have infected those provinces. Such indeed is the piety, such is the concord of sectaries!

But the Arminians may be called "mild Calvinists," when compared with the Gomarists who are of the rigid class, and tenaciously adhere to the opinions of Calvin. The same distinction of Mild and Rigid, was formerly made, and still exists, among the Lutherans.

A great assembly of [Dutch and foreign] ministers was held at Dort in 1618, against the Arminians, in the presence of Prince Maurice and other leading characters. Yet it could make no certain determination of the controversy respecting Predestination; for the ministers were divided among themselves, and the Arminians raised their objections, because they could not be heard in their own defence through the prevalence of the faction that maintained the predestination of Gomarus and Calvin. But the issue of the Dort assembly was, the banishment of the Arminian ministers, and the condemnation of Barneveldt who had been seized and arraigned as the author of the seditious proceedings of the Remonstrants: He was beheaded at the Hague, May 13, 1619, in the seventy-third year of his age; and the Arminians began to honour him as a martyr.

The Calvinists in Holland were at this time divided into six principal sects, those who followed Calvin as a Pope, [Calvino-Papista,] the Puritans, the Brownists, the Broughtonians, the Gomarists, and the Arminians. At the same period also, in England, several persons revived the ancient heresies of the Origenists, the Ebionites, the Sabellians, and the Anabaptists; others assumed the office of prophets, or taught new doctrines, which yet were not much dissimilar to those of Calvin. Nor will there ever be an end to such busy-bodies, until all of them bring their understandings into captivity to the obedience of Christ, and of his Church,* "which God hath given for the work of the ministry, that we should henceforth be no more children, tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the sleight of men, and cunning craftiness, whereby they lie in wait to deceive; but speaking the truth in love, may grow up into him in all things, which is the head, even Christ."-Continuation of the Annals of Baronius.

THOMAS STACKHOUSE, A.M.-1734.

Arminius, a Professor in Leyden, wrote against Perkins, [who asserted the supralapsarian points,] upon which Gomarus and he had many disputes, and their opinions bred great distraction_over all the United Provinces, till at length a great Synod met at Dort, which condemned the tenets of Arminius. What contributed to the condemnation of the Arminian doctrine, was a political question+

This was the insidious manner, by which the Popish writers of that age endeavoured to profit by the quarrels of the Protestants; but their success, during the Inter-regnum in England, was far greater, especially among the Calvinists, than it was at any period in Holland. These remarks, however, come with a very bad grace from a man who had himself apostatized from Protestantism!

In the beginning of the last century, the contest was vehement between the Remonstrants and the Calvinists in Holland. The latter engaged Prince Maurice on their side, artfully turned a religious into a political quarrel; and, being superior in power, overcame their antagonists who surpassed them as much in judgment, learning, probity, and every thing that was commendable. They held a Synod at Dort, and established their Calvinistical decrees by cruel insolence and oppression. Thus the Remonstrants were obliged to fly their country, and seek for refuge where they could find it, amongst the Papists, to shun the barbarity of their fellow-citizens, who had

that had some time been agitated and occasioned a difference of opinion, viz. Whether the war should be carried on with Spain or propositions of a peace be entertained? The followers of Arminius were almost all for a peace; and the others, among whom the Prince of Orange was chief, were as generally for a war: Hereupon the Arminians were represented as men disaffected to their country, and whose opinions inclined them to Popery, and therefore it is less wonder to find them condemned in a Synod which was convened in a country where such misrepresentations of them had been industriously spread.

When these disputes crossed the sea and came amongst us, they were soon carried to so great a height, that a proclamation was issued out, requiring divines to preach no longer upon these heads. But, as the Arminian tenets were greatly encouraged by Archbishop Laud, they very much prevailed; until unhappy disputes falling in at that time, concerning the extent of the royal prerogative, and the Arminians declaring for it, though they were favoured at Court, yet they were censured in Parliament, which brought their doctrine under a very hard character all the nation over. The subversion of the government, that afterwards followed, gave a fatal blow to the Arminian doctrines; most of the sectaries that then prevailed, embraced Calvin's notions in point of Predestination, and held all other opinions in great detestation: But, when the government came to be re-established, the exploded doctrines revived, and were the kindlier used and cultivated for having suffered so hardly before. At present they are become the general profession of almost all the clergy of the Church of England, as the others are made the favourite and distinguishing opinions of most Dissenters.-Body of Divinity.

THE REV. RICHARD THOMSON, Cambridge.-1605.

I view with approbation what you write concerning Arminius ;— though we in England are not so ignorant of his REPUTATION, as you seem to apprehend. For I formerly knew him very well, before he became Professor of Divinity; and since he entered on his new office, he has begun to be well-known to many others in this country. As often, therefore, as any students come from Leyden to Cambridge, our Professors make particular enquiries about Arminius. I am truly glad, for the sake of your University, that she contains SUCH A GREAT MAN.-Epist. Eccl.

N. TINDAL, M. A.-1758.

Arminius and his followers declared, that God decrees not "absolutely" any person to be saved or damned, but "conditionally," or according to what He foresaw they would do: That Christ did not die only for a particular number whom God intended to save, but for all men, &c.-When the Arminian scheme began to spread not learned from their own sufferings the rights of conscience, and the necessity of mutual forbearance. But these violent men trod in the steps of their own fathers; for the litigious temper of many of the Reformed in the Low Countries, their dogmatical decisions of nnimportant speculations, their immortal hatred of toleration, their zeal far imposing confessions of faith, and the fanatical, ambitious, and turbulent spirit of several of their ecclesiastics, make it a matter of wonder to posterity how the Protestant religion was ever established there. Nothing but the diabolical cruelty of the Spanish government, which became insupportable even to the Dutch Papists, could, hmanly speaking, have brought about a Reformation. Jortin's Dissertations.

in Holland, and to be favoured by the government, as more rational in itself and more intelligible by the people than the Calvinistical, the Predestinarian party, who were most prevalent there, grew outrageous at the progress of the Arminian doctrines, and called the authors of them "Devils" and " Plagues," animating the magistrates to extirpate and destroy them, and utterly refusing to enter into any treaty of reconciliation. They never ceased till they had leave to hold a National Synod at Dort, in 1618, from which all the Arminian divines being expelled, their tenets were condemned, and the Predestinarian or Calvinistical doctrines more firmly established.-Continuation of Rapin's History.

THE REV. JOHN UYTENBOGARDT.-1612.

The Remonstrants thank God, that they have been permitted to know, to hear, and to see SUCH A MAN AS ARMINIUS, and to enjoy the benefit of his GREAT ABILITIES. They look upon this church to be happy in having had such a light, and unhappy in having lost it so soon; but still more unhappy are those who, when they might, did not learn of him.-I have written to the Patriarch, [Cyril, of Alexandria,] but I have not sent him an Account of the Conference [at the Hague in 1611,] because it is not yet translated into Latin, and he does not understand the Dutch language. I have only transmitted to him the Disputations of Arminius, because they contain a sort of BRIEF SYSTEM OF DIVINITY, on which I am very desirous to obtain his opinion.-Brandt et Epist. Eccl.

JOHN WESLEY, M.A.-1778.

Meantime, from others, ARMINIUS underwent almost continual persecution, and was treated with the most flagrant injustice. Thirty-one Articles, containing many things which he utterly denied, as well as the most senseless and wilful misrepresentations of what he maintained, were circulated through Holland, as an exact code of his doctrines. He, more than once, in his answer, complains of his enemies making him a fool, as well as a heretic.-THE DECLARATION OF HIS OPINIONS, which he spake in an assembly of the States, serves at once by facts to evidence the unfair usage he met with, and to proclaim to the world AS MANLY and RATIONAL a SYSTEM of DIVINITY as any age or nation has produced. His uncommon MILDNESS and FORBEARANCE, (rendered still more extraordinary by the age in which he lived,) is apparent in every page of his writings : And his disputes with the celebrated Junius, and our English Perkins, on the subject of Predestination, are, for the POLITE and GENEROUS MANNER in which he has conducted them, AN HONOUR TO HUMAN NATURE.-Arminian Magazine.

James Harmens, in Latin, Jacobus Arminius, was first one of the ministers of Amsterdam, and afterwards Professor of Divinity at Leyden. He was educated at Geneva; but, in the year 1591, began to doubt of the principles which he had till then received: And being more and more convinced that they were wrong, when he was invested with the Professorship, he publicly taught what he believed of the truth, till, in the year 1609, he died in peace. But a few years after his death, some zealous men, with the Prince of Orange at their head, furiously assaulted all that held, what were called, his Opinions, and having procured them to be solemnly condemned, in the famous Synod of Dort, (not so numerous or learned, but fully as

impartial as the Council, or Synod of Trent ;) some were put to cath, some banished, some imprisoned for life, all turned out of theilemployments, and made incapable of holding any office, either in Chrch or State.

The errors charged upon these (usually termed Arminians by their opponents, are five, (1.) That they deny Original Sin.-(2.) That they deny Justification by Faith.-(3.) That they deny Absute Predestination.-(4.) That they deny the Grace of God to be resistible;—and, (5.) That they affirm, a Believer may fall from Gice. With regard to the two first of these charges, they plead, Not guilty. They are entirely false. No man that ever lived, not Jhn Calvin himself, ever asserted either Original Sin, or Justificatiorby Faith, in more strong, more clear, and express terms, than Armiius has done. These two points, therefore, are to be set out of the qestion: In these, both parties agree.

nd

But there is an undeniable difference between the Calvinists nd Arminians, with regard to the three other questions. Here tey divide: The former believe Absolute, the latter, only Conditinal Predestination. How can any man know what Arminius held, ho has never read one page of his writings? Let no man bawl agast Arminians, till he knows what the term means. And then he ill know, that Arminians and Calvinists are just upon a level. Arminians have as much right to be angry at Calvinists, as Calvints have to be angry at Arminians. John Calvin was a pious, leared, sensible man: And so was James Harmens. Many Calvinists ire pious, learned, sensible men: And so are many Arminians. Gly the former hold Absolute Predestination, the latter ConditionaWhat is an Arminian?

JOHN WILKS, Esq.-1822.

In all his Lectures, Arminius was attended by a numerous adience, who admired the strength of his arguments, and vere astonished at the great learning which he displayed: This expoed him to the contempt of his brethren, who treated him with harshess and cruelty. Gomarus was his greatest persecutor.

Arminius was a faithful and energetic minister of the Gosel. His voice was firm, but moderately low; and his conversation sch as became a Christian: While it was pious and judicious, it vas intermixed with that politeness of conduct and elegance of manners, which delights the young, and insures the approbation and estem of the aged. His enemies, indeed, endeavoured to represent hin in the most disadvantageous light; but his memory has been sufficiently vindicated by men of the greatest distinction and eminence: And, in spite of all the malevolence and enmity of his antagonists, his character was in very many points highly commendable, and worhy of imitation.-Christian Biographical Dictionary.

LAURENCE WOMACK, D. D.-1658.

When those points of doctrine maintained by Melancthon and other moderate Lutherans, came to be managed by the acute wit, solid judgment and great learning of James Hermine, Public Reader in the University of Leyden, they appeared to the unprejudiced examiners so much more consonant as well to the Sacred Scriptures and right reason as to primitive Antiquity, and so much more agreeable to the Mercy, Justice and Wisdom of Almighty God, and so much

mor conducing unto Piety, than the tenets of the rigid Calvinists, thatthey quickly found a cheerful reception and great multitudes of follwers in the Belgic Churches. Hereupon their adversaries, (haing so passionately espoused the contrary opinions, and being so ehemently carried on with a prejudice against these,) that they migt the more effectually decry and suppress the propugnators of the, caused some of their confidants to represent them and their docrine under such odious characters as were indeed proper to their ow opinions. It was given out that, among their heresies, they hel: First, "That God was the author of sin," and Secondly, "That Hicreated the far greatest part of mankind, only of purpose to glorif himself in their damnation,"-with several others of like nature; wlch indeed are not only the consequence and results of Calvin's dctrine, but positively maintained and propagated by some of his foowers.-Examination of Tilenus.

SIR HENRY WOTTON.-1616.

ND to another that spake indiscreet and bitter words against Armiius, I heard him (Sir Henry Wotton,) reply to this purpose: n my travel toward Venice, as I past through Germany, I rested alost a year at Leyden, where I entered into an acquaintance with AMINIUS, (then the Professor of Divinity in that University,) a ma much talked of in this age, which is made up of opposition and cotroversy: And, indeed, if I mistake not Arminius in his expressias, (as so weak a brain as mine is, may easily do,) then I know I iffer 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 hi to be of A MOST STRICT LIFE, and of A MOST MEEK SPIRIT. Ar that he was so mild, appears by his proposals to our Master Pekins, of Cambridge, from whose book, Of the order and causes of saiation, (which was first writ in Latin,) Arminius took the occasia of writing some queries to him concerning the consequents of his doctrine; intending them (it is said) to come privately to Mr. Pekins' own hands, and to receive from him a like private and a lik 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 then (but since his death, his sons did not). And it is pity, if Gal 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 mek spirit, and of great and sanctified learning. And though sine 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 doubtles, 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.