly performance, has the affurance to pronounce Luther an enemy to what is now known by

the