Imatges de pàgina
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another form by the Manichees, and always considered by the Ancients as the most dangerous heresy. Nay St. Augustine himself, notwithstanding all his zeal against. Pelagius, asks this question:+"Which of us affirms that free-will is perishedutterly from mankind by the fall of the first man?" He replies to this: "Freedom indeed is destroyed by sin: but it is that freedom only, which we had in paradise, of having perfect righteousness with immortality." For otherwise, as Dr. Heylin observes, it appears to be his opinion, that man was not merely passive under all the influences of grace, according to that celebrated expression of his, "He, who first made thee without thy help, will not save thee at last without thy concurrence." But if any harsher expressions have escaped his pen, as it often happens in the heat of dispute, they are to be qualified by this last rule, and another of his, in which it is affirmed, that God could not with justice judge and condemn the world, if the sins of all men did not proceed from their own free will, but from some over-ruling Providence which constrained them.§

In the Council of Trent there was a contest between the Dominicans and Franciscans upon the subject of the decrees. The most considerable Divines there inclined to the opinion of the great school Divines, St. Thomas Aquinas, Scotus, and others who affirmed that God before the creation, out of the mass of mankind, did from mere mercy elect some for glory, for whom he hath effectually prepared the means to obtain it; that their number is certain and determined, and none can be added to them. And that others, who are not predestinated to salvation, cannot complain, since God hath afforded them sufficient assistance for this purpose, although none but the elect can be saved. This doctrine they endeavoured to prove from the Epistles of St. Paul and the works of St. Augustine. But the Franciscans represented it as injurious to the attributes of the Deity, since he would act partially, if without any cause he should elect one, and reject another,—and unjustly, if he should: damn men for his own will, and not for their faults, and create so great a multitude of men to condemn them. Catarinus, who was in favour of a medium between the two opinions, observed, that the doctrine of St. Augustine was not heard of before his time; and he himself has confessed, that it cannot be found in the works of any preceding writer. He added, + Lib. i, contra Epist. Pelag. cap. 2.

Hist. Quinq. cap. i. p. 9.

§ Idem, cap. i. p. 9.

that the warmth with which he opposed Pelagius, had transported him too far. *

rest.

It appears upon a general view, that the Franciscanst among the Papists, and the followers of Melancthon and of Arminius among the Protestants, were on one side with regard to the divine decrees; and the Dominicans, the rigid Lutherans, who followed Flaccius Illyricus, and the Sublapsarian Calvinists on the other; while Catarinus took the middle way, in which he was afterwards followed by Dr. Overal, Professor of Divinity at Cambridge, and successively Bishop of Litchfield and Norwich. † Calvin found out a way by himself, which neither the Dominicans, nor any other of "the followers of St. Augustine's rigours," as Dr. Heylin expresses it, had previously found out, by making God to have imposed upon Adam an unavoidable necessity of falling into sin and misery, in order that he might shew his mercy in electing some few of his posterity, and his justice in the absolute rejection of all the This scheme appeared very shocking to many of the Papists, and so offensive to the Lutherans ingeneral, that they have professed a greater readiness to return to Popery, than to give their assent to it.|| But by the interest of Calvin it was almost universally received in all churches of his platform, though strongly opposed by Sebastian Castalio in Geneva itself, who met with severe treatment from Calvin and Beza on that account. The terror of this example, and the great reputation which Calvin had gained by his preaching and writing, not only confirmed his power at home, but also made his doctrines the more easily admitted abroad. His system, therefore, was zealously adhered to in all those churches which either had received the discipline of Geneva, or whose divines endeavoured to advance it. By this means, as Mr. Hooker observes § in the preface to his Ecclesiastical Polity, "that of what account the Master of the Sentences was in the Church of Rome, the same and more amongst the preachers of the Reformed Churches Calvin had purchased, so that the perfectest Divines were judged they who were skilfullest in Calvin's writings. His books almost the very Canon, by which to judge of doctrine and discipline. The French Churches, both under others abroad or at home in their own country, all cast according to that mould, which Calvin had made. The Church of Scotland in erecting the fabrick of their Reforma• Idem, cap. ii. + Idem, cap. iv, p. 34, 35. Idem, cap. iv, p.35. Idem, cap. iv, p. 36.

§ Page 9.

tion took the self-same pattern." This was received not long after in the Palatine Churches and those of the Netherlands; in all which as his doctrine made way to bring in the discipline, so it was no difficult matter for the discipline to support the doctrine and oppress all those who durst oppose it.*

We may observe, however, that Beza and his followers proceeded to a much greater excess of rigour in fixing the decree of Predestination before the fall, which Calvin had himself placed in massá corruptâ, the corrupted mass of mankind; and which was maintained by the more moderate Calvinists.But as they agreed with the rest with regard to personal elec tion and reprobation, in restraining the benefit of our Saviour's sufferings to the elect, and asserting the irresistible efficacy of grace, with the impossibility of falling from it, there was hardly any notice taken of their deviation, though they differed in the foundation; and they passed under the general name of Calvinists. Those Divines of the Low Countries, who were of the old Lutheran stock, were more inclined to the sentiments of Melancthon concerning Predestination, than to those of Calvin; yet knowing the prodigious esteem in which the latter was held amongst them, or being unwilling to engage in any disputes, they suffered his opinions to prevail without opposition.

In this manner affairs stood till the year 1592, when Mr. Wm. Perkins, an eminent divine of Cambridge, published his Book, called Armilla Aurea, &c., containing the doctrine of Predestination as it is represented by Beza, but digested into a more distinct and methodical form. This induced our Arminius to oppose the current of those opinions, which appeared to him extremely shocking and injurious to all our natural notions of the Deity. †

But in order to shew that the doctrine of the Remonstrants was more ancient than Calvinism in the Churches of the Low Countries, we may observe, that those Provinces embraced the Reformation at first, according to the Lutheran model. About the year 1530, the Reformed religion was admitted into EastFriesland, under Enno the first, upon the preaching of Hardinbergius, a learned man, and one of the principal reformers of the Church of Embden, a town of the greatest eminence in that Earldom. From him Clemens Martini received those principles, which he afterwards propagated in the Low Countries, where the same doctrine concerning Predestination had been publicly maintained in a Book intitled Hodegus Laicorum or * Heylin, Hist. Quinq. cap. iv p. 37., + Idem, cap. iv, pag. 38

*

The Layman's Guide, published by Anastasius Veluamus in 1554, and highly commended by Henry Antonides, DivinityProfessor in the University of Franeker. But on the other hand, the French Ministers having settled themselves in those parts which either used the French language, or anciently belonged to the Crown of France, and exerting themselves with more vigour than the other party, prevailed so far with William of Nassau, Prince of Orange, that a confession of their own drawing up was presented to the Lady Regent, ratified, as Dr. Heylin says, in a forcible and tumultuous manner, and afterwards by degrees obtruded upon all the Churches in the Low Countries. However, the Ministers successively in the whole Province of Utrecht adhered to their former doctrines, and were not considered upon that account as less Reformed; nor were there wanting some persons of great distinction among them, who opposed the doctrine of Predestination contained im that confession, which was first published in the year 1567.Johannes Isbrandi, one of the Preachers of Rotterdam, openly professed himself an Anti-Calvinist, as well as Gellius Snecanus in West-Friesland, who esteemed those of Calvin's judgment as innovators in the doctrine which had been first received among them. We also find the same account of Holman, one of the professors at Leyden, of Cornelius Meinardi, and Cornelius Wiggeri, two persons of great reputation, before the name of Arminius was ever mentioned.†

In addition to the great Divines here enumerated by Dr. Heylin, as favourers and defenders of conditional Predestination prior to the time in which Arminius flourished, we may specify the names of Erasmus, Bullinger, Sarcerius, Latimer, Duifhusius, Dr. Overal, Bishop Andrews, Dr. Clayton, and last, but not least, the two learned Professors, (formosi ambo!) HEMMINGIUS of Copenhagen, and BARO of Cambridge. The following epistle which the latter of these learned

* Idem, cap. v, pag. 47.

+ Idem, cap. v. p. 48.

HEMMINGIUS was born in the isle of Laland, a part of the King of Denmark's dominions, in the year 1513; and, after having made considerable progress in learning during his youth, he was sent to the University of Wirtemburgh, where for the space of five years he was one of the most assiduous of Melancthon's auditors. He supported himself at that seat of learning by performing part of the duties of a tutor, and by writing for some of those students who are distinguished in almost every University for their opulence and their idleness. By Melancthon's interest he was admitted into a gentleman's family, as tutor to his daughters. After a faithful and exemplary discharge of his trust in that situation, he received the appointment of Minis

Professors addressed to the former, will still further illustrate the state of public opinion on Predestination, a few years prior to the time when Arminius began to publish sentiments.

ter to the Church of the Holy Ghost in Copenhagen, and of Professor of Hebrew in that University; in which, when in 1557 he had taken his degree of DOCTOR OF DIVINITY, he was made Professor of Theology. In 1579 he obtained a Canonry in the Church of Roschild, which preferment he happily enjoyed till the period of his death, on the 25th of May 1600. He was blind during the latter part of his life; which circumstance can excite no surprise when it is considered that he had always been a hard student and attained to the advanced age of eighty seven years. Hemmingius was not a proselyte to all the doctrines that had been propagated by Luther; for in his mature years he explained the real presence in The Lord's supper according to the views of Calviu; which at that time caused him some trouble. But on the subject of predestination he was one of the ablest opponents of the tenets of the Genevan school; and became, under Divine Providence, the principal cause of preserving an immense number of the Churches in the North of Europe sound in the faith on that most important doctrine.

His friend PETER BARO was born in France, and admitted a licentiate in the University of Bourges; but, being of the Protestant Religion, he was compelled to leave his native country, to avoid persecution. He retired into England; and, being a very learned person, was humanely entertained in the family of that great man the Lord Treasurer Burleigh, who, after he had himself been chosen Chancellor of the University of Cambridge, recommended Baro as a person well qualified for the situation of Lady Margaret's Professor of Divinity. To that high and responsible office he was elected some time prior to 1574, and became at the same time a member of Peter House. Upwards of twenty years he manfully stemmed the torrent of Calvinism which threatened to uproot every thing that opposed its progress. This intrepid conduct occasioned him much trouble from that bitter Calvinist Dr. Whitaker, and his powerful allies, Archbishop Whitgift, Bishop Vaughan, Dr. Tyndal and others. When these Divines, in their zeal for rigid Predestination, had in 1595, of their own authority, framed the notorious Lambeth Articles, which at Queen Elizabeth's command they were compelled almost immediately to recal and suppress, they were with exultation conveyed to Cambridge by Dr. Whitaker, (who died within a few days afterwards,) and were tendered as a sort of test to Dr. Baro. He had much to endure from the schemes of these men, who misrepresented his proceedings both to Lord Burleigh, and, through the Archbishop, to her Majesty. Baro, however, though only a stranger naturalized, displayed all the intrepidity of a native Briton, and exculpated himself to the satisfaction both of his patron and his Grace of Canterbury. He was cited before Dr. Goad, the Vice-chancellor ; but when his judicious friend the Chancellor heard of the nature of the process and the grounds of accusation, he discountenanced that mode of persecution. In the spring of 1596," finding his doctrine crossed by the Lambeth Articles, and afterwards his peace distracted by several informations brought against him by the adverse faction," he voluntarily vacated his Professorship, and retired to London, where he died about three or four years afterwards, and was interred with great honour in the parish church of St. Olave, Hart-street: His pall was supported by six Doctors of Divinity, and his remains were attended to the grave by all the ministers of the city, according to an order by Dr. Bancroft, then Bishop of London.

It was in the last year of his Professorship that he addressed to Hemmingius the interesting letter inserted in the text, in which he distinctly alludes to the treatment that he and the supporters of his doctrines were then receiving at the hands of their adversaries. But instead of indulging in despair, he strengthens the hand of his brother champion, and encourages him in his laudable exertions.

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