GOD'S LOVE TO MANKIND.  
MANIFESTED, By Disprooving his Absolute Decree for their Damnation.  HOS. 13.9. 
O Israel thou hast destroyed thyself: but in me is thy help.  WISD. 1.12, 13. 
Seek not Death in the error of your life; and pull not upon yourselves destruction, with the works of your hands.  
For God made not death: neither hath he pleasure in the destruction of the Living.  
Imprinted, ANNO, 1633.   

TO THE READER.  
THe Author of this Treatise was persuaded to Pen the reasons of his opinion against absolute Reprobation, that he might satisfy a worthy friend of his, who required it. What satisfaction that learned Gentleman, his friend, hath received by these reasons, I know not: but sure I am, they have given good content to some others, who have read them, and do still desire a Copy of them for their further use. To ease whose pains in transcribing this Treatise, it doth now appear in this form. If any of contrary opinion, shall undertake to answer or refute it; I wish, he would set down his opinion and reasons with that perspicuity and modesty, that our Author set down his. Such a course of disputing will gain more credit to himself and his cause, then voluminous Vagaries about impertinent things. If any shall use railing speeches, or unnecessary diversions from the cause; I shall ever interpret that to be a strong sign of a weak cause: or, at least, I shall think it to be an argument of an obstinate mind, who neither knoweth how to yield to the Truth, nor to defend his error. I hope the Reader, who loveth his own salvation, will be a more indifferent judge in a question, which concerneth him so nearly. And so I leave him to God's blessing.   


Faults escaped in the Printing.  pa lin for read pag lin for read 2 1 Saying Say. 52 26 viz. Gods, viz. that God● 9 ● thressing, threshing. 53 20 transgressions, transgression. 11 1● of speculative, of certain speculative.  ult fault of nature, fault of our nature.  26 which they, which, this they. 56 12 eo usque miseri, eo usque mistreri, 12 4 by this, besides this. 60 10 slow of anger, slow to anger. 13 8 second, secondly.  27 that, how that, look how.  25 Peucer, Peucer. 62 ●1 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 14 4 to error, to the error. 63 2 compatible, incompatible.  ult scape it, escape it. 65 5 and mercy, and his mercy: 16 15 sovereignty power, sovereignty & power 66 14 Sublapsarians, Supralapsian●.  36 of God in, in God of. 70 34 if had, if it had. 17 5 gavy, gave. 71 6 De nativit. De natura Dei. 21 3 sharp or sensible, sharp and sensible. 73 9 commandeth, commanded. 22 29 ou●tam, ●cutam. 75 35 which bear, which bare. 24 15 other things, other sins. 79 6 God is, yet God is.  35 that he hath, , he hath. 81 4 sacrificing himself, sacrificing of himself. 26 10 3 Wicked, (3) Wicked,  38 to what use, of what use. 32 36 this, is. 82 37 the end of, the end than of. ●3 3 2 (2) 89 13 ●e upbraid, he may upbraid.  6 (1) 1 95 37 self, selves. ●8 5 put o, put to. 99 23 negiient, negligent.  25 rigid, rigid, 103 32 for the whole world, for the sins of the whole world.  39 swim, any swim, or any.   41 29 any outrageous, any other outrageous ibid. 34 thou art one of the whole world, thou art one of them that were lost, & thou art one of the whole world. ●2 2 2 Nor (2) Nor  ult Works, this Works, saith this.   ●4 33 most harsh, more harsh.   ●8 9 included from excluded from. 104 5 my lot to be, my lot not to be, 
Faults escaped in the Margin.  pa lit. for read pag. lit. for read 2  Brand, Brand. 43 (s) injustitiaené, injustitiaué. 3 (b) per, par.  (t) adv, adv. hares. 4 (e) justit. I●stit. 44 (w) can. 2, can. 25. 6 (r) ad obj. ad obj. 7. 49  Heb. 20, 20, Heb. 10.38.  ibid. id eo, ideo. 50 (y) aptum, apertum. 7 (a) credire, credere 57 (i) Ecclesiam. Spiritu, Ecclesiam Spiritu. 0 (m) ausam, a●sam.  (r) ipsumque, ipsamque. 5  jonah, 4.22. jonah, 4.2, 66  § 23. §. 7. 6 (t) Epist. job, Epist. 106. 67 (d) cum dicemus, cum dicimus. 7  praed gag. praed. pag. 81 (p) delactionem, dilectionem. 6 (i) pag. thesi. pag. 29, thesi. 87 (s) que, quae.  (n) illustrandum, illustrandam.  ibid. excicantur, excitantur.  (o) Reprobri, Reprobi. 89 (t) debit, debet. ●7 (q) v. 18, cap. 18.  (a) contractum, contra●am.  (s) destivat, destinat. 90 (e) a antecedancis. de Antecedancis. ●2  Instit. lib. 14, lib. 4. 97 (g) proterunt, poterunt. ●3 (r) 6. 2. deal cap. 2. 101 (q) sumusué, sumus●é.   

GOD'S LOVE TO MANKIND.  
SIR,  
I Have sent you here the reasons, which have moved me to change my opinion in some controversies of late debated between the Remonstrants and their Opposites.  
I do the rather present them unto you.  
1 That I may show the due respect which I bear your Worship with my forwardness to answer your desires, as I can with regard to conscience.  
2 That you may see that I descent not without cause, but have reason on my side.  
3 That if I can be convinced that my grounds are weak and insufficient, I may think better of the opinion which I have forsaken, than I can for the present.  
In the delivery of my motives I will proceed in this order.  

1 I will state the opinion which I dislike.  
2 I will lay down my reasons against it.   
Touching the first, your Worship knoweth these two things very well.  
1 That the main 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and question in these controversies, and that on which the rest do hang, is what the decrees of God are touching the everlasting condition of men, and how they are ordered.  
2 That the men who have disputed these things, may be reduced to two sorts and sides.  
The first side affirmeth, that there is an absolute and peremptory decree proceeding from the alone pleasure of God, without any consideration of men's final impenitency and unbeleef; by which God casteth men off from grace and glory, and shutteth up the fare greater part, (even of those that are called by the preaching of the Gospel to repentance and salvation) under invincible and unavoidable sin and damnation.  
The other side disavowing any such decree, saying, that God's decree of casting men off for ever, is grounded upon the foresight of their continuance in sin and unbelief, both avoidable by grace, and consequently inferring no man's damnation necessarily.  
The first side is divided, for  
1 Some of them present man to God in the decree of reprobation looked on out of, or above the fall: and say,  
That God of his mere pleasure antecedent to all sin in the creature, original or actual, did decree to glorify his sovereignty and justice in the eternal rejection and damnation of the greatest part of mankind, as the end; and in their unavoidable sin and impenitency, as the means. And this way go Calvin, Beza, Zanchius, Piscator, Gomarus, and some of our own Countrymen.  
2 The rest of that side, thinking to avoid the great inconveniences, to which that supralapsarian way lieth open, fall down a little lower, and present man to God in his decree of Reprobation, lying in the fall and under the guilt of original sin, saying,  
That God looking upon miserable mankind lying in Adam's sin, did decree the greatest number of men (even those men whom he calls to repentance and salvation by the preaching of the Gospel) to hell torments for ever, and without all remedy, for the declaration of his severe justice. This way went the Synod.  
The difference between them is not much, and even in their own account too small a discord to cause a breach. Notwithstanding this petty difference therefore, they agree well enough together, as we may see in the Hague conference and Synod.  
In the conference at Hague, the Contraremonstrants have these words; 
(a) Col. Hag. Braved. pag. 37. Quo ad sententiarum diversitatem in hoc argumento, quòd deus respexit hominem in hoc decreto nondum creatum, vel creatum & lapsum; quia hoc ad fundamentum hujus doctrinae non pertinet, libenter alij alios aequitate Christianâ toleramus.  As touching the diversity of opinions in this argument, viz. that God looked at man in this decree, not yet created, or created and fallen: because this belongs not to the foundation of this doctrine; we do in Christian equity bear with one another.  
After this in the Synod at Dort, they permitted Gomarus to set down his judgement in the upper way. And the Delegates of South- Holland were very indifferent which way they took: For these are their words, 
(b) Acta Syn. per. 3● pag. 48. An Deus in elagendo consideraverit homines ut lapsos, an etiam ut nondum lapsos; existimant non esse necessarium, ut definiatur; modò statuatur Deum in eligendo considerasse homines in pari statu.  Whether God in choosing, considered men as fallen, or else as not fallen: They (the Delegates of South-Holland) think it is not necessary to be determined; so it be held, that God in choosing, considered men in a like estate. 
(c) Antidote. Remonstra. pag. 32.  Maccovius also Professor of Divinity at Francker, a violent and stiff maintainer of the most unsavoury speeches, which have been uttered in this Controversy, and one that undertook in the very Synod to make good against Lubbert his fellow Professor, that God did 
(d) Velle peccata, ordinare homines ad peccatum, quâ peccatum, & neutiquam velle, ut omnes homines salventur, etc.  Will sins, ordain men to sin, and would not at all, that all men be saved: and besides this, openly and peremptorily affirmed, that Except these things were hold and maintained by them, they could not possibly keep their own ground, but must come over to the Remonstrants. This man was not only not censured, but publicly declared in the Synod to be pure and Orthodox, and dismissed only with this kind and friendly admonition: that he should hereafter take heed of such words, as might give offence to tender ears, and could not well down with those, who are yet uncapable of such Mysteries.  
By these instances it appeareth, that they of the first side can easily bear one with another in this difference. And (to say the truth) there is no reason why they should quarrel about circumstances, seeing they agree in the substance. For they both contend,  
1 That the moving-cause of Reprobation is the alone will of God, and not the sin of man, Original, or Actual.  
2 That the final impenitency and damnation of Reprobates are necessary and unavoidable by Gods absolute Decree.  
These two things are the [maxima gravamina] principal grievances that the other side stick at. So that these two paths meet at last in the same way.  
Both these opinions of the first side I dislike.  
My reasons why, are of two sorts; 

1 Such as first made me to question the truth.  
2 Such as convince me of their untruth.    
MY reasons of the first sort do indifferently respect and make against both, and I will set them down against both together.  
My second sort of reasons I will divide, delivering some of them against the upper and more rigid way, others against the lower and more moderate way.  
I begin with those reasons, which first moved me to question the truth of absolute Reprobation, as it is taught both ways.  
They are these four, which follow.  

1. Reason, Novelty.  1 The Novelty of this opinion. Absolute and inevitable Reprobation hath little or no footing in Antiquity. The upper way was never taught or approved by any of the Fathers (even the stoutest defenders of grace against the Pelagians) for the space of 600 (I may say 800) years after CHRIST: nor the lower way till the time of St. Austin, which was about 400 years after CHRIST. They did generally agree upon the contrary conclusion, & taught men in their times,  
That it was possible for them to be saved, which in the event were not saved; and to have repent which repent not: and that there was no Decree of God, which did lay a necessity of perishing upon any son of Adam. This that I say, Mr. Calvin himself doth freely acknowledge, speaking of Election and Reprobation according to God's foreknowledge: 
(e) Calv. Iust. l. 3. c. 22. Sect. 1. Neque haec vulgò recepta opinio solius vulgi est: habuit enim seculis omnibus magnos authores.  This commonly received opinion (saith he) of a conditional respective Decree) is not the opinion only of the common people, but hath had great Authors in all ages. Reverend Beza likewise speaking of the same opinion, hath these words to the same purpose: 
(f) Beza in cap. 11 ad Rom. v. 35. In quem errorem sanè turpissimum Origines veteres plerosque tum Graecos, tum Latinos adegit:  Into which surely most foul error Origen hath driven many of the Ancients both Greek and Latin. To the same effect also Prosper (St. Augustine's follower) hath a remarkable speech. 
(g) Prosper in Epist. ad Aug. prope finem. Pe●è omnium parem inveniri & unam sententiam, quâ propositum & praedestinationem dei secundùm praescientiam receperunt ●ut ob hoc Deus alios vasa contumeliae, alios honoris vasa fecerit; qu● finem uniuscujusque praeriderit, & sub ipso gratiae adjutorio, in qua futurus esset voluntate & actione praescierit.  Almost all the Ancients (saith he) did grant with one consent, that God decreed men's ends according to his foresight of their actions, and not otherwise. To these speeches let me add that of Remigius Archbishop of Lions, who to Rabanus Archbishop of Mentz, objecting that St. Austin wrote a book called Hypognosticon, against Pelagius and Caelestius, wherein he denied that Reprobates were properly 
(h) Usher. hist. Gotto. pag. 107.  [praedestinati ad interitum] predestinate to destruction; answereth, that St. Austin said not so: but some other man (as it is supposed) to purge the Church of that calumny, which some ill affected once did cast upon it: namely, that it taught, that God by his predestination did impose upon men a necessity of perishing, did withdraw the word (Predestination) from the point of Reprobates, and gave it only to the Elect, and so gave great occasion of further error and mistake. In this speech of his is clearly employed, that it was the constant doctrine of the Church then, that Reprobates lie under no necessitating Decree of Perdition.  
The truth of this charge may further appear by a few particular instances.  
Minutius Foelix brings in the Pagans objecting to the Christians, that they held the events of all things to be inevitable, and did feign and frame to themselves an unjust God, who did punish in men their unavoidable Destinies, not their ill choices. This is the Objection: 
(i) Min. Foelix pag. 32. Quicquid agimus, ut alii fato, ita vos Deo addicitis: iniquum igitur deum singitis, qui sortem in hominibus pumat, non voluntatem.  Whatsoever we do, as others to fate, so you ascribe to God: you make therefore to yourselves an unjust God, who punisheth in men their lot, not their will. To this he answereth, 
(k) Illud fatum est, quod de unoquoque Deus fatus est.  Christians hold no other Fates, than God's Decrees; who 
(l) Min. Foelix p 116 Qui cum universam praescit materiam, pro meritis & qualitatibus singulorum etiam fata determinat, & ita in nobis non genitura plectitur, sed ingenii natura punitur.  foreknowing all men and their actions, did accordingly determine their retributions.  
St. Hierom an eager opposer of the Pelagians, in many places of his Writings saith the same thing; 
(m) Hier. ad Galat. c. 1. v. 15. Ex praescientiá dei evenit, ut quem justum futurum scit, prius diligat, quam oriatur ex utero, & quem peccatorem, oderit antequam peccet.  From the foreknowledge of God it cometh to pass, that who he knoweth will be righteous, him he loveth before he cometh out of the womb; and who he knoweth will be a sinner, him he hateth before he sinneth. In another place he speaketh to the same purpose, 
(n) Ad c. 1. Malac. Dilectio & odium dei, vel ex, praescientiâ nascitur futurorum vel ex operibus; alioquin novimus quod omnia Deus diligat, nec quicquam corum oderit quae creavit.  The love and hatred of God, ariseth either from the foresight of future things, or from the works; otherwise we know that God loveth all things, nor doth he hate any thing that he hath made. And in his book against Pelagius he saith 
(o) Lib. 3. contr. Pelag.  [Eligit Deus quem bonum cernit] God chooseth whom he seethe to be good.  
The sum of all which speeches is but this, that there is no decree of damning or saving men, but what is built upon God's foreknowledge of the evil and good actions of men. Fulgentius is plain for it too: 
(p) Fulgent. lib. 1. ad Monimum. Quos praescivit deus hanc vitam in peccato terminaturos praedestinavit supplicio interminabili puniendos.  Those whom God foresaw would dye in sin, he decreed should live in endless punishment. I may take in St. Austin and Prosper also, who are judged to be the Patrons of the absolute decree, as it is set down the Sublapsarian way: even they do many times let fall such speeches, as cannot fairly be reconciled with absolute Reprobation.  
I will only cite Prosper (for St. Austin speaks in him) he discoursing of some that fall away [à Sanctitate ad immunditiem] from Holiness to uncleanness, saith 
(q) Prosp. ad obj. 3. Gall. Non ex co necessitatem percundi habu●runt, quia praedestinati non sunt, sed ideo praedestinati non sunt, quia tales futuri ex voluntariâ praevaricatione praesci● sunt.  They that fall away from holiness to uncleanness, lie not under a necessity of perishing, because they were not predestinate; but therefore they were not predestinate, because they were foreknown to be such by voluntary prevarication.  
Not long after speaking of the same men he saith, 
(r) Prosper resp. ad Obj. Quia illos ruituros propriâ voluntate praescivit, ob hoc à filijs perditionis nulla praedestinatione discrevit.  Because God foresaw they would perish by their own freewill; therefore he did not by any predestination sever them from the children of perdition. And again in his answer to the 12th, Objection, he hath these words; 
(s) Ib resp. ad Ob. 12 Vires obedientiae non ideo cuiquam subtraxit, quia eum non praedestinavit; sed quia recessurum ab ipsâ obedientiâ esse praevidit, ideo eum non praedestinavit.  God hath not withdrawn from any man ability to yield obedience, because he hath not predestinated him: but because he foresaw he would fall from obedience, therefore he hath not predestinated him.  
I will shut up mine instances of that Age with the judgement of the council at Arles against the Pelagians in the year 490. or thereabout. This council subscribed to the letter which was written by Faustus against Lucidus the Predestinarian, and made the Anathemaes and curses, which therein he denounceth against him and such like to be their own: Some of which were these 
(t) Anathema illi qui dixerit illum qui peri●t non accepisse ut salvus esse possit.  Cursed be he that shall say that the man that perisheth, might not have been saved: and again, 
(u) Anathema illi qui dixerit, quod vas contumeliae non possit affurgere ut sit vas in honorem.  Cursed be the man that shall say that a vessel of dishonour, may not rise to be a vessel of honour.  
A testimony or two I will borrow likewise from some persons of note, and those St. Augustine's followers too, who lived about 400 years after St Augustine's time. Remigius the great patron of Gottschalk the zealous preacher and publisher of absolute reprobation in those times) in his answer ●o that epistle, which we suppose to be the Epistle of Raba●s; to Rabanus saying, that God did 
(w) Bishop Usher hist. Gotts●. p. 53. & 54. Sanabiles facere nationes orbis terrarum.  make the nations ●f the world healthful, and that he doth [velle omnes homi●es salvos fieri] will that all men be saved; he gives such ●n answer as cannot stand with absolute Reprobation; 
(x) Et hoc omnino verum est, quia nemini deus imponit necessitatem pereundi, sicut nemini imponit necessitatem ma● agendi.  This (saith he) is very true, because God layeth on no ●an a necessity of perishing, as he hath laid on none a necessity of ●inning. And a little after he is plainer, 
(y) Quos verissimè praescivit impios & iniquos futuros & insuâ impietate & iniquitate permansuros, justis & rectissimis de causis decrevit, statuit, & praedestinavit peritu●os, sicut ipse ait, Qui peccaverit mihi, ipsum delebo de libro meo.  Those whom God did foreknow would live and dye in their wickedness, for reasons most just he decreed should perish, as himself saith, Him which sinneth against me, even him will I blot out of my book.  
In the Valentine Synod assembled in favour of Gottschalk we may find these words,  

(z) Can. 2. Nec ipso malos ideò perire, quia boni esse non potuerunt, sed quia boni esse noluerunt, suo que vitio in massâ damnationis, vel merito originali vel etiam actuali permanserunt.  Therefore do the wicked perish not because they could ●ot, but because they would not be good, and by their own fault Original or actual also, remained in the mass of perdition. And in the end of their third Canon they denounce Anathema to those, that hold that men are so predestinated unto evil, as that they cannot be otherwise. 
(a) Can. 3. Verum aliquos ad malum praedestinatos esse divinà potestate, ut aliud esse non possint, non solum non credimus, sed etiam si sunt, qui tantum malum credire velint, cum omni de●estatione, sicut Ara●sica Synodus, illis Anathema dicimus.  That any should be (saith the Council) predestinated to evil by the power of God, so as he cannot be otherwise; we do not only not believe but also if there be any that will believe so great an evil, with all detestation we denounce them accursed, as the Arausican council also did. By these testimonies (which are but a few of many) it appeareth that absolute and inevitable Reprobation ●ound but cold entertainment from Antiquity.  
Which considering, I began to call it into question.  
For albeit I make not the decisions and determinations of the Fathers or counsels the rules of my faith, (because they are but men, and therefore subject to error:) yet I honour their grey hairs and their grave assemblies, and do vehemently mistrust those doctrines, which they never taught or approved; but misliked and condemned.  
2 Its unwillingness to abide the trial. I find that the authors and abetters of it have been very backward to bring it to the standard; not only when they have been called upon by their adversaries to have it weighed, 
2 Reason, Unwillingness to be tried.  but also when they have been entreated thereto by their chief Magistrates, who might have compelled them: a shrewd argument (me thinks) that it is too light.  
In the disputation at Mompelgart, anno 1586 held between Beza and Jacobus Andrea, with some seconds on both sides, Beza and his company having disputed with the Lutherans about the Person of CHRIST and the Lords supper, when they came to this point, did decline the sifting of it, and gave this reason among others, that it could not then be publicly disputed of 
(b) Beza in Coll. Mompel pa. 373. Sine gravi eorum offendiculo, qui tanti mysterij capaces non sunt.  without the great scandal and hurt of the ignorant, and unacquainted with these high mysteries. 
(c) Braved Col. Hag. pa. 57  The contraremonstrants also in their Conference with the opposite parties at the Hague in the year 1611, could not be drawn to dispute with them about this point, but delivered a petition to the States of Holland and West Friezeland, that they might not be urged to it, resolving rather to break off the conference, then to meddle with it.  
In the Synod likewise at Dort, in the years 1618. and 1619, the Remonstrants were warned by the Precedent of the Synod 
(d) Act a Sin per 1. pa. 133.  de electione potiùs quam de odiosa Reprobationis materiâ agerent.  That they should rather dispute of the point of Election, than the odious point of Reprobation.  
Can this Doctrine be a truth and yet blush at the light, which maketh all things manifest? Especially considering these things:  
1 That Reprobation is a principal head of Divinity, by the well or ill stating and ordering of which, the glory of God and the good of Religion, is much promoted or hindered.  
2 That there is such a necessary connexion between the points of Election and Reprobation (both being parts of Praedestination) that the one cannot well be handled without the other.  
3 That the Doctrine of Reprobation was the chief cause of all the uproars in the Church at that time.  
4 That it was accused with open mouth and challenged of falsehood; and therefore bound in justice to purge itself of the crimination.  
5 That the Remonstrants did not at that time desire that it should be talked of among the common people, who might have stumbled at it; but disputed of among the judicious and learned, who (as the thressing Oxen which were to beat the corn out of the husk) are to bolt out those truths which are couched and hidden in the letter of the Scriptures.  
That the doctrine which is loath to abide the trial even of learned men, carrieth with it a shrewd suspicion of falsehood, the Heathen Orator shall witness for me; who to Epicurus saying that he would not publish his opinion to the simple people, who might happily take offence at it, answereth thus; 
(e) Cicer. de fin. bon. & malorum, l 2 pag. 115, Aut tu eadem ista dic in judicio, aut si coronam times, dic in Senatu. Nunquam facies. Cur nisi quod turpis est oratio.  Declare thine opinion in the place of Judgement, or if thou art afraid of the assembly there, declare it in the Senate-house, among those grave and judicious persons. Thou wilt never do it; and why? but because it is a foul and dishonest opinion.  
This striving to lie close, is (peradventure) no infallible argument of a bad cause, yet it is a very probable one. For true Religion (as Vives saith) is not a thing guilded over, but gold itself; the more that's scraped and discovered, the brighter and goodlyer it is, and so is the truth. 
(f) Vives de ve●. fidei, l. 1. p. 16. Puriorem ac nitidiorem illam ●eddit bellum, quam pax adversus gentes  Disputations illustrate and set forth true opinions more than silence can: let's not fear therefore (saith he) lest our Faith when it is laid open, appear filthy to the eyes of beholders. 
(g) Metuant hoc aliae religiones falsae & umbranles.  Let false and Superficial religions, in which there is no soundness, be afraid of this.  
The jew is loath to reason with the Christian touching his Law; and the Turk is forbidden to dispute of his Alcoran: because their Religions are brittle, like glass broken with the least touch. But the Christian 
(h) Vives l. 4 page 4●9. Qui veritate suâ sidit, nihil reformidat examen ingenii: imo advocate, & quantum potest, exacuit.  who is confident of the goodness of his Faith, feareth no examination, but rather as much as may be, soliciteth and provoketh his Adversary to the Combat.  
Truth whether it be in men or doctrines, is best, when it is uncovered; it covets no corners, though error do; but is willing to abide the trial. 
(i) Psal. 139.23.24  Search me O Lord and know my heart, try me and know my thoughts: and see if there be any way of wickedness in me; saith the Prophet David, knowing his heart to be without guile. And our Saviour telleth us, 
(k) joh. 3.20, 21.  that every one that doth evil, hateth the light, and cometh not to it lest his deeds should be reproved; but he that doth truth, cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made manifest, that they are wrought in God. As St. Paul saith of an Heretic, 
Titus 3.11.  he is [〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉] Selfe-condemned; so we may say of Heresy and untruth; it condemneth itself, and by nothing more, than by refusing the touchstone. He is to be thought an empty Scholar, who is loath to be opposed; and his gold to be light and counterfeit, who will not have it touched and weighed, and those opinions to be but errors, which would so willingly walk in a mist, and dwell in silence, when it concerneth the peace of the Church so much to have them examined.  

3. Reason. Infamy.  3 The Jnfamy of it. It is an opinion (especially as it is defended the upper way) odious to the Papists, opening their foul mouths against our Church and Religion; abhorred (maintained either way) by all the Lutherans: who for this very Tenet call us damned Calvinists, think us unworthy to be above ground, and in their writings protest, that they will rather unite themselves to the Papists then to us. And it is also distasteful to all the Greek Churches, which are very many. Molin in his Anatomy, speaking of the Supralapsarian Doctrine, saith 
(l) Molin. Anat. Arm. c. 12. de Praed.  If it should be so that God hath reprobated men without the consideration of sin, or hath ordained them to sin; yet it is the part of a wise man to conceal these things, or not to know them, rather than to utter them; 
(m) Quia enunciata injiciunt scrupulos, & ausam praebent adversatiis infamandi veram Religionem.  Because when they are taught and defended they fill men's heads with scruples, and give occasion to the Adversaries of defaming the true Religion. The same may as truly be said of the Sublapsarian way. For (as I have said) they are in substance all one. And Sir Edwin Sandys is of the same mind too. For in his most excellent Book called a Survey of the State of Religion in the Western parts of the World. Speaking of the deadly division between the Lutherans and Calvinists in Germany, 
Sir Edwin Sandys pag. 172.  he hath these words. That though the Palsgrave and Landsgrave have with great judgement and wisdom, to asslake those flames, imposed silence in that part to the Ministers of their party, hoping the charity and discretion of the other party, would have done the like; yet it falls out otherwise. For both the Lutheran Preachers rail as bitterly against them in their pulpits as ever, and their Princes and people have them in as great detestation, not forbearing to profess openly, that they will return to the Papacy, rather than ever admit that Sacramentary and predestinary Pestilence.  
For these two points are the ground of the quarrel, and the latter more scandalous at this day, than the former. And in the same book, pag. 194. and 198. speaking of men whom he commendeth for singular learning and piety (whose judgement he so sets down as that he declareth it to be his own) he saith, that they think it were no blemish for the reformed Doctors to revise their doctrines, and to abate the rigour of speculative opinions, (for so he is pleased to call them) especially touching the eternal decrees of God: wherein some of their chief authors have run into such an extreme to all Romish doctrine, as to have exceedingly scandalised all other Churches withal, yea and many of their own to rest very ill satisfied.  
At the closing up of the conference at Mompelgart, 
Coll. Momp. pa. 566.567 Ofiand. Hist. Eccles pa. 1040. Cent. 16.  when Frederick Barle of Wortenberg exhorted his Divines to acknowledge Beza and his company for brethren, and to declare it by giving them their hand; they utterly refused, saying they would pray to God to open their eyes, and would do them any office of humanity and charity, but they would not give them the right hand of brotherhood, because they were proved to be guilty [errorum teterrimorum,] of most pestilent errors, among which they reckoned for one.  
Hemingius left his own side and joined with us in the point of the Sacrament: but he would come no nearer, maintaining always a distance in this.  
And as for the Grecians, 
pag. 237.  we learn also by Sir Edwin Sandys his relation, that they do mightily descent from that doctrine touching the eternal counsels of God, which Calvin (as some conceive) first fully revealed or rather introduced into the Christian world; and since, some of his friends and followers have seconded: as thinking it very injurious to the goodness of God, and directly and immediately opposite to his very nature. In regard of which, one of their Bishops hath written a Book against it, which hath been sent to Geneva and there received.  
It is a morsel which the greatest part of Christian Churches cannot swallow: and therefore (I think) it should not very easily without suspicion down with us.  
And to say one thing more; by this infamy of it among Christians, 
pag. 223. 224.  it is very probable, that among the too many scandals given to the jews by Christians, among whom they dwell; this doctrine is not one of the least rubs in the way of their conversion. For they think it a bad opinion (says the same judicious and learned Gentleman) Which some of great name have seemed to hold, that God in his everlasting and absolute pleasure should affect the extreme misery of any of his Creatures for the showing of his justice and severity in tormenting them; or that the calamity, casting away and damnation of some should absolutely and necessarily redound more to his glory, than the felicity of them all, considering that his nature is mere goodness and happiness, and hath no affinity with rigour or misery. This is my third reason.  

Reason, 4. Affinity to Fate.  The fourth, It's affinity with the old exploded errors of the Stoics and Manichees.  
The opinion of the Stoics was, that all actions and events were unavoidable, determined either by the revolutions of the Heavens, and the qualities of such stars as reigned at men's births, or by the concatenation of natural things and the disposition of the first matter, all things being so put together from eternity, that one thing must needs follow another, as it doth; and the [prima materia] being so disposed, that things cannot successively come to pass otherwise then they do, but must of necessity be as they are, even [invito deo] though God would have some things to be otherwise then they are.  
The Manichees held, that all men's actions, good or evil were determined too: good actions by a good God, who was the author of all good things that were created, and of all good actions that came to pass in the world; Evil actions by an evil God who was the [primum principium mali] the prime author of all evil things or actions that were extant in the world.  
The Maintainers of the Absolute Decree do say one of these two things, either that all actions natural and moral, good and evil, and all events likewise are absolutely necessary; so the Supralapsarians: or that all men's ends (at least) are unalterable and indeterminable by the power of their wills; so the Sublapsarians. And this is upon the matter all one with the former. For first, in vain is our freedom in the actions and means, if the end at which they drive, be pitched and determined; sith all actions are for the ends sake, that it might be obtained by them, which without them could not. And second, the determination of the end doth necessarily involve the means that precede that end; as if a man be foredetermined to damnation, he must avoidable sin, else he could not be damned.  
Now in these 3 opinions we may note two things.  
1 The Substance and formality of them, which is an unavoydablenesse of men's actions and ends whatsoever they be: in this all of them agree, all holding that in all things, at least in all men's ends, undeclinable fates and insuperable necessity do domineer.  
And therefore Melancthon doth not stick sundry times in his common places to call this Absolute Decree [Fatum Stoicum, & tabulas Parcarum] Stoical fate, and the Destiny's tables: He also chargeth the Church of Geneva (the great Patron of it) with a labour to bring in the Stoics error, as we may see in a certain Epistle of Melancthons' to Pencer, where he hath these words. 
(n) Melanct. in Epist. ad Pen●. Scrib●t ad me Lelius de Stoico fato usque adeo litem Genevae moveri, ut quidam in ca●cerem conjectus sit, propterea quòd a Zenone differ●et. O misera tempora! Doctrina salutis peregrinis quibusdam dubitationibus obscuratur.  Lelius writeth unto me, that in Geneva there is such strife about the Stoics fate that one was cast into prison, because he dissented from Zeno. O miserable times! etc. And by the Testimony of Beza too, who speaking of Melancthon saith; 
(o) Beza in vita Calvini. Philippus de his rebus ita scribere caeperat, ut Genevenses quasi Stoicum fatum invehentes notare quibusdam videatur.  Philip hath so written of these things, as if he meant to tax the Geneva Divines for bringers in of Destiny.  
2 We may note the circumstance or the grounds of their opinions; The Stoics derive this necessity from the Stars or the first matter; The Manichees from two [prima principia, aeterna & saetern] first principles of all things eternal and coeternal. These last, from the peremptory decree of Almighty God.  
So that they diffe● in their grounds indeed; but in this difference the Stoics and the Manichees in some respects have the better. For it is better to derive this necessity of evil actions and unhappy events, from an evil God or the course of nature, then from the decree of that God, who is infinitely good. The substance of their opinions is all one, the ground wherein they differ is but accidental to error.  
Which being so, for this very reason alone may this doctrine of absolute Reprobation be suspected: because those dreams of the Stoics were exploded by the best Philosophers of all sorts; and this of the Manichees was generally cried down by the Fathers, not only as foolish, but as impious and unworthy of entertainment in a Christian heart, or Christian Commonwealth, not so much for any thing circumstantial in it, as for the substance of the error; because it made all things and events to be necessary, and so plucked up the roots of virtue, planted vice, and left no place for just rewards or punishments.  
These are my reasons of the first sort.  
THe Reasons that have convinced me of the untruth of absolute Reprobation, now follow. And first of those that fight against the upper way.  
They are drawn [ab incommodo] from the great evils and inconveniences, which issue from it naturally: which may be referred to two main heads.  

1 The dishonour of God.  
2 The overthrow of religion and government.   

I. Jnconvenience.  It dishonoureth God. For it chargeth him deeply with two things, no ways agreeable to his nature.  

1 men's Eternal torments in Hell.  
2 Their sins on Earth.   
First, it chargeth him with men's Eternal torments in hell, and maketh him to be the prime, principal and invincible cause of the damnation of millions of miserable souls: the prime cause, because it reporteth him to have appointed them to destruction, of his own voluntary disposition, antecedent to all deserts in them; and the principal and invincible cause; because it maketh the damnation of Reprobates to be necessary and unavoidable through Gods absolute and uncontrollable Decree: and so necessary, that they can no more scape it, then poor Astyanax could avoid the breaking of his neck, when the Grecians tumbled him down from the Tower of Troy.  
Now this is a heavy charge, contrary to Scripture, God's nature, and sound reason.  
1 To Scripture, which makes man the principal, nay the only cause (in opposition to God) of his own ruin. Thy destruction is of thyself O Israel, but in me is thy help. Hos. 13.9. As I live, saith the Lord, I will not the death of the wicked, etc. Turn ye, turn ye, why will ye dye? Ezech. 33.11. He doth not afflict willingly, nor grieve the children of men. Lam. 3.33. To which speeches, for likeness sake, I will join one of Prospers. 
(p) Resp. ad 12. Obj. Vincent. Praedestinatio dei multis est causa standi, nemim est causa labendi.  God's predestination is to many the cause of standing, to none of falling.  
2 It's contrary to God's nature 
(q) Exod. 34.6.  who sets forth himself to be a God merciful, gracious, long suffering, abundant in goodness, etc. and he is acknowledged to be so by King David. 
(r) Psal. 86.5.  Thou Lord art good and merciful, and of great kindness to all them that call upon thee. And by the Prophets Joel, jonah, and Micah. He is gracious and merciful, 
joel. 2.13.  slow to anger and of great kindness saith joel. 
jonah. 4.22.  I know (says jonah) that thou art a gracious God and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness. 
Micah. 7.18.  And who (saith Micah) is a God like unto thee, that taketh away iniquity? etc. be retaineth not his wrath for ever, because mercy pleaseth him.  
3 'Tis contrary also to sound reason which cannot but argue such a Decree of extreme cruelty, and consequently remove it from the father of mercies.  
We cannot in reason think that any man in the world can so fare put off humanity and nature, as to resolve with himself to marry and beget Children, that after they are borne and have lived a while with him, he may hang them up by the tongues, tear their flesh with scourges, pull it from their bones with burning pincers, or put them to any cruel tortures; that by thus torturing them he may show what his authority and power is over them Much less can we believe without great violence to reason, that the God of mercy can so far forget himself, as out of his absolute pleasure to ordain such infinite multitudes of his children made after his own Image, to everlasting fire; & create them one after another, that after the end of a short life here, he might torment them without end hereafter, to show his power & sovereignty over them. If to destroy the righteous with the wicked temporally, be such a piece of injustice, that Abraham remooveth it from God with an Absit, Wilt thou destroy the righteous with the wicked? 
Gen. 18.25.  That be fare from thee O Lord. Shall not the judge of all the world do right? How deeply (may we think) would that good man have detested one single thought, that God resolveth upon the destruction of many innocent souls eternally in hell fire?  
Object. But God (say some) is sovereign Lord of all creatures and men, they are truly and properly his own. Cannot he therefore dispose of them as he pleaseth, and do with his own what he will?  
Answ. The question is not what an Almighty sovereignty power can do to poor vassals, but what a power, that is just and good, may do. By the power of a Lord, his absolute and naked power, he can cast away the whole mass of mankind; for it is not repugnant to omnipotency or soveveraignty: but by the power of a judge, to wit, that actual power of his, which is always clothed with goodness and justice, he cannot.  
For it is not compatible with these properties in God, to appoint men to Hell of his mere will and pleasure, no fault at all of theirs preexisting in his eternal mind.  
1 It is not compatible with justice, which is a constant will of rendering to every one his proper due, and that is, vengeance to whom vengeance belongeth, namely to the obstinate and impenitent. 
(s) Aust. l. 3. cont. julian. c. 1●. pag. 164. Bonus est Deus, justus est Deus: potest aliquem sinc bonis mericis liberare, quia bonus est; non potest quenquam sine malis meritis damnare, quia justus est.  God is good (saith St. Austin) and God is just: he may without any deserts free men from punishment, because he is good; but he cannot without evil deservings condemn any man because he is just. In another place also he saith, 
(t) Aug. epi. job. ad Bonifac. Quemquam verò immeritum & nulli obnoxium peccato si Deus damnare creditur, alienus ab iniquitate non creditur.  If God be believed to damn any man that by sin deserveth it not; he is not believed to be free from injustice.  
2 Nor is it compatible with goodness, which is an inclination of God in communicating that good which is in himself to his creatures, as fare as he can without wronging his Justice: and therefore if God be (as the Scripture reporteth him) good to all; it cannot be that he should of himself without any motive in the reasonable creature provide for it from everlasting the greatest of all miseries, and that before he thought of making it, or bestowing any good at all upon it.  
Object. 2 It is further objected, 
Perk. l. de praed. gag. 25.  that we do and may slaughter our beasts for our daily use, without any cruelty or injustice: & therefore God may as well, nay much more appoint as many of us as he pleaseth to the torments of Hell for his glory, and yet be just and good notwithstanding: for there is a greater disproportion between God and us, then between us and beasts.  
Answ. 1 1 For answer to this we are first to premise thus much, namely, that our slaughtering of our beasts for our daily use, is by God's ordnance and appointment: We had not this authority of ourselves, but God of his bounty towards us, gave it us, as we may see, Gen. 9.2.3. where we may observe, First, that God delivereth up all Creatures, beasts, birds, and fishes into the hands of men. Secondly, that the end why he doth so, is, that they might be meat for men and consequently that they might be slain.  
Which being so, our slaughtering of oxen, sheep, and other creatures for our daily use, is to be accounted Gods doing rather than ours. And therefore the objection should be made thus; God may without any breach of goodness or justice appoint brute creatures to be slain for man's use: therefore he may ordain men to be cast into hell torments for ever for his own use, that is for the declaration of his sovereignty, etc.  
This being premised, I answer further, that this comparison holds not: for there is little proportion between the objects compared and less between the acts.  
1 There is but small proportion between the objects, beasts and men, creatures of a different nature and made for a different end. Beasts are void of reason and liberty in their actions, creatures whose beings vanish with their breath, made only for the use and service of men upon Earth: but men are reasonable and understanding creatures, able through the creators bounty to discern between good and evil, and according to their first principles, to choose the good and forsake the evil: they are the very image of God's purity and eternity, and were made for the service of God alone upon Earth, and his blessed and everlasting society in Heaven.  
So that albeit there be a very great distance between God and men, yet nothing so great as between God and beasts. It followeth not therefore, that if God may appoint beasts to be killed of his own free pleasure for man's use, he may with like equity and reason appoint men of his own will to destruction for his own use. We read that God required of his people many thousand beasts for Sacrifices, but not one man.  
The first borne of other creatures he challenged for  offerings (except they were unclean beasts;) but the first borne of men were to be redeemed: which showeth, that he put a wide difference between the blood of men and beasts. Besides, in the 9 of Gen: he giveth men power to kill and feed upon all living creatures, but he straight forbids them to shed man's blood, and giveth this reason of the prohibition; Man is the Image of God. So that we may well conclude, that there is but small proportion between the objects compared men and beasts, in respect of this act of killing or slaughtering.  
2 There is fare less or rather no proportion at all between the acts compared, killing and eternal tormenting. A man may kill, but he cannot without barbarous injustice and cruelty torment his beast and prolong the life of it, that he may daily vex and torture it, to show what power and sovereignty he hath over it: so I doubt not (though there be some that will not grant it, 
Vid. Molia ei c●dat. quaest. graviss. p. 12●.  but charge the Armininians with contumely against God for affirming it) I doubt not (I say) but God may kill a man of his own free pleasure, yea and resolve him into nothing without any cruelty or injustice; because in so doing he doth but take away what he had given him: but he cannot without both these, antecedently decree to keep him alive for ever in Hell, that he may there torment him without end, to show his sovereignty. For this is to inflict an infinite evil upon a guiltless creature, to whom he had given but a finite good. And so is the comparison most unequal too in the acts compared: and therefore proveth just nothing.  

Dr. T●isse his vindi: gra. l 2. part 1. dig●. 1 pag. 17. Edit. 2.  But it is replied by some (who will rather speak unreasonably and against common sense, then lay down the conclusions which they have undertaken to maintain,) that it is better and more eligible to be tortured in Hell, then to want or lose a being: for he that wants a being enjoyeth no good, but he that is tormented in Hell, hath a being; and by consequence some thing that is good. If therefore God may take away a man's being that is innocent, and turn him into nothing for his pleasure; much more may he torment him in hell.  
Answ. 1 1 To the first part of this Reply, namely, that it is more desirable to be in Hell, then to be nothing, I oppose three things.  
1 The speech of our Saviour concerning judas: 
Math. 26.24.  Woe be to that man, by whom the Son of man is betrayed: it had been good for that man, if he had never been borne. Two things especially are set forth in these words of our Saviour. First, the misery of judas the betrayer of his Lord, Woe be to, etc. Secondly, the greatness of his misery, It had been good, etc. It is as much as if our Lord had said, Judas the Traitor shall be damned; and therefore so woeful will his condition be, that it had been good and happy for him, if he had never received a being: good in earnest as Interpreters do generally expound it, not in the opinion and esteem of weak-minded, faint-hearted men only, as some few understand it. For,  
1 Let it be granted that the Scripture speaketh of things sometimes according to men's opinions; yet without reason to fasten such an exposition upon any Scripture, is to do as Dunces do in the Schools, who being not able to answer a place in Aristotle wherewith they are charged, shift it off and say, [loquitur ex aliorum sententia] he speaks according to the opinion of others.  
2 This Scripture cannot in reason be thus expounded,  
1 Because it is an argument and ground by which CHRIST declareth the truth or greatness of the misery of Judas; Woe to the man, etc. And why woe? Because it had been good, etc. But it were no argument to show his woeful estate by, to say that it had been good for him that he had never been borne, in the opinion of men who mistake the case, but not in truth.  
2 Because this Exposition would teach and encourage men to be Atheists and Epicures. In the second of Wisdom we read, how voluptuous men do stir up one another to enjoy the good things that are present, to fill themselves with wine and ointments, to leave some tokens of their jollity in every place, and to practise all manner of wickedness: and what is their motive? A false persuasion that they● souls should dye with their bodies, and that they should have no being after death. If this conceit could flesh them thus in their impious and voluptuous courses, how freely and eagerly (may we think) would they pursue their carnal and sinful delights, if they could be but once persuaded, that after all their pleasures they shall be in a better case, then if they had no being?  
Secondly, I oppose common consent; where shall we pick out a man, but will say (if he speak from his heart) that he were better to vanish into a thousand nothings, then to be cast into hell? what is the reason why men are so afraid of Hell, when they are touched to the quick with the conscience of their ungodly lives, and the expectation of eternal vengeance, that with Job they curse their birthday, and wish an hundred times over, that they had never been, or might cease to be, that so they might not come into the place of torments; but because they judge a being there to be incomparably worse than no being any where? and why are men who are sensible of hell fire, so strongly kerbed and held in by the fear of feeling it, even from darling and beloved sins, but because they apprehend it to be the most terrible of all terribles! fear of being annihilated can never do that which the fear of Hell doth.  
The third thing which I oppose is common sense, which judgeth pains when they are extreme to be worse than death. Hence it is, that Job being tormented in his body by the Devil, cursed his birthday, magnified the condition of the dead, and wished himself in the grave, plainly preferring the loss of his being before that miserable being which he then had.  
And hence it is, that men even of stoutest and hardest spirits (as we see by daily experience) would (if they might enjoy their option) choose rather to have no bodies at all, than bodies tormented with the stone or gout, or any other sharp or sensible disease. It is a known saying grounded on this judgement of sense, [Praestat semel quàm semper mori] better it is to dye once, then to be always dying.  
This the Tyrant Tiberius knew very well: and therefore he would not suffer those, towards whom he purposed to exercise his cruelty, to be put to a speedy death, but to lingering torments, as Swetonius reporteth of him in that chapter where he reckoneth up his barbarous and cruel practices.  

(u) Sueton. vit. Tib● cap. 61. Mori volentibus vis adhibita vivendi.  Those (saith he) who through the extremity of their torments would have died, he used means to keep alive. [Nam mortem adeò leve supplicium putabat] For he accounted death so light a punishment, that when he heard that one Carnulius a man apppointed to torments, had prevented him, he cried out [Carnulius me evasit] Carnulius hath escaped my hands. To a prisoner entreating him to put him quickly to death, he gave this answer, [Nondum tecum redij ingratiam] I am not yet friends with thee; accounting it great kindness to put him quickly to death, whom he might have tortured.  
Many that were called into question, did partly wound themselves in their own houses [ad vexationem ignominiamque vitandam] to prevent that pain and ignominy, which they knew they should endure: and partly poisoned themselves in the midst of the court, as they were going to their arraignment, for the same cause. 
Senec Epist. l 17. Epist. 101.  Seneca speaking of one Maecenas, who was so afraid of being dead, that he said he would not refuse weakness, deformity, [nec acutam crucem] no nor the sharpest crucifying 
(w) Dummodo inter haec mala spiritus prorogetur.  so that he might live still in the midst of these extremities; he calleth his desire [turpissimum votum] a base and most ignoble and unnatural wish, and censureth him for a most effeminate and contemptible man; 
(x) Quia distulit id quod est in malis optimum, supplicit finem.  because in all his evils he was afraid of that which is the end of all evils, the privation of his being. And certainly we must needs conceive and censure them to be stocks and stones rather than flesh and blood, who can so put off all feeling and sense, as to think a tormented being in Hell to be a lighter and lesser evil than no being at all.  
Answ. 2 2 To the reason on which the reply is grounded, which is, [Melius est esse quàm non esse] it is better to be, then to have no being, I answer that it is a sophism or fallacy, à non distributo ad distributum. To be, in itself is better than not to be● but it is not universally true in all particulars. Again, it is true in some cases & ex hypothesi, [si caetera sint paria] if there be any equality in the adjuncts. It is so far from being simply true, that our Saviour limiteth it, & putteth a case wherein it is not true, but the contrary to it is true: and that is the case of Judas, of which we have said somewhat before.  
It had been good etc. which words St. Hierom expounding, saith, 
(y) Hieron comment. in Mat. c. 26. v. 24. Simpliciter dictum est, melius est non subsistere quàm malè subsistere.  It is simply and plainly averred by our Saviour, that it is better to have no being then an ill being. This was the judgement too of Job cap. 3. v. 11.12.13. Why died I not (saith he) in the birth? why did the knees prevent me? and why did I suck the breasts? for now should I have lain still and been quiet: I should have slept then and been at rest. In which words he plainly implieth, that he thought it fare better to have had no birth and being, than such a painful and miserable being. This was also the opinion of Solomon. Eccles. 4.1.2.3. So I returned (saith he) and considered all the oppressions that are done under the Sun; and behold the tears of such as were oppressed, and they had no Comforter, etc. Wherefore I praised the dead which are already dead, more than the living which are yet alive: yea better is he then both they, which hath not yet been, who hath not seen the evil work that is done under the Sun.  
The words do clearly show, that Solomon did think it better to be dead and to be deprived of being, or to have always wanted a being, then to be oppressed by the mighty and to be without comforters: that is, then to have a miserable and a mournful being.  

Sr. Fr. Bacon's colours of good and evil, the last colour.  To this assenteth Sir Francis Bacon in his Colours of good and evil, where against this mathematical position (as he calls it) that there is no proportion between something and nothing; and that therefore the degree of privation seemeth greater than the degree of diminution: he excepteth, that it is false in sundry cases, and among the rest in this, namely, when the degree of diminution is more sensitive, than the degree of privation. In this case, a total privation is much better than a diminution: hence these usual forms of speech, Better eye out then always ache: make or mar, etc.  
Some evils and pains (perhaps) either for their lightness, because they may be well endured; or for their shortness, because they are quickly over; are less than resolution into nothing: and a man had better for a while endure them, then lose his being to be rid of them; because his being may afford him presently or afterward such and so many desirable good things, as will more than recompense his pains. But when his pains are so many and violent, that they leave him no other good than a poor being, or so pinch him that he cannot enjoy or joy in the goods that remain; it were a thousand times better for him to have no being. And such are the pains of Hell, which for their greatness are infinite, producing many miserable weep and wail, and gnash of teeth; all symptoms of intolerable griefs: and for their length, eternal; The worm never dyeth, the fire is never quenched: but the breath of the Lord, as a River of brimstone doth kindle it for ever. And therefore it is incomparably better to cease to be, then to live in those torments, which cannot be equalled by any good, which a being can make us capable of: much less by that poor little entitative good, which is all the good the damned do enjoy in Hell.  
This sophistical evasion therefore and all others of the like sort notwithstanding; I doubt not but I may safely say, that the unavoidable damnation of so many millions cannot be absolutely and antecedently intended by God, without the greatest injustice and cruelty which may in no wise be imputed to God. 
(a) Plut. de superst. prope sinem.  Plutarch speaking of the Pagans who to pacify the anger of their Gods, did sacrifice to them men and women, saith; It had been much better with Diagoras and his fellows to deny the being of a God, then confessing a God to think he delighteth in the blood of men. How much rather may we say, it were better to be an Atheist & deny God, then to believe or report him to be a devourer of the souls of men. The like argument is pressed by Eusebius against those cruel and merciless Gods of the Pagans; 
(b) Euseb de preparat. l 4. c 16. p. 161. edit Graecol. Enimvero, si boni vestigium in iis ullum esset, quamobrem bonorum appellationem jure sor●itentur eos utique cùm naturâ suâ benignos ac salutis omnium cupidos, tùm verò amantes justitiae, hominumque studiosos ac defensores esse oporteret, etc.  Doubtless (saith he) if there were any footstep or spark of goodness in them, for which they might deserve to be called good; they would be disposed to do good and desirous to save all men: they would love justice, and take a care of men. And being such, how could they delight in their slaughter? etc. Yea, he concludeth that they were 
(c) Ibid. c. 15. pag. 153 Non bonos sed malos fuisse daemons: vel hac ipsa ratione confici existimo. Quicquid bonum est prodesse solet; nocere vero contrarium.  Devils or evil spirits; and not Gods or good spirits; because, if they were good, they would do good, whereas those which are evil use to do hurt. I will therefore shut up my first reason with the speech of Prosper. 
(d) Prosp. a● Obj. Vincent. resp. 3. Omnium quidem hominum deus creator est, sed nemo ab eo ideo creatus est, ut periret: quia alia est causa nascendi, alia pereundi.  God is the Creator indeed of all men, but yet of no man for this end, that he might be damned; the reason why we are created is one, and why we are damned another.  
SEcondly, this opinion chargeth God with men's sins on earth, and makes him the Author, not of the first sin only that entered by Adam into the world, but of all other things that have been, are, or shall be committed to the world's end: no murders, robberies, rapes, adulteries, insurrections, treasons, blasphemies, heresies, persecutions, or any other abominations whatsoever, fall out at any time or in any place, but they are the necessary productions of Gods Almighty decree. The Scriptures, I am sure, 
Psal. 5.4.  teach us another lesson. Thou art not a God (saith David) that hath pleasure in wickedness. And the Prophet Esay tells the people, that when they did evil in the sight of the Lord, 
Esay. 66.4.  they did choose the things which he would not. Let no man say when he is tempted; 
jam. 1.13.14.  I am tempted of God: for God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempteth he any man; but every man is tempted, when he is drawn away with his own concupiscence. 
1. joh. 2.16.  And S. John having referred all the sins of the world to three heads, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life; tells us that they are not of the Father, but of the world. To which speeches let me add the speech of Siracides, though not of the same authority: Say not thou it is through the Lord, that I fell away: 
Ecclesiasticus 15.12  for thou oughtest not to do the things that he hateth. Say not thou that he hath caused me to err: for he hath no need of the sinful man.  
Pious antiquity hath constantly said the same, and pressed it with sundry reasons; some of which are these that follow. If God be the Author of sin, than  
1 He is worse than the Devil, because the Devil doth only tempt and persuade to sin, and his action may be resisted: but God (by this opinion) doth will and procure it by a powerful and effectual decree, which cannot be resisted. This is Prospers argument 
(a) Prosper resp. ad ad obj. 11. Vincent.  who to some, objecting that by S. Augustine's doctrine, when Fathers defile their own Daughters, and mothers their own sons, servants murder their masters, and men commit any horrible villainies; it cometh to pass, because God hath so decreed: answereth, that if this were laid to the Devil's charge, he might in some sort clear himself of the imputation; 
(b) Quia etsi delectatus est furo●e peccantium, probaret tamen se non intulisse vim criminum.  Because though he be delighted with men's sins, yet he doth not, he cannot compel them to sin: 
(c) Quâ ergo insipientiâ, quârè dementiâ disinitur ad Dei referendum esse consilium, quod nec diabolo in totum ascribi potest, qui in peccantium flagitiis, illecebrarum adjutor, non voluntatum credendus est esse generator.  What a madness therefore is it to impute that to God, which cannot be justly fathered upon the Devil?  
2 He cannot be a punisher of sin: for none can justly punish those offences, of which they are the authors. This is Prospers argument too: 
(d) Prosp. Resp. ad Obj. 4. Vincent. Insanum omnirò & contra rationem est dicere, damnatorem diaboli, & ejus famulorum, velle ut diabolo serviatur.  It is against reason to say, that he which is the damner of the Devil, would have any man to be the Devil's Servant. This reason Fulgentius useth likewise. 
(e) Fulgent lib. 1. ad Monim. c: 19  [Jllius rei Deus ultor est, cujus author non est] God is the avenger of that, which he is not the author. Tertullian also before them hath said, 
(f) Tert. l. 2 cont. Martion. c. 9 Nec idem habendus est delicti author, qui invenitur interdictor & condemnator.  He is not to be accounted the Author of sin, who is the Forbidder, yea and the Condemner of it.  
3 He cannot be God; because he should not be just, nor holy, nor the judge of the world, all properties essential to God. And this is S. Basils' reason, who hath written a whole Homily against this wicked assertion. 
(g) Basil. homil. quòd deus non est, etc. Tantundem est deum asserere esse authorem peccati, & negare esse deum.  It is all one (saith he) to say, that God is the author of sin, and to say he is not God.  
Upon these and the like considerations I may well conclude, that the opinion which chargeth the holy God with the sins of men, is neither good nor true.  
But this opinion doth so. For albeit the Writers, that have defended it (Piscator and a few more of the blunter sort excepted;) have never said directly and in terminis, that God is the cause of sin; yet have they delivered those things, from which it must needs follow by necessary consequence, that he is so. For they say,  
1 That as the decree of Reprobation is absolute, so it is inevitable: those poor souls which lie under it, must of necessity be damned. 
(h) Marlor. Comm. in ●ob. 15. v. 2. S●at igitur firma sententia: Quemcunque deus ante conditum orbem elegerit, eum non posse pe●ire; quem verò rejecerit cum non poss: sal●ri, e●si omnia sanctorum opera fecerit: usque adeo i●ratractabilis est sententia.  It is (saith Marlorat,) a firm and stable truth, that the man whom God in his eternal counsel hath rejected, though he do all the good works of the Saints, cannot possibly be saved.  
2 That without sin this decree of Reprobation cannot be justly executed. 
(i) Piscat. l. contr. Schafin. pag. thes. 27. Deus ●c consilio condidit homines, ut teipso liberentu●: quip cum nisi naratione perven●e non p●uent, ●d sins illos s●os principales.  God (saith Piscator) did create men for this very purpose, that they might indeed fall: for otherwise he could not have attained those his principal ends. He meaneth the manifestation of his justice in the damnation of Reprobates, and of his mercy in the salvation of the Elect. Maccovius also saith the same: 
(k) M●oc. disp. 17. p. 11. Locus misericordiae & justiu● manifesta●ae n●llus fu●let fu●s, si precatum non ex●et.  If sin had not been, the manifestation of justice and mercy (which is as much to say, as the damnation of Reprobates) had never been.  
3 That therefore God decreed, that Reprobates should avoidable sinne, and sin unto death, that his eternal ordinance might be executed and they damned. 
(l) Zanch lib 5 d● nat. dei. c. 2. the praed. part. 4. resp. ad postr. arg. prope finem Damus reprobos necessitate peccandi● eoque & pereundi, ex hac dei ordinatione constringi, atque●ta constringi, ut nequcant non peccare, atque perire. . We gr●t (saith Zanchius) that Reprobates are held so fast under God's almighty decree, that they cannot but sin and perish. A little after he saith 
(m) Non dubitamus itaque confiteri, ex immutabili reprobatione necessitatem peccandi, & quidem sine resipiscentia ad mortem usque pe●candi, enque & paenas aeternas dandi reprobis incumbere.  We doubt not therefore to confess, that there lieth upon Reprobates by the power of their unchangeable reprobation, a necessity of sinning, yea of sinning unto death without repentance, and consequently of perishing everlastingly.  
Calvin also saith, that Reprobates obey not the word of God, partly through the wickedness of their own hearts, and partly because 
(n) Calv. l. 3 Instit. cap. 24. Sect. 14. Inse utabili de● judicio suscitati sunt ad gloriam ejus suâ damnatione illustrandum.  they are raised up by the unsearchable judgement of God to illustrate his glory by their damnation. I will end this with that speech of Piscator. 
(o) Pisc. resp ad dupl. Vorst. part. 1. pag. 220. Reprobri ad utrumque hoe malum à Deo praecise destinal sunt, ut in aeternum puniantur, & necessario peccent, & quidem ideo peccent, quo justè puniri possint.  Reprobates are precisely appointed to this double evil, to be punished everlastingly, and to sin; and therefore to sin that they might be justly punished.  
4 That as he hath immutably decreed that Reprobates shall live and dye in sin; so he procures their sins in due time by his Almighty hand, partly by withdrawing from them grace necessary for the avoiding of sin, and partly by moving and inclining them by his irresistible and secret workings on their hearts, to sinful actions. 
(p) Calv. Instit. l. 1. c. 17. Sect. 11.  Calvin saith, that devils and reprobate men are not only held fast in God's fetters, so as they cannot do what they would, but are also urged and forced by God's bridle [ad obsequia praestanda,] to do as he would have them. And in the next chapter there are his words, 
(q) Ib. v. 18. sect. 1. Quod nihil efficiant homines nisi arcano der nutu, nec quicquam deliberando agitent, nisi quod ipse jam apud se decreverit, & arcanâ suâ directione constitua: ● innumeris & claris testimoniis probatur.  that men have nothing in agitation, that they bring nothing into action, but what God by his secret direction hath ordered, is apparent by many and clear testimonies. In the Section following he saith, 
(r) Ib Sect 2. Et certè nisi intus operaretur in mentibus hominum, non rectè di●u esset, auferre labi●n à veracibus, & à s●nibus prudentiam, etc.  And surely unless God did work inwardly in the minds of men, 'twould not be rightly said, that he taketh away wisdom from the wise, etc. In those two chapters, that which he mainly driveth at, is to show, that God doth not only behave himself privatively in procuring the sins of men, but doth also put forth powerful and positive acts in the bringing of them to passed. And in his second Book and 4 chapter after he had said, that God may be said to harden men, by forsaking them, he putteth in another way, by which God hardeneth men, and that (he saith) cometh a great deal nearer to the propriety of the Scripture phrases; namely by stirring up their wills: 
(s) Instit. l. 2. c. 4. §. 3 ad exequenda sua jud●i● per minist●ū●rae suae Satanam, & consil●a co●um d●stivat quò visum est, & voluntates excitat, & conatus firmat.  God doth not only harden men by leaving them to themselves, but by appointing their counsels, ordering their deliberations, stirring up their wills, confirming their purposes and endeavours by the minister of his anger, Satan: and this he proveth by the work of God on Sihon king of the Amorites, Deut. ●. 30. and then insinuateth the end too, why God thus hardens men in their wicked courses, which is, that he might destroy them, 
(t) Quia p●ditum Deus volebat, ob●tin●io cordis divina fuit ad ruinam praeparatio.  because God intended his ruin, he prepared him for it by his induration.  
The sum of all these propositions is this; God, who from all eternity appointed many miserable men to endless and unavoidable torments, decreed for the bringing about of their intended ruin, that they should without remedy live and dye in a state of sin: and what he thus decreed from everlasting, he doth most powerfully effect in time, so governing, overruling, and working upon the wills of those Reprobates, that they have no liberty or ability at all in the issue, of avoiding their sins, but must of necessity commit them.  
Thus they teach: and therefore by just consequence they make God the author of sin; as it will plainly appear by these following considerations.  
1 It is ordinary to impute sin to those, who have not so great a hand in the production of it, as hath the Almighty by the grounds of this opinion. For,  
(1) The devil is called a father of lies, Joh. 8.44. and by the like reason of all other sins; and therefore he that committeth sin, is said to be of the devil, and to be a child of the devil, 1 Joh. 3.8.10. and sin is called, a work of the devil, which the son of God appeared to lose, vers. 8. And why is the devil so called, but because he doth egg and allure men by inward suggestions and outward temptations to fall into sin! This is all he doth or can do. But God doth much more, if he necessitate and by his decree first, and next by his powerful and secret working in the souls of men, determine their wills irresistibly to sin. For to determine is infinitely more than barely to persuade; for as much as sin must needs follow the determination, but not the persuasion of the will. God is therefore a truer cause of sin (by this doctrine) than the Devil.  
(2) Wicked men are esteemed authors of their own offences; because they plot, purpose, choose and commit them, and are immediate agents in the acting of them.  
But God (by this opinion) doth more: for he overruleth the projects and purposes of wicked men, and by an uncontrollable motion proceeding from an immutable decree, carrieth all their deliberations, resolutions, choices and actions precisely that very way; so as they cannot choose but do as they do, whatsoever they may think to the contrary. They have indeed [potentiam in se liberam] a power in itself free, to choose what they refuse, or to refuse what they choose, to determine themselves this way or that way as liketh them best: but they have not [liberum ●sum] a free use of this their power. God doth determine their will before it hath determined itself; and maketh them do those only actions, which his omnipotent will hath determined, and not which their wills out of any absolute dominion over their own actions, have prescribed. More rightly therefore, may God be called the Author of those offences; for 
(u) Opera magis pertinent ad imperantem, quam ad exequentem.  deeds whether good or bad, are owned more truly by him that over-ruleth them, then by the servile instruments that only execute and do them.  
3 Wicked counsellors, and they who allure and advise men to sin, are accounted by God and men to be the causes of those sins, to which they are the persuaders; and have been punished for those misdeeds, which others through their instigations have committed. Jezabell Ahab's wife, was reputed and punished as the murderer of Naboth; because she counselled and contrived the doing of it, as we may see 1. Kings. 21.23.25. But what is counselling to enforcing? Evil counsels may be refused, but an almighty power cannot be resisted? God therefore that useth this (according to their doctrine) in the production of sins, is much more an author of them, than he that only useth the other.  
2 If we could find out a King that should so carry himself in procuring the ruin and the offences of any subject, as (by this opinion) God doth in the effecting of the damnation and transgressions of Reprobates, we would all charge him with the ruin and sins of those his Subjects. 
(w) Molin. Anat. c. 12. de praedest. p. 73 Quis non regem abominetur sic loquentem?  Who would not abhor (saith Moulin) a King speaking thus; 
(y) Ego hunc hominem addico suspendio● sed ut justè suspendatur, volo patret homicidium vel peculatum.  I will have this man hanged, and that I may hang him justly, I will have him murder or steal? This King (saith he) should not only make an innocent man miserable, [sed & sceleratum] but wicked too, and should punish him for that offence [cujus ipse causa esset] of which himself is the cause. It is a clear case. 
(y) Sueton vit. Tib. cap. 61.  Tiberius (as Suetonius reports) having a purpose to put certain Virgins to death; because it was not lawful among the Romans to strangle Virgins, caused them all to be deflowered by the Hangman, that so they might be strangled. Who will not say, that Tiberius was the principal author of the deflowering of those maids? In like manner (say the Supralapsarians) God hath a purpose of putting great store of men to the second death, but because it is not lawful for him by reason of his justice to put to death men innocent and without blame, he hath decreed, that the Devil shall deflower them; that afterward he may damn them. It followeth therefore, that God is the main cause of those their sins.  
3 That God is the Author of men's salvation and conversion, all sides grant: and yet he doth no more in the procuring of them, than these men report him to do in the Reprobates impenitency and damnation. The salvation and conversion of the Elect (say they) he hath absolutely and antecedently, without the foresight of any deservings of theirs, resolved upon, and by irresistible means in their several generations draweth them to believe, repent and endure to the end, that so they might be saved, and his absolute decree accomplished. On the other side, the damnation, the sins and the final impenitency of Reprobates, he hath of his alone will and pleasure peremptorily decreed; this his decree he executeth in time, drawing them on by his unconquerable power and providence from sin to sin, till they have made up their measure, and in the end have inflicted on them that eternal vengeance, which he had provided for them. What difference is here in the course which God taketh for the conversion and salvation of the Elect, and the obduration and damnation of Reprobates? And therefore what hindereth, but that God (by their grounds) may as truly be styled the prime cause and author of the sins of the one, as of the conversion of the other?  
The Father's thought it a plain case: and therefore they did generally make sin an object of prescience, not predestination, and bend the most of those arguments by which they refuted this foul assertion, against an absolute, irresistible, and necessitating decree, as I could easily show, but that I fear to be overlong. Only I will cite some few of those Author's words, whom the learned and reverend Bishop hath alleged in favour and for the defence of the Predestinarians and the maintainers of Gotteschalkes opinion.  
The Church of Lions in their answer to the positions of johannes Scotus which he framed against Gotteschalk, hath these words 
(z) Bish. Usher. his hist. of Gottesc. pag. 138. Qui vim & necessitatem peccandi deum intuliste homini vel inferre dicit,  horribiliter in deum blasphemat quem ad peccata compellendo utique authorem peccati osse confirmat.  Whosoever saith, that God hath laid a constraint or a necessity of sinning upon any man, he doth manifestly and fearfully blaspheme God, in as much as he maketh him by affirming that of him, to be the very author of sin. Remigius Archbishop of that Church, explaining his Church's opinion in the point of prescience and predestination in 7 several rules; in the 5th. of those rules he hath these words to the same purpose. God (saith he) by his prescience and predestination hath laid a necessity of being wicked upon no man, 
(a) Id. ib. p. 173. He enim si fecisset ipse utique esset author mal rum, etc.  For if he had done this, he should have been the author of sins.  
And thus (in my judgement) doth it plainly appear that by absolute Reprobation, as it is taught the upper way, God is made to be the true cause of men's sins.  
Many distinctions are brought to free the Supralapsarian way from this crimination: all which (me think) are no better than mere delusions of the simple and inconsiderate, and give no true satisfaction to the understanding.  
There is (say they) a twofold decree.  
1 An Operative, 
Distinction, 1.  by which God positively and efficaciously worketh a thing.  
2 A Permissive, by which he decreeth only to let it come to pass. If God should work sin by an operative decree, than he should be the author of sin; but not if he decree by a permissive decree, to let it come to pass. And this only they say they maintain.  
Answ. 1 It is true, that God hath decreed to suffer sin: For otherwise there would be none. Who can bring forth that which God will absolutely hinder? He suffered Adam to sin, leaving him in the hand of his own counsel. Eccl. 15.14. he suffered the nations in times past to walk in their own ways, Act. 14.16. and daily doth he suffer both good and bad to fall into many sins. And this he doth, not because he stands in need of sin for the setting forth of his glory: for he hath no need of the sinful man: Ecclus 15. but partly, because he is [summus provisor,] supreme moderator of the world, and knoweth how to use that well which is ill done, and to bring good out of evil: and especially for that reason which Tertullian presseth, 
Tertull. l. 1. contr. Martion.  namely, because man is made by Gods own gracious constitution, a● a free creature, undetermined in his actions, till he determine himself: and therefore may not be hindered from finning by omnipotency, because God useth not to repeal his own ordinances.  
2 It is true also, that a permissive decree is no cause of sin, because it is merely extrinsecall to the sinner, and hath no influence at all upon the sin: it is an antecedent only, and such a one too, as being put, sin followeth not of necessity. And therefore it is fitly contradistinguisht to an operative decree. And if that side would in good earnest, impute no more in sinful events to the divine power, than the word (Permission) imports, their main conclusion would fall and the controversy between us end. But,  
(1) Many of them reject this distinction utterly and will have God to decree sinne [efficaciter] with an energetical and working will. 
Colloq. Mompel. 2. par. pa. 177.  Witness that discourse of Beza, wherein he averreth and laboureth to prove, that God doth not only permit sin, but will it also: and witness Calvin too, who hath a whole Section against it: calling it.— A carnal distinction, invented by the flesh, and [effugium] a mere evasion to shift off this seeming absurdity, 
Calv. Instit. l 14 c. 18 Sect 1 & 2.  that that man is made blind [volente & jubente Deo] by God's will and commandment, who must shortly after be punished for his blindness: he calleth it also, [figmentum] a fiction, and saith they do [ineptire] play the fools that use it.  
By many reasons also doth he endeavour to lay open the weakness of it, taxing those who understand such Scriptures as speak of Gods smiting men with a spirit of flumber and giddiness, of blinding their minds, infatuating and hardening their hearts, etc. of a permission and suffering of men to be blinded and hardened, 
Id ib l. 21. c. 4. Sect. 3.  [Nimis frivola est ista solutio] saith he, this too frivolous a gloss. In another place he blameth those that refer sin to God's prescicience only, calling their speeches [argutia] tricks and quirks, which Scripture will not bear: and those likewise that ascribe it to God's permission: and saith, 
(c) Similiter quod de permissione afferunt, dilutius est quam ut subsistat.  What they bring touching the divine permission in this business, will not hold water.  
2 They that admit the word (Permissive) do willingly mistake it, and while (to keep off this blow) they use the word, they corrupt the meaning. For,  
(1) Permission is an act of Gods consequent and judiciary will, by which he punisheth men for abusing their freedom, and committing such sin's day by day, as they might have avoided, and to which he proceedeth [lente gradu] slowly and unwillingly, as we may see, Psal. 81.11, 12. Israel would none of me: so I gave them up, etc. Ezech. 18.39. Go and serve every one his Idol; seeing ye will not obey me, etc. Rom. 1.21, 24. Because when they knew God, they glorified him not as God: therefore God gave them up to their heart's lust, to vile affections, and to a Reprobate mind. Revel. 22.11 He which is unjust, let him be unjust still. In these places and many more we may see, that persons left to themselves are sinners only; and not all sinners, but the obstinate and wilful, which will by no means be reclaimed. But the permission, which they mean, is an act of God's antecedent will, exercised about innocent men, lying under no guilt at all in God's eternal consideration.  
2 Permission, about whomsoever it is exercised, obstinate sinners or men considered without sin, is no more than a not hindering of them from falling, that are able to stand, and supposeth a possibility of sinning or not sinning, in the parties permitted: but with them it is a withdrawing or withholding of grace needful for the avoiding of sin, and so includeth an absolute necessity of sinning: for from the withdrawing of such grace sin must needs follow, as the fall of Dagons' house followed Sampsons' plucking away the Pillars that were necessary for the upholding of it Maccovins in two disputations, expounding this word (Permission) circumscribes it within two acts: 
Maccov. coll. theo●. disp. 9 pag. 10.  the first of which, is a substraction of divine assistance necessary to the preventing of sin: and having proved it by two arguments that none may think he is alone in this, he saith, that he is compassed about with a cloud of witnesses, and produceth two: 1 The first of them, is our reverend and learned Whitaker, some of whose words alleged by him are these. 
(d) Pag. 15. Permiss● p●c●i est privatio ●uxilu divini, quo positio peccatum impediretur.  Permission of sin, is a privation of that aid, which being present, sin would have been hindered. The second is Pareus, for saying, that 
(e) Sub●racto auxilio dei, homo (Adamus) istis facultatibus ad standum benè uti non potuit,  that help (which God withdrew from Adam) being withdrawn, Adam could not so use his endowments as to persevere. And this doctrine (saith he) is defended by our men, as it appeareth out of Pareus lib. de gratia primi hominis. cap. 4. pag. 46.  
Their permission therefore of sin being a substraction of necessary grace, is equivalent to an actual, effectual procuring and working of it. (For [causa deficiens in necessariis est efficiens] a deficient cause in things necessary is truly efficient) and so is but a mere fig-lease to cover the foulness of their opinion.  

Distinct. 2.  There are two things (they say) in every ill act,—  
1 The material part, which is the substance of the action.  
2 The formal part, which is the evil or obliquity of it. God is the Author of the action itself, but not of the obliquity and evil that cleaveth to it; as he that causeth a lame horse to go, is the cause of his going, but not of his lame going. And therefore it followeth not from their opinion, that God is the Author of sin.  
Answ. 1 1 All sins receive not this distinction; because of many sins the acts themselves are sinful, as of the eating of the forbidden fruit, and saul's sparing of Agag, and the fat beast's of the Amalekites.  
2 It is not true, that they make the decree of God only of actions and not of their aberrations: for they make it to be the cause of all those means that lead to damnation, and therefore of sinful actions as sinful, and not as bare actions. For actions deserve damnation, not as actions, but as transgressions of God's law.  
3 To the Simile I say, that the rider or master that shall resolve first to slay his horse or knock him on the head, and then to make him lame that for his halting he may kill him, is undoubtedly the cause of his halting: and so, if God determine to cast men into Hell, and then to bring them into a state of sin, that for their sins he may bring them to ruin, we cannot conceive him to be less than the author as well of their sins as of those actions, to which they do inseparably adhere, and that out of God's intention to destroy them.  
The will is determined to an Object two ways: 
Distinct. 3.  

1 By Compulsion, against the bent and inclination of it.  
2 By necessity, according to the natural desire and liking of it.    
God's Predestination (say they) determineth the will to sinne this last way, but not the first; it forceth no man to do that which he would not, but carrieth him towards that which he would: when men sin, it is true they cannot choose; and it is as true they will not choose. It followeth not therefore from the grounds of their doctrine, that God's decree is the cause of men's sins, but their own wicked wills.  
Answ. 1 1 The Ancients made no distinction between these two words (necessity) and (compulsion;)) but used them in this argument promiscuously: and did deny, that God did necessitate men to sin, lest they should grant him hereby to be the Author of sin, as I have touched before, and shall intimate again afterward.  
Nor did the Schoolmen put any difference between them, as may appear by the testimony of Mr. Calvin, 
Calv. Instit. i. 2. c. 2 Sect ●●  who speaking of the Schoole-distinction of the wills threefold liberty, from Necessity, from Sin, from Myery, saith; This distinction I could willingly receive, but that it confoundeth necessity with coaction.  
2 That which necessitateth the will to sin, is as truly the cause of sin, as that which forceth it; because it maketh the sin to be inevitably committed, which otherwise might be avoided: and therefore, if the divine decree necessitate man's will to sin, it is as truly the cause of the sin, as if it did enforce it.  
3 That which necessitateth the will to sin, is more truly the cause of the sin, than the will is; because it over-ruleth the will, and beareth all the stroke, taketh from it its true liberty, by which it should be Lord of itself and disposer of its own acts, and in respect of which, it hath been usually called by Philosophers and Fathers too, [〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉,] a power which is under the insuperable check and control of no Lord, but itself. It over-ruleth (I say) and maketh it become but a servile instrument, irresistibly subject to superior command and determination: and therefore is a truer cause of all such acts and sins, as proceed from the will so determined, than the will is. For when two causes concur to the producing of an effect, the one a principal overruling cause, the other but instrumental and wholly at the devotion of the principal; then is the effect, in all reason, to be imputed to the principal, which by the force of its influx and impression produceth it, rather than to the subordinate and instrumental, which is but a mere servant in the production of it. We shall find it ordinary in Scripture, to ascribe the effect to the principal Agent. It is not ye, that speak (saith CHRIST,) but the spirit of my father, that speaketh in you. Math. 10.20. I laboured more abundantly, than they all, yet not I, but the grace of God which was in me. 1. Cor. 15.10. And I live; yet not I, but CHRIST liveth in me, saith S. Paul. Gal. 2.20.  
In these and many other places, the effect or work spoken of, is taken from the instrument, and given to the principal Agent. Which being so, though man's will work with God's decree in the commission of sin, and willeth the sin which it doth; yet seeing what the will doth, it doth by the commanding power of God's almighty decree, and so it doth that otherwise it cannot do; the sin committed cannot so rightly be ascribed to man's will the inferior, as to Gods necessitating decree the superior cause.  
4 That which maketh a man sin by way of necessity only; that is, with and not against his will, is the cause of his sin in a worse manner, then that which constraineth him to sin against his will: as he which by powerful persuasions draweth a man to stab, or hang, or poison himself, is in a grosser manner the cause of that evil and unnatural action, than he that by force compelleth him, because he maketh him to consent to his own death. And so, if God's decree do not only make men sin, but sin willingly too; not only cause that they shall [malè agere] do evil, but [malè velle] will evil, it hath the deeper hand in the sin.  
Sin may be considered as sin, 
Distinct. 4.  or as a means of declaring God's justice in men's punishments: God doth not predestinate men to sin, as it is sin, but as a means of their punishment. He is not therefore (say they) the Author of Sinne.  
Answ. 1 1 A good end cannot moralise a bad action: it remaineth evil, though the end be never so good: [bonum oritur ex integris] end, manner, yea and matter too must be good, or else the action is naught. He that shall steal that he may give an alms, or commit adultery that he may beget children for the Church, or oppress the poor to teach them patience, or kill a wicked man that he may do no more hurt with his example, or do any forbidden thing; though his end be never so good, he sinneth notwithstanding. And the reason is, because the evil of sin is greater than any good that can come by sin; for as much as it is [laesio divinae majestatis,] a wronging of God's majesty, and so [divino bono opposita,] directly prejudicial to the good of Almighty God, as much as any thing can be. This S. Paul knew very well: and therefore he telleth us plainly, that we must not do evil that good may come of it. Rom. 3.8. Whosoever therefore willeth a Sin though for never so good an end; he willeth that which is truly and formally a Sin: and consequently God, though he will sinne for ends never so good, yet willing it with such a powerful and effectual will, as giveth a necessary being to it, he becometh Author of that which is formally sin.  
2 The members of this distinction are not opposite: for Sin as Sin and in no other consideration, is a means of punishment. If God therefore willeth it as a means of punishment, he willeth it as Sin; his decree is terminated at the very formality of it.  
3 This distinction fasteneth upon God a further aspersion, and loadeth him with three special indignities more.  
(1) Want of Wisdom and Providence. His counsels must needs be weak, if he can find out no means to glorify justice, but by the bringing in of sin, which his soul hateth, into the world, and appointing men to commit it, that so he may manifest justice in the punishment of it.  
(2) Want of sincerity and plain dealing with men.  
Tiberius (as Suetonius reporteth) having a purpose t● put the two Sons of Germanicus (Drusus and Nero) t● death 
(f) Suetonius in vit. Tib. cap. 54. Variâ fraude induxit u● con●tatentur ad conv● S●concitati perdie en●r.  used sundry cunning contrivances to draw them to revile him, that reviling him they might be put 〈◊〉 death: and herein is justly censured for great Hypocrisy. And so, if God having apppointed men by his absolute wi● to inevitable perdition, do decree that they shall sinne that so they may be damned for those sins which he decreeth and draweth them into; he dissembleth, because he slaughtereth them under a pretext of justice; for sin but yet for such sins only as he hath by his eternal counsel apppointed as the means of their ruin.  
(3) Want of mercy in a high degree, as if he did so delight in blood, that rather than he will not destroy men's souls, he will have them live and dye in sin that he may destroy them; like to those Pagan Princes, of whom I●st● Mart. apol. 2. two or three leaves from the beginning sayeth 
(g) Videmini vereri nè omnes celant justitiam, atque ita desint, in quos animadvertaris. Verum haec cuia fuit magis ●a●u a qu●m bonorum principum.  They are afraid that all should be just, lest they should have none to punish: But this is the disposition of hangmen, rather than of good Princes. And therefore fare be these foul enormities, and in particular this latter from the God of truth and father of mercies.  
And thus notwithstanding these distinctions, it is (in my conceit) most evident, that the rigid and upper way maketh God the author of men's sins, as well as punishments. And so much for the first general Inconvenience, which ariseth from this opinion, namely the dishonour of God.  

II. Inconvenience.  THe second Inconvience is, the overthrow of true religion and good government among men.  
To this, this opinion seemeth to tend, for these reasons.  
1 Because it maketh sin to be no sin indeed, but only in opinion. We use to say, Necessity hath no law: creatures or actions in which necessity beareth sway, are without law. Lion's are not forbidden to prey, birds to fly, fishes to swim, any bruit creatures to do according to their kinds, because their actions are natural and necessary: they cannot upon any admonition do otherwise. Among creatures endued with reason and liberty, laws are given to none, but such as can use their principles of reason and freedom: fools, mad men, and children, are subject to ●o law, because they have no liberty. To men that can use their liberty, laws are not given neither, but in those actions which are voluntary. No man is forbidden to be hungry, thirsty, weary, sleepy, to weep, to laugh, to love or to hate; because these actions and affections are natural and necessary: the will may govern them, but it cannot suppress them.  
And so if to deal justly, to exercise charity, etc. with their contraries, be absolutely and antecedently necessary too, whether this necessity flow from a principle within or a Mover without, we are as lawless in these, as in the other.  
Now if Necessity have no law, than actions in themselves evil, if under the dominion of absolute necessity, are transgressions of no law and consequently no sins. For Sin is a transgression of the Law. 1 joh. 3.4.  
This that I say, hath been said long ago. For justin Martyr speaking against destiny, hath these words; 
(h) Iust. Mart. Apol. 2 a little beyond the middle. Si fato fieret ut 〈◊〉 aut improbus ●ut bonus, nec alii quidem probi essent 〈…〉 ma●.  If it be by destiny (that is, by absolute necessity, for that the fathers do generally call by the name of Destiny;) that men are good or bad, they are indeed neither good nor bad. A speech like to this he hath a little after 
(i) Videretur verum esse, ●l 〈◊〉 v●rtutem nec v●um sed opinione solum bona & m●●c● quae, 〈…〉 ●st m●xima impietas & injustiti.  It would seem, if this be so, that virtue and vice are nothing; but things are judged to be good or evil by opinion only, which as good reason teacheth, is very great injustice and impiety. And surely well might he say so: for to what purpose was the Son of God made man, and being man made a sacrifice for sin? why was the Ministry of the word and sacraments ordained? to what end are heaven and hell propounded? why are exhortations, dissuasions, or any other means to hinder men from sin applied, if sin be nothing but a mere opinion?  
CHRIST, the Christian faith, the word and Sacraments and whatsoever according to the Scriptures hath been done for the applying of the pardon of sin, are all but mere sables, nay very impostures, if sin be nothing. And by consequence it is no matter at all, whether men be Christians, jews, Turks, or Pagans, of what religion, or whether of any religion at all. Now whither tendeth this, but to the overthrow of religion?  
2 Because it taketh away the conscience of sin.  
Why should men be afraid of any sin that pleaseth or may profit them, if they must needs sin? or what reason have they to weep and mourn when they have sinned, seeing they have not sinned truly, because they sinned necessarily?  
The Tragedian saith, 
(k) Fati iita culpa est: nemo fit fato nocens.  when a man sinneth, his destiny must bear the blame. Necessity freet lo him from all iniquity. Sins are either the faults of that irresistible decree that causeth them, or no faults at all. If either: then sorrow, fear, or any other act of repentance whatsoever, may as well be spared as spent. This conceit being once drunk in, religion cannot long continue; for the affections have been the strongest planters, and are the surest upholders of it in the world. Primus in or be Deos fecit timor.  
3 Because it taketh away the desert and guilt of sin.  
Offences if fatal, cannot be justly punished. The reason is, because those deeds for which men are punished or rewarded, must be their own, under their own power and sovereignty: but such are no fatal actions or events. Neither temporally nor eternally can sin be punished, if it be absolutely necessary.  
(1) Not temporally, as God himself hath given us to understand by that law which he prescribed the jews. Deut. 22.25. which was, that if a maid commit uncleanness by constraint, she should not be punished. His reason was, because there was no cause of death in her: what she yielded to, was through compulsion, being overborne by power; as a man that is wounded to death by his Neighbour, so was a virgin in that case, a sufferer rather than a doer. This particular law is of universal right: no just punishment can be inflicted for sin, where there is no power in the party to avoid it. The speech of Lypsius, is but a mere crotchet contrary to reason, [Fatali culpae fatalis paena] Fatal fault's must have fatal punishments. Did Magistrates think men's offences unavoidable, they would think it bootless and unreasonable to punish them. Nay not only so, but we see by daily experience, that judges following the direction of reason, have very remissely punished such faults, as have been committed through the power of headstrong and exorbitant passions: Yea, we may read of some, who have not thought it fit to punish such faults at all. Valerius Maximus telleth, that Popilius a Roman Praetor, 
Val. Max. l. 8. c 1.  sitting in judgement on a woman who had in a bitter passion slain her mother, because she had murdered her children; [neque damnavit, neque absolvit] neither cleared her nor condemned her. 
Gell. l. 12. c. 7.  And Aulus Gellius reporteth of Dolabella the Proconsul of Asia, that when a woman of Smyrna was brought before him who had poisoned her husband and son for murdering a son of hers, which she had by a former husband; he turned her over to the Areopagus (which was the gravest & most renowned judgement seat in the world.) The judges there not daring to acquit her being stained with a double slaughter, nor yet to punish her being provoked with just grief; commanded the Accuser and the Offender to come before them 100 years after. And so 
(l) Neque absolutum mulieris venesicium est, quod per leges non licuit; neque no●ns damnata punitaque quae digna venia fuit.  Neither was the woman's fact justified, the Laws not allowing it, nor yet the woman punished; because she was worthy to be pardoned. If wise Magistrates have spared such Offenders as have been over-swayed with passions, which did but incline, not determine them to their irregular actions; they would never have punished any trespassers, if they had thought them to be such by invincible necessity. Or, if offenders did think that their offences were their Destinies, and that when they Murder, steal, commit adultery, make insurrections, plot treasons, or practise any outrageous villainies; they do them by the necessity of God's unalterable decree, and can do no otherwise: they would (and might) complain of their punishments, as unjust; as Ze●oes servant did. When he was beaten by his Master for a fault, he told him out of his own grounds that he was unjustly beaten; because he was [fato coactus peccare] constrained to make that fault by his undecline b●e fate. The Adrumetine Monks, misled by S. Austin, Epist. 105. ad Sixtum Presbyterum (which he calleth a Book, wherein he setteth down his opinion concerning God's grace) did so teach grace, that they denied . And this S. Austin confuted in his book De gratia & lib. arb. And thinking the grace of God (as S. Aug. taught) to be such, as could not stand with freedom of will, they thought that no man should be punished for his faults, but rather prayed for, that God would give them grace to do better. Against this, S. Austin directed his other Book, De Corr. & great. In which discourse though it be grace that is still named, yet predestination is included. 
K●. in pra● a●l. Luth. de ser●●l●.  For as Kimedoncius saith truly in his Preface to Luther, de servo arbitr. Between Grace and Predestination, there is only this difference (as S. Aug. teacheth, l. de Praedest. Sanctorun cap. 10.) that Predestination is a preparation of Grace, and Grace a bestowing of Predestination. As Zenoes' servant and these Monks did, so would all men judge; did they considerately think that men could not choose but offend. And what would be the resultance of such a persuasion, but an inundation of the greatest insolences, and a dissolution of all good government!  
2 Nor if this be true, can sin be punished eternally, or that tribunal be just, on which the sentence of eternal fire shall be denounced against the wicked at the last day. To this, I have the Father's bearing witness generally and plainly. Tertullian hath these words, 
(m) Tertul. lib. 2. Contr. Martion. Caete●ùm, nec boni nec mali merces ●re pēsa● ei, q● aut b●nus aut malus neccisitate suit inventus, non v●luntate.  The recompense of good or evil can with no justice be given to him, who is good or evil, not freely but of necessity.  
S. Hierom saith, 
(n) Liberi arbi●i nos condi●t Deus, acc●d v●tu es nec ad ●a necessitate trahimur: alioquin ubi necessitas est, nec damnatio, nec corona est.  Where necessity domineers, there is no place for retribution. Epiphanius saith. 
(o) Epiph. advers. her. l 1. haer 5. num. 3. Sanè quidem justi● a st●lis quae necessitatem private, pae●ae repetantu●, quam ab eo qui quod agit (〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉) necessitate adactus aggreditur.  The stars which impose upon men a necessity of sinning, may be punished with better justice than the men themselves. 
(p) Aug. l. 2 contr. Faust. c. 5. Et nos quidem sub fato stellatum nullius hominis genesin ponimus, ut liberum arbitrium voluntatis, quo bene vel male vivitur, propter justum Dei judicium ab omni necessitatis vinculo vindicemus.  We place men's nativities under no fatal constellations (saith S. Aug.) that we may free the will by which a man liveth either well or ill, from all bands of necessity, because of the righteous judgement of God. Prosper speaking of the judgement of God, by which he decreed to render unto every man according to his works, 
(q) Prosp. ad Obj. 10. Vinc. Quod judicium futurum omnino non esser, si homines Dei voluntate peccarent.  This judgement should never be, if men did sin by the will and determination of God. Fulgentius also saith the same 
(r) Fulgent. l. 1. c. 2. add Mont: cap. 22. Nec justitia justa dicetur, si puniendum r●um non invenisse, sed fecisse dicatur. Major vero erit injustitia, si lapso Deus retribuat paenam, quem stantem praedestinasse dicitur ad ruinam.  It is great injustice in God to punish him whom he doth not find, but make an offender. This was St. Bernard's opinion too, 
(s) Ber. l. de gra● & lib. arb p. 908. Sola voluntas, quoniam profui ingenita libe●tate aut dissentire sibi aut praeter se in aliquo consentire, nulla vi, nulla cogitur necessitate, n●n mimerito justum vel injustum beatitudine seu miseria dignam ac capa●m creaturam c●uit, prou● scilicet justitiae, injustitiaenè consense●.  It is only a will free from compulsion and necessity (saith he) which maketh a creature capable of reward and punishment. Out of these testimonies laid together may be collected 3 things;  
1 That the Ancients did use to call a necessity of humane actions good and bad by the name of destiny, from what external cause soever this necessity did arise.  
2 That they did use these two words [Necessity] and [Compulsion] pro●cuously: and therefore thought that necessity as well as compulsion did take away the wills liberty.  
3 (Which is for our present purpose,) that they believed and contended, that the judgements of God on sinners could not be just, if they were held by the Adamantine chains of any absolute necessity under the power of their sins.  
I will therefore conclude this argument with the words of Epiphanius writing of the error of the Pharisees, who believed the immortality of the soul, and the resurrection of the Dead, and yet held that all things come to pass by necessity. 
(t) Epiph. l. 1. adv. h●r 1●. p 35. nu 3. Est illud verò extremae cujusdam imperitiae, ne dic●m amentiae, cùm resurrectionem mortuorum ●sse fateare, ac justissinaū cujuisque f●cts ju●iu●o sti●utum f● nihil ●u● esse ●ullum, ●ss●re●e. Qui m●●st●●ve● peasant, jud● atque fatum  It is (saith he) a Point of extreme ignorance or madness rather, for him that confesseth the resurrection of the dead, and the great day appointed for the revelation of God's righteous judgement, to say, that there is any Destiny, any necessity in men's actions. For how can the righteous judgement of God and destiny comply and stand together? And (let me add) how can the belief of this and true piety stand together? For where this persuasion that men's sins are necessary, and that therefore there can be no righteous judgement, is rooted in; religion will quickly be rooted out.  
4 It tendeth to religions overthrow, because it maketh the whole circle of a man's life but a mere Destiny. By it all our doings are Gods ordinances, all our imaginations branches of his Predestination; and all events in Kingdoms and Commonweals the necessary issues of the divine decree. All things whatsoever, though they seem to do somewhat,; yet (by this opinion) they do indeed just nothing: the best laws restrain not one offender, the sweetest rewards promote not one virtue, the powerfullest Sermons convert not one sinner, the humblest devotions divert not one calamity, the strongest endeavours in things of any nature whatsoever, effect no more than would be done without them: but the necessitating, overruling decree of God doth all. And if laws do nothing, wherefore are they made? If rules of Religion do nothing, why are they prescribed? If the wills of men do nothing, why are men encouraged to one thing, scared from another? And if good endeavours and onsets do nothing (being excited, continued, limited, controlled, and every way governed by an active, absolute and almighty decree) to what purpose are they used? Who seethe not plainly whither these things tend? To nothing more, than the subversion of piety and policy, religion and laws, society and government? This did the Romans see full well:) and therefore, they banished [Mathematicos] The teachers and aberters of destiny, out of Rome. These and the like inconveniences which come from the upper way, did work so with Prosper, as that he calls him no Catholic, who is of this opinion. 
(u) Prosp. ad ●a. Gall. s●t 1. Quisquis ergo ex p●aedestinatione de●, velu● fatali necessitate, homines in peccata compulsos cogi dicit in mortem, non est Catholicus.  Whosoever saith, that men are urged to sin and to be damned by the predestination of God, as by a fatal (unavoidable) necessity, he is no Catholic.  
They did also make the Arausican council denounce a curse against such. 
(w) Concil. Ar●s 2. Can, 2. Aliques ad malum divina potest●e praedest●tos esse, non solum non 〈◊〉 edimus, sed etiam si qui sint, qui tantum m●lum credere vel●nt, cum onini detestatione illis Anathema dicimus.  That any are predestinated by the divine power to sin, we do not only not believe, but with the greatest detestation that we can, we denounce Anathema to such (if there be any such) as will believe so great an evil.  
Thus fare of my reasons against the upper and most harsh and rigorous way.  
THe Arguments by which for the present I stand convinced of the untruth, even of the milder and lower way too, I will take from, 

These five following heads; namely, from  
1 Pregnant testimonies of Scripture, directly opposing it.  
2 Some principal attributes of God, not compatible with it.  
3 The end of the word and Sacraments with other excellent gifts of God to men, quite thwarted by it.  
4 Holy endeavours much hindered, if not wholly subverted by it.  
5 Grounds of comfort (by which the conscience in distress should be relieved) which are all removed by it. 
It is 1 Repugnant to Scripture.     
1 It is repugnant to plain and evident places of Scripture even in terminis, as will appear by these instances. 
Ezek. 33.11.   
As I live saith the Lord, I have no pleasure in the death of a sinner; but that the wicked turn from his ways and live.  
And lest men should say, It is true, God willeth not the death of a repenting sinner; the Lord in another place of the same Prophet, 
Ezek. 18.32.  extendeth the proposition to them also that perish— I have no pleasure in the death of him that dyeth.  
In this Scripture we may note three things.  
1 God's affection to men, set forth— 
Negatively, I have no pleasure in his death that dyeth.  
Affirmatively, but that the wicked turn.   
2 The persons in whose destruction God delighteth not: (Wicked men) such as for their rejecting of grace dye and are damned. If God have no pleasure in their death, much less in the death of men, either altogether innocent or tainted only with original sin.  
3 The truth of his affection; 
Tertull. lib. de paen. c. 4.  As I live [Cupit credi sibi] God would f●ine have us believe him (saith Tertullian) when he saith, I will not the death of him that dyeth: and therefore he bindeth his speech with an oath. 
(x) O beatos nos, quorum causâ Deus ju●at. O miserrimos, si nec juranti domino credimus.  Happy are we for whose take the Lord vouchsafeth to swear; but most ●nhappy, if we believe him not when he sweareth.  
Now if God delight not in the destruction of wicked men, certainly he never did out of his absolute pleasure seal up so many millions of men lying in the fall under invincible damnation: for such a decreeing of men to eternal death, is directly opposite to a delight in their repentance and everlasting life.  

Rom. 11.2.  God hath shut up all in unbelief, that he might have mercy over all.  
In these the Apostles words are two (All's) of equal extent, the one standing against the other.  
An (All) of unbelievers, and an (All) of objects of mercy: look how many unbelievers there be, on so many hath God a will of showing mercy. And therefore, if all men of all sorts and conditions, and every man in every sort be an unbeliever; then is every man of every condition under mercy: and if every man be under mercy, than there is no precise antecedent will of God, of shutting up some and those the most from all possibility of obtaining mercy. For these two are 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 and cannot stand together.  

joh. 3.16.  God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, etc. God loved the world, saith the Text, that is, the whole lump of mankind: therefore he did not absolutely hate the greatest part of men.  
Again, God loved it fallen into a gulf of sin and misery. For he so loved them, as to send his son to redeem them; and a Saviour presupposeth sin. He did not therefore hate the most of them lying in the fall: for love and hatred are contrary acts in God, and cannot be exercised about the same objects.  
Many Expositors (I know) do take [world] here in a restrained sense, and understand by it the company of the Elect, or the world of Believers only, but they have little reason for it (in my opinion;) for,  
1 I think there can be no place of Scripture alleged, wherein this word [world] especially with the addition of [whole] as 1. Epist. of Joh. cap. 2. v. 2. (a place equivalent to this for the matter of it and a comment upon it.) I say no place (I think) can be produced, where [world] doth signify only the Elect, or only believers; but it signifieth, either all men, or at least the most men living in some certain place, and at some certain time, but without distinction of good and bad, or if it be used any where more restraynedly, it is applied only to wicked and Reprobate men, who in their affections are wedded to the world and its transitory delights: and therefore do most properly deserve this name.  
2 Suppose it be granted, that (World) in some Scriptures is restrained to the Elect; yet it cannot bear this signification here;— because,  
1 The words than would have a senseless construction. For thus would they run; God so loved the Elect that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, etc. and if they run thus, this would follow:— There are two sorts of the Elect, some that do believe and shall be saved, others that do not believe and shall be damned: which is a division or distinction unknown in Divinity.  
2 Believers and unbelievers, damned and saved, comprehend all mankind: for there is no man but he is one of these. Now (world) in this place includeth believers and unbelievers, the saved and the damned, as appeareth most plainly to him that layeth the 16, 17. and 18. verses together. Therefore it signifieth here all mankind without exception of any.  
Who would have all to be saved, 
●. Tim. ●. 4.  and to come to the knowledge of the truth.  
In these words, the Apostle delivereth two things:  
1 That it is Gods will, that men should enjoy a happy end, and be saved.  
2 That it is also his will, they should have the means and make a good use of them in coming to the knowledge of the truth, that so they might be saved. There is no let in God, but that all men may believe and be saved: and therefore there is no absolute will, that many thousand men shall dye in unbelief and be damned.  
Two answers are usually returned, which I confess give me little satisfaction.  
1 That by (All) here we are to understand all sorts, and not every particular man in those sorts.  
It is true, that (All) is sometimes so taken in Scripture; but (I believe) not here: for the very context showeth, that we are to understand by it the individuals and not the kinds. In the first verse there is a duty enjoined. [I will that prayers and supplications be made for all men;] and in this verse the motive is annexed [God will have all to be saved:] As if he should have said— Our charity must reach to all whom God extends his love to.  
God out of his love will have all to be saved: and therefore in charity we must pray for all. Now in the duty, (All) signifieth every man for no man though wicked and profane is to be included from our Prayers.  
Pray for them (saith our Saviour) that persecute you: and pray (saith the Apostle here) for Kings and all that are in authority; men in those days, though the greatest, yet the worst, the very Lions, Wolves and Bears of the Church: Pray for them. And if for them, then for any other. Thus in the duty it signifieth every man: and therefore, it must have the same extent in the motive too, or else the motive doth not reach home, nor is strong enough to enforce the duty.  
The second answer is, that God will have all to be saved with his revealed will, but millions to be damned with his secret will.  
But if this answer stand, than (in my apprehension) these inconveniences will follow.  
1 That God's words (which are his revealed will) are not interpretations of his mind and meaning; and by consequence are not true: for the speech which is not the signification of the mind, is a lie.  
2 That there are two contrary wills in God, a secret will, that many sons of Adam shall irrevocably be damned, and a revealed will, that all the sons of Adam may be saved.  
3 That one of God's wills must needs be bad, either the secret or the revealed will. For of contraries, if the one be good, the other is bad: and so of God's contrary wills, if one be good, the other must needs be bad. For, malum est contrarium bono.  

〈◊〉 3. ●.  Not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance, etc.  
This Scripture is not so liable to the exceptions against the former testimony. For it is a negative proposition and must be taken distributively: and therefore speaketh that in plain terms, which is contrary to absolute reprobation.  
That which is usually replied, is that the persons here spoken of, are the elect only, and such as truly believe: God is not willing that any of them should perish.  
But the contrary appeareth in the text. For the persons here mentioned are those, toward whom God exerciseth much patience, and long suffering; as it is in the words next going before. And who are they? Are they the elect, are they believers only? No, but Reprobates rather, who die for their contempt of grace. For it is apparent by Scriptures, that God doth patiently expect the conversion even of them that are never changed, but die in their sins, as we may see, 1 Pet. 3. v. 19, 20. Where we read that the patience of God was exercised toward those, who in the days of Noah despised it, and went to prison, that is, to Hell for it. Yea of all men, Reprobates are the truest and most proper objects of God's patience, as we may see, Rom. 2.4. where St. Paul speaking of such as go on in sin, and treasure up wrath to themselves against the day of wrath, saith; that God useth patience towards them that he might lead them to repentance. And Rom. 9.22. He endureth (saith the text) with much long suffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction, In the 5 of Esay, v. 2. and the 65 cap. v. 2. we may see the same thing. Reprobates therefore as well as others, my rather then others, doth Peter here speak of, and saith, that God would have none of them to perish: if they do perish, it is through their own fault and folly, and not God's absolute pleasure, who would have no man to perish.  
To these testimonies, I may add these conditional speeches.  
I thou seek him, he will be found of thee: 
2. Chron. 28.9.  but if thou forsake him he will ●ast thee off forever.  
If you se●ke him, he will he found of you: 
2 Chron. 15. ●.  but if you forsake him, he will forsake you.  
If thou do well, shalt thou not be accepted? 
Gen. ●. 7.  and if thou dost not well, sin lieth at the door.  
The just shall live by faith: 
Heb ●0. 2●  but if any man wit● 〈…〉 self, my soul [〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉] shall have no p● 〈…〉 shall not like him, he shall be a Reprobate.  
By all these and many other places that speak conditionally (for aught that I can see) it is clear, that God forsaketh no man considered simply in the fall, till by actual sins and continuance in them he forsake God. Now if God reject no man from salvation in time and in deed, till he cast off God; then surely he rejected no man in purpose and decree, but such a one as he foresaw, would reject and cast off him. For God's acts in time are regulated by his decrees before time. Ephes. 1.11. He worketh all things (saith the Apostle) according to the counsel of his own will: and therefore there must be an exact conformity between them, as between [regulam] and [regulatum,] the rule and the thing squared thereby. By whatsoever therefore God doth in the world, we may know what he purposed to do before the world; and by his actual casting men off when they grow rebellious and impenitent, and not before, we may certainly gather, that he decreed to cast them off, for their foreseen rebellion and impenitency, and not before.  
Besides, it is in substance all one, to cast a man off indeed and to entertain a resolution to do it. Our velle and facere are all one in God's account: and the reason is, because where there is a deliberate and settled will, the deed will follow, if nothing hinder. Much more is God's will and deed all one, seeing his will is omnipotent and irresistible: and whatsoever he willeth directly and absolutely, is certainly done, when the time cometh.  
Well: all these plain and express Scriptures, with the whole course and tenor of God's word, this opinion fla●ly contradicting; though it do (perhaps) shroud itself in some dark and obscure speeches of holy writ, I take it to be an untruth. For what S. Austin saith in another case, I may safely say in this. 
(y) Nunquid ideo negandum quod aptum est, quia comprehendi non potest quod occultum est.  Shall we contradict plain places, because we cannot comprehend the obscure? 
(z) Secundum plura pauciora sunt intelligenda, & ne unus sermo subvertat allied, secundum omne● potius qu●m adversus omnes intelligentus erit.  A few Testimonies (saith Tertullian) must receive an exposition answerable to the current of Scripture, not contrary to it▪  
This is my first reason.  
SEcondly, it crosseth some principal Attributes of God: 
2 It is incompatible with God Attributes.  therefore it cannot be true. For God useth not to make decrees contrary to his own most glorious nature, and such as are incompatible with these excellent Attributes, by which he hath discovered part of himself to men. [Voluntas Dei semper sequitur naturam suam] is a rule among Divines, Gods will always follows his nature; the reason why, is given by the Apostle, 2. Tim. 2.13. God cannot deny himself.  
Two things are here to be premised.  
1 That God's chief attributes are those perfections, in the manifestation of which by acts conformable to them, God is most glorified; which are Mercy, Justice, Truth and Holiness. For God is more honoured by the exercise of these among men, then by the putting forth of his unlimited power and sovereignty; as a King is more renowned among his Subjects for his equity, candour and clemency, then for his dominion and authority, or any thing that is done only for the manifestation thereof. And there is good reason for it. For,  
(1) Power is no virtue; but Holiness, Mercy, justice, and Truth are: acts of power are not morally good in themselves, but are made good or evil by their concomitants. If they be accompanied with justice, Mercy, etc. they are good; if otherwise, they are naught. For [justum oportet esse, quod laudem meretur] Nothing deserveth praise, unless it be just.  
(2) Power and sovereignty may as well be showed in barbarous and unjust actions, as in their contraries. Saul shown his authority and power to the full in slaying the Lords Priests, and Nabuchadnezzar in casting the three Children into the fiery furnace, and Daniel into the Lion's Den; but no Mercy, nor justice, nor any thing else that was good.  
2 The second thing to be preconsidered, is—  
That justice, Mercy, Truth, and Holiness in God are the same in nature with these virtues in men, though infinitely differing in degree; (as light in the air and the Sun, are the same in nature, not degree:) and that which is just, upright and merciful in men, is so in God too: and by these virtues in ourselves with acts conformable to them [tanquam ex pede Herculem] we may safely measure what are so in God. For otherwise these things will follow.  
(1) The common and received distinction of divine Attributes into communicable and incommunicable would fall to the ground. For against it this might be said, that the holiness, mercy justice and sincerity with other virtues that are in us, are not the perfections of God in a lower degree communicated to us, but things of a different nature.  

C●n. 〈…〉  (2) Men cannot be truly said to be made according to God's Image; nor when they are regenerated to be renewed after the same image, and to be made partakers of the divine nature That picture cannot be the picture of such a man, which doth not in his parts and lineaments truly resemble him: no more can we be truly called the picture or image of God, if in our graces (in respect of which we are principally so called) there be not a lively resemblance of God's attributes.  
(3) We may not safely imitate God, as we are commanded. Be ye perfect as your heavenly Father is perfect: 
Math 5.48. 1. Pet. 1.16.  and Be ye holy, as I am holy. Nor when we show forth holiness, mercy, justice and sincerity in our doings, can we be properly said to imitate God, if these be one thing in God and in men another.  
These two things being thus premised, viz. God's holiness, mercy, justice and truth, are four of his chief Attributes, in the exercise of which, he taketh himself to be much glorified; and that we are to measure these attributes by the same virtues in ourselves.  
I come to the proof of my second reason, against absolute Reprobation stated even in the mildest and most plausible way.  
It opposeth Gods principal Attributes; particularly his 

Holiness.  
Mercy.  
justice.  
Sincerity.    

1. Repugnant to God's Holiness.  FIrst, it sighteth with God's Holiness, and maketh him the principal cause of sin in the greatest number of men. I know that the defenders of it do not think so. For the main reason which moved the Synod at Dort and some other Divines before and since, to bring down Predestination thus low, and begin their Reprobation after the fall; was, that they might maintain a fatal and absolute Reprobation of men, and yet avoid this imputation, as 
* Dr. Twisse his vind. gra●. 1. par. 1. c. 4. initio.  Dr. Twisse hath noted. But what they intended (for aught that I can see) they have not compassed. For it followeth evident enough, even from their conclusions too, that of all the sins of Reprobates, which are the greatest number by many degrees, God is the true and principal author.  
Two things they say, which taken together (me thinks) infer it.  

1 That God of his own will and pleasure hath brought men into an estate, in which they cannot avoid sin.  
2 That he leaveth the Reprobate irrecoverably in it.   
I. That God of his own will and pleasure hath brought men into an estate in which they cannot possibly avoid sin: that is, into the state of original sin, which consists of two parts: 1 The guilt of Adam's transgressions. 2 The corruption of nature. In both these they say mankind is interessed, not through the force and efficiency of natural generation, because we all derive our nature from Adam as our first principle; but by Gods free and voluntary order and imputation. 
(a) Calv. Instit. l. 3. c. ●3. Sect. 7 Non eni● factum est natural●ter, ut à salute exciderent omnes un●us parenus culpâ.  It came not to pass by any natural means (saith Calvin) that all men fell from salvation by the fault of our first parent. 
(b) Cunctos mortales in unius ho● personâ morti ●eturnae mancipatos fu●: Scriptura clamat: hoc cum naturae nequeat ascribi, ab admirabili dei consilio profectum esse minime obscu●um est.  That all men are held under the guilt of eternal death in the person in the person of one man; it is the clear and constant voice of Scripture. Now this cannot be ascribed to any natural cause: it must therefore came from the wonderful counsel of God. A little after he hath the same again with as great an Emphasis,- 
(c) Quomodo factum est, ut to● gentes unà cum liberi● corum infantibus, ●ae m●ti● prolvere lapsus Ad● absque remedio, anis, quia d●o ita 〈◊〉 est.  How is it, that so many nations with their children should be involved in the fall without remedy but because God would have it so? As roundly doth Dr. Twisse affirm the same. 
(d) Twisse vind gr●. l. 1 par. 1 ●r. 4 viz. prope● 〈◊〉 Or●ginalis p● 〈◊〉, non nisi imp●u●●ious; lu● 〈◊〉 propagatione ad no● derivatur; quorum 〈◊〉 que non nisi a libera Dei c● s●tutione proficisc●tur.  The guilt of original sin is derived to us only by imputation; the silth only by propagation: and both these only by God's free constitution. A little before he hath these words— 
(e) Etenim naturae v●ium non est cu●que suum voluntate prop●â contractum, sed solâ imputatione aut propagatione detivatum; quarum utraqu● ut voluntate Dei, Deus enim nulla necessitate, sed pro me●â mâ voluntate nobis imputat peccatum Adae  The fault of nature cometh from God's free appointment: for he doth not out of any necessity, but of his mere will only impute the sin of Adam to us. To this purpose he speaketh a great deal more in the same place.— To these sayings S. Bernard hath the like: speaking of Adam's sin, he saith. 
(f) Bern. Serm. 1. ●ni. 1. p●st S. Epiph. Alien est, quia in Adam omn● nescientes p●ccavimus; noster, qui● etsi in alio, nos t●men peccavimus & nobis justo Dei consilio imputabatur, h●lto.  Adam's sin is another's, because we knew not of it; and yet ours, because it was through the just, though secret judgement of God reputed ours.  
And this that they say is agreeable to reason. For if we be fallen into the guilt of the first sin and the corruption of nature, only because we were in Adam's loins when he sinned, and derive our being from him; then these two things will follow.  
1 That we stand guilty of all the sins which Adam committed from his fall to his lives end. For we were virtually in his loins as well after his fall as before, and in every passage and variation of his life he was still a principle of mankind. But where do we read that we are guilty of any other of his sins? To the first sin only doth the Scripture entitle that sin and misery, which entered into the world, and invaded all mankind, as we may see Rom. 5.15, 16, 17, etc.  
2 That children are guilty of the sins of all their progenitors, especially of their immediate Parents. For they were in their loins when they sinned, and more immediately then in adam's. But children are not guilty of their parents faults, nor obnoxious to their punishments, because they are their children, as we may see, Exod. 20.5. where God saying, that he will visit the sins of the Fathers upon the children to the third and fourth gener●on in them that [hate] him; plainly implieth, that children are not simply charged with their father's sins, but conditionally if they be haters of God as their fathers were; if by imitating their wicked parents, they become partakers of their sins. In Ezek. 18.14. etc. The Lord signifies thus much in his Apology against the Cavil of the jews. For first he saith, that if a wicked man beget a son that seethe his Father's sins, and doth not the like, he shall not dye for the iniquity of his Father. This implieth, that the derivation of being from the Parent doth not render the child obnoxious to the punishment of the father's sin, nor consequently to the sin. For the good child is not obnoxious, and yet the good child is equally in the father's loins with the bad, and equally receiveth nature and being from him.  
And then vers. 20. the Lord telleth them expressly thus much, in two propositions.  
1 Affirmatively. The Soul that sinneth, it shall dye. And that it may be known that he speaketh exclusively, only the soul that sinneth, shall dye; he delivers his mind.  
2 Negatively, The Son shall not bear the iniquity of the Father, neither shall the Father bear the iniquity of the Son, etc.  
Our Saviour in that woeful speech of his to the Pharisees, Math. 23.32, 34. Fulfil ye also the measure of your Fathers. Behold I send unto you Prophets, etc. them ye shall kill and crucify, that on you may come all the righteous blood, etc. Intimateth apparently, that the Pharisees were not inheritors of their Father's sins and punishments by birth; but by the commission and imitation of their father's sins, they came to inherit both their sins and plagues. Miserable would our case be on whom the ends of the world are come, if children should be guilty of all their Ancestors prevarications. What a world of sins should we be to answer for, personal sins, parents, progenitors sins, to a thousand past generations? A thing with no reason to be imagined.  
This is the first thing.  
II. Secondly, they say that God hath immutably decreed, to leave the fare greatest part of mankind in this impotent condition irrecoverably, and to afford them no power and ability sufficient to make them rise out of sin to newness of life; and this decree he executeth in time; and both these he doth out of his only will and pleasure.  
O this proposition there be three branches.  

1 God decreeth to leave them.  
2 He doth leave them.  
3 He doth both out of his alone pleasure.   
1 God (say they) hath decreed to leave them without sufficient grace, and consequently under an everlasting necessity of sinning. This is the very Helen which they fight for, the main act of that absolute Reprobation, which with joint consent and endeavour they labour to maintain.  
Most of them cast their Reprobation into two acts: a Negative, which is a peremptory denial of grace and glory to some men lying in the fall: and a Positive, which they say is a preordination of the men thus left, to the eternal torments of Hell.  
Others among them define Reprobation by an act merely negative, 
Suffr●g. Brit. A●t. 1. de Repr. thes 1.  and call it [Non Electioner, ●etm● quo staruit non ●o usque miseri, etc.] Thus our Divines in their suffrage ●fi●e it, and in th●ir explication on the definition when they give; they say, that the proper acts of Reprobation, as it standeth opposed to Election, are no other than a denial of that same glory and grace, which are prepared ●e decree of Election for the Sons of God. But in this they all agree, that by the decree of Reprobation, g●ce necessary for the avoiding of sin, is s●ly denied to Reprobates. And if at any time we hear them say, that God hath gratified R●probates with some grace; (for so saith Wa●ns, Reprobates are left 
(g) Wil defence A●t ermine ●e Repr. In sta●u p●istino & sub exercitio arbitrii sui, & administration m●munis provi●.  Under the common providence of God, and consequently under some common endowments: And our Divines in the Synod say, 
(h) Suff. Brit. thes. ●e Reprob. Hos etsi non ●s, peicipe●e t● mul● 〈◊〉 ●neg●mus.  Reprobates though they are not elected, yet receive many of God's graces: they are to be understood, of such gifts and graces as are insufficient to make them avoid sin, as we may see in these two cited places and many more.  
2 God doth actually according to his eternal and unchangeable decree leave the Reprobates in their several times and generations, without his grace, under a necessity of final sin and impenitency.  
This is the second branch, of that second proposition.  
And this must they needs say. For God's dec● cannot be lustrated: what he purposed before time, without a●le he doth in time. I shall not need therefore to prove, that they say so; Nevertheless, to let it be seen how positively and categorically they say so, I will give an instinc or two. The Divines of Geneva at the Synod among their Theses of Reprobation, have this for one— 
(i) Act. Syn. Suffr. Genev. de Reprob. Easdem personas in tempore, ex eodem placito voluntatis vel non vocat, vel vocatos in Ecclesiam. Spiritu regenerationi● non renovat penitissimè, non inserit Christo mysticè, non justificat, etc.  Those whom God hath reprobated, out of the same will by which he hath rejected them, either he calleth not at all, or being called, he reneweth not throughly by the spirit of regeneration, ingraffeth not into Christ mystically, nor justifieth, etc. Like to this is the speech of Lubbert, who speaking of Reprobates, saith; 
(k) Act Syn. Suffr. Lubbert de Reprob. jis vel non revelat viam salutis, vel non donat cos fide, & cognition jesus Christi, non regigniteos, non justificat, sed relinquit cos in peccato & miseria, etc.  To them either he revealeth not the way of salvation, or giveth not faith and regeneration: but leaveth them in sin and misery. The same Author, speaking against the position of the Remonstrants, (viz. that God doth supply to all men sufficient and necessary means of salvation, with an intention of saving them;) setteth down this Antithesis,— 
(l) Deus non subministrat omnibus hominibus necessaria & sufficientia media ad salutem, idque cum intenti●ne servandi.  God doth not administer to all men means needful and sufficient to salvation, and that with an intention of saving them. And to this his Antithesis, Polyander, Walaeus, and Thyseus, 3 other professors of divinity in the Low-Countries did set their hands.  
3 God both decreeth and executeth this leaving of men to themselves, of his alone absolute will and pleasure.  
This is the third branch.  
That they say so, witness the suffrage of our English Divines. 
(m) Suffr. Brit. ar● 1. de reprob. explic. thes. 1. Orthodox. Hanc non-electionem in libertima dei veluntate fundari dicimus.  We affirm, that this nonelection is founded in the most free pleasure of God. And 
(n) Ib thes. 3. heterodox. Nominem post l●psum merâ Dei voluntate praeteritum osse.  that no man lying in the fall is passed over by the mere will of God; is numbered by the same Divines among the Heterodox positions. To this purpose also speak the Ministers of the Palatinate, 
(o) Act Syn. jud.  thes. 3. Causa reprobationis est liberrima ac justissima Dei voluntas  The cause of Reprobation is the most free and just will of God,— 
(p) Ib thes 4. Quod Deus nonnullos praeterit granâ praedicationis evan keliis, ejus causa est idem beneplacitum, sive eadem libera v●luntas.  That God passeth over some and denyeth them the grace of the Gospel, the cause is the same free pleasure of God.  

(q) judic. Theol. Hassiac Decrevit deus quosdam in lapsu & mis●ia relinquere pro suo beneplacito  God decreed to leave some in the fall, of his own good pleasure. Thus the Divines of H●ssen. The proof of this they fetch from the execution of this decree in time,— 
(r) Deus in tempore quosdomè genere humino de relinquit in mise●â●suâ, nec media ad fi●em & conversionem ipsumque etiam salu●em obtinendam necessaria eis confert &c idque pro libertiniâ suâ voluntate.  God doth in time leave some of mankind fallen and doth not bestow upon them means necessary to believe, etc. and this out of his most free pleasure. This they jointly affirm, and prove it by this reason especially; All men were looked on as sinners: If sin therefore were the cause that moved God to reprobate, he should have reprobated or rejected all.  
But he did not reprobate all; therefore for sin he reprobated none, but for his own pleasure, in which we must rest without seeking any other cause.  
Now from these two things laid together, viz. 

1 That God did bring men into a necessity of sinning.  
2 That he hath left the reprobates under this necessity: it will follow that he is the author of the reprobates sins.    
1 Because [Causa causae est causa causati,] The cause of a cause is the cause of its effect, (if there be a necessary subordination between the causes and the effect;) whether it be a cause by acts negative, or positive. But God is the chief or sole cause (by their doctrine) of that which is the necessary and immediate cause of the sins of Reprobates, namely their impotency and want of supernatural grace; therefore he is (by the same doctrine) the true and proper cause of their sins.  
2 Because [Removens prohibens, etc.] that, which withdraweth or withholdeth a thing, which being present would hinder an event, is the cause of that event: as for example, he that cutteth a string in which a stone hangs, is the cause of the falling of that stone; and he that withdraweth a pillar, which being put to, would uphold a house; is the true cause in men's account of the falling of that house. But God (by their opinion) withholdeth from Reprobates that power, which being granted them, might keep them from falling into sin: therefore he becometh a true moral cause of their sins,— 
(s) Ter●ul. l. 1 contr. Martion. c. 22. In cujus manu est quid ne fiat, ei deputatur, ●m jam fit.  In whose power it is that a thing be not done, to him it is imputed, when it is done, saith Tertullian.  
It will not suffice to say, that God by withholding grace from Reprobates becometh only an accidental, not a proper and direct cause of their sins. For a cause is then only accidental in relation to the effect, when the effect is beside the intention and expectation of the cause. For example: digging in a field is then an accidental cause of the finding a bag of gold, when that event is neither expected nor intended by the husbandman in digging, But when the effect is looked for and aimed at, than the cause (though it be the cause only by withholding the impediment) is not accidental; as a pilot who withholdeth his care, and skill from a ship in a storm, foreseeing, that by his neglect the Ship will be drowned, is not to be reputed an accidental, but a direct and proper cause of the loss of this ship. This being so, it followeth, that God by this act and decree of removing and detaining grace necessary to the avoiding of sin, from Reprobates, not as one ignorant and careless what will or shall follow, but knowing infallably what mischief will follow, and determining precisely that, which doth follow; namely, their impenitency and damnation, becometh the proper and direct cause of their sins.  
SEcondly, it opposeth God's Mercy.  
God is merciful; a part it is of his title. Exod. 34.6. 
2 Contrary to his Mercy.  merciful and gracious. He is mercy in the abstract, 1 Joh. 4.16. God is love, a Father of mercies, and God of all consolations, 2 Cor. 1.3. a Saviour of men, 1 Tim. 4.10. And thus the Church hath always taken him to be. And therefore hath of old styled him in her liturgy, A God, whose nature and property is always to have mercy and to forgive.  
Two ways is God's mercy spoken of in Scripture, absolutely and comparatively.  
(1) Absolutely, and so it is set out in high and stately terms. It is called rich mercy, Eph. 2.4. great kindness. jonah. 4.2. Abundant mercy, 1 Pet. 1.2. love without height or depth, length or breadth, or any dimensions,— love passing knowledge, Eph. 3.18. So great it is, that Jonah could not entreat him to punish the little, infant, harmless Ninivites with temporal death for the sins of their guilty parents jonah 4.11.  
(2) Comparatively: with two things it is compared.  

1 His own justice.  
2 The love that dwelleth in the creature: and is advanced above both.   
I. With his own justice it is compared and advanced above it: not in its essence (for all God's excellencies are infinitely good; and one is not greater than another) but in its expressions, and some things that have relation to it: particularly in these;  
(1) In its naturalness and dearness to God. It is said of mercy, it pleaseth him, Micah. 7.18. but justice is called his strange work [ali●num à naturâ suâ] Esay 28.21. He doth not afflict willingly, nor grieve the children of men. Lamentat. 3. 33.  
(2) In the frequent exercise of itself. He is said to be slow of anger, but abundant in goodness. Exod. 34.6. mercies are bestowed every day; judgements inflicted but now and then, sparingly, and after a long time of forbearance, when there is no remedy, 2 Chron. 36.15. All the day long have I stretched out my hands to a gainsaying and rebellious people, Esay, 65.2. That is, I have been patiented a long time, and in that time I have not been idle, but employed in exhorting, promising and showing mercy, that so I might do you good. God waits a great while for the conversion of sinners, as Mariners do for their tide: and at last with much ado, if there be a necessity, he chideth and fighteth.  
(3) In its amplitude or objects, to whom it is extended; Visiting the iniquities of the fathers upon the children to the third and fourth generation, but showing mercy to thousands, Exod. 20.5. In these words God implieth, that his mercy reacheth farther than his justice, and that, how much 3 or 4 come short of a thousand; so much doth his justice come short of his mercy in the exercise of it.  
(4) In the occasions that move God to exercise them. It is a great matter that moveth God to punish, as we may see, Gen. 6.5, 6, 7, 12, 13. when the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and all flesh had corrupted his way, than God thinketh of a flood. He would not destroy the Amorites, till their wickedness was full. How oft would I have gathered thee? saith CHRIST to jerusalem, Matthew 23.37. that is, I have not taken advantages against thee, nor upon the first, second, or third unkindness, cast thee off: small matters have not moved me to destroy thee, O jerusalem. But how small an occasion doth God take to spare men? when he had examined Sodom, and found their sins to be answerable to the cry, yet then, for ten righteous men's sakes would he have spared Sodom, Gen. 18.32. Nay, he would have spared Jerusalem, if the Prophet could by his searching have found one man who did execute judgement and seek the truth. Jer. 5.1. What a slender humiliation made him to spare wicked Ahab and his house a long time? 1. Kings, 21.29. And the repentance of Ninive, whose wickedness cried to the Lord for vengeance, jonah. 1.2. did easily procure her a pardon.  
Thus is God's mercy advanced above his justice.  
2 It is compared also with the affection of a father to his son, of a tender mother to her child, and of the most affectionate bruits to their brood, and set above them all. It goeth beyond a fathers to his son, Mat. 7.11. If you that are evil, can give good gifts to your children; how much more will your heavenly Father give good things to them that ask him? What doth this (quanto magis) imply, but that God's love outstrips a fathers! And so it doth a mothers too. Esay, 49.15. Can a woman forget her sucking child, that she should not have compassion upon the Son of her womb? yea, they may forget; yet I will not forget thee. Women are compassionate toward their children, because they are the fruit of their wombs, and a part of themselves: but most indulgent are they toward those children, to whom they are Nurses, as well as mothers, to their sucking children. And yet mothers may forget even their sucking children: but as for God, he can never forget his children.  
Again, God compareth himself with one of the most affectionate females among unreasonable creatures, (the Hen) Math. 23.37. O ●erusalem, how oft would I have gathered thee, as a Hen gathers her chickens under her wings, etc. No Bird (saith S. Austin) expresseth such tender love to her young ones, as the●en doth; 
(t) Aug tract 15. in joh. pag. 46. Videmu● nidi●are passeres quos●bet ante oculos nostros: hirundines, ciconias, columbas, quotidit videmus nidificare; quos nisi quando in nidis videmus, parents esse non agnoscimus. Gallina verò sic infirmatur in pullis suis, ut etiamsi ipsi pulli non sequantur, filios non videas, matrem tamen intelligas. Ita fit alis demissis, plumis hispida, voce rauca, omnibus membris demissa & abjecta; ut (quemadmodum dixi) etfis filios non videas, matrem tamen intelligas.  No Fowls discover themselves to be mothers, so much as Hens do. Others, when we see them in their Nests with their young, we know them to be mothers, but no way else: but the Hen discovereth herself to be so ev● when her chickens do not follow her; her feathers stand up, her wings hang down, she clocketh mournfully and goeth feebly; so that we may know her to be a mother, when yet we cannot see her brood.  
Such another speech he hath in another place, and concludeth it with these words. 
(w) Id. in Ps. 58. p. 212. B. C. Quare ergo Dominus, nisi propter hoc, gallina esse voluit, in Sancta Scriptura dicens, O jerusalem, jerusalem, quoties volui te congregare ut gallina, etc.  Our Lord did therefore compare himself to a Hen rather, then to any other creature, because of her singular expressions of love to her young ones, even when they are out of her sight.  
By these things we see how highly the Scriptures speak of God's mercy, especially in its expressions to mankind, to whom he hath borne a greater love, and for whom he hath declared himself to have done fare greater matters, then for the Angels; the wisdom of God delighting itself in the children of men, before the world was. Prov. 8. 31● and gratifying them in the fullness of time with the assumption of their nature. (Heb. 2.16.) and the redemption of their souls with his blood. 1. Pet. 1. etc.  
Now with such a Mercy cannot stand such a decree: absolute Reprobation being once granted, we may (me think) more properly call God a Father of cruelties, then of mercies, and of [hatred] rather then of [love.] And the Devil's names [Satan, and 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉] an adversary, a destroyer may be fit for him, then [〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉] a Saviour, which I tremble to think. Doth mercy please him, when he hath made a decree which showeth fare more severity toward poor men than mercy? Is he slow to anger, when he hath taken such a small and speedy occasion to punish the greater part of men for ever; and for one sin once committed, hath shut them up under invincible sin and damnation? Is his mercy abundant, doth it reach further than justice; when it is tucked up so short, limited to a very few selected ones, when a hundred for one at least (take in all parts of the world) are avoidable cast away out of his only will and pleasure? Or doth his love pass knowledge, when we see daily fare greater love, than this in men and other creatures? What Father and mother (that have not only cast off fatherhood and mother-hood, but humanity too) would determine their children to certain death, nay to cruel torments worse than death for one only offence, and that committed too, not by them in their own persons, but by some other, and imputed only to them?  
But to deliver things a little more closely. Four things (in my conceit) being well and distinctly considered, do make it apparent, that this decree is compatible with God's mercy.  
1 That Adam's sin is the sin of man's nature only and no man's personal transgression, but Adam's: it was neither committed nor consented to, by any of his posterity in their own persons.  
2 That it was the sin of our nature, not by generation (as I have showed) but by Gods own voluntary imputation.  
3 That God did pardon it in Adam, (for so it is generally believed;) who did actually and freely commit it in his own person.  
4 That CHRIST came into the world to take away [Peccatum mundi] the sin of the world. Joh. 1.29. That God either did or might have satisfied his wronged justice, in the blood of the Covenant for all mankind, and without any impeachment to justice, and have opened a way of salvation to all and every man.  
These considerations (I think) being well digested, will make any man to think, that either there is no decree of absolute Reprobation; or that God is not merciful to men at all: much less more merciful to them then to other creatures; but more sharp a great deal and severe than he is to 

1 any Creatures in the world.  
2 the very Devils themselves.    
1 Then to any other creatures. For they, even the basest among them, though perhaps they have but a despicable being, yet they have such a being as is fare better than no being at all: Whereas men are determined by his omnipotent decree to such a woeful being, as is a thousand times worse than no being at all. What man would have accepted of life, when first he entered upon possession of it, if he had known upon what lamentable conditions, it was to be tendered? Or (did men firmly believe this decree) they would at a venture with job curse their birth day, be released willingly from the right of creatures, and desire their immortal souls might vanish into nothing. Malunt extingui penitus, 
Minut. Felix pag. 113.  quam ad supplicia reparari (as Minutius Felix speaks in another case) And Parents out of mere compassion to their children, would wish that they might be borne toads and serpents, rather than men; creatures whose beings at last shall be resolved into nothing, rather than immortal spirits.  
2 To the very Devils also (supposing this decree) is God more merciful, then to men; and yet the Devils are set forth in Scripture for the greatest spectacles of Gods ireful severity. In one thing, this decree maketh most men and Devils equal, [Vtrisque desperata salus,] they are both sure to be damned: but in three things, men are in a fare worse condition by it.  
(1) In their appointment to hell, not for their own, proper, personal sins, for which only the Devils are damned: but for the sin of another man, that lived and sinned long before they were borne.  
(2) In their unavoidable destination to endless misery, under a colour of the contrary. The Devils, as they are decreed to damnation, so they know it, they expect it, they look for no other. But men, who are appointed to wrath, are yet fed up with hopes of salvation and made to believe that the whole business is put into their hands; so as if they perish, it is not [defectu misericordiae] because God will have no mercy on them, but [defectu voluntatis propriae,] because they will not be saved: when yet indeed there is no such matter.  
Now if it be worse to be deluded in misery, then simply to be miserable; then is the condition of men in this respect (by this decree) much worse than the state of Devils.  
(3) In their obligation to believe, and the aggravation of their punishment by not believing. The Devils, because they must be damned, are not commanded to believe in CHRIST, nor is their punishment heightened by their not believing: 
(z) Senten. super. 8. c. Gall Qui dicit quòd non omnes homines velit deus salvos fieri, sed certum numerum praedestinatorun; dutiùs loquitur, quam loquendum est de altitudine infcrutabilis gra●ae Dei.  but miserable men, who by this decree have no more liberty to escape Hell, than the Devils, must yet be tied to believe in CHRIST, and have their torments increased, if they believe not. These things being so, (I think) I may conclude with the words of Prosper. (x) He which saith, that God would not have all men to be saved, but a certain set number of predestinate persons only: he speaketh more harshly than he should of the height of God's unsearchable grace. Nay, he speaketh that which cannot stand with his infinite grace and mercy, especially to the sons of men.  
Nor doth that give me satisfaction, which is usually answered, namely, that God by this absolute decree doth fully manifest his justice and mercy too: his justice toward Reprobates, his mercy toward the Elect; and that it is necessary his decrees should so be ordered, as that both these may be clearly declared by them. For,  
1 Gods mercy is revealed to be rich mercy, abundant, long suffering, surmounting justice, and beyond understanding. Now such a mercy set forth with such titles, clothed with such properties, is no ways manifested by this decree.  
2 Neither is God's pure and spotless justice set forth by it, as I now come to show: this being my third argument drawn from God's attributes against absolute Reprobation.  
THirdly, this absolute Reprobation is incompatible with God's Justice. 
3 Against God's Justice.   
The Lord (saith David) is righteous in all his ways, Psal. 145. The judgements of the Lord (saith Solomon) are weight and measure. Prov. 16.11. Exact and without exception. So apparently just is God, that he offereth the justice of his decrees and ways to the trial of humane understanding. Esay, 5.3. Judge I pray you between me and my Vineyard. Those to whom the Vineyard was committed, slew their master's heir being sent unto them: What will the Lord of the Vineyard think ye (saith CHRIST) do therefore when he cometh, to those husbandmen? Math. 21.40. In which words he appealeth to their judgement: nay, he is content to prove himself and his dealings to be just by plain and evident arguments, Ezek. 18.25. etc. Are not my ways equal, and yours unequal, O ye house of Israel? And he permits Abraham when he was in his greatest humility acknowledging himself to be but dust and ashes, yet to reason with him about the equity of his doings. Wilt thou slay the righteous with the wicked? Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right? Gen. 18.23, 25. And Moses also is suffered to argue God's justice in the same manner. Shall one man sin, 
Numb. 16.22.  and wilt thou be wrath with all the Congregation! In a word, so evidently just is God in all his proceed, that many both good and bad, who have felt his justice, have cleared God, and deeply charged themselves. Witness Ezra, Nehemiah, and Daniel in their 9th. Chapters: and Adonibezek, jud. 1.7. And the Emperor Mauricius, who having seen his children butchered, and waiting every minute for the bloody stroke of death, broke out into these words. 
(y) Osiand. Eccl. hist. Cent. S. pag. 261. Iustu●es domine & justum est ja●um tuu●.  Righteous art thou O Lord, and just is thy Judgement.  
With this inviolable justice of God, cannot absolute Reprobation (of such especially, as are commanded to believe and are called to salvation) be reconciled.  
My Reasons are these.  
1 Because it maketh God to punish the Righteous with the wicked.  
The Sublapsarians say directly in plain terms, that God decreed to destruction men considered without sin, and therefore yet righteous. And the Sublapsarians say as much in effect; for they say two things.  
(1) That God did lay a necessity upon every man of being borne in Original sin (as I have noted before.)  
(2) That he hath determined for that sin to cast away the greatest part of mankind for ever: and so they make God to do that by two acts, the one accompanying the other, which the other say he did by one.  

Calv. Instit. 3. cap. 23. §. 23.  This is so clear a case, that Calvin with some others have not sticked to say, that God may with as much justice determine men to Hell the first way, as the latter. (See Jnstit. l. 3. c. 23. §. 7.) Where against those who deny that Adam fell by God's decree, he reasoneth thus; All men are made guilty of Adam's sin by God's absolute decree alone: Adam therefore sinned by this only decree. 
(z) Quid eos prohib●t fateri de uno homine, quod inviti de toto humano genere concedunt? Quid enim tergiversando luderent operam?  What lets them to grant that of one man, which they must grant of all men? And a little after he saith: 
(a) Bonos istos justitiae Dei patronos perplexos haerere in fest●â, altas verò trabes superare, nimis absurdum est.  It is too absurd, that these kind Patrons of God's justice, should thus stumble at a straw and leap over a block. God may with as much justice decree Adam's sin and men's damnation out of his only will and pleasure; as out of that will and pleasure, the involving of men in the guilt of the first sin and their damnation for it: that is, the substance of his reasoning. To the same purpose, speaketh Maccovius. From hence we may see (saith he) what to judge of that opinion of out adversaries: viz. That God, cannot justly ordain men to destruction without the consideration of sin. 
(b) Maccov disp. 18. p. 16. Nam dicant (quaeso) nobis, quid majus sit, imputate alicui culpam alterius, & propter ipsam, illum morte aeternâ plectere; an verò ordinare ad interitum. At hoc potest sine ullâ laesione justitiae suae: ergo multò magis potest illud posterius.  Let them tell me which is greater, to impute to one man the sin of another, and punish him for it with eternal death, or to ordain simply, without looking at sin to destruction: surely no man will deny the first of these to be greater. But this God may do without any wrong to Justice, much more therefore may he do the other. To these consenteth Dr. Twisse and saith. 
(c) Dr. Twiss. Vind. gra. l. 2. digr. 1. pag. 15. Quod potest Deus intercedente liberâ suà constitutione, illud etiam absolutè poterit, vel sine aliqua constitutione inter●dente.  If God may ordain men to Hell for Adam's sin, which is derived unto them by God's only constitution, he may as well do it absolutely, without any such constitution. And it is most true, it is all one in substance, simply to decree the misery of an innocent man, and to involve him in a sin that he may be brought to misery.  
Neither of these decrees (I take it) are just.  
2 The second reason, why it is against God's justice, is, because it maketh him to require faith in CHRIST of those to whom he hath precisely in his absolute purpose denied both a power to believe, and a CHRIST to believe in.  
That God bindeth Reprobates to believe as well as others, it is the constant doctrine of Divines; among whom Zanchius delivereth it for a Thesis, 
(d) Zanch. l. 5. the nature, Dei, cap. 2. q. 1. de praed. Sanctorii. Quisque mandato Dei tenetur credere se ad salutem aeternam in Christo fuisse electum; maximè autem is qui fidem in Christum profitetur. Cum dicemus unumquemque teneri hoc credere neminem, ne Reprobos quidem, qui neque unquam ciedent, nec credere in Christum possunt, excipimus; & nisi credant gravissimè omnium peccant.  Every man (especially he that professeth CHRIST) is bound to believe, that he is chosen in CHRIST to salvation; every man without exception (even the Reprobate himself:) and if he believe it not, he committeth a most grievous sin above all others. This he proveth by that speech of CHRIST, joh. 16.9. The Spirit shall convince the world of sin, because they believe not in me. Reprobates therefore are bound to believe. Mr. Perkins also saith something to the same purpose. 
(e) Perk lib. de Praed. pag. 89. Obj. 3. Quisque in Ecclesia mandato Dei [cicde Evangelio] tenetur credere, se redemptum esse per Christum, etiam improbus, perinde ac Electus, sed aliâ tamen & aliâ ratione: Electus tenetur credere, ut credendo particeps siat electionis; reprobus, ut non credendo fiat inexcusabilis, etiam ex intentione Dei.  Every one in the Church by virtue of this commandment [believe the Gospel] is bound to believe that he is redeemed by CHRIST, as well the Reprobate as the Elect, though for a different reason: the Elect, that by believing he may be saved, the Reprobate, that by not believing he may be without excuse: and this out of the very purpose of God.  
But now they cannot in justice be bound to believe, if they be absolute Reprobates, for three causes.  
(1) Because they have no power to believe: they want it and must want it for ever. God hath decreed they shall never have any to their dying day. [Nemo obligatur ad impossibilia] no man can be justly tied to impossible performances. Because no man can fly like a bird, or reach heaven with the top of his finger; therefore, God cannot with justice exact of any the performance of these actions: nor can he of Reprobates the obedience of Faith, if it be not possible to them.  
(2) Because it is not God's unfeigned will they shall believe. No man will say, that it is Gods serious will, that such a man shall live, when it is his will, that he shall never have the concourse of his providence and the act of preservation. Nor can we say, that God doth in good earnest will that those men should believe, whom he will not furnish with necessary power to believe. It may rather be said, it is Gods unfeigned will they shall not believe, because it is his will they shall want power to believe. For it is a Maxim in Logic, [Qui vult aliquid in causâ, vult effectum ex istâ causa profluentem.] He who willeth a thing in the cause, willeth the effect that necessarily floweth from that cause. Now if it be the certain will of God, that Reprobates shall in no wise believe, he cannot with reason and equity tie them to believe. For than he tieth them to an act contrary to his determinate will.  
(3) Because they have no object of Faith, no Christ to believe in: [Credere jubet, & fidei nullum obiectum ponit.] He commandeth to believe, and affordeth no object to believe in: this soundeth not well. The Devils have no part in Christ or the new Covenant. We will not therefore say, that God can justly bind them to believe, or punish them as transgressors of the Covenant; because they believe not. How then can we say, that God can justly require faith of Reprobates, or destroy them for not believing; if they have indeed no more part in Christ or in the Covenant, than the Devils have? If a man should command his servant to eat and punish him for not eating, and in the mean time fully resolve, that he shall have no meat to eat; would any reasonable man say, that such a man were just in the command or punishment? Change but the name and the case is the same. Again, that Christ died for Reprobates (by the Doctrine of absolute Reprobation) is a lie; and can God justly bind men to believe a lie?  
This is the second reason.  
3 The third reason why the absolute decree infringeth God's justice is, because it will have him to punish men for omission of an act, which is made impossible to them by his own decree: not by that decree alone, by which he determined to give them no power to believe, having lost it; but by that decree also, by which he purposed, that we should partake with Adam in his sin, and be stripped of all that supernatural power, which we had by God's free grant bestowed upon us in Adam before he fell.  
These are the reasons which move me to think, that this absolute decree is repugnant to God's justice.  
Three things are usually answered.  
1 That God's ways may be very just, and yet seem unjust to man's erring understanding: and so is this decree, though flesh and blood will not yield it to be so.  
This answer I take to be false, and the contradictory to it to be true, namely, that nothing is truly just, which humane understanding purged from prejudice, corrupt affections and customs, hath in all ages, places and persons judged to be unjust. The reason is, because God hath by the light of nature, and those general impressions of good and evil, honest and dishonest, just and unjust, made in the hearts of men, sufficiently instructed and enabled them to judge what is just and what is not. When a thing is done, reason so qualified is able to say, This is just, or this is unjust whether it be done by God or man. For (virtues in men being but the image of those perfections that dwell in God) justice in men and God are for substance but one and the same thing, though infinitely differing in degree, as the greater and lesser light. That this power is ingraffed in men, God himself (who best knoweth with what endowments he hath beautified his creature,) hath sufficiently signified in those Scriptures, where he calleth on men to be judges of the equity of his ways. judge I pray you between me and my vineyard, Esay 5. Judge, O ye house of Israel, are not my ways equal and your ways unequal? Ezek. 18.25. God would never put them upon the trial of reason, if he had not made it able to examine them. The incarnation of the son of God, his birth of a Virgin, his dying, the resurrection of the body, and such mysteries, as are peculiar to the Gospel, and the proper objects of the Christian faith; God hath not offered to the trial of our understandings, bu● rather derideth those, that presume to judge of them by reason. 1 Cor. 1.20. Where is the Scribe? where is the wise? when is the disputer of this world? and the reason is, because, these things being supernatural, and therefore not discernible by natural power; man is no competent judge of them by his natural understanding, nor may adventure upon the trial and judgement of them with less danger, than Vzzah look into the Ark, for [Scrutator majestatis opprimetur à gloriâ] 〈◊〉 that pryeth into God's majesty, will be overwhelmed of his glory. But of the justice of his decrees and ways, he maketh him a judge; because, the common notions of just and unjust being imprinted in nature, he is able by natural reason to apprehend what is just in divine acts, as well as in his own.  
2 It is answered, that these decrees are set down is Scripture to be the will of God: and therefore, they must needs be just. For Gods will is the rule of all righteousness.  
To this answer, I have these things to reply.  
(1) This rule in Divinity is much abused by the maintainers of absolute Reprobation, and may not be admitted in their sense and meaning. For Gods will is not a rule of justice to himself, as if things were therefore just, because he willeth them and worketh them: but his justice rather is a rule of his will and works, which are the expressions of his will. He therefore maketh decrees and executeth them, because they are agreeable to that justice which dwells in the divine nature: as he maketh nothing, which hath not [potentiam objectivam,] a power of being created without implying contradiction to himself or any thing in him: so he willeth and doth nothing, but that which may be willed or done, [saluâ justitiâ] without wrong to his justice. 
Hierom: Proem. in Hosea.  St. Hierom speaking of the Prophet Hoseas taking a wife of fornications, Hosea 1.2. saith it was done [in typo] typically, not really, [quia si fia● turpissimum est,] because if had been indeed done, it had been a most foul thing. But thou wilt answer (saith he) [Deo jubente nihil turpe est] God commanding it, nothing is dishonest. Thus much we say, (saith the Father,) that God commandeth nothing but what is honest, but he doth not by commanding dishonest things, make those things honest which are abominable: plainly giving us to see what he thought, viz. that God doth not will a thing and so make it good; but willeth it, because it is in itself good antecedently and before the act of Gods will about it.  
And thus much doth Zanchy (though a rigid maintainer of absolute reprobation) not obscurely confess in his Treatise, the nativ. Dei: where he letteth fall such speeches as make God's justice antecedent to his will; and therefore the rule of it, rather than a thing regulated by it. 
(f) Zanch. l. 3. the nat. Dei c. 4 q. 9 thes. 2. Neque aliquid velle potest, quod justum non sit.  Neither can God will anything (saith he) which is not just. And again, 
(g) Quod placet principi, legis habet vigorem.  The Prince's pleasure hath the strength of a Law; is a rule (saith he) among the Canonists: but 
(h) Ibi maxime verum est, ubi rex justus est, & nihil vult nisi justum. Quanto magis in regno Dei, etc.  this is true, where the King is just and willeth nothing but what is just. In which words, he plainly maketh the justice of the King antecedent to that will of his, which must be a law. Many more speeches he useth there to the same purpose. God's will therefore, is not a rule of justice to himself. To whom then?  
To us. For by it we are, (1) to square all our thoughts, words, and deeds. (2) to examine them when they are spoken and done: [Primum in aliquo genere est regula posteriorum, & supremum inferiorum.]  
(2) I reply, that these absolute decrees of men's inevitable salvation and damnation are no parts of Gods revealed will. The Scriptures teach us no such matter.  
And therefore to say they are, is but a mere begging of the question. It hath always been ordinary with false Teachers, to make God's word a Father to their false opinions, that they may stand the faster and win the greater credit. The Papists ground their transubstantiation, and the Lutherans their consubstantiation and ubiquity upon the Scripture, [Hoc est corpus meum] This is my body, Math. 26. And the defenders of absolute Reprobation do so too: they make their cause to be Gods, and entitle his word to it; because they see it is the surest way to defend it: being herein like to some contentious people, who being in law and having a bad cause which they are like to lose, they entitle the King to it, that they may the better uphold it.  
(3) Absolute Reprobation can be no part of Gods revealed will. The reason is, because, it is odious to right reason, and begetteth absurdities. For [Nulla veritas parit absurda] no truth begetteth absurdities. Divers truths are revealed in Scripture which are above, but not contrary to right reason, whether they be matters of faith or life: faith and reason, nature and scripture are both Gods excellent gifts: and therefore though there may be a disproportion, yet there can be no repugnancy between them. The worship which God requireth, is [cultus 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉] a reasonable service. Rom. 12.2. and the word of God is [〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉,] milk reasonable and without guile. 1 Pet. 2.2.  
These things therefore being laid together, it will appear to be but a mere shift and evasion, when absolute Reprobation is proved to be unjust; and therefore unworthy of God; to say, Gods will is the rule of justice: this is part of Gods revealed will; and therefore most just, whatsoever reason may cavil and say to the contrary.  
3 Their third answer is, that God is not bound to restore men power to believe, because they once had it and have lost it through their own fault, as a master is not bound to renew his servants stock, if he have wasted it by bad husbandry.  
This answer doth not satisfy me. For I grant, that God is simply and absolutely bound to no man, because he is [agent liherrimum] a most free dispenser of his own favours, where and what, and to whom he will, and no man is aforehand with God: [Quis prior illi dedit ut retribuatur] Who hath given unto him and it shall be recompensed again? Rom. 11.35.  
But yet he is conditionally bound: for he hath determined and tied himself 3 ways especially.  
(1) Decernendo, by decreeing. The Almighty is eternally subject to his own ordinances, or else he should be mutable. And therefore, what gifts soever he hath decreed to men, he is bound to give them by virtue of his own decree.  
(2) Promittendo, by promising. We use to say promise is debt, it is justice to perform what it was free to promise: and whosoever he be that promiseth and payeth not, is guilty of a trespass (witness Ananias and Sapphira;) and unworthy of the kingdom of heaven, Psal. 15.4. If therefore God hath made a promise of any gift or grace to men; his promise bindeth him to performance, Name semell emissum volat irrevocabile verbum.  
(3) Legem ferendo, by giving men a law to keep; which without supernatural grace they can no more keep; then they can eat a rock. By such a law the supreme Lawgiver bindeth himself to his people, to give them such power as may enable them to keep that law, or else he becometh (as the evil servant in the parable styled him) a hard master, reaping where he sowed not, and the very true and proper cause of the transgression of that law. We shall find God always giving strength when he giveth a command. When he commandeth the creatures, to increase and multiply; he gave them a multiplying virtue: when CHRIST bade the lame man arise, take up his bed and walk; he put into his limbs an ability of walking: when Adam had a spiritual law given him to obey, which without spiritual strength he could not; God gave him strength answerable to the law, as Divines agree, consenting to that noted speech of St. Austin, that Adam had [posse non cadere] though he never had [non posse cadere] a power and possibility, though no necessity of continuing in obedience.  
That I may bring this home to my purpose, I say, that God is bound to restore unto men power to believe, supposing these things that follow.  

1 That he hath vouchsafed to enter into a new Covenant of peace with men, when he needed not.  
2 That in that Covenant, he requireth obedience at men's hands, even at theirs that perish.  
3 That he promiseth eternal life to every man, if he obey and keep the Covenant.  
4 That he punisheth the disobedient with everlasting death.   
These particulars supposed, the most free God who is absolutely bound to none, is engaged to give ability of believing unto men: nor can he justly without this gift punish the disobedient any more than a Magistrate having put out a man's eyes for an offence; can command this man with justice to read a book; and because he readeth not, put him to death: or then a Master (that I may return the Simile in the answer) when he hath taken away from his servant the stock which he hath misemployed, can afterward exact of him a just employment of the same stock, and punish him, because he employeth it not.  
I conclude therefore, that the absolute and inevitable reprobation of such men as are called to believe in CHRIST, and punished if they believe not; is utterly repugnant to the justice of God, and therefore can be no part of his word.  

4 Opposite to God's Truth.  FOurthly, it oppugneth the truth and sincerity of God.  
God is a God of truth, Deut. 32.4. Truth itself, joh. 14.6 so called, because he is the fountain of truth; and the perfection of truth without the least mixture of falsehood. The strength of Jsraell cannot lie, 
Rom. 3.4.  1 Sam. 15.29. Let God be true and every man a liar (saith the Apostle;) that he might be justified in his sayings, and overcome when he is judged, that is, men may lie, (for all men are liars:) but God can never lie. If any man would go about to challenge him with untruth, his challenge would easily appear to be a calumny: the truth of God like the glorious Sun will break through all the clouds of false accusations, that seek to obscure it. [Simile gaudet Simili] Like loveth his like, God loveth such, as are true of heart, Psal. 51.6. and hath an hypocrite in utter detestation: and therefore, he must needs be true himself. No man (for aught I know) doubteth of it. But by absolute Reprobation God is made untrue and Hypocritical in his dealings with men, and in all matters appertaining to their eternal state; particularly, ¹ in his commands, ² in his offers of grace and glory, ³ in his threats, ⁴ passionate wishes and desires of men's chief good, and ⁵ in his expostulations and commiseration also.  
1 In his commands. For by this doctrine God commandeth those men to repent and believe, whom he secretly purposeth shall not believe. Though God command Reprobates to believe the Gospel, 
(i) L. contr. schafm. pa. 60. Etsi reprobos mandat Deus ut evangelio credant, non vult tamen ut credant.  yet he will not have them believe; saith Piscator. Now whom God commandeth to believe and repent, those he willeth outwardly, should believe and repent, for by his commandments he signifieth his good will and pleasure: and he must inwardly and hearty will it too, or else he dissembleth. For words if they be true, are an interpretation of the mind: when they are not, they are mere impostures and simulations.  
2 In his offers of grace and glory, which he maketh to such as refuse them and perish for refusing them, as well as to those who do accept them to their Salvation.  
This is evident, Esay, 65.2. I have spread out my hands all the day long. To whom? to a rebellious people, and Math. 22. we read, that those men were invited to the wedding, that came not: and Act. 3.26. there 'tis said to the jews who had denied Christ, as vers. 14. To you hath God sent his Son JESUS to bless you, in turning every one of you from your iniquities. How oft (saith Christ) would I have gathered you? speaking of such as neglected their visitation, and so lost their salvation. It is evident also by reason. For, as many as are under the Commandment, are under the Promise too; as we may see, Act. 2.38, 39 Repent and be Baptised every one of you, and ye shall receive the gift of the holy Ghost: for to you and your children is the Promise made.  
In which words, Peter maketh the command and the promise of equal extent, both universal. And there is cause why: for he maketh the Promise his motive to persuade obedience to the command: and it would not have reached home, if it had not respected all those, to whom the command was given. No man, Reprobate or other, thinketh any less: every man that heareth the Gospel preached; taketh himself to be under the gracious offer of eternal life; and upon these thoughts hath some desires, some hopes of it, and stirreth up himself to forsake some pleasing sins, which otherwise he would not part with, and do some unwelcome duties, which otherwise he would not do.  
But now God's meaning is [by this doctrine] that the most of those to whom he offereth his grace and glory, shall have neither. And so Piscator saith,— 
(k) l. de praed. contr● schaf. pa. 74. Gratia non ●ffertur à Deo singulis (licet vocatis) animo communicandi came, sed solis Electis.  Grace is not offered by God even to those who are called, with a meaning to give it, but to the Elect only. In the same Book he hath such another speech. 
(l) Non vult Deus reprobos credere, licet linguâ profiteatu● se velle. pag. 143.  Though God in words protest he would have Reprobates to believe, yet indeed he will not have them. They make God to deal with men in matters of Salvation, as the Poets feign the Gods to have dealt with poor Tantalus. They placed him in a clear and goodly river up to the very chin, and under a tree which bear much sweet and pleasant fruit that did almost touch his lips: but this they did with a purpose that he should taste of neither. For when he put his mouth to the water to drink, it waved away from him: and when he reached his hand to the fruit to have eaten of it, it withdrew itself presently out of his reach: so as he could neither eat nor drink. Just so dealeth God with Reprobates (by their Doctrine:) he placeth them under the plentiful means of Salvation, offereth it to them so plainly, that men would think they might have it when they will; and yet intendeth fully they shall never have it, withholding from them either the first grace that they cannot believe, or the second grace that they cannot persevere. Did not those Gods delude Tantalus? yes doubtless. And if God do so with Reprobates; what doth he but delude them, and dissemble with them in his fairest and likeliest offers of Salvation that he makes them? And this do Zanchius and Bucer grant by evident consequence, as appeareth by a speech or two of theirs, which cannot stand with their conclusion; and therefore [I suppose] fallen unwarily from them.  
Zanch●us telleth us roundly, that every man, who is called, is bound to think that he is elected, otherwise he doth offer great injury to God, and 
(m) Zanch. l. 5. the not Dei c. 2. Pierced inger● Deum mondacii qui illi in verbo dicit, se velle salurem ejus, & in hunc finem ad Ch●istum vocasse.  accuse him of lying, which saith to him in his word, that he desireth his Salvation, and for this cause hath called him. In which speech he plainly implieth, that if God call a man whom he hath absolutely rejected, he doth but delude him when he calleth him. The like speech hath Bucer 
(n) Bucer in c. 8 ad Rom. q. de praed. Primum quod Deo debes, est ut credas esse te ab eo praedestinatum. Nam id ni credas, facis eum tibi, cum te ad salutem vocat per Evangelium, illudere.  A man must believe that he is predestinate: or else he maketh God to mock him, when he calleth him.  
A man therefore that is not predestinate, but an absolute Reprobate; when he is called to Salvation, is but deluded: it is the necessary resultance of their speeches.  
If a Creditor should resolve, upon no terms to forgive his Debtor one farthing of his debt, and yet make him offers to remit the whole upon some conditions, and bind his offers with a deep and solemn oath: would not we say, that he were a rank dissembler and a mere deluder of his poor debtor? We can say no less of God, if it be true, that he hath irrevocably decreed at no hand to save such particular men, and yet promiseth and sweareth that he will save them, if they will believe his promises, and repent. What can such oaths and promises be, but mere delusions of miserable men?  
3 In his threats and comminations also (by this doctrine) is God made to be hollow and deceitful. For against what sins are threats denounced? Always against actual sins; we never read that they are thundered out against us for Original sin: they intimate therefore that the sins for which men go to Hell, are their actual transgressions. But if it be true that God decreed men to Hell for original sin, that which those threats import and signify is not true, and so God is not sincere in them. Besides, all threatenings imply that the evil threatened may be avoided. For therefore are they denounced, that men might by them be brought to repentance, and so escape the evils threatened. But if some men be peremptorily ordained to destruction, than their destruction cannot be prevented: and so the threatenings of damnation (in this respect also) do signify an untruth, and God in them dealeth not plainly with men.  
4 In all the other things before mentioned, is God full of guile too (by this opinion;) namely, in his—  
(1) Passionate wishes, that even those men might repent, that repent not, and might be saved that through their impenitency are not saved. Of these we read, Deut. 5.29. O that there were such a heart in them to fear me, that it might go well with them. And, Psal. 81.11. O, that my people had harkened, and Israel had walked in my ways, etc. And, Esay. 48.18. O, that thou hadst harkened to my Commandments. etc.  
(2) In his mournful Expostulations, Esay. 5.3. Judge (I pray you) between me and my Vineyard, what could I have done more for my Vineyard? And jeremiah 2. throughout the whole Chapter, especially ver. 31. Have I been a Wilderness to Israel, or a land of darkness? And ver. 32. Can a Maid forget her Ornaments, or a Bride her attire? Yet my people have forgotten me days without number. Ezek. 33.11. Turn 〈◊〉 turn ye: why will ye dye, O house of Israel?  
(3) In his melting commiserations of the woeful condition of foolish men, who would not be reclaimed. How shall I give thee up O Ephraim? How shall I deliver thee O Israel? My repentings are kindled together, my heart is turned within me. Hos. 11.8. O jerusalem, jerusalem, which killest the Prophets, and stonest them that are sent to thee, etc.  
In all these there is but little sincerity, if there be a secret resolution that the most of those, towards whom those wishes, chide, and pitiful bemoanings are used, shall be damned without remedy. God's fairest offers, his sweetest invitations, his greatest sympathies, and amplest courtesies, (if this doctrine be true) come little short (I think) of Absolom● feast, joabs' congey, the kiss of judas, and the Hyaenaes' tears. For in all these [aliud animo vult, aliud verbis significat] he saith one thing and meaneth another, and therefore dissembleth.  
Nay, the whole Ministry (wherein God commandeth, offereth, chideth, entreateth, lamenteth, etc.) if this be true, is but a mere imposture, a giving of words without any meaning of answerable deeds; and an imposture so much the greater, by how much the show of kindness is the heartier. For how can a good thing be offered with stronger shows of a good meaning, then when it is offered with exhortations and entreaties to accept it, with clear demonstrations of the excellencies of it, with unfeigned wishes that the parties to whom it is offered, would accept it, and bitter lamentations for their folly in refusing it? With all these enforcements is Gods tender of Salvation to Reprobates accompanied; and therefore in show most hearty and serious.  
In a word, thus speaketh God (by this doctrine) to Reprobates in the ministry.  
O ye Reprobates, (once most dear beloved of me in your father Adam, but now extremely and implacably hated, and by mine eternal & uncontrollable order Sealed up under invincible sin and misery:) amend your lives, and believe in the name of mine only begotten Son. If you repent and believe not, there is no remedy, you must be damned: but if you repent and believe, you shall be saved; though your sins be as red as Scarlet, I will make them as white as Wool. Think not that I would have you die, for I swear as I live, I will not the death of him that dyeth; I would have no man to perish, but all to come to repentance. I beseech you therefore be reconciled. I have cried and called unto you, I have a long time waited upon you, that you might repent, and still am I knocking at the doors of your hearts for entrance. O, that there were a heart in you to fear me, and keep my commandments that it might go well with you for ever. What shall I do unto you? how shall I entreat you? Will you not be made clean? When will it once be? Can God speak thus to Reprobates, who by his own decree shall never repent, nor be saved, without the deepest dissimulation?  
That which is usually said to clear the absolute decree from this crimination, is, That God wisheth the Salvation of the Reprobate seriously, but not absolutely; he would have those men saved who are not saved, but yet upon condition they will repent and believe. And therefore, though they do perish, God is candid and sincere in his offers of Salvation to them. For therefore do they perish, because they perform not the condition, and not because God offereth not Salvation seriously unto them.  
But this answer is too short: It is true indeed, God will have all men to be saved upon condition only, that they will believe and repent, according to that speech of S. Ambrose, [Deus vult omnes salvari, si & ipsi velint.] God would have all to be saved, if they themselves would: For if he would absolutely have it so, what can hinder it? who hath resisted his will? and it is true likewise, that a conditional promise may be serious as well as an absolute: but then the condition must be possible to them, to whom the promise is made; and the performance of the condition must be a part of God's will, as well as the Salvation promised: or else the promise cannot be candid and sincere. [Conditio est oblata potestas aliquid eligendi] a condition is the offer of a power of choice. Where there is no liberty of choice afforded, there is no true condition appointed. In substance it is all one to offer a courtesy under a condition not possible, and not to offer it at all; and in circumstance it is much worse.  
In substance all one; The Lawyers tell us that a Contract made [sub conditione impraestabili nullus aestimatur] under a condition not possible, is esteemed no bargain. And the Logicians rule is, that 
(o) Conditionalis propositio quae habet annexam conditionem impossibilem, aequipollet simpliciter neganti.  A conditional proposition which hath an impossible condition annexed to it, is equivalent to a bare Negation. It is all one for me to offer a piece of money to one blind man upon condition he will open his eyes and tell me what piece of money it is, and what stamp it hath; and to deny it flatly to another. For the one hath it no more than the other. And it is all one for a man that hath a daughter to bestow in marriage, to tell her Suitor; I will give you my Daughter, if you will span the Earth, or touch the Heavens with your finger; and to tell him plainly, set your heart at rest, I will never bestow her upon you. For the Suitor speedeth both ways alike.  
And it is in circumstance a great deal worse. For it is a denial under colour of the contrary, a denial joined with a scoff, a derision, as was that of the jebusites, 2. Sam. 5.6. Who told David, that he should not enter into the Fort of Zion, except he took away the blind and the lame. Their meaning was, they would never deliver it up unto him: and because they thought it impossible for him to take away the blind and the lame, they told him if he did so, than they would yield it up. It was an Ironical and scoffing denial of his demand. If the King should make an unrepealable Law, that no German should be made a Citizen of London, or free Denizen of the Kingdom; and then make a Decree to give some bountiful gratuities, but to the Citizens of London, or to the Subjects of the Kingdom only, and to none but them; and yet for all this should command it to be proclaimed, that he will give them to the Germans upon condition they will be made Freemen of London, or be incorporated into the Kingdom: would not any man say, that the King in this case did dissemble and delude the poor Dutchmen? and if any should say, there would be no dissembling in it; for if they would become Citizens or Subjects, they should have the promised gratuities: a man might truly answer, that therefore the King doth counterfeit and cousin them, because he maketh a tender of them upon a condition not possible by his own decree. In like manner, if God have made a decree, that such men shall never believe, and yet offer them Heaven on condition they will believe; it may most truly be said, that God doth not only deny them Heaven, but deny it with a bitter derision, which is fare from that candour and goodness that dwelleth in him.  
And thus have I shown the contrariety of this Opinion to four principal attributes of God, which is my second general reason against it.  

3 It is contrary to the use & end of God's gifts to men.  THirdly, it is contrary to the use and end of God's gifts bestowed upon men, which gifts are of two sorts:  
(1) Gifts of Nature, our Creation, Sustentation, Preservation, together with Health, Strength, Beauty, Wisdom, etc.  
(2) Gifts of Grace, which have a more immediate relation to everlasting life, and are means either of purchasing Salvation or of applying it.  
Means of purchasing it, are the coming of CHRIST into the world, and the sacrificing himself on the Cross.  
Means of applying it, are the ministry of the word and Sacraments, the long suffering of God, the enlightening of men's understandings, the plantation of many excellent virtues in their hearts, with many more of the like sort.  
Now of these endowments of Nature and Grace, what the true use and end is, the Scripture doth plainly and particularly show us.  
First, for gifts of Nature, we find them bestowed upon all that have them, for the encouraging and enabling of them to serve God and save their Souls. For, Act. 14.16, 17. The Apostle saith, that God (even in those times in which he suffered the Gentiles to walk in their own ways, and withheld from them the light of his holy word) did give unto the people of the world, rain from Heaven and fruitful seasons, filling their hearts with food and gladness, and in so doing he left not himself among them without witness. This implieth, that therefore he gave them these good things, that he might make himself known unto them, and so might draw them to glorify him according to the knowledge which they had of him.  
Act. 17.26. The Apostle saith directly, that therefore men are made and placed in this world and apppointed to their several times and dwellings, that they might seek and find God: that is, that they might serve him and save their Souls. For what is it to seek God, but to serve him? and what is it to find God, but to enjoy his face and favour here and in Heaven? To this purpose Prosper. 
(p) Prosper. de voc. Gentium. l. 2. c. 4. p. 8●8. Coelum quip & terra & marc, omnisque creatura quae videri & intelligi potest, ad hanc praecipuè disposita est humani generis, utilitatem, ut natura rationalis de contemplatione tot specierum, de experimentis tot bonorum, de perceptione tot munerum, ad cultum & delactionem sui imbueretur autho●is, implente omnia spiritu Dei in quo vivimus, movemur & sumus.  Therefore (saith he) is every creature made and ordained especially, that Mankind which is endued with knowledge and ability to discourse, might by the sight of so many goodly sorts of Creatures, and the taste of so many blessings, be drawn to the love and service of his and their maker.  
And a little after he saith, in the same Chapter.  

(q) Ibid. Quod ergo in Israel per constitutionem legis, & Prophetica eloquia gerebatur, hoc in universis nationibus totius creaturae testimonia & bonitatis Dei miracula semper egerū●.  Look to what use the Law and Prophets were to the Jsraelites; of the same use were the gifts of Creation and Providence to the Gentiles. God never intended to deal with the Gentiles (as the foul-mouthed Manichees said, he dealt with the jews) to feed and fat them up with outward and more common blessings, as so many Hogs and Swine with husks and acorns, but to draw them up by these to an expectation of better things and a careful endeavour to please God, that so they might obtain them.  
The end of all Creatures and of all created gifts bestowed upon man, is subordinate to the end of man. Man's end is to glorify God upon earth, and enjoy perpetual society with him in heaven; and the end of those gifts is to direct and encourage men to achieve that high and excellent end, to which his Creator had apppointed him.  
Now for the gifts of Grace, they likewise are given to all them that enjoy them for the same use and end too.  
For first, CHRIST came into the world, not that he might be a rock of offence, at which the greater part of men should stumble and fall; but to shed his blood and by that blood to purchase Salvation for all mankind, not only for those who are saved, but for those also who through their wilful unbelief and impenitency are not saved; as we may see, Joh. 3.17. God sent his Son (saith the Son) into the World, not to condemn the world, but that the World through him might be saved. In which words the end of his coming is set down.  

1 Negatively, [not to condemn the World.]  
2 Affirmatively, [but that the World through him might be saved:] and therefore very fully.   
The like speech we have, joh. 12.47. I came not to judge the World, but to save it. These Negations joined with affirmations, show, that the Salvation of all men was the only end of CHRIST'S coming, the end exclusively, no other end was properly intended by it but this. The Son of man came to seek and to save what was lost. Luke, 19.10. Therefore he came to save every man, for every man was lost. And Act. 3.26. To you (saith S. Peter) hath God sent his Son JESUS to bless you in turning everyone of you from your iniquity; [every one of you] you that reject him, as well as you that receive him. The end of CHRIST'S coming into the world was the Salvation of all and every man therein.  
2 The ministry of the word and Sacraments is given also and appointed for the same end, and is in its own proper nature and use, an instrument of conveying the Spirit of regeneration to those that live under it and to all those.  
Better proofs for this I cannot have, than those which our reverend Divines at Dort gathered to my hand. Esay, 59.21. This is my Covenant with them (saith the Lord) my Spirit that is upon thee, and my words which I have put in thy mouth, shall not departed out of thy mouth, nor out of the mouth of thy seed, nor seeds seed for ever. Hinc patet (say they) from these words it appeareth, that the word and spirit are joined in the ministry of the word with an inseparable band, by the promise of God. Hence it is, that the Ministers of the New Testament are called, Ministers not of the letter but of the Spirit; not of the letter that killeth, but of the spirit that giveth life. 2. Cor. 3.6. And the ministry of the Gospel is called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 the ministry of the Spirit, in the same place, vers. 8. Hence also is the Gospel called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, Grace bringing Salvation. Tit. 2.11. And 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, the word of Reconciliation. 2. Cor. 5.19. To these let me add, 1. Pet. 1.23. Where the word is called, the seed of the new birth: and 2. Cor. 5.20. Where Ministers are called, Ambassadors for CHRIST, to beseech men to be reconciled to God. They are so called, to show that the word preached is by God's appointment an instrument to make men new creatures, and that the proper matter of Ministers errands is reconciliation with God, and the natural fruit of it is in God's intent, not the obduration and destruction, but the conversion and salvation of men. The same Authors out of Joh. 15.22. [If I had not come & spoken unto them, they should not have had sin] do say it is evident, that CHRIST in his preaching did administer so much inward grace as was sufficient to convince those that rejected the Gospel, of positive unbelief, and render them obnoxious to just punishment: and by good consequence (say I) so much as sufficed by their good husbandry, to have converted and saved them: for that grace leaveth none without excuse, which is not sufficient to convert them. I will conclude what they say of this gracious intention of God in the ministry of the word, with that speech of Prospers, cited by them in the same place. 
(r) Prosper. ad cap Gal. resp. ad. Obj. 〈◊〉 Non omnes voca● ad gratiam eos, qui● bus omnibus evang●lium praedicatur 〈◊〉 recte dicitur; etiam si sint qui evangel● non obaudiunt.  They that say, that all those to whom the Gospel is preached (even those that obey not the Gospel) are not called to grace, they say an untruth. God looked for Grapes (says the Text) Esay, 5.2. What doth this imply? but that it was Gods principal aim in the husbandry which he bestowed upon the Church of Israel, that it should bring forth good fruit, though in the event it did not? How oft would I have gathered you? saith CHRIST to jerusalem. Math. 23.37. These things (saith he) have I spoken to you, that ye might be saved: but ye will not come to me, that ye might have life. joh. 5.34, 40. In those words intimating no less than this, that it was his full intent by his preaching to gather and to save those very particular men, that in the end were not gathered nor saved, through the contempt or neglect of CHRIST'S Ministry.  
Touching the Sacraments, this is also the use and end for which they were ordained; as we may see, Luke, 7.30. Where we have these words; But the Scribes and Pharisees and expounders of the Law despised the counsel of God against themselves; and were not baptised of john. In which words thus much is evidently included, that it was God's counsel and purpose in john's Baptism to bring them to CHRIST, and in him to Heaven. So much also is said of his Baptism, Mark. 1.4. john did baptise in the Wilderness and preach the baptism of Repentance, and remission of sins. If this were the end of john's, much more is it the end of CHRIST'S baptism; it being more excellent than john's was, not in substance, but in the fullness of grace administered and dispensed by it. All that have been baptised into CHRIST (saith the Apostle) have been baptised into his death. Rom. 6.3. All ye that have been baptised into CHRIST, have put on CHRIST, Gal. 3.27. The very phrases there used, show that baptism is in its original intention, an instrument of uniting men to CHRIST, and giving them communion with him in the benefits of his death. Except a man be borne again of water (saith our Saviour) and of the Spirit, he cannot, etc. Joh. 3.5. In which words are these two things.  
1 The necessity of regeneration. [Except a man be borne again.]  
2 The working cause of it: Efficient, the Spirit; instrumental the Sacrament of Baptism, there called Water from the outward matter of it. Baptism therefore is apppointed to be a means of regeneration to all those that are baptised, and doth effect it in all, who do not put an obstacle in the way to hinder it. So much doth the Apostle ascribe to Baptism, Eph. 5.26. and for this cause doth dignify it with this title, [The laver of regeneration.] Tit. 3.5.  
I will shut up this with Act. 2.38. where Peter saith, Repent and be baptised every one of you for the remission of sins; plainly implying, that therefore is baptism ordained to be received, that those who do receive it, might have their sins remitted.  
This is also God's intent in the Lord's Supper. This is my body (saith CHRIST) and this is my blood, Math. 26.26, 27. in those words teaching us, that in that Sacrament there is an exhibition of CHRIST and his benefits intended on God's part, and received of those by whom no obstacle is interposed: and therefore doth the Apostle call it in express words, 1 Cor. 10.16. The communion of the body and blood of Christ.  
For this end also, is the patience of God (another singular dignation of God) exercised among men, as we may see, Rom 2.4. Despisest thou the riches of his goodness and forbearance, not knowing that the bountifulness of God leadeth thee to repentance? but thou after thy hardness and heart that cannot repent, heapest up wrath to thyself, etc. In these words may be noted for our purpose: (1) God's intent in forbearing sinners, which is, the leading of them to repentance, and so on to Salvation: (for repentance, is per se ordinata ad salutem, by him ordained to Salvation as a means to the end.) (2) The persons, to whom God intendeth this good by his forbearance: and they are, such as despise the riches of his goodness, and have hard and impenitent hearts. (3) The issue and event of this their contempt of God's patience, and that is, a treasuring up of wrath unto themselves against the day of wrath. Out of all which laid together ariseth thus much, that God by sparing wicked men, who have hard and impenitent hearts, intendeth their everlasting good, though they by the abuse of his patience and refusal to repent, do treasure up unto themselves wrath and misery everlasting. The like to this is delivered in 2 Pet. 3.9. God is not slack (saith Peter) (as some men count slackness) but patiented toward us? that is us men. And why patiented toward us? because he would have none to perish. The end therefore of God's patience, is man's Salvation and Repentance.  
In the last place those other gifts of God, by which men's understandings are enlightened, and their souls beautified (namely knowledge, faith, repentance, fortitude, liberality, temperance, humility and chastity, and such like) are bestowed upon all that have them [among whom are many who prove Reprobates in the end] that by the exercise of them and continuance in them they might come to eternal life.  
That Reprobates are adorned with many of these graces, appeareth by sundry Scriptures, especially Heb. 6.4. where the Apostle saith, That it is impossible for them that have been enlightened, tasted the heavenly gift, been made partakers of the Holy Ghost, tasted the good word of God and the powers of the world to come; if they fall away, should be renewed by repentance. 〈◊〉 graces which the Apostle here speaketh of, are not ordinary and common, but special and excellent graces; illumination, faith, a relish of God's word and a taste of Heaven; and the persons spoken of, are Apostates, such as are under a possibility of falling away for ever (for upon a danger not possible cannot be built a solid exhortation,) and consequently Reprobates: and the thing intimated, is that upon Apostates & Reprobates are these excellent gifts many times bestowed The like speech we have, Heb. 10.26. For, if we sinne willingly after we have received the knowledge of the truth; there remaineth no more Sacrifice for sin, etc. From whence we may collect, that men who sin willingly and unpardonably, may receive the knowledge of the truth; yea and be sanctified by the blood of the Testament and the Spirit of grace, vers. 29.  
In the 2 Pet. 2.20. They may (saith Peter) escape the filthiness of the world: that is, be washed from their former sins by repentance. The unclean spirit may go out of them, Math. 12.43. They may receive the word with joy, Math. 13.20. And many more excellent graces they may have beside. Now all these virtues and graces are not therefore given then that they might abuse them, and so purchase to themselves the greater damnation; or that they might do good to others with them, but none to themselves: but rather, that (as by the former gifts of nature, so) by these of grace they may obtain Salvation. For if God aim at this in those gifts that are farther off, much more in these, which make those that have them (like the young man in the Gospel) not fare from the kingdom of Heaven. My proof for this, I borrow of our Divines at the Synod, who in their suffrage have these two positions.  
1 
(s) Suffrag. Brit pag. 41. thes. 2. & p. 43. thes 3 Sunt quaedam effecta interna ad conversionem praevia, que virtute verbi, spiritusque in nondum justificatorum cordibus excicantur; qualia sunt, notitia voluntatis divinae, sensus peccati, timor paenae, cogitatio de liberatione, spes aliqua veniae.  There are certain internal works preparing a man for justification, which by the power of the word and Spirit are wrought in the hearts of men not yet justified; such as are the knowledge of God's will, a sense of sin, fear of punishment, etc. that is their first.  
2 Their second position is this. 
(t) Quos Deus (mediante verbo) per Spiritum suum in hunc modum afficit, eos ad fidem, conversionem. que verè & seriò vocat & invitat.  Those whom God by his word and Spirit affecteth after this manner, those he truly and seriously calleth and inviteth to conversion.  
Out of these two Theses thus much ariseth, that God worketh the knowledge of his will, the sense of sin, fear of hell, hope of pardon, and consequently many other excellent graces in the hearts of men, that by these, they may be converted and so eternally saved.  
We see by these things, what end God aimeth at in his gifts to men.  
But there are some Scriptures, that seem to say the contrary, namely Rom. 1.20. where God is said to reveal himself to the Gentiles by the creatures, [〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉] that they might be without excuse. And Luke 2, 34. Simeon saith of CHRIST, that he is apppointed for the falling and rising again of many in Israel. And 1 Cor. 1.23. I preach Christ (saith St. Paul) to the Jews a stumbling block, 2 Cor. 2.16. We are the favour of death to death, etc. By these places it seemeth, that God giveth these things to some, to make them stumble, and that they might be left without excuse. What shall we say therefore to these places.  
Of all these places in general, I may say this; that they are to be understood of the end, which is many times effected by these gifts of God, and not of the end which is primarily intended in them; and they show what CHRIST, the word preached, and the gifts of nature and grace are [occasionally] to some men, through their voluntary rebellion against God and his ordinances, and not what they are [intentionally] in God's first thoughts and resolutions: he intendeth them for their good, though many times they receive them to their hurt. It is with God's ordinances and gifts (and that very often too,) as it is sometimes with physic: it is given by the Physician for the patients good, but many times through the distemper of his body, it doth him hurt. And as it is with the Sun. God intendeth by the shining of it the enlightening and clearing of men and other creatures in this inferior world; and yet some men are hurt by the light of it, others are scorched by the heat of it; [accidentally] by reason of the climates wherein they live, or the ill affectedness of their eyes and bodies.  
So the blessings of God, which out of his abundant goodness are bestowed on men for their eternal good; through their ill frame and temper of heart do effect their hurt, partly because lighting on naughty hearts, they lose their edge; (for quicquid recipitur, recipitur ad modum recipientis:) and partly because of the severity of God, who as he hath an antecedent and gracious will to do men good; so he hath a consequent and judiciary will of giving up obstinate men to their own hearts lusts, and of permitting them to dash against CHRIST and other means of eternal life, and so to fall into endless misery and mischief, as we may see, Psal. 81.11, 12. and Rev. 22.11. which made Prosper say, 
(u) Prosp. resp. ad obj. 16. Vincent. Qui voluntatem Dei spreverunt invitantem, voluntatem Dei sentient vindicantem.  They that have despised Gods inviting will, shall feel his revenging will.  
Now if this be the meaning of these Scriptures, then do they not thwart that which hath been said of God's gracious intent of promoting the eternal good of men by his blessings bestowed upon them. For, [argumentum ab eventu ad intentionem Dei non valet:) because no sinful event is properly under God's decree, but his prescience only, or at most under a permissive decree: and many things happen in the world which are beside the antecedent and principal purpose of God; not because there is any want of power in God, but because his will is oftentimes conditional, and therefore not effected; because the condition is not performed.  
But by the opinion of absolute Reprobation, the gifts both of Nature and Grace have another end: either God doth not mean them to those that perish (although they do enjoy them, because they are mingled in the world with the Elect to whom only they are directed:) or if he do, he meaneth they shall have them, and be lifted up by them above the common rank of men, [ut lapsu graviore ruant,] that their fall may be the greater. And so much is said by the chief defenders of it. 
(w) Calv. Instit. l. 3. 6. 24. n. 13. Ecc● vocem ad eos ditigit ut magis obsurdes ●t; lucem accendit sed ut redantur caecicres; doctrinam profe●t, sed quâ magi● obstup●scant; remedium ad●ibe●, sed n●sanentur.  God sendeth his word to Reprobates (saith Calvin) that they might be made more deaf; he setteth up a light before them, to make them the blinder; he giveth them a remedy that they might not be healed. And 
(z) Bez. praelud in c● 9 ad Rom. p. 434 Absurdum videri no● debit, deum reprob● quibusdam, qui in E●clesiâ Dei ve●santur gratiam suam in verbo suo, sive etiam pe● Sacramenta sua eff●●e, non eum in finem 〈◊〉 per eam s●ventu● sed contrà, ut m●ù ha● cant excusationi● quàm reliqui, & tan●●é graviùs pu●ian●ur●  it should not seem absurd unto us (saith Beza) that God should offer his grace in the word and Sacraments to some Reprobates in the Church, not to this end that they might be saved by it, but that they might be less excusable than others, and obnoxious to the sorer punishment. Speeches like to these hath Maccovius in his Disputations, 
(a) Mac. disp 1● pag 11, 12. Pulsa Christus ad ostiu● reproborem, quod n●vit nec posse ne● velle aperire; non u● intret, sed p● u● expr● b●t●llis ●potentiam suâ 〈◊〉 ●u● culpâ contractum; partim ut condēn● in illis augeat, etc.  CHRIST (saith he) knocketh at the hearts of Reprobates, who he knoweth neither can nor will open unto him; not that he may enter in, but partly that he upbraid them for their impotency, and partly that he may increase their damnation. And immediately after to a place in john, c. 15. v. 22. he giveth this exposition. 
(b) Nimi●um ide● locutus est 'tis, ut ex contempt odi●●usi● unigeniti ●vio condemnatio es●e.  Therefore did God speak to them, that by the contempt and hatred of his Son they might procure the greater damnation. In another place likewise of his disputations he speaketh the same thing four or 5 times over, very positively. 
(c) Disp. 2. p. 3. De● reprobis verbum 〈◊〉 proponit non ali● fine, quam ut inexcusabiles reddantur  God doth propound his word to Reprobates for no other end, then that they might be left without excuse.  

(d) p. 1●. Si Evangelun consideres ratione intentionis Dei, finem ejus esse per se, & non per accidens, inexcusabilitatem ratione reproborum.  If the Gospel be considered in respect of God's intention, the proper end of it, and not the accidental in reference to Reprobates is their inexcusableness. And very consequently do these writers speak to their main conclusion. For, how can God intent the means or gifts of grace for the Salvation of them, whom he hath by his absolute eternal decree rejected utterly from grace and glory?  
More particularly by this Doctrine,  
1 CHRIST came not into the world to procure the Salvation of them that perish, because they were inevitably ordained to perish.  
2 The word of grace is not sent to them: or if it be, it is sent, that they might slight it, or contemn it; and so increase their damnation by contemning of it, which being so, these inconveniences will arise;  
(1) That God is a mere deluder of miserable men, whom he calleth to Salvation in the name of his Son by the preaching of the word. For what else can he be that fairly pretendeth their good, whom he fully intendeth to ruin?  
(2) That Ministers are but false witnesses, because in their ministry they offer Salvation conditionally to many, whose damnation is determined absolutely.  
(3) The Ministry of the word cannot leave men without excuse. For Reprobates may have this just plea; Lord, dost thou punish us for not believing in thy Son, when thou didst call us to believe by the preaching of thy word? why? Thou didst decree to leave us (woeful men) in Adam's sin, to give us neither power to believe, nor a CHRIST to believe in. How canst thou justly charge us with sin, or increase our punishment for not believing in him whom thou didst resolve before the world was, that we should never believe in? Certainly that 
(e) Neque enim ea fingi potest homines reddere inexcusabiles, per verbum & Spiritum vocatio, quae eo tantum fine ex●betur ut reddat in excusabiles. Suffrag. Brit. the 3 & 4. art. Antecedancis ad Convers these 3. pag 43.  Ministry giveth men a fair excuse, that is given for no other end, then to leave them without excuse.  
3 The Sacraments also (by this opinion) do signify nothing, seal up nothing, confer nothing to such as are not saved; but are mere blanks and empty ordinances at the best unto them; not through the fault of the men, but by the primary and absolute will of God.  
Lastly, Gods other gifts which he bestoweth upon men of what nature soever they be, are to the most that receive them in God's absolute intention,  
(1) Unprofitable, such as shall never do them good in reference to their eternal condition.  
(2) Dangerous and hurtful, given them not out of love but extreme hatred; not that they might use them well and be blessed in so doing, but that they might use them ill, and by ill using of them procure to themselves the greater damnation. God lifteth them up (as the Devil did CHRIST) to the pinnacle of the Temple; that so they might fall: and loadeth them with knowledge and other goodly endowments, that with the weight of them he might sink them down to Hell.  
And so by good consequence, God's choicest gifts are intended and used as snares to entrap men's souls. Men that have them, have little cause to be proud of them, (for they are the more unhappy because they have them:) or small reason to be thankful for them, or to love the giver of them, but to hate him rather; because they are but giftlesse gifts, of the same nature with a griping Usurer's bounty, jaels' courtesy, saul's marrying of Michal to David, or a bait for a poor fish which she swalloweth with a hook to boot: 
Munera magna quidem misit, sed misit in hamo.  
Num piscatorem piscis amare potest?   
MY fourth general reason against this absolute Reprobation is, It is a hindrance to Piety: 
4th. Reason. It is prejudicial to Piety.  it is a Doctrine that serveth greatly to discourage holiness and encourage profaneness. It maketh Ministers (by its natural importment) negligent in their Preaching, praying, and other services, which are ordained of God for the eternal good of their people. It maketh people careless in hearing, reading, praying, instructing their families, examining their consciences, fasting and mourning for their sins, and all other godly exercises. In a word, it cutteth a sunder the very sinews of religion, and pulleth away the strongest inducements to a holy life. Therefore it is no true and wholesome Doctrine.  
That it doth so, it will appear by these reasons that follow.  
I. It taketh away [Hope] and [Fear:] Hope of attaining any good by godliness; fear of sustaining any hurt by wickedness: and so it taketh away two principal props of Religion.  
This reason may be resolved into these two branches.  
1 Hope and fear uphold godliness. Were it not for these, it would come to ruin: by these, are men strongly led on to virtue, and withheld from vice. Hope doth [excitare] stir men up to begin, and [corroborare] strengthen them in the doing of any good action begun. By this hope of Heaven did our Saviour stir up himself to endure the Cross, and despise the shame. Heb. 12.2. By this he heartened his Disciples to do and to suffer for his sake. Mat. 5, 11. Mat. 10.32. By this have all the godly in all ages encouraged themselves in well doing, as we may see in general. Phil. 3.20. Col. 1.5. Tit. 2.12, 13: And in particular, Heb. 11. Abraham left his Country and Kindred at Gods call, because he looked for a City, whose builder and maker was God. ver. 8, 9, 10. Moses left all the pleasures and treasures of Egypt, and endured afflictions with the people of God, because he saw him that was invisible, and had respect to the recompense of reward, ver. 25.27. The Martyrs endured racks, gibbets, lions, sword, fire, with a world of other torments, because they looked for a better resurrection, ver. 35. Paul indeavoureth always to keep a clear conscience, through the hope which he had of a blessed resurrection, Act. 24.15. All the noble and heroic acts of active and passive obedience, have sprung from the hope of eternal glory. Soldiers, Merchants, Husbandmen, all are whetted on by hope to diligence in their callings, as daily experience showeth us. Hope, saith Aquinas [confert ad operationem] conduceth to action: 
Aquin. 1, 2, q. 40. art. S.  and he proveth it: first by Scripture, 1. Cor. 9.10. He which eareth and thresheth, must ear and thresh in hope. And then he proveth it by a twofold reason. 1 From the nature of Hope's object, which is [benumb arduum, & possibile haberi] some excellent good attainable by industry. [Existimatio ardui excitat attentionem] hope to get that by pains, which is conceived to be a thing of worth, stirreth up to pains taking. 2 From the effect of hope, which is, [detectat●o] an inward pleasure, which the party that liveth under hope, is affected with by his hope. There is not any man, which hath an inward contentment and satisfaction of heart in the work be hath to do, but goeth on merrily. The hope of Heaven therefore is a great encouragement to piety.  
The fear of Hell also is a strong curb to hold men in, from impiety, and therefore (saith one) God hath planted in men a fear of vengeance, that by it as the ship by the Rudder, the soul may be presently turned aside from any rocks gulfs, or quicksands of sin, when it is near them, and may steer its course another way. For this cause fear of God and abstaining from evil are often joined together in Scripture, Job. 1.1. Exod. 1.17. And the want of this fear is made the root of all licentiousness in sinning. Gen. 20.11. Nor doth fear only hinder a bad action, but it promoteth a good. It hindereth a bad action [directly] because it is [fuga mali] a flying from that evil of misery which is annexed to the evil of sin: and it promoteth a good action [accidentally,] because men think that they are never so safe from the mischief which they fear, as when they are exercised in such employments as tend to the getting of a contrary state. Work out your salvation (saith the Apostle) with fear and trembling; implying that the working out of salvation goeth not on handsomely, except the fear of mi●ling it be an ingredient into the work.  
The second branch of this reason is, That by the absolute decree, Hope and fear are taken away. For hope is properly exercised about [bonum possibile haberi] some good thing which may be obtained, not which must be obtained of necessity: and the object of fear is [malum possibile vitari,] an evil that may be escaped. For [metus est fuga mali] fear is a fleeing from evil: and therefore supposeth the evil to be avoidable. For no man will flee from an evil that cannot be prevented, but will yield up himself to it, as Caesar did his body to the murderers in the Senate house. Now (by this decree) Heaven and Hell are not objects possible but necessary. Heaven shall avoidable be obtained by those that are elected, and Hell must as certainly be endured by those that are reprobated. For men have no power to alter their eternal states: all men by this decree are precisely determined ad unum, to one state, to necessary salvation or necessary damnation without any power or liberty to choose whether.  
And from hence this conclusion is cle●e, that the absolute decree taketh away the chiefest inducements to holiness, and deterrements from wickedness, and consequently hindereth a godly life exceedingly.  
The injuriousness of this doctrine to a godly life may further appear by these considerations that follow, one depending upon another.  
1 Absolute and peremptory decrees are inevitable, whatsoever the things be about which they are exercised: and men's everlasting states if they be absolutely determined, are altogether undeclinable. [Stat fati lex indeclinabius] the law of destiny is undeclinable. And the reason is, because it hath an inevitable cause, the Adamantine decrees of Almighty God, which are indeclinable two ways.  
(1) Jrreversible, liable to no repeal (as the Statutes are which are made in our Parliaments:) but fare more unalterable than the Laws of the Medes and Persians. A● have spoken, so will I bring it to pass: I have purposed, and I will do it. Esay. 46.11. Men do many times bite in their words again, because they utter things rashly; and do repeal their statutes and ordinances, because they see some inconvenience in them being made, which they could not foresee: but God never calleth in his decrees, because they are all made in great Wisdom.  
(2) Jrresistible. It lies not in the power of any creature to disannul them. Who hath resisted his will? Rom. 9.19. Our God is in Heaven: he doth whatsoever he will. Psal. 115.3. Whatsoever is once concluded by his absolute will, is no ways alterable by the will of man. It is more possible for a man to hinder the rising of the Sun, or to stay his course in the Heaven, to stop the revolutions of the year, and overturn the whole course of nature, then to make the least change in any of God's absolute decrees.  
2 men's actions about ends and things determined by an absolute decree are vain and fruitless; and the reason is, because they cannot make them otherwise then they are determined to be. It is absolutely decreed, the Devils shall be damned. Were it not a fruitless thing in them by prayers, tears, and endeavours to seek to alter it? It is also simply decreed, that the Soul of man shall be immortal. Is it not a labour in vain for any man to use means that his Soul may be annihilated? It is ordained, that the Sun shall rule the day and the Moon the night; that the one shall finish his proper course in a year, the other in a Month. Would not a man's endeavour to make an alteration in these things be unprofitable and ridiculous? Without doubt it would. So likewise, in vain do men labour to obtain everlasting life, and avoid eternal death; if there be no power and liberty in their hands to choose life or death, but must of necessity take that which is assigned them, be it life or death. For by their labour they effect just nothing: if they be absolutely appointed to destruction; their hearing, reading, praying, alms giving, and mourning for their sins cannot possibly procure their Salvation: damned they must be. And if they be absolutely ordained to Salvation, their neglect of holy duties, their ignorance, their love of pleasures, and continuance in a course of ungodliness cannot bring them to damnation, they must be saved. If so many Souls in a Parish, be in this manner decreed to Heaven or Hell; the Minister preacheth in vain, and the people hear in vain. For there cannot one Soul be saved by all his or their pains, which is ordained to Hell; nor one Soul be cast away by his or their negligence, which is appointed to Heaven.  
It is hard for thee (said CHRIST to Saul) to kick against pricks: that is, 
Acts, 9 5.  to endeavour by thy Persecutions & slaughters to root out my Church out of the world; because the preservation of it is absolutely decreed in Heaven: Teaching us by that speech, that a man's labour in any thing whatsoever, is never profitable, except it be exercised about an end, attaynable thereby, and without which the end may be lost.  
3 Men are not willing to be employed in fruitless actions, if they know it.  
I so run (saith S. Paul) not as uncertainly; so fight I, 
1. Cor. 9.26.  not as one that beateth the air: but I keep under my body, and bring it into subjection; lest that by any means, when I have preached to others, I myself should be a castaway. The meaning is, I endeavour to keep God's Commandments, I fight with the temptations of the Devil, the allurements of the world, and mine own corruptions; I keep my body low by watchings, and fastings, and other severe exercises of holy discipline. But cui bono? Do I all this at random? uncertain whether I shall obtain any good or prevent any mischief hereby? No, but I do this, as one that is sure, that by so doing, I shall attain everlasting life, and without so doing, I cannot avoid eternal death: intimating in these words the common disposition of men, which is, to labour, where some proportionable good is to be gotten, or evil prevented: otherwise to spare their heads and hands too.  
To be employed in fruitless affairs, is both a folly and a misery.  
(1) A folly, for [de necessariis nemo saepiens deliberate.] No man useth deliberation about things necessary, saith the Philosopher. And our Saviour speaking of things above our power; Curio estis soliciti? saith he to his Disciples, Math. 6.27. Luke 12.25, 26. Why take ye thought about such things? which is as much as if he had said, It is an argument of folly in you to trouble yourself about such things as lie not in your power.  
(2) It is a misery in the opinions of all men, as the fable of Sisyphus implieth, who (as the Poets feign) is punished in Hell for his Robberies, with the rolling of a great stone to the top of a steep hill, where it cannot rest, but presently tumb down again.  
The moral of that Fable is, that it is a torment, and a t●ment fit for Hell; for a man to be set about any work that fruitless and in vain. Men will rather be exercised in hi● and hard employments that produce proportionable end then pick straws, play with feathers, or with Domitian spe● their times in flapping and killing of flies, or do any oth● easy work, which endeth in nothing but air and empting except they be fools or Selfe-tormentors. And therefore when Balaam once saw that the Lord had fully determined bless Jsrael, 
Numb. 24.1.  and that all his Sorceries could not effect the contrary; he presently gave over and set no more Enchantment▪ And reason teacheth every man to do the like. If any m● were fully possessed with a persuasion that his temporal estal were determined in Heaven, and that he should be wort● just so much, neither more nor less; he would conclude i● his thoughts, that his care and pains could nothing prof● him, nor his idleness impoverish him: and so would quickly be persuaded to take his ease. And were it evident tha● every commonwealth had [terminum magnitudinis] a condition apppointed for it which could not be altered, and a fatal period which could nor be avoided; then would the King call no Parliaments, use no privy Counsellors, make no laws and Ordinances for the preventing of a Kingdom's ruin, o● the procuring of its prosperity and continuance. For it would be to little purpose (as once a famous privy Counsellor told our late Queen Elizabeth) but would follow the Poets' counsel: 

Manilius.  Solvite mortales animos, curisque levate,  
Tota que super vacuis animum deplete querelis:  
Fata regunt orbem, certâ stant omnia lege.   
From these three premises laid together it followeth directly, that the doctrine of an absolute decree, which determineth men's ends precisely; is no friend at all to a godly life. For if events absolutely decreed be unavoidable; if men's actions about unavoidable ends be unprofitable; if in unprofitable employments men will have no hand willingly: whosoever they be that believe and consider this, will have nothing to do with the practice of godliness. For their ends being absolutely pitched and therefore unavoidable; they will conclude that their labour in religion will be unprofitable, and so will not labour in it at all.  
That which hath been said, may be yet confirmed by two Witnesses. The one of them is Mr. Calvin, who in his Institutions hath these words; 
(f) Instit. l. 3. c. 23. §. 14. Si quis ita plebem compellet; Si non creditis, ideo fit, quia jam divinitus exitio praedestinati estis; is non modò ignaviam fovet, sed etiam indulget malitiae.  If any man (saith he) should speak thus to the people; If there be any among you that believe not, it is because ye are ordained to destruction; this man would not only cherish slothfulness, but wickedness also. Which is as much to say (me thinks) as this; If a man should set forth the doctrine of Reprobation in its colours, and explain it to people in a clear and lively fashion, he would hereby open a door to liberty and profaneness.  
The other witness is a man of another stamp, the miserable Landgrave of Thuring, of whom it is recorded by Heisterbachius, that being by his friends admonished of his vicious conversation and dangerous condition, he made them this answer; 
(g) Heist. l. 1. de memor. hist. c. 27. pa. 38. Si praedestinatus sum, nulla peccata proterunt mihi regnum coelorum auferre: Si praescitus, nulla opera mihi illud valebunt confer.  If I be elected, no sins can bereave me of Heaven; if I be reprobated, no good deeds can help me to Heaven.  
I conclude therefore, that by this opinion (which is taught for one of God's principal truths;) Religion either is or may be made a very great loser, which is my fourth general Reason against it.  
But there are three things which are usually answered to vindicate this opinion from this crimination.  
First, that many of them which believe and defend this doctrine, are holy and good men: and therefore of itself it openeth no way for liberty of life, but through the wickedness of men, who use to pervert the sweetest and surest truths of Scripture to their own damnation. The like defence to this, did the Epicures of old make in favour of their sensual and Swinish doctrine; which was, that happiness consisted in pleasure. They said that many of their Sect were honest men, and so much Tully granteth to be true, but with exception still against their doctrine. 
(h) Cic. l. 2. de finibus bon. & mal pag 117. Ac mihi quidem videtur quòd ipse vir bonus fuit: & multi Epicurei fuerunt, & hodiè sunt, & in amicitiis fideles, & in omni vitâ constantes & graves; nec voluptate, sed officio consilia moderantes.  I take (saith he) Epicurus himself to be an honest man, yea and many Epicures have been and are faithful in friendship, square and constant men in all conditions of life, ordering themselves and their lives, not by pleasure by duty. But, (saith he) 
(i) Hoc videtur ma●s honestatis, minor voluptatis.  this proceeded not from the principles of their opinion, but from their own virtuous inclination: and the force of honesty by their so doing, appeared to be more prevailing in them, than the force of pleasure, which they pleaded for. A little after he hath other words to the same purpose; 
(k) Atque ut caeteri existimantur dicere mel●ùs, quàm facere; sic hi mihi videntur meliùs facere quàm dicere.  As other men's doctrines are esteemed to be better than their deeds; so these men's deeds seem to me to be better than their doctrines.  
Like to this answer of Tully to the defenders of Epicurism, will I shape mine.  
It cannot (I confess) be denied, that many of this opinion are godly men; but it is no thanks to their opinion, that they are so; (the true and natural genius of which is to beget sloth, to drown men in security, and to countenance carnal liberty:) but to something else, either to God's providence, (who will not suffer this doctrine for his own glories sake and the good of men, to have any great stroke in their lives;) or to men's incogitancy, who think not of reducing it [ad praxim] to practice, and drawing conclusions out of it, but rest in the naked speculation of it, as they do of many others; or lastly, to some good practical conclusions, which they meet with in the word of God, and apply to their lives (as they do not the former deductions;) such as these are for example; Be ye holy as I am holy. Without Holiness no man shall see God. If ye consent and obey, ye shall eat the good things of the land. Godliness hath the promises of this life and of the life to come, etc. And hence we may learn to measure this opinion, not by the lives of some few of the men that hold it, but by the sequels, which the logic even of simple men, if they should apply their brains to consider it, would fetch out of it. No man that hath throughly sucked it in, and understandeth the force of it, but will either quite relinquish it, or live according to the natural importment of it, that is, licentiously.  
Secondly, it is said, that albeit this doctrine teach, That men are absolutely elected, or absolutely reprobated: yet,  
(1) It tells no man who in particular is elected, who rejected.  
(2) It teacheth that men must get the knowledge of their Election by good works, and so by consequent, doth rather encourage, then stifle holy and honest endeavours:  
For answer to the first of these; The ignorance of a man's particular state (in my judgement) doth not alter the case a ●ot. For he that believeth in general, that many and they the greatest company without comparison, are inevitably ordained to destruction, and a few others to salvation; is able out of these two general propositions, to make these particular conclusions, and to reason thus with himself: Either I am absolutely chosen to grace and glory, or absolutely cast off from both. If I be chosen, I must of necessity believe and be saved; if I be cast off, I must as necessarily not believe, and be damned.  
What need I therefore take thought either way about means or end? My end is pitched in heaven and the means too; my final perseverance in Faith and my Salvation, or my continuance in unbelief and my damnation. If I lie under this necessity of believing and being saved, or of dying in unbelief and being damned; in vain do I trouble myself about means or end, I have my Supersedeas, I may take mine case and so I will: enough it is for me to sit down and wait what God will do unto me. Thus (it is likely) did Tiberius' reason with himself. For Suetonius reports of him, that he was 
(l) Suet. de vit. Tib. c. 69. p. 180. Circa Deos & religiones negligentior, quip addictus Mathematicae, persuasionisque plenus omnia fato agi.  The more negiigent in religion, because he was fully persuaded, that all things came to pass by destiny. And in this manner (it is to be feared) do too many reason in their hearts, and by this very ground (though they will not perhaps acknowledge it) encourage themselves in profaneness. Though men cannot hide their wickedness, yet they will hide their grounds, which flesh them in it, either through modesty, or to avoid some further ignominy: The fool hath said in his heart, there is no God. Psal. 14.  
To the 2d. I answer, that men ordinarily will not think the getting of the knowledge of their election (if that be all) worth all those painful duties of religion, that are to be performed, and all those sweet and pleasing sins which are to be relinquished, they will rest contented without it for a while, rather than pay so dearly for it: and the rather, because  
1 When they have gotten it, it is in most but a weak and conjectural knowledge, obscured with many clouds and uncertainties.  
2 It must be maintained with a great deal of pains and care, or else it will be lost again. To the retaining of it is required a continual endeavour to keep a clear conscience, which is irkesom and tedious. Men therefore had need of a stronger motive to obedience then this is, or else they will do nothing.  
Thirdly, they that defend and teach this absolute reprobatition (say they) do earnestly exhort men to good works, and deny that any can be saved, except they live honestly.  
So much was also said in the behalf of Epicurus, viz. That he denied that any man that lived not honestly, could live pleasantly. But Tully answereth roundly: 
(m) Cic. office l. 3. prope finem. Quasi ego id curem quid ille ai at aut neget? illud quaero, quid ei qui●n voluptate summum bonum putat, consentantum sit dicere.  As if I cared what he affirmeth or denyeth: this I ask, what is meet for him to say who placeth happiness in pleasure. And so it mattereth not what these men teach, but what they should teach, if they will speak consequently to their own conclusions.  

5th Reason. It is an enemy to true Comfort.  I Come now to my last reason against it, drawn from the uncomfortableness of it: it is a doctrine full of desperation, both to them which stand, and to those that are fallen, to men out of temptation, and to men in temptation, It 

leadeth into Temptation.  
leaveth in Temptation.    
And therefore can be no Doctrine of God's word, for that is 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉, good news to men, a storehouse of sweet consolations for us in our [turbidu & lucidis intervallis,] in our best and worse conditions and changes. 
Rom. 15.4.  These things are written (saith the Apostle) that by patience and comfort of the Scriptures we might have hope: implying that therefore was the word written, & left to the Church, that by the comforts comprised in it, those poor souls that look toward Heaven, might never want in any changes or chances of this mortal life, a sweet gale of hope to refresh them, and to carrion their Ship full merrily toward the Haven.  
I. First, this Doctrine leadeth men into Temptation, and into such a one too, as is as sharp and dangerous as any the Tempter hath. The Devil can easily persuade a man that maketh absolute reprobation a part of his creed, that he is one of those absolute Reprobates: because there are fare more absolute Reprobates (even a hundred for one,) then absolute chosen once: and a man hath a great deal more reason to think that he is one of the most, than one of the fewest, one of the huge multitude of inevitable castaways, than one of that little flock, for whom God hath precisely prepared a kingdom. Such a man is not only capable of, but framed and fashioned by his opinion for this suggestion. Which is a very sore one, if we may believe Calvin, Bucer and Zanchius. Calvin telleth us, 
(n) Calv. justit. l. 3. c 24. § 4. Quod nullâ tentatione vel gravius, vel periculosius fideles percellit Satan.  that the Devil cannot assault a believer with a temptation more dangerous.  
And a little after he saith, that it is so much thedeadlyer, by how much commoner it is then any other.  

(o) Rarissimus est cujus non interdum animus hac cogitatione feriatur, unde tibi salus, nisi ex Dei electione? Electionis autem quae tibi revelatio? quae si apud quempiam semel invaluit, aut diris tormentis miserum perpetuò excruciate, aut reddit penitus attonitum.  So ordinary is this temptation, that he which is at all times free from it, is a rare man (we are to conceive that he speaketh of those who hold absolute Reprobation:) and so dangerous it is that if it get strength, he which is under it, is either miserably tormented, or mightily astonished. And a little after he saith again; 
(p) Ergo si naufragium timemus, sollicitè cavendum ab hoc scopulo in quem nunquam sine exitio impingitur.  He that will not wrack his soul, must avoid this rock. Bucer also hath a passage like to this. 
(q) Bucer in 8. ad Rom. q. de praed.  caput omnis noxiae tentationis, repellenda est haec quaestio, Sumusuè praedestinati. Nam qui de hoc dubitat, nec vocatum se nec justificatum esse credere poterit, hoc est, nequit esse Christianus.  This doubt whether we be predestinate or no; must be repelled as the head of every pernicious temptation: for he that doubteth of this, cannot believe that he is called or justified: that is, he cannot be a Christian. 
(r) Presumendum igitur ut principium fidei, nos omnes esse àdeo prescitos.  Every man therefore must presume upon it as a principle of his faith, that he is elected. 
(s) Zanch. l. 5. de nat. Dei q. de praed.  This very speech of Bucers, Zanchy maketh use of to the same purpose.  
We see then by the testimonies of these worthy men, that this temptation is very dangerous and ordinary too, to such as think there be absolute Reprobates.  
The truth of both will further appear by the example of of 
(t) Georg. major in 2 ad Tim. 2. fol. 1109●  Petrus Jlosuanus, a Schoolmaster in Hungary, who going to hang himself, signified in a writing which he left in his Study for the satisfaction of his friends and countrymen, the true cause of that his unnatural fact. In that writing he delivered these three things.  
(1) That he was of calvin's and St. Augustine's opinion, that men are not dealt withal [secundúm bona aut mala opera] according to their works good or evil; but that there are [occultiores causae] more hidden causes of men's eternal conditions.  
(2) That he was one of that woeful Company of absolute Reprobates; [Vas formatum in ignominiam] a vessel prepared to dishonour: and that therefore (though his life had been none of the worst) he could not possibly be saved.  
(3) That being unable to bear those dreadful apprehensions of wrath, with which he was affrighted, he hanged himself. For these are some of his last words there recorded: 
(u) Discedo igitur ad lacus infernales aeternum dedecus patriae meae: Deo vos commendo, cujus misericordia mihi negata est:  I go to those infernal lakes, an eternal reproach to my Country. I commend you to God, whose mercy is denied to me.  
Out of this example, two things we may safely collect.  
1 That men who think there are many whom God hath utterly rejected out of his only will and pleasure, may be easily brought to think by Satan's suggestion that they are of that company.  
2 That this Temptation is very dangerous.  
I conclude therefore this first part of my last reason, which is; That absolute Reprobation leadeth men into temptation.  
II. It leaveth men in Temptation: and this it doth two ways; by, 

1 Making the tempted uncapable of true comfort.  
2 Making Ministers unable to give true comfort.    
1 It maketh the Tempted uncapable of true comfort: like a Gorgon's head, it doth so trouble their fancies and amaze them, especially in their paroxysmes and fits, that the strongest arguments of comfort, applied with as much art and cunning as may be, will not fasten upon them. With David they say in their fear, that all men are liars, namely all such as come to comfort them in their temptation. The reason is, because it is an opinion incompatible with any word of comfort, that can be ministered to the distressed Soul in this temptation. God's love to mankind, CHRIST'S death for all men, the calling of poor sinners without exception, to repentance and salvation, with all other grounds of consolation; the tempted will easily elude with the grounds of his opinion.  
Which that we may the better see, let us imagine that we hear a Minister and a Tempted Soul, reasoning in this or the like manner.  
Tempted. WOE is me; I am a Castaway: I am absolutely rejected from Grace and Glory.  
Minister. Discourage not thyself thou poor afflicted soul: God hath not cast thee off. For he hateth nothing that he hath made, but beareth a love to all men, and to thee among the rest.  
Tempt. God hateth no man as he is his Creature, but he hateth a great many as they are sinners in Adam. And God hath a twofold love (as I have learned) a general love, which putteth forth itself in outward and temporal blessings only, and with this he loveth all men: and a special love, by which he provideth everlasting life for men; and with this he loveth only a very few, which out of his alone will and pleasure he singled from the rest. Under this general love am I, but not under the special.  
Min. Nay but God so loveth all men, as that he desireth their eternal good: for the Apostle saith, He would have all to be saved, and he would have no man to perish, nor thee in particular.  
Tempt. (All) is taken two ways: for all sorts and conditions of men, high and low, rich and poor, bound and free, etc. and for all particular men in these several sorts and ranks. God would have all men to be saved in the first sense: that is, all sorts; but he would not have all to be saved in the second sense, that is, all particular men of those sorts: some of my country, my calling, my condition of life, but not all and every one, nor me in particular. Or if it be true, that God would have all particular men to be saved; yet he willeth it only with a revealed will, not with a secret: for with that he will have millions to be damned. Under this revealed will am I, not under the secret.  
Min. Nay but CHRIST came into the world to seek and to save what was lost, and is a propitiation not for our sins only, viz. the sins of a few particular men, or the sins of all sorts of men, but for the [whole] world. Therefore he came to save thee, and to be a propitiation for thy sins: for thou art one of the whole world.  
Tempt. The [world] as I have heard, is taken two ways in Scripture: largely for all mankind, and strictly in a restrained signification, for the elect, or for believers. In this latter sense, CHRIST died for the world, namely, for the world of the Elect, for the world of Believers. Or if it be true, that he died for all mankind, yet he died for them but after a sort: he died for them all [dignitate pretii] he did enough to have redeemed all, if God would have had it so; but he did not dye for all [voluntate propositi.] God never intended that he should shed his blood for all and every man, but for a few selected once only, with whom it is my lot to be numbered.  
Min. God hath founded an universal Covenant of peace with men upon the Mediators blood: and therefore he intended it should be shed for all men universally. He hath made a promise of salvation to every one that will believe, and excludeth none, that do not exclude themselves.  
Tempt. God purposed that his Son should dye for all men, and that in his name should be preached and offered remission of sins to every one; but yet upon condition they will repent, believe, and do that which he meaneth the greatest part of men shall never do, nor me among the rest.  
Min. God hath a true meaning that all men who are called, should repent and believe; that so they might be saved; as he would have all to be saved, so he would have them come to the knowledge of the truth, and as he would have no man to perish, so he would have all men to repent; and therefore he calleth them in the preaching of the word to the one, as well as to the other.  
Tempt. God hath a double call; an outward by the preaching of the word in men's ears; an inward by the irresistible work of the Spirit in their hearts.  
The outward call is a part of God's outward will: with that he calleth every man to believe: the inward and effectual call is a part of his secret will; and with that he calleth not every man to believe, but a very few only, whom he hath inevitably ordained to eternal life. And therefore by the outward call, which I enjoy among many others, I cannot be assured of God's good will and meaning, that I should believe, repent and be saved.  
By this we may see, that no sound comfort can be fastened upon a poor soul rooted in this opinion, when he lieth under this horrible Temptation.  
The example of Francis Spiera an Italian Lawyer, will give some further light and proof to this. This Spiera about the year 1548. against his knowledge and conscience, did openly abjure his Religion and subscribe to Popery, that thereby he might preserve his life, and goods, and liberty. Not long after he fell into a deep distress of conscience, out of which he could never wrestle, but ended his woeful days in despair.  
To comfort him came many Divines of worth and note, but against all the comforts which they applied to him, he opposed two things especially.  
(1) The greatness of his sin: it was a sin (said he) of a deep die, committed with many urging and aggravating circumstances: and therefore could not be forgiven. This argument they quickly took from him, and convinced him by the example of Peter, that there was nothing in his sin, that could make it irremissible. Peter that committed the same sin, and with some more odious circumstances, repent and was pardoned, and so (no doubt) might he.  
(2) He opposed his absolute Reprobation, and with that he put off all their comforts. Peter (saith he) repent indeed and was pardoned, because he was elected: as for me I was utterly rejected before I was borne; and therefore I cannot possibly repent or be saved. If any man be elected, he shall be saved, though he have committed sins, for number many, and heinous in degree: but if he be [ex repudiatis] one of the Castaways, [necessario condemnabitur] he shall be inevitably condemned, though his sins be small and few. 
(w) Nihil interest an multa, an pauca, an magna, an parva sint, quando nec Dei misericordia, nec. Christi sanguis, quicquam ad eos pertinet  A Reprobate must be damned, be his sins many or few, great or little, because God's mercy and CHRIST'S merits belong not to him.  
In this Story (recorded by Coelius Secundus and Calvin with some others who lived at that time and wrote of it to their friends;) as in a glass we may see the disconsolate condition of a poor Soul, that is strongly conceited that the greatest part of the world are absolute Reprobates, and that he is one of them: he sticketh so fast in the mire and clay, that he can very hardly be drawn out.  
2 It maketh Ministers unable to afford true comfort to the Tempted; and this it doth, because it— 

1 Taketh from them all solid grounds of comfort.  
2 Leaveth them only weak and insufficient grounds.    
1 It bereaveth them of all solid arguments of comfort, which are these; The universality of God's love, of CHRIST'S death, and of the new Covenant of grace. That Minister which doth explain and apply these three things sound and wisely to him which is tempted in this kind, doth that which is abundantly enough for the relieving and releasing of him from this Temptation. And he that doth not apply these, leaveth him as he found him, in the midst of the Temptation still; whatsoever may be said to the contrary in the heat of Disputation. 
(x) Mel●nct. loc. come. p. 52 c. 1 Pred Etli male● disputantur dum●ùs ●men necesse est in ve●o agone ad hanc arcem confugere, videlicet, quò i de voluntate dei judicandum sit ex presto verbo, & quòd promissio sit universalis, & quòd sit mandatum Dei aeternum & immutabile, audire filium & assentiri promissioni. . Though (saith Melancthon) there be many things disputed in this point more harshly; yet when all is done, the universal promise of Grace and Salvation is a Christians only Bulwark in this temptation and combat. 
(y) Obtemperemus igitur nè vagentur animi quaerentes electionem extra verbum, & relicto Christo & omisso mandato de amplectenda promissione; sed teneamus ce●â & indubitatâ fide promitionem gratiae non inanem esse fabulam; sed Deum verè patefecisse voluntatem suam in promissione, & vaerè praestare quod promisit.  Let us not therefore (saith he) leave CHRIST and seek for an Election out of the word: but let us judge of Gods will of saving men by the promise and commandment, which are both universal. And in another place of the same Book he hath these words. 
(z) P. 230. de prom. Evang. Sicut est necesse scire Evangelium esse promissione gratuitam; ita necesse est scire Evangelium promissionem universale esse. Hanc universalem tenere necesse est adversus periculosas imaginationes deprae destinatione, ne disputemus hanc promissionem ad paucos quosdam alios pertinere, non pertinere ad nos. Non enim dubi●m est, qum omnium animos haec cogitatio exerceat.  As it is needful to know that the promise of Salvation is free: so it is needful to know that it is universal, against some dangerous conceits of Predestination.  
By these speeches we see clearly what this learned man thought to be the true balm of Gilead, whereby a wounded soul should be cured; viz. The universality of the promise, and of God's love and of CHRIST'S death; for they all hang together, and cannot be disjoined.  
The reason why those grounds are able to help a man in such a case, is twofold.  
1 Because they are directly contradictory to the temptation: a will to save all, a giving of CHRIST to death for all, a serious offer of grace to all, cannot possibly stand with an absolute antecedent will and intent of casting away the greatest part of mankind, or to say the truth, of any one man in the world. Upon this followeth the second reason.  
2 Because they serve to convince the Tempted, that he cannot be in that condition, in which he supposeth himself to be. For if two contradictories cannot be true, he that evinceth the truth of the one, convinceth the understanding of the untruth of the other: and he that maketh it appear that this contradictory, [God would have all to be saved, redeemed and called, to repent and believe] is true; putteth it out of all doubt to the understanding, that the other contradictory [God will have most men to be absolutely and inevitably damned] must needs be false, and so raiseth up that poor soul which was pressed down with an erroneous conceit and fear, that it was true. In this manner did junius, (though not in the same temptation) relieve a woman perplexed exceedingly with a strong persuasion, that she and all her children should be damned; because she was busied about her children at a certain time when she should have been at Mass. Junius maketh short work with her, telleth her, that her employment about her children was a duty pleasing to God, but the Mass was a mere will-worship: and so (delivering her of her error upon which the temptation was built,) giveth her present ease and comfort. In like manner tell a man who feareth himself to be an absolute Reprobate, that there are no such absolute Reprobates, and that his fear is but a mere fancy and his doubt a dream; convince him once by contradictory grounds, that there is no man in the world in that state in which he thinketh himself to be, and you drive out one nail by another, and expel the temptation. These are the sword of Alexander, which will cut asunder this Gordian knot of absolute Reprobation; and these are the true Nepenthes of a sick and sorrowful soul.  
But now these true grounds of hope and comfort no Minister can make use of, that holdeth absolute Reprobation: nor if he do usurp them, can he possibly maintain them against the replies of the tempted, unless he relinquish his opinion; because (as I have said) there is a plain contradiction between them, and no man is able to maintain two propositions, which speak contrary things, to be both true, any more than he can make it good, that the same thing may have a being, and no being at the same time. For example, A minister cometh to comfort a man that thinketh himself to be an absolute Reprobate, and how doth he set about it? He telleth him, that God would have all to be saved, that CHRIST died for all, etc.  
But what right hath he to these grounds of comfort seeing he holdeth the contrary conclusions, viz. that God will have a great many to be damned, and to have no part in CHRIST? Well: he usurpeth them notwithstanding; but is he able to maintain them against the answers of the tempted? or can he make a good reply. No certainly, for thus answereth the tempted, God would have all to be saved with a revealed, but not with a secret will: and CHRIST died for all men sufficiently, but not intentionally, or if God did intent that he should dye for all, yet he intended it upon a condition, which he purposed the most should never perform.  
What can the Minister reply to this? If he will make a direct reply, which shall take away the answer, he must deny that God hath two wills, the one opposite to the other, a secret will that many shall avoidable be damned, and a revealed will that all men may be possibly saved. And he must also deny, that God had an intent, that CHRIST should not dye for a great many, or that he intended be should dye for all upon condition, they would believe or repent, and yet purpose that the most should never believe or repent. But can he deny these things? he cannot, except he deny his own conclusion, which is, that there are many thousands eternally and avoidable rejected in God's absolute purpose from grace and glory. For that conclusion is all one with the answers of the Tempted, and contradictory to those arguments of comfort, which he is glad to make use of.  
Absolute Reprobation therefore bereaveth that Minister who believeth it, of all solid grounds of consolation, and so maketh him unable to recover a poor Soul wounded with this temptation.  
Secondly, it leaveth a Minister some weak grounds only and insufficient to quiet the tempted: and therefore it maketh him unable to comfort him.  
The grounds which it leaveth him, are insufficient, because they cannot convince, and make it evident to the understanding of the Tempted, that he is not that which he feareth: that is, a Reprobate. Out of temptation probabilities will uphold a man's hopes (as they did Manoahs' wives. Judg. 13.22.23. If the Lord would kill us, he would not have received a  offering at our hands, nor shown us all these things;) because men are not so mistrustful then: but in temptation men are usually very suspicious and incredulous, like Jacob who would not be persuaded that joseph was alive, and a great man in Egypt; till he saw the Chariot that were sent to fetch him thither. Gen. 45.25. And like Thomas, who would not believe that CHRIST was risen, till he saw the print of the nails and spear. Joh. ●0. 25. They will not believe any thing that is spoken for their comfort, till it be made so apparent, that they have nothing to say to the contrary.  
Myself have known some, who in their temptations have often put their comforters to their proofs, to their protestations, nay to their oaths too, before they would believe their words of comfort. And in this temptation (we speak of) men are strongly possessed with the fear of eternal rejection from the face of God, that they will not easily without manifest conviction believe the contrary.  
But grounds convincing and satisfying, a Minister that maintaineth absolute Reprobation, hath not in store: nothing can he say, that is able to make it appear infallibly and undeniably to the understanding of the Tempted, that he is no absolute Reprobate. All that he can say is, Be of good comfort: you are a Believer, a truly repenting sinner: therefore no Reprobate. For faith and repentance are infallible fruits of Election, and arguments of a state contrary to what you fear. But this the Tempted will deny: he will say, that he is no believer, etc. and how will the Minister convince him that he is? He must prove to him by the outward acts of Faith and Repentance, (for they only are apparent to him;) that he doth repent and believe.  
But this proof is not demonstrative, nor doth convince, because [opera virtutum simulari possunt] the external acts of Faith, Repentance, or any other grace may be counterfeited. The Devil may seem to be an Angel of light, Wolves may go in Sheep's clothing, Judas may make the world believe by his preaching and following of CHRIST, that he is a true Apostle; and Simon Magus though he remain in the gall of bitterness and bond of iniquity, may be thought by his receiving of baptism, to be a true believer: and so may any hypocrite by some exterior acts of Faith and Repentance delude the best discerner of spirits among men, and gain the opinion and esteem of a true penitent and believer. Actions externally good, or good in appearance, may be evil indeed for want of a good rule, manner, end, or some other good circumstances, with which an action that is good must be clothed. For [bonum non oritur nisi ex integris:] and so by good consequence cannot certainly prove the man who doth them to be a good man, or to have the grace of Faith, Repentance, or any other truly planted in his heart.  
Which being so, I say, that a Minister cannot by the outward acts and fruits of faith, and Repentance which he seethe come from him, make it evident to the Tempted (to the silencing of all replies;) that he is without doubt a true believer and repenting sinner and consequently no Reprobate. For still the Tempted may say, you may be deceived in me: for you cannot see any thing more in me, than hath been seen in many a Reprobate. And if this be all you can say, to prove me to be none; I am not satisfied, I may be a Reprobate: nay I am a Reprobate, and you are but a miserable comforter, a Physician of no value.  
This that I say, Piscator doth confess ingenuously in Disput. de Praed. contra Schafmanu: thes. 85. where he saith,  
1 That no comfort can be possibly instilled into the souls of Reprobates afflicted with this horrible temptation: from whence it followeth, that the fare greatest part of men, even an hundred for one must bear their burden, (if they fall into this distemper and trouble,) as well as they can: the Gospel is not able to afford them any solid comfort.  
2 That the Elect being in this condition, may indeed be comforted, but it must be by their sense of sin and their desire to be freed of it by CHRIST: which proofs are but only probable to the best, and to a man in temptation no proofs at all: and consequently either no comforts or very small ones.  
In the end of the same Thesis also, where he saith, that a man should reason thus with himself; Grace is offered to some with a mind of communicating it unto them: therefore it may be that I am one of those to whom it is so offered. In this place (I say) he implieth plainly, that the Doctrine of absolute Reprobation, which teacheth the communication of grace to a very few only, affordeth but a [fieri potest] a peradventure I am Elected (and that a very poor one too) for a poor soul to comfort himself withal.  
FINIS.