“VII. The means pertaining to the execution of the decree of reprobation to eternal death, are partly such as peculiarly belong to all those who are rejected and reprobate, whether they ever arrive at years of maturity or die before that period, and they are partly such as are proper only to some of them.. -The mean that is common to all the reprobate, is desertion in sin, by denying to them that saving grace which is sufficient and necessary to the salvation of any one. This negation [or denial] consists of two parts:-For, in the First Place, God is not willing that Christ should die for them [the reprobate] or become their Saviour,-and this neither in reference to the antecedent will of God (as some persons call it,) nor in reference to his sufficient will, or the value of the price of reconciliation; because this price was not offered for reprobates, either with respect to the decree of God, or its virtue and efficacy. (2) But the other part of this negation [or denial] is, that God is unwilling to communicate the Spirit of Christ to reprobates, yet without such communication they can neither be made partakers of Christ nor of his benefits.

"VIII. The mean which belongs properly only to some of the reprobates, is obduration [or the act of hardening], which befals those of them who have attained to years of maturity, either because they have very frequently and enormously sinned against the law of God, or because they have rejected the grace of the Gospel.-(1.) To the execution of the first species of induration [or hardening] belong the illumination of their conscience by means of knowledge, and its conviction of the righteousness of the law For it is impossible that this law should not necessarily detain them in unrighteousness, to render them inexcusable.—(2.) For the execution of the second species of induration, God employs a call by the preaching of his gospel, which call is inefficacious and insufficient both in respect to the decree of God, and to its issue or event. This calling is either only an external one, which it is neither in their desire nor in their power to obey. Or it is likewise an internal one, by which some of them may be excited in their understandings to accept and believe the things which they hear; but yet it is only with such a faith as that with which the devils are endowed when they believe and tremble! Others of them are excited and conducted still further, so as to desire in a certain measure to taste the Heavenly gift. But the latter are, of all others, the most unhappy, because they are raised up on high, that they may be brought down with a heavier fall: And this fate it is

impossible for them to escape, for they must of necessity return to their vomit, and depart or fall away from the faith.

"IX. From this decree of Divine election and reprobation, and from this administration of the means which pertain to the execution of both of them, it follows, that the elect are necessarily saved, it being impossible for them to perish,and that the reprobate are necessarily damned, it being impossible for them to be saved; and all this from the absolute purpose [or determination] of God, which is altogether antecedent to all things, and to all those causes which are either in things themselves or can possibly result from them."

These opinions concerning Predestination are considered, by some of those who advocate them, to be the foundation of Christianity, salvation, and of its certainty. On these sentiments, they suppose, is founded the sure and undoubted • consolation of all believers, which is capable of rendering their consciences tranquil; and on them also depends the praise of the grace of God, so that if any contradiction be offered to this doctrine, God is necessarily deprived of the glory of his grace, and then the merit of salvation is attributed to the free-will of man and to his own powers and strength,—which ascription savours of Pelagianism."

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These then are the causes which are offered why the advocates of these sentiments labour with uncommon anxiety to retain the purity of such a doctrine in their Churches, and why they oppose themselves to all those innovations which are at variance with them.

2. My Sentiments on the preceding scheme of Predestination. But, for my own part,-to speak my sentiments with freedom, and yet with a salvo in favour of a better judgment,— I am of opinion, that this doctrine of theirs contains many things that are both false and impertinent, and at an utter disagreement with each other; all the instances of which, the present time will not permit me to recount, but I will subject it to an examination only in those parts which are

This is a very accurate description of the plan pursued, by the rigid Predestinarians, towards all those who cannot discover in the Word of God any traces of Calvin's invention of Irrespective Election and Reprobation. Such calumnious reproaches appear most preposterously applied to the Arminians, whose tenets, from their very origin, have always had a tendency to exalt the grace of God to its scriptural elevation; while the doctrines of Calvin and his imitators have seized on a solitary apostolic expression, (O wretched man that I am!) to beat down the legitimate aspirings of Divine Grace after a holy conformity to God, and to controvert and explain away the positive commands of God our Saviour concerning personal sanctity.

most prominent and extensive. I shall therefore propose to myself four principal heads, which are of the greatest importance in this doctrine; and when I have in the first place explained of what kind they are, I will afterwards declare more fully the judgment and sentiments which I have formed concerning them. They are the following:

"I. That God has absolutely and precisely decreed to save certain particular men by his mercy or grace, but to condemn others by his justice: And to do all this without having any regard in such decree to righteousness or sin, obedience or disobedience, which could possibly exist on the part of one class of men or of the other.

"II. That, for the execution of the preceding decree, God determined to create Adam, and all men in him, in an upright state of original righteousness; beside which, he also ordained them to commit sin, that they might thus become guilty of eternal condemnation and be deprived of original righteousness.

"III. That those persons whom God has thus positively willed to save, he has decreed not only to salvation but also to the means which pertain to it; (that is, to conduct and bring them to faith in Christ Jesus, and to perseverance in that faith;) and that he also in reality leads them to these results by a grace and power that are irresistible, so that it is not possible for them to do otherwise than believe, persevere in faith, and be saved.

"IV. That to those whom, by his absolute will, God has fore-ordained to perdition, he has also decreed to deny that grace which is necessary and sufficient for salvation, and does not in reality confer it upon them; so that they are neither placed in a possible condition nor in any capacity of believing or of being saved.”

After a diligent contemplation and examination of these four heads, in the fear of the Lord, I make the following declaration respecting this doctrine of Predestination.

3. I reject this Predestination for the following reasons. I. Because it is not the foundation of CHRISTIANITY, of SALVATION, or of its CERTAINTY.

1. It is not the foundation of CHRISTIANITY:-(1) For this Predestination is not that decree of God by which Christ is appointed by God to be the Saviour, the Head, and the Foundation of those who will be made heirs of salvation: Yet that decree is the only foundation of Christianity.—

(2) For the doctrine of this Predestination is not that doctrine by which, through faith, we as lively stones are built up into Christ, the only Corner-stone, and are inserted into him as the members of the body are joined to their head.

2. It is not the foundation of SALVATION:-(1) For this Predestination is not that decree of the good-pleasure of God in Christ Jesus on which alone our salvation rests and depends. -(2) The doctrine of this Predestination is not the foundation of salvation: For it is not "the power of God to salvation to every one that believeth :" because through it "the righteousness of God" is not "revealed from faith to faith."

3. Nor is it the foundation of the CERTAINTY of salvation : For that is dependent upon this decree,-" They who believe, shall be saved:" I believe, therefore I shall be saved. But the doctrine of this Predestination embraces within itself neither the first nor the second member of the syllogism.

This is likewise confessed by some persons in these words: "We do not wish to state, that the knowledge of this [predestination] is the foundation of Christianity or of salvation, or that it is necessary to salvation in the same manner as the doctrine of the Gospel," &c.

II. This doctrine of Predestination comprises within it neither the whole nor any part of the Gospel.-For,-according to the tenour of the discourses delivered by John and Christ, as they are described to us by the Evangelists, and according to the doctrine of the Apostles and Christ after his ascension,the Gospel consists partly of an injunction to repent and believe, and partly of a promise to bestow forgiveness of sins, the Spirit of grace, and life eternal. But this Predestination belongs neither to the injunction to repent and believe, nor to the annexed promise. Nay, this doctrine does not even teach what kind of men in general God has predestinated, which is properly the doctrine of the Gospel; but it embraces within itself a certain mystery,* which is known only to God who is

Is this one of the mysteries to which the shrewd Calvinist alluded, (page 522,) when he claimed for his system all the secret things contained in the gospel? Yet Calvin's scheme is strangely at variance with itself, in this as in many other particulars: For, however great the mystery mentioned in the text may appear to the uninitiated, it must be a manifest and perceptible truth to those who feel themselves irresistibly drawn or driven to embrace the peculiarities of Calvin's scheme, and to derive from it some portion of comfort and security. But not only have they this personal perception of it within themselves, but they seem to possess a kind of intuitive power of discerning it in others. It is on the latter principle, I suppose, that, in the very outset of Calvinism, the followers of that ungracious system deemed themselves justified in visiting with reproaches and abuse all those who had not boldly joined the little Predestinarian flock, and in looking upon their despised Arminian brethren as Papists and modern Pelagians!

the Predestinator, and in which mystery are comprehended what particular persons and how many he has decreed to save and to condemn. From these premises I draw a further conclusion, that this doctrine of Predestination is not necessary to salvation, either as an object of knowledge, belief, hope, or performance. A confession to this effect has been made by a certain learned man* in the theses which he has proposed for discussion on this subject, in the following words:"Wherefore the Gospel cannot be simply termed the book or "the revelation of predestination, but only in a relative sense: "Because it doth not absolutely denote either the matter of "the number or the form; that is, it neither declares how many persons in particular, nor (with a few exceptions,) "who they are, but only the description of them in general, "whom God has predestinated.”

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III. This doctrine was never admitted, decreed, or approved in any COUNCIL, either General or Particular, for the first 600 years after Christ.-1. Not in the General Council of Nice, in which sentence was given against Arius and in favour of the the Deity and Consubstantiality of the Son of God:-Not in the first Council of Constantinople, in which a decree was passed against Macedonius, respecting the Deity of the Holy Spirit-Not in the Council of Ephesus, which determined against Nestorius, and in favour of the Unity of the Person of the Son of God:-Not in that of Chalcedon, which condemned Eutyches, and determined, "that in one and the same person of our Lord Jesus Christ there were two distinct natures, which differ from each other in their essence:"-Not in the second Council of Constantinople, in which, Peter Bishop of Antioch, and Anthymus Bishop of Constantinople, with certain other persons, were condemned for having asserted, "that the Father had likewise suffered," [as well as the Son,]: -Nor in the third Council of Constantinople, in which the Monothelites were condemned for having asserted, “that there was only one will and operation in Jesus Christ."

2. But this doctrine was not discussed or confirmed in Particular Councils,-such as that of Jerusalem, Orange, or even that of Mela in Africa, which was held against Pelagius and his errors, as is apparent from the articles of doctrine which were then decreed both against his person and his false opinions.

This is Gomarus, whose Theses on Predestination the reader will have an opportunity to peruse in the Examination of them which was instituted by Arminius.