m 
 
 wm 
 
 ■io.iJ^^of 
 
CALVINISM AND ARMINIANISM 
 
 COMPABED IN 
 
 THEIR PRINCIPLES AND TENDENCY, 
 
 Part tfic i^ix^t 
 
It has been ingenuously confessed, not only by all the Ancients, but likewise 
 by Modern Divines, (among whom let it suffice to have praised Thomas as one 
 witness,) that the Free WUl of man is incompetent to the performance of any 
 good thing, except so far as it is moved and aided by God. Nor is there so 
 much impiety as certain persons think in those assertions about Free Will which 
 some of the Fathers and of the 3Ioderns have made, — provided their expressions be 
 received in a right manner, and in such a sense as it was the wish of the writers 
 themselves that they should be received. Bucer. 
 
 In his lapsed and sinful state, man is not capable, of and by himself, either 
 to think, to will, or to do that which is really good ; but it is necessary for him to 
 be regenerated and renewed in his intellect, affections or will, and in all his 
 powers, by God in Christ through the Holy Spirit, that he may be qualified 
 rightly to understand, esteem, consider, will, and perform, whatever is truly 
 good — I ascribe to Divine Grace the cowjiencemekt, the continu- 
 ance, AND THE CONSUMMATION OF ALL GOOD ; and to such an extent 
 do I carry its influence, that a man, though already regenerate, can neither con- 
 ceive, will, nor do any good at all, nor resist any evil temptation, without this 
 preventing and exciting, this following and co-operating Grace. 
 
 Arminius. 
 
 The Bishops of Ely and Lichfield, [Andrews and Overal,] were always accus- 
 tomed to say, " that, as long as men mamtained the true doctrine of the Antece- 
 " dent Will [of God] or of Conditional Decrees, there could not be much danger 
 " in disputing about Predestination and Free 'W^ill." The correctness of this 
 sentiment appears to me more and more evident. Grotius. 
 
 The sum of that which I contend for is briefly this : That the God of 
 Heaven hath not appointed any creature to do wickedly, but hateth sin with 
 an unfeigned and perfect hatred, and doth not give a necessity to all events, but 
 to those alone which are agreeable to his holiness and are the objects of his 
 absolute unconditional decrees : That God's Decree of Reprobation was 
 eternally respective, and respective of sins as well actual as original : That God's 
 Decree of Election was eternally respective of our being in Christ, and 
 of our abiding in Him unto the end : That God's execution of his Decrees are in ' 
 a just conformity to his Decrees : That Jesus Christ is a General but a Con- 
 ditional Saviour, — a Saviout to all who do the duties by him required, to 
 none without it : That they who stand may fall for ever, and must therefore very 
 watchfully take heed lest they fall, ever " giving all diligence to make their calling 
 and election sure." Dr. Thomas Pierce. 
 
CALVINISM AND ARMINIANISM 
 
 COMPARED IX 
 
 THEIR PRINCIPLES AXD TENDENCY: 
 
 OR 
 
 THE DOCTRINES 
 
 OF GENERAL REDEMPTION, 
 
 AS HELD BV THE MEMBERS OF THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND, 
 
 AND BY THE EARLY DUTCH ARMINIANS, 
 
 EXHIBITED IN THEIR SCRIPTURAL EVIDENCE, 
 
 AND IN THEIR CONNECTION WITH THE CIVIL AND RELIGIOUS 
 
 LIBERTIES OF MANKIND. 
 
 BY JAMES NICHOLS. 
 
 Melancht/ionis ae Johaiiiiis Armli discipulos fenne videas bonos ac lenes : Contra, Calvini 
 
 asperos, et tales qualem iu maximam partem humaui generis Deum esse sibi imaginantur. 
 
 TanCiunrefertquoutaris Doctore! GROTIUS- 
 
 If it must be Arminianism to teach, that " the Ecclesiastical Power is subjected to the 
 
 Civil Magistrate, who, in all causes over all persons, is acknowledged by us supreme 
 , under Christ," we must becontent to lie down under that envy, and not ex(3is»«r remmnae 
 
 that piece of loyal Arminianum. HENRY J^fSffSiOND, D. D. 
 
 LONDON: 
 
 PRINTED FOR LONGMAN, HURST, REES, ORME, BROWN 
 AND GREEN. 
 
 1824. 
 
3T77S 
 
 /vr 
 
 
 Jam^s Nichols, Printer, 22, Warwick.Square, London. 
 
INTRODUCTION. 
 
 r. BRIEF VIEW OF ARMINIANISM. 
 
 " Do THE Elect believe?" Or, " Are Believers the ti iieEkci ?" 
 These are the two questions, which, long before Arminius was 
 known, were proposed to all Predestinarian adversaries, by'tli^' 
 learned and amiable Lutheran Professor Hemmingius, \\ ho justly 
 asserts, that in the manner in which these simple but opposing 
 Queries are solved, consists the real difference between the favourers 
 of Particular and General Redemption. He says, "those per- 
 sons who maintain the former position, hold sentiments agreeable 
 to the doctrine of the Manichees and Stoics; and those wlio main- 
 tain the latter point, are in obvious agreement with Moses and 
 the Prophets, with Christ and his Apostles." 
 
 If, according to the spirit of the First Question, men regard 
 themselves as Believers because they have been elected, the conse- 
 quences which they deduce from such a fatal doctrine are very 
 obvious : Not only is their eternal felicity thus inevitably secured, 
 without any personal exertion on their part, but the means of 
 this spiritual security are also permanently fixed ; and " the 
 righteousness divine" with which a renewed man becomes in- 
 vested, is, through an abuse of the doclrine of Imputation, ren- 
 dered inefficacious by being viewed as a relative and not a 7-cal 
 qualification. In this manner the whole of the Five Points and 
 their concomitants are represented absolutely and nnconditivnalltj; 
 and being thus independent of all personal considerations, they 
 produce none of that salutary influence upon the conduct of indi- 
 viduals which the various scriptural promises and threatenings 
 are intended to inculcate. 
 
 On the contrary, when, in the spirit of the Second Question, men 
 regard themselves as the Elect of God, because they believe a?id 
 obey his commandments, the consequences which they deduce from 
 such a doctrine are equally apparent : Not only are their present 
 religious enjoyments and their eternal felicity thus rendered certair, 
 and yet contingent upon the continued exercise of their faith, and 
 upon their acts of evangelical obedience, — but " the righteousness 
 divine," with which, as renewed persons, they are endowed, is 
 viewed as a real qualification, a fructifying principle ; and " ihe 
 Grace of God" which they receive, is one of those "talents" con- 
 cerning which their Blessed Lord commands, " Occupy (or 
 trade) till I come." In this manner, all the Five Points and their 
 appurtenances are exhibited conditionally ; and, being made to 
 
 a 
 
11 INTUODUCTION. 
 
 dppend upon the proper and diligent use of the " gracfous gifts 
 bestowed," they produce a most salutary influence upon the con- 
 duct of individuals, and give practical effect to the exhortaiions, 
 promises, and threatenings, which the Holy Scriptures contain. 
 
 The First of these opinions therefore ascribes the jippoinlment 
 of man's eternal destiny to the mere arbitrary pleasure and to the 
 absolute and unalterable decree of the Almighty : while the Se- 
 cond attri])utes it, quite as strongly, to the Divine pleasure in the 
 first, instance; but it is to that Will Suprf.me, as expressed in 
 G.bd'&,w<Vrd, which gives countenarjce to no other election than 
 that of faith a-n.d perseverance foreseen. 
 
 '. .Those ijrenevolent men who plead for the perfectly imiocuous 
 ' natu'ri af menial error, would acknowledge the erroneousness of 
 this principle, were they to peruse the strange and unscriptural 
 assertions made by many of the early Calvinists, who v.ere the 
 cotemporaries of Arminius. The bare repetition of them has a 
 desecrating effect; and I consequently abstain from producing 
 any examiiles of thera, since the reader will find a few, in the suc- 
 ceeding pages, and in Bishop Womack's Calvinisls' Cabinet Un- 
 locked. From the year in which Calvin first published his refine- 
 ments on St. Augustine's doctrine of grace, and sophistically 
 changed some of the plain doctrines of the Gospel into the fate 
 of Heathenism, the evil of this substitution gradually increased ; 
 and some of the finest metaphysical wits that the world ever saw, 
 had still further refined upon Calvin's scheme, till the Gospel of 
 Jesus Christ, as expounded by them, exhibited a tissue of such 
 monstrous and absurd propositions as were never devised by any 
 christian divines, or published to the world even by any philoso- 
 phers,* — ^with theexception, perhaps, of the Mahommedanccmmen- 
 
 • Certain of the greatest among the Heathen Philosophers tried to vindicate the 
 character of their Supreme Deity, from the charge of impelling men to sin, and 
 afterwards punishing them for their offences. The following account of some of 
 their attempts is exceedingly instructive, and shews, contrary to certain modem 
 assertions, that the Fa'alism of the Heathens and that of the Calvinists are more 
 nearly allied, and defended by arguments which bear a greater resemblance to 
 each other, than many persons not extensively versed in their writings have sup- 
 posed : 
 
 " The complaint of the Gods in ITomer (Odyss. «,) will best shut up this : ' O 
 ' how unjustly mortal men accuse and charge the Gods, saying, that their evils 
 ' are from them, when the truth is, that they by their own wretchlesp [reckless] 
 ' courses bri'ig mischiefs upon themselves, above what their fate or decree of the 
 ' Gods can be deemed to have brought upon them.' Arid accordingly it is one of 
 the exceUeat lessons of the Pytliagcreans, in thnr Goldrn Verses, ' Tliis thou 
 ' must know, the evils that men fall under, are brought upon them by their own 
 ' choices.' — On which even Chrysippvis, the Stoic and great assertor of Fate, 
 hath thus commented : ' Evils or mischiefs come to every man from himself ; it 
 ' being certain, that by their own incitation they both sin and suffer, and that 
 ' according to their own mind and purpose.' This being so far distant from the 
 doctrine of Fatality, it may well be wondered how Clirysippus, (who asserted 
 THAT under the name of /Ac cAaiH and t/ie decree,) could believe himself, or recon- 
 cile this comment and that verse with his great principles. And indeed Cicero 
 
INTRODUCTION. ,«| 
 
 tators on the Koran. Yet a doctrine of Election, contrary to that of 
 Calvin, and consonant to the scriptures of truth, was maintained 
 nearly from the commencement of the Reformation, by the immense 
 body of the IvUtheran Church, and by the Church of England. 
 The resistance which several of the Protestant Martyrs in Queen 
 Mary's days. Professor Baro, the judicious Hooker, and others of our 
 
 hath passed a right sentence of it, ' Chrysippus contending and labouring how to 
 ' reconcile these two propositions, thctt all things are done by Fale^ and yet that 
 
 ' something is in 07ir mvn jtower^ is entangled, and cannot extricate himself.' 
 
 ' This master of the Stoics was pressed,' saith Gellius. ' with these inconvenient con- 
 ' sequences of his doctrine of Decrees, that then the sins of men were not to be 
 ' charged on their v/ills, but to be imputed to a necessity and pressing which 
 ' arose from Fate, and that it must be unjust to make laws for the punishina; of 
 ' offenders : ' To which he had nothing to say but this, ' that though, if you 
 ' look upon the First Cause, all is thus fatally decreed and chained, yet the dispo- 
 ' sitions of each man's mind are only so far subject to Fate, as is agreeable to 
 ' their own properties and qualities : As,' saith he, ' when a man tumbles a 
 ' cylinder or roller down a hill, it is certain that the man is the violent enforcer 
 ' of the first motion of it ; but when it is once a tumbling, tlie quality and pro- 
 ' priety of the thing itself continues and consummates it.' " — IIajijigks on, 
 Fundamentals. 
 
 This is exactly the shallow reasoning of Zancliius, and otliers cf the early 
 defenders of Calvin's system. See a note in page 18. The learned and amiable 
 Doctor then makes several remarks on the cylinder of Chrysippus, and concludes 
 them thus : 
 
 " Neither is the cylinder charged with sin, whether by God or men ; nor any 
 punitive law enacted, by either, against its rolling down the hill ; nor, indeed, 
 are such charges, or such laws, ever brought in or enacted against any aclions of 
 any other creature, plant, or beast, till you ascend to man, who is supposed to 
 have a will, and not to be under such inevitable fatal laws, but to be, as that 
 excellent man Pomponius Atticus was wont to say, ' the forger of his own fate, 
 the framer of his own fortune;' which yet should be as improper to be applied 
 . to or affirmed of a man, as of any other creature, if all his actions were as irre- 
 versibly predetermined as the descent of heavy bodies, or the ascending of light, 
 that is, if Chrysippus' cylinder and the motion thereof were a commodious 
 instance or resemblance of this matter. But t'ne truth is, the man was acute and 
 dextrous, and could say as much for the reconciling of contradictions as another. 
 
 " Though this last age hath considered the question very diligently, and had 
 the advantages of the writings of the former ages to assist them, jtt he that shall 
 impartially make the comparison will find, that the ancient philosophers have 
 written more subtilely in this matter, and are more worth our reading, than any 
 of our modern schools : And when the master of them, Chrysippus, v.'as so una'ole 
 to speak intelligible sense, or extricate himself in this busmess, it will be less 
 matter of wonder to us, that they who have espoused this prolepsis should endea- 
 vour, as unprosperously as Chrysippus is judged by Cicero to have (lone, to 
 extricate themselves out of a labyrinth not oi fewer but of more difficulties ; God 
 having most clearly revealed to Christians, that as He rewardeth every man 
 according to his works., so He requireth of him according to ivhat he hath in bis 
 power to do, and not according to ichat he hath not. He that shall survey Hie- 
 nocLES on the Golden Verses of Pythagoras, Ammonius on Aristotle's Ilept 
 'Ep/j.Tjveias in shewing the nature of contingent and necessary propositions, the 
 Christian Philosopher Boetius (lib. 2) De Consolalione FhilosophicB^ and 
 Aphrodis.eus concerning the Chain and Decree., where he confutes, as absurd, 
 this comparison of the Cylinder, will, I believe, be convinced of the truth of 
 what I say." 
 
 a2 
 
IV INTRODUCTrON. 
 
 English Worthies, offered to the progress of Calvin's doctrines and' 
 platform prior to the appearance of Arniinius, is matter of history. 
 
 It must ever be regretted as an unfortunate circumstance, that 
 there was not then another great denomination of Protestants 
 on the Continent beside that of Calvin, with which those per- 
 sons might coalesce who could not digest the Lutheran doctrine of 
 the Real Pi-esence, and other niceties in the Augsburgh Confession. 
 The doctrines connected with General Redemption suffered 
 greatly, from being recommended solely by this respectable body 
 of christians, some of whose tenets Avere exceedingly obnoxious 
 to such moderate men as wished to be at the greatest possible dis- 
 tance from Popery. This fact, if examined in its different bear- 
 ings, will account satisfactorily for the rapid spread of Calvin's 
 doctrines and the Presbyterian discipline, in various countries of 
 Europe, between the years 1540 and I6OO. 
 
 Happily, however, for the honour of Protestantism, God Al- 
 mighty raised up for the defence of the Truth among the Dutch 
 Presbyterians, a man of consummate talents, deep piety, and emi- 
 nent modesty. On beholding the devastations committed on the 
 purity of the Gospel by the Supralapsarians, whose opinions at 
 that period were exceedingly prevalent in Holland, in christian 
 meekness he enquired of the leaders of Calvinism, with whom he 
 had been a mighty favourite : " Since you perceive the pernicious 
 purposes to which your high Predestinarian opinions are applied, 
 and the baneful effects which they produce on the practice of 
 professing christians, why do you not adopt that hallowing view 
 of Predestination which has the Christian Fathers of the three 
 First Centuries for its patrons, and which is still professed by 
 nearly three-fourths of the Protestants in Europe ? If you will 
 make such a mystery as Predestination the chief part of your 
 discourses, why do you not imitate the Ancients,* and the majo- 
 rity of the Moderns, in deriving it from the Divine Foresight of 
 Faith and Poseverance ? The Gospel says, God so loved the world, 
 that He gave his only -begot ten Son, that whosoever helievcth in Him 
 shoidd have everlasting life: But your novel doctrine declares, 
 * God so loved those whom He had absolutely elected to eternal 
 
 • This is acknowledged by Scui.tetus \n\m Marrow of the Fathers, by 
 VossiiTS in his IHstonj of Pehigianism, and in particular by Peter D-u ]Mou- 
 LiN in his Novelty of the Papacy, which he wrote against Cardinal Perron, and 
 in which he says : " All the Fathers before St. Augustine, and Augustine him- 
 self at first, believed, tliat God predestinated men to salvation according to his own 
 Prescience, that this and that person wnnld perform good rvorks and exercise 
 faith." " And," say the Remonstrant Synod of Utrecht, " though St. Augus- 
 tine, and certain others after him somewhat changed their sentiments in the mat- 
 ter of Predestination, yet they always acknowledged, that Christ died for all men, 
 that thefree-will nf man [iras concerned'\ in his conversion, and that if, was pos- 
 sihle for men to decline from the faith.'''' — But this higher kind of Predestination, 
 the last which St. Augustine espoused, was not sufficiently high for Calvin and 
 other modern Fatalists. — On this topic, see two subsequent notes, pp. viii, and 428. 
 
INTKODUCTION. -T 
 
 life, as to give his Son to them alone, and by an irresistible force 
 -to produce within them faith on him,' " &c. 
 
 Though this was no more than what had been frequently said 
 by others who maintained General Redemption, yet no one can 
 imagine the uproar and confusion that the repetition of it excited 
 amongst the querulous race of high Predestinarians in Holland 
 and in the different states and kingdoms in which Calvinism 
 'flourished, as soon as it was delivered by an eminent man of their 
 own profession. The calmness and moderation of Arminius 
 communicated an importance to all the arguments which he pro- 
 duced ; and the fine character of him which Bishop Womack has 
 drawn in a succeeding page (91 )> will be acknowledged by all 
 competent judges to be exceedingly appropriate. When the more 
 prudent and judicious in the enemy's camp saw their idol, Uncon~ 
 ditional Predesthwfion, fall down before the ark of God's truth, 
 they severally gathered a few of the scattered fragments toge- 
 ther, -and with them each attempted to form another less objec- 
 ^tionable image according to his own fancy. Before that event 
 the Calvinists were divided only into two great parties. Supra 
 and Sub-Lapsarians, who were very loving and agreeable 
 towards each other. But as soon as their favourite system was 
 overturned, scarcely one Predestinarian divine of eminence could 
 be found throughout Europe who adhered strictly to the old doc- 
 trines ; each of them attempted to amend that which he deemed 
 the most reprehensible, and to communicate, to its " more 
 uncomely parts," a plausible if not a consistent appearance. Thus, 
 among these great enemies to the diffusive Benevolence of Hea- 
 ven, a discord arose, which has not subsided to this day, and 
 which has been the means of bringing many of them within the 
 hallowing precincts of scriptural Arminianism, before they were 
 aware of being near its abhorred approaches. 
 
 Those who are acquainted with the secret history of the Synod 
 of Dort, know, that palpable and obvious as were the political 
 designs of the Princes and Potentates who appeared by their 
 proxies on that occasion, there were certain purposes which had 
 long been in the contemplation of the chief divines of Calvin's 
 party, and vhich they hoped to effect in that convention. While 
 many of the hot and short-sighted members of the Assembly 
 indulged in the charming idea, that the condemnation and banish- 
 ment of the Arminians would be the best method of restoring 
 peace to the great body of Calvinists, the aim of their chiefs, 
 whose views, if not more liberal, were imdoubtedly more exten- 
 sive, was, the devising of a grand formulary of Calvinism, so 
 comprehensive in its nature as to compose within itself their 
 various differences. But in the latter intention they completely 
 failed. Certain Canons or Articles were indeed signed by all the 
 members of the Synod ; but their signatures to that document 
 could be obtained, only on the condition, that to those Canons 
 
 A 3 
 
VI INTKODUCTION. 
 
 jshoidd he apjwvdcd the large exposilion of the sense in which they se- 
 verally subscribed those Formularies of Calvinistic concord. Thuis 
 *' the Acts of the Synod" contain the widely different meanings 
 given to those Articles by the foreign Divines of Great Britain, 
 the Palatinate, Hesse, Switzerland, VVedderavx, Geneva, Bremen, 
 and Embden,* — and by the Dutch Divines from the Provinces and 
 
 " From this exact enumeration of the several petty principalities and small 
 towns, that deputed Calvinistic representatives to the Dutch jynod, the reader 
 -will perceive the narrow constitution of that notorious Assembly. The only Pro- 
 testant kingdom in Europe that sent deputies to it, was Great Britain : The rest of 
 the members of the Synod, with the exception of the Dutch Divines and those 
 from Geneva and Switzerland, were the delegates of a few inconsiderable States 
 in Germany ; in which extensive empire, the Lutherans constituted above three- 
 fourths of the Protestant population, but deputed no Divines to Dort. It was 
 •therefore a good specimen of the bold and tcfwering spirit of Calvinistic self-election, 
 •when this small number of Divines issued their Canons, which they hoped to 
 employ as fetters for binding the o^jinions of all the Reformed in Europe, and 
 which some of their admirers tell us, have never been equalled since tlie days of 
 the Apostles, — " except," say the English Calvinists, " by the decisions of 
 4the Westminster Assembly of Divines T' 
 
 The same vain-glorious practices, which are, indeed, natural results of those 
 Predestinarian principles that foster human pride, were displayed in England at 
 the commencement of our CiviJ Wars, in 1640, when the " Solemn League and 
 Covenant'' v/as invented, by which all men were required to swear that they would 
 *' endeavour a reformation of religion, in the kingdoms of England and Ireland, 
 according to the v/ord of God, and the examples of tJie best Refcrmed Chvrcfies.'" 
 Dr. Hooper has given us a just description of what the Calvinists meant by thi? 
 phrase : 
 
 " Good men, who know the grounds and reasons of our reformation, were at a 
 loss, what the late design might mean of ' brhiging mi^r C/mrcfi nearer lo the Pb o- 
 TESTANTS ABKOAD," to thosc of ovT brethren of Calvin'' s way, we suppose, [they 
 intended. We hope the intention was not to insinuate an unjust reproach, as if 
 ■we had not the amity or affection for them which we ought, did not rejoice 
 in their edification, or compassionate their affliction ; but only this, to alter 
 OUT constitution into a nearer resemblance with theirs. But if any of ours 
 <iesired this for amendment, as a fr.rther reformation and greater perfection, it 
 was because they were not pleased to consider their own frame weU : Nor could 
 any honest man of our Church, and who understood her right, have ever con- 
 sented. And if the design was only political, (though the policy appears not,) 
 yet why might it not be as fit for those Protestants to come nearer to us ? But, 
 not to stand on such terms, how could we have gone nigher to the Calvinists, 
 without departing from the Lutheran ? Our Church is already in the middle, 
 and reaching out her hands on either side ; settled there long ago, by weighty 
 reason, and upon mature deliberation : For, although the word Protestant 
 has been here at home appropriated to a party, and the Reformed Church 
 .abroad has been still understood only for those of one way [the Calvinists] ; yet 
 every one knows, that the Lutheran is the first Reformed, and that the term Pro- 
 TESTANT is only proper to them, and particularly to those only of the German 
 nation. This then is the first fallacy endeavoured to be put upon the people, — 
 
 * that those to whom som-C of our Dissenters pretend a nearer approach, are t/ie 
 ■* only Reformed (did Protestants in the world:'' As if the Luth'.ran were not to 
 be imdcrstood by his own name. The other is this, ' that the Calvinist is so 
 
 * great, that the other deserves not to be mentioned :' Whereas the other [the 
 Jjutherans] have still been the far greater number, and the much more consider- 
 aJble. fhit trade, indeed, makes us look into Holland, (where, though, the 
 
INTBODUCTIOK. "Vll 
 
 Dependencies of Guelderland and Zutphen, South Holland, North 
 Holland, Zeland, Utrecht, Friezland, Overyssel, Groningen, the 
 Ommelands, and Drent, and by the Walloon Churches. The expla- 
 natory and often opposite significations, given by each of these par- 
 ties, occupy a far larger space in the Acts than the Canons them- 
 selves, and contain curious apologies for every contradictory 
 ^rade of Calvinism.* The fiiilure of their grand scheme of Pre- 
 
 tnie Calvinist makes not above a third of the people !,) and our fashions, into 
 France, (and would to God, their numbers increased there !,) we speak much of 
 Switzerland and the Lower Palatinate : But we forget to take notice cf the large 
 countries that are entirely of the other profession ; as Denmark, Sweden, the 
 dominions of the Elector of Saxony and Braudenburgh, of the great House of 
 Lunenburg, and the many Imperial Cities. So, that the design, mentioned 
 before, ' of coming nearer to die Reformation abroad,' was nothing else but 
 this ; — to persuade us to go farther from the universal church primitive, from the 
 major part of the moderns Reformed, from our innocent agreement with general 
 Christianity, and from those of ourselves who are much edified by our present 
 constitution ; to come nearer to those abroad, who, to speak in the fairest lan- 
 guage, are not better constituted than ourselves ; and to compl y with those at 
 home who are, certainly, neither the greater nor the best part of us ; to give way 
 to the falsest and most destructive prejudice, opposite to all catholic agreement ; 
 and to countenance and encourage a m.ost causeless and seditious separation." 
 
 * I have briefly described " the discord which arose among these great ene- 
 rnies to the diffusive benevolence of Heaven ;" and the foUowir.g quotation, from 
 the able reply which Grotius made to Ei vet's ^^Jo/of/^, wUl further illustrate 
 this Calvinistic disagreement, and the spirit which animated the Dutch members 
 of the Synod cf Dort and their immediate successors. At the commencem_ent he 
 alludes to the collection of blasphemous and indiscreet expressions which the 
 Remonstrants produced froin the WTitings cf some of the niost eminent Calvinists, 
 both Dutchmen and foreigners. 
 
 " Those noxious dogmas," says Grotius, " which the Remonstrants objected 
 against the men who called themselves the Reformed, these nominal 
 Reformed have not yet been able to rem^ove from them.selves, and never wiU be 
 able. For they were not mere inferences^ but the very expressions, not only of 
 one or two individuals, but of many persons of great eminence, — who pointed out 
 to the [members of the] Synod of Dort the way into which they entered, — who 
 constituted no inconsiderable portion of that Synod, — and who gave such inter- 
 pretations of [the decisions of] that Synod as accorded exactly with the meaning 
 of Bogennan's spirit. I wiU not use the authority of the men [the Remonstrants] 
 who made those collections [of injudicious expressions] : For they are poor, des- 
 titute, and were, not long ago, driven into banishment by these very Synodists. 
 Let the passages which they quoted be inspected, and it wOl appear that they are 
 exact — nothing is added, nothing subtracted. But Richelieu has adduced a 
 smaller number of passages [from the writings of the Calvinists] of the same 
 import : \Vhen he first wrote them, he was only a Bishop ; when he caused them 
 to be republished, he had been invested with a Cardinal's purple, and was at the 
 •helm of the government. The weU-knc-,7n prudence of the Cardinal does not 
 allow us to suppose, that he would utter any thing without consideration ; and 
 the great benefits, which he has bestowed on the pastors of Charentcn and their 
 associates, will not perm.it us to view him as under the influence of hatred. 
 
 " But these are not the only persons who urge such objections against Rivet 
 and his colleagues : The same objections are made by the greater portion of the 
 Roman Catholics, the Greek Church, and of the Protestants,- — not only by those 
 of the latter denomination who adhere to the Augsburgh Confession in Sweden, 
 Deimaark, and the largest regions of Germany, but by those likewise who occupy 
 
Vm IMTRODUCTIOX. 
 
 tlestinarian concord was rendered still more apparent, after the 
 termination of the Synod, when hot disputes arose among the 
 Calvinists in several countries about the kind of Predestination 
 sanctioned byj^the Synod, — sonie of them asserting it to have been 
 Sui'RA and others Sub-lapsarianism. 
 
 By the perusal of the following extract, relative only to a 
 single subject of their disagreement, the reader will form some 
 tolerable judgment concerning the dreadful schism which Armi- 
 nius made in the Calvinistic phalanx : 
 
 " That the decrees of Election and Reprobation levied by our 
 brethren, are shadows of mountains not men, human and not di- 
 vine conceptions, those endless digladiations and irreconcilable 
 divisions amongst themselves, about assigning or stating the object 
 of these decrees, are an abundant confirmation unto us. — Some of 
 them hold, ' that men, simply and indefinitely considered, are the 
 ' object of these decrees.' — Others contend, 'that men, considered 
 
 * as yet to be created or made, are this object' — A third sort 
 
 the chief stations in the Church of England, or who, I ought rather to say, Jiave 
 
 occupied those stations But the men, who, by such a. general concurrence 
 
 of Christians, are accused of these great evils, act a most iniquitous part : For 
 they neither condemn those sentiments which are produced from the writings of 
 the chief men of their party, through a fear of deserting their leaders ; nor do 
 they venture to defend those sentiments, lest their ulcers should become apparent 
 to all persons. They wish to have no perception of their diseases, and yet they 
 do not try to lay aside the use of those soothing medicines which physicians call 
 
 ANODYNE?. 
 
 " Docs any one wish to know, to which of the parties in this controversy the 
 ■charge of NOVELTY attaches ? Let him set asidje St. Augustine, and the few 
 writers who imitate his sayings ; let him separate them on this account — because 
 their words admit of an ambiguous interpretation. Let him consult Augustine'5 
 Christian predecessors in Asia, Africa, Greece, and throughout the whole of 
 'Western Cliristendom, — ^vriters, v/ho have been most conspicuous for exemplary 
 living and sound judgment, who have perused and examined the Holy Scriptures 
 with diligence, have expressed the doctrines in their manners, and some of whom 
 have sealed their testimony with their blood. 'W'hat peril is there in [the 
 Anninians] following such ni'merjus and great guides as these ? It is the belief 
 of those who co-incide in ofinio-i with Rivet, and this belief they constantly 
 inculcate, tliat every believer ought to be assured of Ms final salvation or of his 
 present predestination. This doctrine is their principal consolation, both in life 
 .and in death ; it is likewise the foundation of the whole of their instruction. 
 These are not crude declarations of ours, but they are crude articles of their belief. 
 ' Predestination,' in the sense in which St. Augustine imderstood it, ' remains a 
 
 * secret in the bosom of the Almighty : There are no certain marks of it in this 
 
 * world, unless God be pleased to reveal it to some person, — which He is not accus- 
 ' tomed to do.' Those indications of it which have been fabricated, are the 
 xlreams of those who wish to have it so. The Spirit of adoption is a seal only to 
 present experience., and not necessarily [as the Calvinists maintain,] of that which 
 \fi future : For it is possible to quench the Spirit. ' But,' says Rivet, ' we do 
 
 * not assert that sins are forgiven before they are committed.' What then does he 
 assert ? Does he not say, ' that the pardon of sins was absolutely and from all 
 ' eternity decreed by God ?' And what real difference is there between these two 
 assertions, especially when it is the wish of the Calvinists to inculcate, on all those 
 wlio have believe<l in Christ, the necessity/ of being personally assured of thin 
 
 ytecrcc!" — Then follows the paragraph about I^loscs Amyraut, which I have 
 rjuotcd in a subsequent page, 750. 
 
INTllODUCTION. IX 
 
 stands up against both the former with this notion, ' that men, 
 
 * considered as ah-eady created and made, are this object.'^ — A 
 fourth disparageth the conjectures of the three former, with this 
 conceit, ' that men, considered as fallen, are the said object.' — 
 Another findeth a defect in the singleness or simplicity of all the 
 former opinions, and compoundeth this in opposition to them, 
 
 * that men, considered both as to be created and as being created, 
 
 * and as fallen, together, are the proper object of those trouble- 
 
 * some decrees.'. — A sixth sort formeth us yet another object, and 
 this is, ' men considered as salvable, or capable of being saved.' — 
 A seventh, not liking the faint complexions of all the former opi- 
 nions, delivereth us this, as strong and healthful ; viz, ' that men, 
 
 * considered as damnable or capable of damnation, are this object.' 
 — Others yet again, super-fancying all the former, conceit "^ men, 
 ' considered as creable, or possible to be created, to be the object 
 
 * so highly contested about.' — A ninth party gives the pre-emin- 
 ence to their sense, nho disciple the world with this doctrine, 
 
 * that men considered as labiles, or capable of falling, are the ob- 
 
 * ject of those men-confounding and God-abasing decrees.' — A 
 tenth squadron, coming up in the rear of all the former, suppos- 
 eth that they all left the Truth behind them, and that themselves 
 have gathered it up, in this notion, viz. ' that men, considered as 
 
 * repairable or capable of restauration, are the object of that Pre- 
 
 * destination which men have laboured to build up, and yet could 
 
 * never agree about the materials.' — And whether all the scattered 
 and conflicting opinions about (he object of our Brethren's decrees 
 ^Election and Reprobation, be bound up in this bundle, or no, we 
 cannot say ; we are rather negatively inclined. However, by 
 those uncouth distractions and interferings in opinion amongst 
 them, where, or how, to bottom their said jiretended decrees, we are 
 jealous with a very great jealousy, that neither they, nor any 
 others, are able to find so much as an inch ofjirm ground \f\ieveoTa. 
 to build them." — Goodwin's Agreement and Distance of Brethren. 
 
 Such were the manifold disputes among the Calvinists, con- 
 cerning one of the most simple matters in their heterogeneous 
 scheme, and one about which they ought to have been at agree- 
 ment before they attempted to raise upon it \he\Y fatal superstruc- 
 ture. The contrast, in this respect, between them and the Armi- 
 nians, is very remarkable : For, how much soever the latter dif- 
 fer among themselves in the more or less gracious quality of the 
 materials of which their Superstructure is formed, (and the 
 difference is to this day great both among the Dutch and English 
 Arminians,) all of them agree in laying the Foundation of the 
 Divine Decrees, concerning man's salvation, in Faiih and Per- 
 severance FORESEEN. In reference to this topic, the celebrated 
 Limborch observes, in his Historical Relation of the Origin a7id 
 Progress of the Controversies aboid Predestination in the United Pro- 
 mnccs: " But, that the Calvinists (Rafter the Synod^, might be 
 
X INXnODUCTlON. 
 
 able to tlec'k out in fair colours the charge of Socinianism, and that 
 they might clefend their own schism and the persecution which 
 they instituted against the Remonstrants, under the specious pre- 
 text of ' the latent Socinianism among them which would insensibly 
 ' betray itself/ they contrived to frame a distinction between the 
 earhj Remonslrants who dissented from them solely in the Five 
 Points, and llie latter whom they stigmatized as Socinians. Others 
 of their writers, (Spanheim, &c.) not content with this two-fold 
 distinction, have invented four classes of Remonstrants, that 
 merge at length into the two already described. But in vain do 
 the Calvinists endeavour to find some refuge for themselves under 
 this distinction : For it is a circumstance well known to every 
 one, that the Remonsti'ants were condemned at the Synod of 
 Dort solely on account of the Five Articles about Predestination. The 
 Acts and Canons of that assembly proclaim the same fact. On 
 account of tliose Five Points alone, the Remonstrant pastors were 
 discharged from the ministry and banished, and their churches 
 were harassed with a most grievous persecution of ten years' 
 continuance. By the jurlgraent of the Provincial Synods, frater- 
 nal communion was refused to those who professed that benevo- 
 lent sentiment. If therefore the latter Remonstrants had adopted 
 Socinianism, that can neither be an argument in excuse for the 
 schism, which had some time previously been introduced onJi) 
 through the dissension about Predestination, nor of the atrocious per- 
 secution with Avliich thf:t schism was connected." 
 
 But though Arminius dissented from his Calvinistic brethren 
 in the manner of stating the order and subject of God's decrees, 
 he was too good a divine to reject the rest of the scriptural docr 
 trines which they maintained. In all his labours his paramount 
 desire was, according to his ov/n words, " to perceive his coun- 
 trymen employing a nicer accuracy of distinction." (P. 478.) He 
 knew that, in a revelation from Heaven,' — ^how great^^soever may be 
 the condescension of the Deity in humbling Himself to creatures of 
 the earth, and in accommodating his expressions to the finite 
 capacities of mankind, — some matters must appear tnysterious : 
 " Secret things belong 7/nto the Lorp our God; but those tilings which 
 •arc revealed belong unto us and to our children," &C. Among those 
 grand verities which have been RtvEALED, these two hold a dis- 
 tinguished place: (1.) "It is God who worketh in you both to ivill 
 and to do of his good pleasure." (Philip, ii. 13.) — (2.) In the same 
 passage, the believers at Phiiippi are thus exhorted, on the 
 ground of iheh constant obedience, " Work out your own salvation 
 with fear and trembling."* St. Peter also exhorts those who had 
 
 • " The concurrence of God and man," says Archbishop Bramhall, " in pro- 
 ducing the act of our believing or conversion to God, is so evident in Holy 
 Scripture, tliat it is vanity and lost labour to oppose it. If God did not concur, 
 the Scripture would not say, ' It is God iJiat worlcetfi in us both tlie ivill and tfie 
 decd.^ If man did not concur, the Scripture avouM not say, ' Wortt out your own 
 
INTRODUCTION. XI 
 
 obtained like precious faith with himself, through the righte- 
 ousness of God f.ud their Saviour Jesus Christ, " Give dili- 
 s^nce to make your calling and election sure : For, if ye do these 
 things, ye shall never fall : For so an entrance shall be ministered 
 unto you abundantly into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord 
 and Saviour Jesus Christ." Arminius has been accused, by those 
 who knew little either about him or his doctrines, " of having ar- 
 rogantly tried to reconcile these two apparently opposite propo- 
 sitions ; and, when he was not able to effect a satisfactory recon- 
 ciliation," it is said, " he then attempted to elevate the doctrine 
 contained in the second proposition at the expence of the other." 
 All this is pure fiction : For Arminius acknowledged both of 
 them to be revealed scriptural truths ; but the mode in which 
 the irresistible power of God can exert itself in the work of human 
 
 salvation ivith fear and trembling.^ If our repentance were God's work alone » 
 God would not say to man, ' Turn ye unto me with all your heart ;' and if repent- 
 ance were man's work alone, we had no need to pray, ' Turn ws, O Lord, and 
 we shall he turned.^ "\7e are commanded to repent and to believe : In vain are 
 •commandments given to them v/ho cannot at all concur to the acting of that which 
 is commanded. Faith and repentance are proposed unto us, as conditions ta 
 obtain blessedness and avoid destruction. ' If thou shall confess tvith thy mouthy 
 and believe irith thy heart, thou shall be saved.'' And ' Exce2}l ye repent, ye 
 shall all likewise perish.'- To propose impossible conditions, which they, to 
 whom they are propos£d,have no power either to accept or refuse, is a mere 
 mockery. Our unbelief and impenitence is imputed to us as our own fault, 
 '. Because of unbelief thou ivert broken off ;'' and ' After thy hardness aiid impe- 
 nitent heart, thou treasnrest up unto thyself wrath.'' Their unbelief and impeni.. 
 fence were not their own faults, if they neither had power to concur with the grace 
 of God to the production of faith and repentance ; nor yet to refuse the grace of 
 God. The Holy Scripture doth teach us, that God doth help us in doing works 
 6f piety : ' The Lord is my Helper,'' and ' The Spirit helpeth our infirmilies.' 
 If we did not co-operate at aU, God could not be said to help us. There is, there- 
 fore, there must be, co-operation. Neither doth this concurrence or co-operation 
 of man, at aU, entrench upon the power or honour of God, because this very 
 liberty to co-operate is his gift, and this manner of acting his own institution." 
 
 This extract from the Irish Prelate is given by the Bishop of "^^'inchester, in 
 his Lordship's able "Refutation of Calvinism." In the late Rev. Thc- 
 MAS Scott's Remarks, it is said, " This quotation is not materially different 
 from the sentiments of modern Calvinists. None of us [Calvinists] imagine, 
 that ' our repentance is God's work alone,' and he admits, that if it ' were our 
 ' work alone, we need not pray, Turn thou us, O Lord, end we shall be turned.'' 
 None of us suppose, that God has, ' proposed impossible conditions, which they, 
 * to whom they are proposed, have no power to accept or refuse.' We have, by 
 nature, both power and inclination to refuse ; and nothing is wanting but a willing 
 mind, in order to accept of them : But Bishop Bramhall would admit, that 
 whateyer power we have, we have not that iviU'ing mind, except by the grace of 
 God. ' The liberty to co-operate is His gift ;' but the inclination to comply with 
 his proposal, is His also. How far the word co-operate is proper, may be ques- 
 tioned : But, as the matter is here stated, I feel no great repugnancy to it ; espe- 
 cially as explained in the concluding part of the quotation." 
 
 The man, who could make these large admissions in sincerity, must have been 
 at that time an Arminian, how pertinaciously soever he might on other occasions 
 contend for some of the peculiarities of Calvin's scheme, of which nevertheless 
 he docs not seem to have had a clear conception. 
 
Till INTRODUCTION. 
 
 salvation, -without destroying the free agency of man, he viewed as 
 one of those secret things which belong unto the Lord." The 
 clumsy manner in which the Calvinists solve this difficulty, 
 resembles the act of Alexander the Great when he cut the Gordian 
 knot : They resolve all the deeds of moral agents into the Absolute 
 Will and Irresistible Power of God, and by tearing away one of 
 these relative propositions from its fellow, they make the first of 
 them the foundation of their system, while the numerous exhor- 
 tations, promises and threatenings of the scriptures become with 
 them objects of inferior consideration. Arminius did. not, in this, 
 follow their example : In modestly advocating the freedom of the 
 will, he spoke more cautiously about it than even Melancthon* 
 had done, and always described it as utterly incompetent to 
 effect any good unless when assisted by the exciting, preceding, and 
 accompanfing Grace of God. Though he could not perfectly 
 reconcile the two propositions which are quoted at the commence- 
 ment of tliis paragraph, yet he conceived them to be equally 
 binding on the belief and practice of christians, and consequently 
 subjects on which reason, enlightened by revelation and aided by 
 the Spirit of God, might appropriately exercise itself. In the 
 ample notes to the first volume of his Works, I have felt much 
 pleasure in elucidating the moderation and sobriety which Armi- 
 nius displayed in all his theological researches, of which the fol- 
 lowing extract, from a letter quoted in that volume, page 6S2, pre- 
 sents a good specimen : " In justification we are not taught yi-om 
 whence faith arises. Let it suffice, that it is there proved. Believers, 
 
 • In the sixteen particulars concerning Arminius, which Dr. Thomas Pierce 
 has given, in his Divine Philanthropy Defended, the following forms the 
 twelfth : — 
 
 " For myself I do declare, that I was then in the opinions I now am in when 
 I had not read one page of Arminius's works : Nor do I agree with him any far- 
 ther, than he agrees with Scripture, Antiquity, the Church of England, and Me- 
 lancthon after the time of his conversion from the errors of Luther, and Mr. Cal- 
 vin. This IMelanchthon at first had been as it were the scholar of Luther, and drew 
 from him his first errors : But, bein^ a pious, learned, and unpassionate man, 
 (pursuing truth, not faction,) he saw his error, and forsook it, embracing those opi- 
 nions concerning the liberty of the will, the cause of sin, the universality of grace, 
 and the respectiveness of God's decrees, which I asserted in those notes against 
 which Mr. B. now declaims. This Melanchthon was and is still the dab ling, 
 (more than any one man) of the Reformed part of the Christiati world; so much the 
 rather, because besides his vastlearning, unbiassedjudgment, and transcendent piety, 
 he was almost proverbial for moderation. For this was he chosen to write the 
 Augustan Confession ; For this he was much considered by them that composed 
 our Book of Articles, and our other Book of Homilies which shews us what is the 
 doctrine of the true Chiirch of England : For this he was imitated and admired by 
 the glorious martyrs of our religion in the days of Queen IMary : For this he was 
 esteemed far above Mr. Calvin by Jacobus Arminius, the famous Professor of Di- 
 vinity in the University of Leyden, who, however a Presbyterian as to matter of 
 discipliae, did yet so very far excel the other divines of that sect, in exactness of 
 learning a^ well as life, that we may say he became Melanchthon'' s convert^ 
 
i;J<TRODUCTIO>r. XlII 
 
 and the]/ alone, are Justified without tfie works of the law. I have 
 endeavoured to distinguish, or rather to disjoin, this decree by 
 which God resolves to justify and adopt believers, from that by 
 which He determines to bestow faith on these or those \j)articular 
 individuals'^ • This distinction I have attempted to make, from the 
 nature and necessity of the things themselves ; expressly with 
 this design — that people may learn that our controversy does not 
 relate to everi/ kind of Predestination, but to that only which is 
 included in the last-named decree. — A consideration of the only 
 order which God has established, will require us to teach, that 
 God justifies none except those who believe, though in that action He 
 perform the condition required by himself, which condition could 
 not have been performed except through that [[irresistible] action. 
 Add to this, that, beside his own omnipotent and internal action, 
 God is both able and willing to employ the following argument : 
 
 * God justifies no persons except such as believe : Believe there- 
 
 * fore, that thou mayest be justified.' With respect, then, to this 
 argument, faith will arise from suasion; but with respect to the 
 omnipotent and internal act of God, faith will arise from an irre- 
 sistible efficacy. — Should any one object, ' That it is impossible 
 
 * for faith to spring at the same time from a suasion 7vhich may be 
 'resisted, and from an efficacy which is irresistible;' I have 
 nothing to offer that will be any great contradiction to this remark. 
 But I have another observation to make, that is somewhat dif- 
 ferent ; it is this, ' In his omnipotent act God employs |^or uses] 
 ' this argument ; and by this argument, when rightly understood, 
 
 * he efficaciously produces faith.' If it were otherwise, the oper- 
 ation would be expended on a stone or a lifeless body, and not upon 
 
 the INTELLECT of a MAN."* 
 
 In another part of the letter, he says, " I do not deny, that 
 faith is communicated to us through the Spirit of Christ, whom 
 he has obtained from the Father, and of whom He is constituted 
 the Donor and Dispenser by the Father. But we must observe, 
 that the Spirit, considered absolutely as the Author of faith, pre- 
 cedes even the union of Christ with us : This conclusion may 
 easily be drawn from the circumstance — that our union with 
 
 Christ is perfected by the Spirit and faith. There is nothing in 
 
 that reasoning by Calvin of which I cannot heartily approve, if 
 all things in it be rightly understood. For I confess, that the 
 grace by which the Holy Spirit is bestowed, is not common to 
 all men. I also acknowledge, that God's gratuitous [[free] elec- 
 tion may be said to be ' the fountain of faith ;' but it is an elec- 
 tion to bestow faith and not to communicate salvation. For a believer 
 is elected to a participation of salvation, but a sinner is elected 
 to faith. Let this passage also be taken into consideration, 
 (2 Thess. ii. 13.) 'Because God hath elected you to salvation 
 
 • See exactly a similar moda of reasoning, in the succeeding extract from Dr. 
 Coplestone, (p. xv.) and from Am^.inius himself at the close of this volume, 
 page 827. 
 
XlV INTRODUCTION.- 
 
 through sanctification of the Spirit and belief o^ the truth,' &c. ; 
 and this two-fold election will be apparent. Or at least, it will 
 seem impossible to say, that ' election to salvation is an election to 
 faith ;' because the former is produced ' \\vi:o\\.gh faith \_ov belief] 
 and sanctification of the Spirit.' " 
 
 T might quote parallel passages from several of the old evange- 
 lical Arminians of the Church of England, but I prefer a large 
 extract, illustrative of the topics which engaged the attention of 
 Arminius,from a highly accomplished modern author, whose chaste 
 and scriptural views of Revealed Truth will recommend them- 
 selves to the approbation of every christian, and who has ex- 
 pressed his " dissatisfaction" with some of " the attempts made 
 to refute the Calvinistic opinions," — attempts which seemed to 
 him " often to retain as mvich error on their own side as they ex- 
 posed on the opposite, and to deprive Christianity of much of that 
 SPIRITUAL AND VITAL FORCE which is its main characteristic and 
 essential property." I allude to Doctor Edward Copleston, Pro- 
 vost of Oriel College, Oxt^ord, who thus expresses himself in his 
 dispassionate " Enquiry into the Doctrines of Necessity and 
 Predestination :" 
 
 " The next difficulty which I suppose may be objected to the 
 opinions we maintain, is, that they are inconsistent v/ith the lan- 
 guage habitually employ.ed by religious men to denote their sense 
 of the supernatural agency exerted in the world. It is an unde- 
 niable fact, that in all ages and under all forms of religion, (setting 
 aside for the present the doctrines of P.evelation,) serious and good 
 men have regarded the events of this life as subject to the con- 
 troul of Divine Providence — that they have talked of the folly 
 and conceit of mankind in supposing that their wisdom, their love- 
 sight. their power and contrivance, brought about the great or 
 good things which happen — and thoiigli the men who make these 
 reflections have had their hopes and fears^ and tiken their full 
 share in planning and executing measures with a view to such 
 events, yet after the event is passed, or even before it comes, in 
 their graver and more contemplative hours they admit that it is 
 God's will alone to which the whole is owing — and that all things 
 have conspired to the furtherance of some great plan of his, which 
 has either served to promote the happiness of men, or to illustrate 
 his own transcendent excellence 
 
 " 'Where then,' it may be said, ' is the consistency of all this? 
 ' Either they do not, while they are acting, think as they do Avhen 
 ' truth forces these reflections from them ; or, if they do, it is a 
 * proof that men may believe in a Superior Power bearing onwar<l 
 ' with a steady and irresistible course, and yet act in concurrence 
 ' with that Power, just as if the issue depended on themselves.' 
 Now as to the first of these suppositions, it may be admitted with- 
 out scruple, that men do, while they are engaged in actiim, 
 think more of their immediate business, than of the share the 
 
INTRODUCTIOy. XV 
 
 PoAver above them takes in the same process — and that in cahner 
 and more leisurely hours, the impression of that Supreme Influ- 
 ence returns upon the mind with increased force, as some sound 
 which in the stillness of the night fills the air, yet is lost or un- 
 perceived amidst the several discords and noises of a busy day. 
 But the position can never be conceded, that the belief of this 
 controlling power is contradictory to the belief of the freedom of 
 human actions. For in the first place it does not follow, that because 
 we believethis power to be exercised, therefore it is exercised tothe 
 exclusion of all other influence. And again, it may be, (to speak 
 in a manner adapted to human conception and human experience,) 
 it may be kept in reserve to act upon occasions ; it may form 
 the plan and the outline, and delegate the subordinate parts to 
 minor agents ; it may, for the purpose of exercising the fidelity 
 and zeal of those agents, one while keep itself out of sight; or 
 at another, to animate their exertions, let them perceive its pre- 
 sence ; or, to check their folly and presumption, make them feel 
 their dependence, and frustrate their endeavours — it may, sup- 
 posing these agents to have a will of their own, incline that will 
 to act conformably to their duty, by making that duty appear 
 easy and agreeable, by removing obstacles and terrors, and 
 placing attractive objects in their way ; or if the will be stub- 
 born, it may make it feel the ill consequences of that stubborn- 
 ness, and it may contrive tliat its perverseness shall defeat its 
 own purpose, and forward some other purpose which is kind 
 and beneficial : it may make the misconduct of one, instrumental 
 to his OAvn correction, or to the improvement and fidelity of the 
 the rest, by shewing, in ordinary cases of disobedience, the 
 evil he brings upon himself — or, in cases of extreme depravity, 
 the utter abandonment and ruin to which the delinquent is left. 
 
 " Does any part of such a scheme either detract from the notion 
 of a Supreme Intelligence planning, governing, guiding, and ac- 
 complishing the whole? or can such a conception, in the mind of 
 man, of the scheme of Divine Providence tend to relax his energy, 
 to discourage his industry, to impair the distinctions of right and 
 wrong, or weaken the principle of duty and obedience? 
 
 " The only argument brought against it is borrow^ed from the 
 difficulty of accounting for evil as mixed with God's creation, and 
 of conceiving free-wili in His creatures. But difficulties can never 
 be listened to against the evidence of facts. The fact of the exist- 
 ence of evil no one denies — and the existence of free-will is by 
 the concurrent unreflecting testimony of all mankind admitted to 
 be a fact, opposed only by the metaphysical objections of a few. 
 That all mankind act, speak, and think, as if the will were free, 
 is admitted by these few- themselves. And I trust it may be re- 
 garded as proved, that to think otherwise would deprive us of all 
 motives to action, and all sense of right and wrong. It is only 
 because they cannot conceive how these two things can co-exist, 
 
3CV1 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 that they call upon us to surrender oui' consciousness, our activity, 
 and our moral principles. 
 
 " Precisely analogous to God's dealings in dispensing the good 
 things of life, and to that method by which a sense of our de- 
 pendence on him for the enjoyment of these blessings is kept 
 alive in us, is the communication also of that unseen influence 
 upon the mind which good and pious men desire, and the belief of 
 which even under the guidance of the light of nature was very 
 general. ' That every good and every perfect gift is from above,' 
 is a sentiment not introduced but adopted by an Apostle of Christ. 
 It occasionally breaks through the gloom of the philosophy and 
 the religion of the heathen world: and the sublimer strains of 
 their poetry speak the same language. * That God favours those 
 ' who yield to his influence — but that he rejects and abandons or 
 ' drives on headlong to their ruin men who resist his will' — are fre- 
 quent exclamations of those who contemplate with an awful won- 
 der his moral government of the universe. ' That these wicked 
 ' and rebellious men, when they fancy they are pursuing their own 
 
 * schemes, are baffled and foiled, and made subservient to those 
 
 * very purposes which they endeavour to defeat* — that they are 
 ' raised aloft in order to render their fall more exemplary — ^that 
 
 * they are flattered for a time with the apparent success of their 
 ' iniquity, in order that the punishment when it comes may be 
 ' more heavy and more instructive'^ — these are reflections which 
 cannot be new to any who are conversant with the ancient hea- 
 then writers ; and they accord also with those occasional impres- 
 sions which the passing events of life or the records of history 
 make upon all serious minds. 
 
 " It is not till they involve themselves in metaphysical per- 
 plexities, that men regard these things as incompatible with the 
 acknowledged attributes of God, or with the free-will of man. 
 But when once they begin to enquire, ' whether the world might 
 
 * not have been constructed otherwise, whether evil might not have 
 ' been dispensed with, whether what God foreknew can be said to 
 ' proceed from the free-will of man, and whether He must not be 
 
 * understood as having pre-ordained every occurrence however 
 ' minute or however iniquitous which takes place in the world,'t it 
 is no wonder that their enquiries should be lost in endless mazes, 
 or in a denial of something which it is as necessary to admit as 
 any other proposition which they think proper to retain. 
 
 * See the arguments of Arminius, p. 827. 
 ■\ Of the unguarded assertions respecting the agency of Divine Providence, 
 which are sometimes made even hy wise and good men, the following brief extracts 
 from Dr. Chalmers's sermon on Predestination^ will afford a fair example : " God 
 is as much master of the human heart, as he is of the elements. Every step of 
 every individual character receives as determinate a character from the hand of 
 God as every mile of a planet's orbit, or every gust of wind, or every wave of the 
 sea, or every particle of flying dust, or every rivulet of flowing water. 
 
INTRODUCTION. XVU 
 
 '* If, however, these difficulties are traced up to some funda- 
 mental positions, that are not contradictory, but whose existence 
 is only inconceivable to our faculties, — if each of these positions 
 must be separately admitted, although their union is mysterious 
 and unaccountable, — it is not adding to the difficulty, it is a natu- 
 ral and probable conclusion, ' that many cotisequences from each of 
 ' those fundamental positions separately taken should be deducible, 
 ' which are no more reconcilable with each other in our appre- 
 ' hensions,than the original truths are from which they are derived.' 
 To dwell upon these subordinate truths, these consequences of 
 the original positions, to set them in array against each other, to 
 represent him who holds the one side as necessarily contradicting 
 the other, and to demand an explicit disavowal of every tenet 
 connected with the one, before we will acknowledge that a man 
 really believes the other, is the sure way to perpetuate strife, and 
 to defeat the practical good which may be derived from both opi- 
 nions. If that God made every thing, knowing beforehand all 
 that would come to pass and all that men would do, be an unde- 
 niable truth — if nevertheless He deals with man as if he were free 
 to act, and rewards and punishes him according to this trial — 
 and we cannot comprehend horo both these things should be true 
 together, — we yet can believe them both to be true, and so believ- 
 ing, we may well conclude that many of our occasional reason- 
 ings concerning these things must be infected with the same ap- 
 parent incongruity that strikes us in the enunciation of those 
 first principles. We ought not to wonder at these difficulties ; 
 we ought rather to expect them. Strife must be endless, if we 
 are not to rest till they are all explained and harmonized : and 
 error, not truth, will prevail, if either position be so established 
 as to exclude the other. Let us however carefully bear in mind 
 that these are not contradictions but apparent incongruities — and 
 the same answer which we give to those who press us with the 
 main difficulty, must in all reason be allowed to cover these also. 
 
 " The book of God's word speaks a plainer language, but not a 
 contradictory language to the book of God's works. He has boun- 
 tifully bestowed upon us in this life, chequered as it is, gifts and 
 blessings to animate our hopes and to reward our obedience : but 
 He bids us receive them as flowing from his free grace — as no 
 
 " This power of God knows no exceptions ; it is absolute and unlimited : 
 And while it embraces the vast, it carries its resistless influence to all the minute 
 and unnoticed diversities of existence : It reigns and operates through all the 
 secrecies of the inner man : It gives birth to every purpose : It gives impulse to 
 every desire : It gives shape and colour to every conception : It wields an entire 
 ascendancy over every attribute of the mind ; and the will, and the fancy, and the 
 understanding, with all the countless variety of their hidden and fugitive operations, 
 are submitted to it : It gives movement and direction through every one point in 
 the line of our pilgrimage. At no one moment of time does it abandon us : It 
 follows us to the hour of death, and it carries us to our place and our everlasting 
 destiny in the region beyond it."«-Such assertions as these require no comment ! 
 
 b 
 
XVni INTRODUCTION. 
 
 man's right, tliough they be every man's hope— as objects of' 
 prayer to Him^ no less than of exertion in themselves — and He 
 would have us still awfully regard Him as knowing from all eter- 
 nity whatever has been, is, or will be. 
 
 " In the dispensation, therefore, of those greater gifts and bet- 
 ter promises which his writlen word has made known to mankind, 
 we cannot but expect, that the same assertion of universal sove- 
 reignty, of absolute knowledge, and unbounded power, extend- 
 ing to all that we now do or shall do hereafter, would frequently 
 be made. It is the seal of revelation set to one of the earliest 
 conclusions of human reason. But we must also expect, that as 
 in the natural world the trial of our virtue is apparently the main 
 object, and the dispensations of providence seem to be especially 
 designed to make us feel how much depends upon ourselves 
 in this state of earthly discipline, so the trial of our faith should 
 be set forth zm Scripture as one grand purpose of our present 
 being — that the more God has done for us, the more we should 
 be called upon to do for ourselves — that if to secure His temporal 
 blessings, virtue and prudence andj industry are demanded on our 
 part, still more to render ourselves capable of this glorious re- 
 ward, we should be exhorted to lay aside every sin, and to labour 
 in every branch of duty with redoubled diligence — that if, in the 
 course of human affairs, men are wont to be disheartened by 
 adversity and by the success of wicked men, insomuch that their 
 belief in an over-ruling Providence is apt to be shaken or im- 
 paired, so in those severer trials which assail a Christian, still 
 stronger and mnre distinct assurances of support should be given, 
 still plainer declarations that God's purpose cannot ultimately be 
 foiled by any powers of darkness — that He will not forsake his 
 elect — ^but that He will comfort and cheer them through all the 
 perils and hardships of their earthly pilgrimage. Lastly, if the 
 general laws of the creation be not so propounded to us here, as to 
 encourage negligence or presumption, but to awaken a lively 
 sense of our dependence upon God, and of the necessity of 
 prayer to Him for the continuance of his blessings — so we might 
 well expect that the course of a Christian would in his written 
 word be represented as anxious though full of hope — as liable to 
 be stopped or turned aside or even frustrated by temptation — as 
 needing a perpetual renewal of God's assisting grace, and a care- 
 ful improvement of all those means of grace, which, if they shall 
 appear to have been bestowed upon us in vain, will certainly be 
 regarded as aggravating the guilt of sin, and will increase our 
 condemnation." 
 
 In this Introduction it is unnecessary to exhibit even the out- 
 lines of Arminianism, since they form a great part of the subject 
 of this volume, and may he studied to better advantage in the 
 admirable Works of Arrninius which have been lately translated 
 into English. But as these highly benevolent principles have 
 
INTRODUCTION-. XIX 
 
 Ijeen frequently (and I may add jmrposely) misrepresented, I sub- 
 join a brief exposition of them from the pen of a Calvinist, -who. 
 notwithstanding the prejudices of his party, has produced one of 
 the most impartial, correct, moderate, and comprehensive ac- 
 counts of the scriptural system of Arminius, that have been pub- 
 lished in the ETiglish language, and one that contains a manly 
 refutation of the errors with which that system has been falsely 
 charged : 
 
 " Arminianism, strictly speaking, is that system of religious 
 doctrine which was taught by Arminius, professor of divinity in 
 the university of Leyden. If therefore we would learn precisely 
 what Arminianism is, we must have recourse to those writings in 
 •which that divine himself has stated and expounded his peculiar 
 tenets. This, howe\er, will by no means give us an accurate 
 idea of that which, since his time, has been usually denominated 
 Arminianism. On examination, it will be found, that in many 
 important particulars, those who have called themselves Armi- 
 nians. or have been accounted such by others, differ as widely 
 from the nominal head and founder of their sect, as he himself 
 did from Calvin and other doctors of Geneva. There are, 
 indeed, certain points, with regard to which he has been 
 strictly and uniformly followed by almost all his pretended 
 adherents;* but there are others of equal or of greater importance, 
 dogmatically insisted on by them, to which he unquestionably 
 never gave his sanction, and even appears to have been decidedly 
 hostile. Such a distinction, obvious as it must be to every atten- 
 tive reader, has yet been generally so far overlooked, that the 
 memory of Arminius is frequently loaded with imputations the 
 most unreasonable and unjust. He is accused by the ignorant 
 and the prejudiced, of introducing corruptions into the Christian 
 church, which he probably never thought of, and which certainly 
 have no place in his works. And all the odium which his fol- 
 lowers have from time to time incurred by their varied and 
 increasing heterodoxy, has been absurdly reflected upon him, as if 
 he could be responsible for every error that may be sent abroad 
 under the sanction of his name. Whatever be the number or the 
 species of these errors, and in whatever way they may be asso- 
 ciated with Ills principles, it is fair to the character of Arminius, 
 and useful to the interests of religious truth, to revert to his own 
 writings as the only source from which we ought to derive in- 
 formation concerning the Arminian scheme. And by doing so 
 it may be discovered, that genuine unadulterated Arminianism is 
 not that great and dangerous heresy which among a certain class 
 of Christians it is too often represented to be ; and that though it 
 
 * That in which Arminius has been " uniformly followed" by his adherents, 
 is the foundation of his system — the Divine Foresight of Faith and Perseverance 
 in those who are finally saved. 
 
 b2 
 
XX INTRODUCTION. 
 
 may still be thought less scriptural and less logical than Calvinism,* 
 yet it does not deserve to be reprobated as wholly inimical to the 
 grace and glory of the gospel. 
 
 " Having made these preliminary remarks, w^e shall now en- 
 deavour to give a short and correct view of Arminianism in the 
 proper sense of that term. Arminianism is to be considered as 
 a separation from Calvinism, with regard to the doctrines of 
 unconditional election, particular redemption, and other points 
 necessarily resulting from these.t The Calvinists held, that God had 
 elected a certain portion of the human race to eternal life, pass- 
 ing by the rest, or rather dooming them to everlasting destruc- 
 tion ; that God's election proceeded upon no prescience of the 
 moral principles and character of those whom he had thus predes- 
 tinated, but originated solely in the motions of his free and sove- 
 reign mercy ; that Christ died for the elect only, and therefore, 
 that the merits of his death can avail for the salvation of none but 
 them ; and that they are constrained by the irresistible power J of 
 
 • " Less scriptural" than Calvinism it cannot be, even according to this 
 ■writer's own showing in the preceding paragraphs. As to Arminianism being 
 " less logical," I wish the test of this fact might be made by a comparison between 
 Dr. Coplestoke's account of the agency of Divine Providence, which I have 
 just quoted, and that lately given by Dr. Chalmehs in his sermon on Predes- 
 tination, from which I have already given an extract, (pages 16 and 17,) 
 and in which he advances sentiments as unscriptural and illogical as those 
 which 1 have produced from Archer, page 438. Till I saw that sermon, the 
 shocking and incautious expressions in which filled me with horror, I had always 
 supposed that the active and benevolent Dr. Chalmers was the author of the very 
 able article Arminianism, in Dr. Brewster's Edinburgh Encyclopmdia. 
 
 But if by " Logical" the author means " Metaphysical," (a very common 
 mistake in these days,) the point will be readily conceded ; and of that field of 
 speculative divinity, the Calvinists will be left in undisturbed possession, provided 
 they wiU receive, in the spirit of meekness, the observations made by Bishop 
 Womack in a succeeding page. (196.) 
 
 -j- The difference between Arminianism and Calvinism, even on the Five 
 Points, is far less than many persons imagine. In no work have I seen this 
 trifling. difference so clearly and ably stated, as in Goodwin's Agreement and 
 Distance cj^ Brethren, which I have quoted in other parts of this Introduction, 
 and which it is my intention soon to republish for the benefit of the present 
 generation. 
 
 J In the year 1623, the famous James Capellus, at that time Professor of 
 Divinity at Sedan, published two Theological Theses, the first of which was 
 On the Controversies that agitate the United Provinces, and in which, among 
 other charges against the Arminians, he adduces the following : " But the 
 " Arminians detract greatly from the Power of God, since they represent the 
 " numerous attempts and the mighty struggles of Divine Omnipotence as capable 
 " of being always overcome by man, and assert, that they are, in fact, every day 
 " successfully resisted." 
 
 The reply which the eloquent Episcopius returned to this false representation, 
 is worthy of attentive consideration : " These expressions are unappropriate ; 
 because nothing can be detracted from Divine Power, where that Divine Power is 
 not exerted. In the conversion of man, Capellus supposes God to employ * his 
 ' ordinary power, which at all times, and by its own force, produces its effect.' — 
 Those persons against whom he disputes, deny this assertion by the subjoined 
 argument : ' Wherever that power is employed, which, at all times, and by its 
 
INTRODUCTION. XXI 
 
 divinegraceto accept of him as their Saviour. — To this doctrine, that 
 of Arminius and his legitimate followers stands opposed: They do 
 not deny an election; but they deny that it is absolute and uncon- 
 ditional. They argue, that an election of this kind is inconsistent 
 wit"h"the character of God, that it destroys the liberty of the hu- 
 man will, that it contradicts the language of scripture, and that 
 it tends to encourage a careless and licentious practice in those by 
 whom it is believed. They maintain, that God has elected those 
 only who, according not to kit decree, but to his Jorehnaivledge 
 and in the exercise of their natural powers of self-determination, 
 acting under the influence of his grace, would possess that faith 
 and holiness to which salvation is annexed in the gospel scheme. 
 And those who are not elected are allowed to perish, not because, 
 they were not elected, but merely and solely in consequence of 
 their infidelity and disobedience; on account, indeed, of which 
 infidelity and disobedience being foreseen by God, their election 
 did not take place. They hold, that Christ died for all men, in the 
 literal and unrestricted sense of that phrase ; that his atonement 
 is able, both from its own merit, and from the intention of him 
 who appointed it, to expiate the guilt of every individual ; that 
 every individual is invited to partake of the benefits which it 
 has procured ;• that the grace of God is offered to make the will 
 
 * own force, produces its effect, there is no place left either for precepts, promises, 
 
 * or threatenings, and therefore none either for obedience or disobedience, for 
 
 * reward or punishment. It is the will of Him who commands any thing, that 
 ' his commands should be performed by him to whom he isssues those conmiands : 
 ' But when he performs that thing himself, it is not his will that it should be 
 ' performed by another ; otherwise, he would, at the same time, be both willing 
 
 ' and univilling for it to be performed by another But wherever no place is left 
 
 ' to precepts, there is none left to obedience or disobedience, and consequently 
 ' none to promises or threatenings, to rewards or punishments.' — Now, when 
 Arminius says, [in the words of Capellus,] ' that it is in the power of man suc- 
 
 * cessfully to resist or overcome the numerous attempts and the mighty struggles 
 ' of Divine Power,' he does not represent man as capable of placing a still greater 
 power in opposition to Divine Omnipotence : For what man, except an atheist, 
 would make such an affirmation ? But he only wishes to convey the idea, that 
 it is possible for man to place his disobedience and contumacy in opposition to the 
 Divine influences, commands, exhortations, supplications, protestations, insti- 
 gations, and inspirations, — all of which undoubtedly are numerous attempts and 
 migfity struggles : So that, when God wills and demands obedience from man, it 
 is possible for man to be unwilling to obey, and thus to render himself guilty and 
 liable to punishment. In this act [of opposition to God's will] no power, properly 
 so called, is posited, that can, in the least degree, derogate from the power of God. 
 For simple disobedience is only a free willingness or unwillingness, by which man 
 is said metaphorically to overcome God, because to the Divine Will he opposes a 
 contrary will, and thus withdraws himself from obedience to God." &c. 
 
 • One of the most forcible of the numerous pass^es of Scripture, which cloorly 
 express the intentional freeness and universality of God's invitation to his lost and 
 offending creatures, is that solemn ministerial commission which Christ gave to 
 his eleven Apostles, and through them to his chosen messengers in all succeeding 
 ages : " Go ye into all the world, and preach the Gospel to every creature. He 
 *' that believeth and is baptized, shall be saved ; but he that believeth not, shall 
 
 bS 
 
XXU INTEODUGTION. 
 
 comply with this invitation, but that this grace may be resisted 
 and rendered ineffectual by the sinner's perversity. Whether true 
 believers necessarily persevered, or whether they might fall from 
 
 " be damned." Christian ministers are commanded to propose the Gospel in its 
 glorious plenitude, and with the meekness and perseverance of Christ himself, " to 
 every creature," as an appointed merciful test of that creature's obedience or dis- 
 obedience to the Heavenly Calling : And that this test is not a mockery with respect 
 even to those who finally neglect or despise the Divine Invitation, is clearly proved, 
 both by the tender expostulations of Christ with those who rejected his proffered 
 benefits, and by many equally striking passages in the Old and New Testaments. 
 (See pages 127, 128.) To this use of the Gospel, as a Divinely. 
 APPOiNTEB Test to all moral agents, to whom " its sound is gone forth," 
 St. Paul adverts, when he informs the Romans, (xvi, 26,) that the Gospel is now, 
 " according to the commandment of the everlasting God, made known to all 
 nations for the obedience of faith." He speaks in a similar strain at the com- 
 mencement of the same epistle, (i, 5,) " By the Son of God we have received 
 grace and apostleship, for obedience to the faith among all nations," &c. He 
 immediately subjoins the purpose for which this grace and faith are bestowed : 
 " Among whom are ye also the called of Jesus Christ, — beloved of God, called to 
 be saints." WTien attention is paid to this calling, God " giveth more grace s'* 
 His promise is, " To him that hath shall be given, and he shall have more 
 abundantly." After this manner " his Divine Power hath given unto us all 
 things that pertain unto life and godliness, through the knowledge of Him that 
 hath called us to glory and virtue : Whereby are given unto us exceeding great 
 and precious promises, that by these ye might be partakers of the Divine Nature,'* 
 &c. (2 Pet. i, 4.) 
 
 But on this subject, the following remarks, from John Goodwin'i Agree- 
 ment and Distance of Brethren, are exceedingly appropriate : " "We are not able 
 to conceive how the Gospel can with simplicity, truth, and clearness of sense and 
 notion, be preached unto every creature under heaven, in this or any like tenor 
 of words, // thou believest, thou shall be saved, unless it be granted and supposed, 
 that Christ died for all and every man, or in case it should be said to any man for 
 whom Christ did not die, If thou believest, thou shall be saved : Such a saying cannot 
 be justified, nor avouched for truth ; because where a commodity is not, it cannot be 
 had upon any condition or terms whatsoever. Now certain it is, that there is no 
 salvation in Christ for any man, but only for those for whom he died. Therefore, to 
 encourage such a man to believe, for whom Christ died not, by saying unto him, 
 that, in case he believes, he shall be saved, — is but to feed him with ashes, or to 
 make him glad with lies. For how should such a man be saved, yea, though he 
 should believe, for whom there was no salvation purchased by Christ ; especially 
 considering that his believing in Christ would not invest Christ with any more 
 salvation, than was in him before, and, consequently, whether he believed or no ? 
 The Synod of Dort itself, in some of its members, saw and acknowledged the con- 
 vincing force of this argument ; though their heart, it seemeth, served them not 
 to displease their company for the truth's sake — We judge, that our brethren's 
 doctrine, asserting ' that Christ died only for those few who will, in conclusion, 
 * be actually saved,' wiU not abide the touch of that golden touch-stone of doc- 
 trines, the description of the Gospel, delivered by the Apostle, 1 Tim. vi, 3, 
 [' th£ doctrine which is according to godliness.^] If a minister of the Gospel 
 should go and preach this doctrine to a numerous auditory of souls, ' that God 
 ' hath given his Son Jesus Christ to die for the salvation only of a small handful 
 ' of men and women in the world (comparatively,) and that none of them who 
 ' were now before him had any certainty, that they or any of them were of this 
 ' number ; yea, and that tiie best amongst men had very little ground to hope or 
 ' think, that he should be one of these few, and that the rest of mankind, let them 
 ■ do the best that they are able, shall, notwithstanding, be certainly damned;' (for 
 all this is nothing but the evident and express import of our brethren's doctrine :) 
 
INTRODUCTION. XXlil 
 
 their faith, and forfeit their state of grace, was a question 
 which Arminius left unresolved,* but which was soon determined 
 by his followers in this additional proposition, that saints may 
 fall from the state of grace in which they are placed by the 
 operation of the Holy Spirit. This, indeed, seems to follow as 
 a corollary, from what Arminius maintainec^ respecting the 
 natural freedom and corruption of the will, and the resistibility 
 of divine grace. 
 
 " In this way, the Arminians suppose that they get free of all 
 the absurdities and dangerous consequences which they allege ta 
 be involved in the Calvinistic scheme ; and, at the same time, 
 detract nothing from the freeness and sovereignty of divine grace 
 that can be reasonably considered as essential to them.t Whether 
 
 must not such a message as this, being believed, directly cause a fearful despon- 
 dency of heart and soul, a general hanging down of hands amongst them, a 
 quenching of all desires, and consequently of all endeavours, either to apply them- 
 selves to the means of believing, or to the exercising of themselves unto godliness 
 in one kind or other ? Or doth such a doctrine as this any ways agree with that 
 declaration which the Angel made concerning the Gospel unto the shepherds ; 
 ' Fear not^ for behold I bring you good tidings of great joy ^ that shall be to all 
 people.^ — We judge that Christ died for all those who stand bound to believe, or 
 to depend on him for salvation. Because God is never found to encourage, 
 exhort, or call men unto, but constantly to dissuade and take men off from, vain 
 dependencies, and from trusting in those, whether persons or things, which are not 
 able or like to help them. Instances hereof, we are able, if need were, to produce 
 very many. Now that all men without exception, considered as men, stand bound 
 to believe, or to depend on Christ for salvation, is to us out of question. There- 
 fore, we cannot but judge that he died for all men. — That doctrine which directly 
 tends to separate and divide between the creature and the Creator, blessed for ever, 
 or to create and raise jealousies and hard thoughts in the former against the latter, 
 cannot be evangelical, nor consonant to the Truth, which is according to godliness : 
 But such we judge our brethren's doctrine clearly to be, which denieth Christ's 
 dying for all men without exception." 
 
 • That Arminius did not leave this question " unresolved," will be seen in a 
 succeeding page, (156,) and is further confirmed by a note in his Works, 
 vol. i, p. 601. The reason why he did not express his thoughts so fuUy on this 
 Point, as on the other Four in the Calvinistic controversy, will be found in his 
 reluctance to deliver any decisive opinion en subjects which he had not fully inves- 
 tigated. There are difficulties in it, which are not apparent at first sight to a 
 cursory observer ; and if Arminius had entirely co-incided with the moderate Cal- 
 vinists on this point, he would only have imitated some of the staunchest of the 
 early English Arminians, who believed in the Final Perseverance of the Saints 
 in the sense which the Calvinists attach to this phrase. In this, however, as well 
 as in other articles of his creed, he gave sufficient proof of the venerable guides 
 whom he followed, on all topics about which he felt the least hesitation : These 
 were the Ancient Fathers of the Church, whose " concurrent testimony" or 
 " general consent," in the purest ages of Christianity, was, to him and to all our 
 great Protestant Reformers, a safe but not an infallible rule for the interpretation 
 of the doctrines of Scripture. Had he not been cut off" at an immature age, he 
 would have favoured the world with his chaste and scriptural views of this interest- 
 ing subject. 
 
 -|- The admission in this paragraph, which truth has extorted, is exceedingly 
 important. The Arminians undoubtedly " succeed in their views to all the extent" 
 ■which they desire, when " they get free of all the absurdities and dangerous con- 
 
XXlV INTRODUDTION. 
 
 they succeed in tliese views to all the extent they imagine, may 
 be justly disputed. Bnt they certainly take away something of 
 that harsh and forbidding aspect, with which Calvinism, in its 
 broad undisguised form, seems to cloud the religion of mercy and 
 benevolence. ^ 
 
 " It may now be proper to mention some tenets with regard to - 
 which Arminianism has been much misrepresented. If a man 
 hold that good works are necessary to justification ;* if he main- 
 sequences which they allege to' be involved in the Calyinistic scheme," — the sole 
 object contemplated by Arminius when he opposed the desecrating dogmas of the 
 Genevan Reformer and of his more incautious successors. That some who call 
 themselves Arminians are Arminiores Armimo, is as true, in fact, as that there 
 are some among their opponents who are more Calvinistic than Calvin himself : 
 Men of this class may perhaps be too sanguine in " imagining," that Arminian- 
 ism solves all the difficulties of Divine Revelation or Providence, — a result to 
 which, it has already been shewn, (page xi,) it makes no pretensions. 
 
 It has been granted in a preceding paragraph, (page xx,) " that Arminianism 
 does not deserve to be reprobated as wholly inimical to the grace and glory of the 
 Gospel." In the notes to the Works of Arminius, (vol. i, pp. 593 — 636,) I have 
 adduced copious proofs of the fact, that Arminianism ascribes far greater efficiency 
 and strength to Divine Grace, from its commencement to its consummation, than 
 Calvinism does ; and that the latter scheme, though in general very scriptural in its 
 description of the immediate visible effects of Grace in Conversion, " allows thia 
 holy principle to be afterwards so inoperative in the elect, as to suffer them to serve 
 the law of God only with one part, ' with that which is regenerate,' and to serve the 
 law of sin with the other part, ' witli that which remaineth of corruption.' This 
 doctrine beats down the legitimate aspirings of Divine Grace after a holy conformity 
 to God, and to controvert and explain away the positive commands of God our 
 Saviour concerning personal sanctity." 
 
 " The Arminians suppose," therefore, with great justice, in the words of this 
 liberal Encyclopaedist, " that they detract nothing from liie freeness and sove^ 
 reignty of Divine Grace that can be reasonably considered as essential to them :'' 
 And it is no slight additional praise, if, in the words of the same author, " they take 
 away something of that harsh and forbidding aspect with which Calvinism seems 
 to cloud the religion of mercy and benevolence." 
 
 • The following quotation from Dr. Coplest one's ^ngwiVj^ mto ^Ae Doc- 
 trines of Necessity and Predestination, exhibits in a favourable view the tenets 
 of the early Arminians on this point: 
 
 " Man cannot bear to be told that his nature is a corrupt, a fallen, and a sinful 
 nature : That the carnal, or in other words, the natural mind is at emnity with 
 God : That if he seeks to be reconciled with God, he must seek it alone through 
 the merits of a Redeemer. To Him, not to his own doings, however diligently he 
 may labour in the regulation of his own mind, or in the service of his fellow- 
 creatures, to his Saviour he must refer the whole merit and the whole efficacy of 
 his salvation. That Saviour hath said, ' that he came to seek and save them that 
 were lost.' And every man who would be his disciple, let him be the wisest and 
 most virtuous of men, must believe that he himself was one of those lost creatures 
 whom Christ came to save. He must not only acknowledge with his lips, but in 
 his heart he must feel, that in the sight of God his best deeds are nothing worth- 
 that however they may tend, as they certainly will tend, to make him happier upon 
 earth, they have no power whatever to raise him to heaven. 
 
 " Nay, more than this, if he trust to himself, if he indulge himself in setting 
 3. value before God upon any thing that he does, these very deeds will be the 
 instrumental cause of his ruin : They will lead him from that gate tlirough which 
 
/fi,. 
 
 INTRODUCTION. XXV 
 
 tain that faith includes good works in its own nature ; if he 
 reject the doctrine of original sin ; if he deny that divine grace 
 
 alone he can enter, and will carry him farther and farther in a wrong direction. 
 His good works will never bring him to Christ, but if he lay hold on Christ in 
 sincerity of faith. He will easily and quickly bring him to good works. He is 
 the way, the truth and the life. He is emphatically called the door of the king- 
 dom of heaven. No man cometh to the Father but by Him. If then there be 
 in any man's breast a secret longing after self-righteousness — if there be a dispo- 
 sition, however faint, to justify himself by his own performance — any lurking 
 conceit that he, being so much better than others, stands less in need of that 
 atoning merit than the worst of his fellow-creatures, let not such an one think 
 that he will receive any thing from tbe Lord. He may, perhaps, upon examina- 
 tion find, that he has exercised himself in doing what he thinks his duty — that he 
 has abstained from excess — that he has dealt justly, and worked diligently for the 
 good of mankind — that he has even practised many of those virtues which are 
 most truly Christian — that he has been kind, patient, humble, charitable, meek, 
 forgiving — ^yet if his heart be a stranger to God, giving its affections not to things 
 above, but to things on the earth, if he suffer it to plead any one of these services 
 as entitled to reward from God, or as fit even to bear his inspection, he is still in 
 his sins — he wUl be left to wander on according to his own wayward fancies, and 
 will never find the gate of salvation, 
 
 " In thus turning from the lying vanities of self-righteousness to the true and 
 living God, he must not flatter hunself that the change is his own work. He 
 must not take credit to himself for the victory, but must give God the praise for 
 having called him out of darkness into his marvellous light. ' No man cometh 
 ' to me,' said our Lord, ' except my Father draw him.' To God then be our 
 thanks and praise rendered, as the giver not only of our natural, but of our 
 spiritual life. He is, as our Church often confesses, the Author of all godliness. 
 
 ' Of his own will begat he us with the word of truth It is God that worketh in 
 
 ' us both to will and to do of his good pleasure.' His grace brought us to the 
 knowledge of the truth, and unless we resist or neglect his gracious influence, in 
 spite of all the powers of darkness, his grace will preserve us in it. ~ 
 
 " Here then we may seem to have arrived at a point where the difficulties of 
 the Christian pilgrimage are to end. And here, if we accept the Calvinistic 
 doctrine of indefectible grace and flnal perseverance, they do end. But how con- 
 trary is this notonly to the natural light of reason which God has implanted in us, 
 but to the whole tenor and complexion of the Christian doctrines as revealed by 
 our Lord and as inculcated by the Apostles ? 
 
 " Does not our blessed Lord himself, in his character of Son of Man, express 
 all tliat feeling of uncertainty about the faith of his followers, which is so natural 
 to the human heart, and so descriptive of the contingency of what is to come ? 
 ' Simon, Simon, I have prayed for thee, that thy faith fail not ; and when thou 
 ' art converted, strengthen thy brethren.' 
 
 ' " Or again, if we pursue the whole train of St. Paul's reasoning, or of any one 
 of the Apostles, shall we not find the same anxiety for the future, both in the 
 case of themselves individually, and of those whom they address, which indicates 
 the still undetermined nature of their spiritual condition ? ' Be not high-minded, 
 
 ' but fear Let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall If he draw 
 
 ' back, my soul shall have no pleasure in him. — If ye live after the flesh, ye shall 
 
 ' die 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 cast-away.' 
 
 " It is, in this point of view, that the Calvinistic doctrine appears to be most 
 dangerous, and most at variance with the example of Apostolical teaching. They 
 continually represent election in Christ as a reason why the true Christian is zealous 
 .<)f good works. Undoubtedly it is a reason, and a powerful one— but the Apostles 
 
XXVI INTHODUCTION. 
 
 is requisite for the whole work of sanctification ; if he speak of 
 human virtue as meritorious in the sight of God ;* it is very gene- 
 take pains to represent it as a reason not why he is so, but why he ought to be. 
 
 * Put on therefore,' says St. Paul to the Colossians, ' put on as the elect of God, 
 
 * holy and beloved, bowels of mercies, kindness, humbleness of mind, meekness, 
 
 * long-suffering.' " 
 
 • To these monstrous doctrines, with which Arminianism has been often branded, 
 the writer might have added, " the great antipathy, evinced by many members of 
 *' the Church of England, against the bare mention of the abiding and comfortable 
 *' influence of the Holy Spirit, though such scriptural indwelling and consolation 
 " are recognized in every portion of the public formularies of the Church, and 
 " especially in her Seventeeth Article." — According to the doctrine of that Article, 
 " the godly consideration of Predestination and Election in Christ is fuU of sweet, 
 pleasant, and unspeakable comfort to godly persons," Arminians as well as Cal- 
 vinists, " and such as feel in themselves the working of the Spirit of Christ, 
 mortifying the works of the flesh and their earthly members, and drawing up their 
 mind to high and heavenly things : as well because it doth greatly establish and 
 confirm their faith of eternal salvation to be enjoyed through Christ, as because it 
 doth fervently kindle their love towards God,'' &c. 
 
 When I peruse the theological tirades uttered by several modem writers 
 against this immediate Divine Influence on the hearts of men, both in the work 
 of Conversion and in that of Sanctification, — an influence which is one of the 
 numerous scriptural " promises" that are " Yea and Amen in Christ Jesus," 
 and which is amply recognized in the public formularies of every Protestant 
 Church in Europe, but which is stigmatized by these imprudent and unskilful 
 divines as " Enthusiasm," — when I peruse their curious productions, I am some- 
 times tempted to think, that were St. Paul deputed to put to them the question 
 which he once addressed to the early disciples at Ephesus, " Have ye received 
 the Holy Ghost since ye believed?," (it the meie historical faith in the general 
 truth of the Scriptures of these moderns may be dignified with the appellation 
 of " Christian belief,") the blessed Apostle would receive nearly a similar 
 answer to that which the Ephesians delivered, " We have not so much as heard 
 [except from a few misguided enthusiasts,] whether there be any Holy Ghost !" 
 In one sense at least, the reply would be appropriate ; for such men ingenuously 
 acknowledge, that they have never had any personal experience of the hallowing 
 impulses of the Holy Spirit, — without which, nothing human is holy, nothing is 
 strong, — and without which, Christianity itself, as explained by these frozen 
 moralizers, would be only a skeleton of doctrines very little superior to the abstract 
 theories of moral virtue invented by Plato, Seneca, or Epictetus. But, on this 
 •ubject, one of the inspired interpreters of the will of God has well remarked, 
 *' The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God ; for they are 
 foolishness to him. Neither can he know them, because they are spiritually 
 discerned." 
 
 Few men have marked with greater abhon-ence, than I have done in various 
 parts of this volume, the perversion of this Divine Influence, when it is no longer 
 applied to the spiritual interests of the man and his actual progtess in personal 
 holiness, but is extended to matters beyond himself, and erroneously confounded 
 with the sangume wishes and the inward persuasion of his own spirit respecting 
 a change in Church or State, or other subjects equally alien to the sanctifying, 
 purposes, for the accomplishment of which the aids of the Holy Spirit have been 
 promised. But though I have strongly reprehended such perversions of the doc- 
 trine of Divine Guidance and Comfort, yet it is no test of *' true philo- 
 sophy," (a distinction to which these objectors aspire,) to repudiate a revealed 
 Terity, because it is liable to be abused either by the weak or the wicked. 
 There is not a blessing, of this or any other class, which Heaven in its illimitable 
 bounty has bestowed on man, that might not be rejected with as great a sem- 
 
INTKODUCTION. XXYll 
 
 Tally concluded, that he is an Arminian. But the truth is, that a 
 man of such sentiments is more properly a disciple of the Pela- 
 gian and Socinian schools. To such sentiments pure Arminian- 
 ism is as diametrically opposite as Calvinism itself is. The 
 genuine Arminians admit the corruption of human nature in its full 
 extent. They admit, that we are justified by faith only. They 
 admit, that our justification originates solely in the grace of God. 
 They admit, that the procuring and meritorious cause of our jus- 
 tification is the righteousness of Christ. Propter quam, says Ar- 
 minius, Detis credent ibus peccatnm condonet eosque pro justis repu- 
 tat non aliler atque si legem perfecie implevissent. They admit in 
 this way, that justification implies not merely forgiveness of sin, 
 but acceptance to everlasting happiness, Jicnctam habet adoptio- 
 Item injilios, et collationem Juris in hereditatem vitce eternce. They 
 admit, in fine, that the work of sanctification, from its very com- 
 mencement to its perfection in glory,* is carried on by the oper- 
 
 blance of reason. — Indeed, after a careful examination of the testimony both of 
 living witnesses and of books, I iind this doctrine, when applied in the manner 
 which the Scriptures direct to the furtherance of personal holiness, is, of all others, 
 the least capable of being rendered pernicious : It becomes hurtful, chiefly when 
 it is made to testify positively concerning an individual's absolute election to life 
 eternal, and his assured final perseverance. Such persons soon make the discovery 
 that they are spiritual ; and since their eternal interests are thus permanently 
 secured, they requue none of that Zne exhortation, (2 Pet. i, 5,) " Beside this, 
 giving all diligence, add to your laith virtue ; and to virtue knowledge, &c. : 
 For if these things be in you and abound, they make you that ye shall neither be 
 barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ." The same 
 Apostle immediately exhorts them " to make their calling and election sure," 
 but appends to it a condition respecting their final perseverance which cannot 
 be relished by Calvinists, " If ye do these things, ye shall never fall." 
 
 • The Arminians ascribe far greater efficacy to the grace of God, in the work 
 of sanctification, than the Calvinists. While the latter confine the experience of 
 mature Christians to that expression of a man under the law, O wretched man 
 that I am I, and while they account it the height of presumption for any one to 
 talk about going on to perfection, (though exhorted so to do by an Apostle, 
 Heb. vi, 1, in addition to the higher authority of Christ himself. Matt, v, 48,) 
 the Arminians think they cannot put too much honour on Divine Grace, or fall 
 into error by trying to fulfil all the evangelical commands of their " Father who 
 is in heaven." 
 
 When, contrary to the explicit declarations of nearly the whole of the New 
 Testament, the modern Predestinarians fixed upon certain phrases in the seventh 
 chapter to the Romans as the low standard of Christian experience, they discarded 
 the authority of their former favourite, St. Augustine, and brought his unfledged 
 system into contempt. That good old Father has, on this subject, some strong 
 passages, which will not be relished by the modern school of Fatalists. On the 
 .56th Psalm he says, " God would never command us to do that thing, if He 
 " judged it impossible to be done of man : If thou, therefore, considering thine 
 " infirmity, faintest under the precept, be comforted by example ; for He that 
 " gave us his example is at hand, that He may also afford us his aid." — In his 
 191st Discourse on Time, he likewise says : " I execrate the blasphemy of those 
 men who assert, that any thing is impossible to be done which God commands man 
 to do. Each of God's commands can be fulfilled, not merely by a single individual, 
 but by all men in general." — Few sentences contain so much sound divinity in few 
 
XtVlU Ix^TRODUCTTON. 
 
 ation of the Holy Spirit, which is the gift of God by Jesus 
 Christ. So sound, indeed, are the Arminians with respect to the 
 
 words, as the following, which Prosper has given us from St. Augustine : " The 
 " Law is given, that Grace may be sought ; Grace is given, that the Law may 
 •' be fulfilled." — One of the numerous paradox,es in the history of these opinions, 
 is, that the very men who admire St. Augustine fo» the species of particular 
 Predestination which he taught towards the close of life, reprehend their Arminian 
 brethren, and stigmatize them as " Pelagians," for adopting the sentiments of 
 this great antagonist of Pelagius on the subject of Christian Perfection. On this 
 point, Episcopius has written an able dissertation, in the 17th chapter of his 
 Apology for the Remonstrants^ Confession^ and proves by unanswerable arguments, 
 " that man can perform the commands of God by the aid of Grace Divine." See 
 also the use which Axminius has made of St. Augustine's authority. (Vol. 1, 
 p. 614.) — King James, who was a better Divine than Politician, had this Father's 
 avowed opinions in view when he delivered the following just sentiment on the 
 Lord's Prayer : " It is blasphemy to say, that any of Christ's precepts are impos- 
 " sible : For that were to give Him the lie who told us out of his own mouth, 
 '* that his yoke is easy and his burden light : And Christ's intimate disciple saith, 
 *' that his commandments are not grievous. (1 John v, 3.)" 
 
 In the answer, given by Episcopius to the 19th of the 64 Questions which his 
 Theological Students addressed to him while he was Professor at Amsterdam, he 
 has explained the meaning of this passage. Be ye therefore perfect, as your Father 
 %cho is in heaven is perfect ; (Matt. v» 48.) and at the conclusion of his explanation, 
 he resolves two other questions, the first of which is the following : " Is it pos- 
 sible for man, when assisted by Divine Grace, to perform all the commands of 
 God, even according to a perfect method of perfonnance ? That is, using now 
 the word love (dilectio) in a general sense fir an observance of the Divine com- 
 mands, is it possible for a man to evince as much love, as he ought to do accord- 
 ing to the requisitions of the Gospel, or according to the covenant of Grace ?"— ■ 
 " About the affirmative of this matter," Episcopius says, " I entertain no doubt. 
 My reasons are : (1.) God requires no other love than that which may be exercised 
 by the whole mind, and soul, and strength. God, therefore, demands nothing 
 which is above or beyond the strength of man to perform. — (2.) God promises, 
 that He will circumcise the heart of his people, that they may love him with all 
 their heart and with all their soul. (Deut. xxx, 6) — (3.) God himself bears testi- 
 mony, that there have been those who have, all the days of their lives, observed 
 all his commandments with all their heart, and with all their soul, and with all 
 their strength ; and this have they done in the sight of God, as we may perceive by 
 what is said concerning Asa, in 1 Kings xv, 14: — concerning all the people, in 
 2 Chron. xv, 12; — concerning David, in 1 Kings xi, 34; xiv, 8 ; & xv, 11 ;-_ 
 concerning Josiah, in 2 Kings xxii, 2, because he returned to the Lord with all his 
 heart, and ivith all his soul, and with all his might, according to all the law of 
 Moses. (2 Kings xxiii, 25. ) We find all these things ascribed, by God, under the old 
 covenant, to the individuals already enumerated : What man, therefore, can doubt 
 concerning the same excellences finding a place under the new covenant ?" He 
 then proceeds to discuss " the vulgar distinction between a perfection of parts 
 and a perfection of degrees ; and observes at the close, "No mortal can rise to 
 the degree of the Divine Perfection, which is incapable of increase. It is the 
 nature of love not to rest or stand still, but always to be desirous of making pro- 
 gress ; and this love never thinks about what is finished, but always about that 
 which is to come." 
 
 The second Question is proposed in these terms: " Is a most intense perfection 
 of this kind absolutely necessary to salvation ?" To this Episcopius replies : 
 " We are not here treating about legal perfection, which embraces all and every 
 kind of unsinning obedience in the highest degree, which also is perpetual, and 
 which excludes through life every imperfection, infirmity, and inadvertence ; for 
 
INTRODUCTION. XXlX 
 
 doctrine of justification, (a doctrine so important and essential in 
 the opinion of Luther, that he scrupled not to call it Articulus 
 ecclesice stantis vel cadentis,) that those who look into the writings 
 of Arminius, may be disposed to suspect him of having even 
 exceeded Calvin in orthodoxy.* It is certain, at least, that he 
 -declares his willingness to subscribe to every thing that Calvin has 
 written on that leading subject of Christianity, in the third book 
 of his Institutes. And with this declaration, the tenor of his writ- 
 ings invariably corresponds." t — Edinburgh Encyclopaedia. 
 
 we believe this perfection to be morally imposiible. But evangelical perfection 
 comprises two things : (1.) A perfection proportioned to the powers (or strength) 
 of each individual. (2.) A desire of always making advances towards what is 
 better, and of increasing that strength still more and more. This perfection varies 
 in the ratio of those who are commencing, of those who are proficients, and of those 
 who are perfect, in the knowledge of Divine Truth and Charity as commanded. 
 On this account, one perfection ii more intense than another, or the perfection of 
 some persons is more intense than that of others. The same perfection neither is 
 nor can be in aU and in each, nor can it belong to all and each : Yet the most intense 
 perfection of all and of each is necessary to salvation, according to the unequal 
 powers (or strength). This intense perfection we have placed in the circumstance 
 of the inequality of their powers, that no one may omit or commit any thing which 
 Tie knows he ought, and has it in his power, not to omit or commit, — that is, that 
 he may not sin against his own conscience, of whatever kind his conscience may be 
 Thus, the desire of making constant advances towards what is better, is common 
 to all ; and, therefore, this ought to be equal and alike in all and in each, accord- 
 ing to their several powers. It is also absolutely necessary to salvation, and ought 
 to precede even penitence itself, or to follow all penitence ; both of which may be 
 proved by numeroui scriptural testimonies, which it is no part of our present design 
 to produce." 
 
 • Of the superior orthodoxy of Anninius in the sense of the Church of Eng- 
 land and of the Ancient Fathers, the reader will find cogent proofs in a succeed- 
 ing page. (274.) 
 
 •f To this extract succeeds the paragraph quoted by me in page 801. I add as 
 a curious piece of church-history, the same writer's account of the manner in which 
 Arminianism has infused itself into Scotland : 
 
 "From England, Arminianism travelled into Scotland, where, however, it 
 made no great impression for a long series of years, having tq contend with a strong 
 and rooted attachment to the doctrine and discipline of Geneva, and being gene- 
 rally united with episcopacy, of which the Scottish nation has been always an3^ 
 utterly abhorrent. Since the middle of the last century it has been rapidly gaining 
 ground, particularly among that class of the higher ranks in which there is still 
 left a serious and practical belief of the truth of Christianity. Of the Clergy, a 
 few venture to preach it openly in some of its most corrupted forms. There are a 
 great many, too, who so far acquiesce in it, as never to meddle with the doctrines 
 of Election and Reprobation in their public or private ministrations ; some from a 
 decided disbelief of them, and others from a mere conviction of their inexpediency. 
 Such of them as carefully avoid, or openly oppose it, (and these form a body 
 respectable both for number and for character,) are certamly best entitled to the 
 praise of honesty, the Confession of Faith which they subscribe being rigidly Cal- 
 vinistic, and each of them being required at his ordination to renounce the Armi- 
 nian heresy. A great proportion of the common people are still so fond of the 
 dogma of Absolute Predestination, which they too often abuse, that they look on 
 those who deny it with anger, or with pity ; and seem to have the same sentiments, 
 with regard to Arminianism, which were declared by Mr. Rouse, in the English 
 
XXX INTRODUCTION. 
 
 In the celebrated " Address to the Christian Reader," which" 
 Professor Poelenburgh prefixed to the second volume of the 
 Theological Works of Episcopius, the following judicious and dis- 
 criminating observations occur: "Besides, I am accustomed to 
 admire the consummate equity and moderation of our men [the 
 Arminians], in forming their sentiments about those matters 
 which are at this day subjects of controversy among Christians. 
 For, while some parties seem generally to diverge to certain 
 extremes, or are hurried down precipices, our people, with pru- 
 dent moderation, have held the way in which nothing might be 
 found that savoured of asperity, that conveyed an unusual sound 
 to Christian ears, or that might seem offensively to oppose the 
 general taste either of divines or of other believers, whether they 
 lived in former ages, or are our cotemporaries. 
 
 " (1.) Disputes are maintained concerning the foreknow- 
 ledge OF God, and it has been asked, Does Divine Prescience 
 comprehend, among other things, future contingencies ? On this 
 point many persons have proceeded so far as daringly to decide 
 even on the mode of God's foreknowledge, and have said, ' God 
 ' foreknows things contingent, because He has already pre-deter- 
 
 * mined all things from all eternity by an immutable decree :' 
 According to this mode, then, it follows as a necessary conse- 
 quence, that God has before determined that even sins should be 
 committed. — Others, in their desire to avoid this rock, have fallen 
 upon one equally erroneous, and, that God may not be repre- 
 sented by them as the author of sin, have entirely divested Him of 
 this foreknowledge of things contingent : In this manner, there- 
 fore, in the estimation of almost all Christians, these persons 
 detract greatly from the Divine Perfections. — Wliat then is the 
 opinion of our Remonstrants on this point } They neither deny 
 the Divine Foreknowledge, nor yet do they derive it from an 
 eternal decree, lest they should deprive Gcd of that which is his, 
 or lest they should ascribe to Him any thing incongruous : But 
 occupying a middle way, and that a very safe one, they acknow- 
 ledge foreknowledge in God ; and yet they account the mode, by 
 which God comprehends those future things, to be altogether' 
 incomprehensible and beyond human investigation. 
 
 " (2.) Discussions have likewise arisen concerning Christ's 
 
 parliament, when he said, that ' it makes the grace of God lackey after the will 
 ' of man ; that it was no better than the Trojan horse ; that an Arminian is the 
 ' spawn of a Papist ; and that he is ready to turn into one of those frogs that rose 
 
 * out of the bottomless pit.' It must be acknowledged, however, and we state it 
 from personal observation, that this sort of bigotry, for which our native land 
 has been long remarkable, is gradually yielding its place to more liberal senti- 
 ments ; and that the time seems to be fast approaching, when a man may be, 
 without incurring any reproach, either a Calvinist or an Arminian, if he be only 
 sincere in his belief, and conscientious in his regard to the ordinances and duties 
 of Christianity." — Edinburgh Encyclopedia, 
 
INTRODUCTION. XXXI 
 
 SATISFACTION FOR OUR SINS ; on whicli point some persons have 
 asserted, that Christ has so satisfied, as to render our repentance 
 unnecessary for obtaining pardon, although the Scriptures elo- 
 quently admonish us in the following words : ' Repent, therefore, 
 
 * and be converted, that your sins may he blotted out,' &c. — On the 
 contrary, other persons, when they perceive this doctrine to be 
 destructive of the very sinews of repentance, have entirely dis- 
 carded all satisfaction, nay they have banished from Theology the 
 very terra, as the hiding-place of a most grievous error. — What is 
 the course which the Remonstrants pursue .'' They neither reject 
 the word ' SATISFACTION,' because it is capable of being employed 
 in a correct sense ; nor do they urge the use of it as necessary, 
 because it is not to be found in any part of Scripture. But the 
 matter itself they explain thus : Christ abundantly satisfied that 
 love which God bore towards justice, so as not only to render it 
 POSSIBLE for Him, without any obstacle, to remit to us the punish- 
 ment due to us for our sins, but likewise to render Him in the 
 fullest sense willing,' — ^but yet on this condition, ' that we cannot 
 
 * obtain this remission of sins which has been obtained for us and 
 
 * proposed to us, unless we betake ourselves by repentance and 
 
 * faith to an observance of the Divine commands.' 
 
 " (3.) While some persons affirm grace to be irresistible, and 
 others that there is no?ie, the Remonstrants, placing themselves on 
 safer ground, neither deny grace, lest they should be injurious 
 towards God, — nor describe it as irresistible, lest they should 
 destroy every command to obedience : But they acknowledge it 
 as a gift conferred most freely upon us by God,* which yet may 
 
 • The late Rev. Thomas Scott, having presented to the readers of his Remarks 
 on the Refutation of Calvbiism, a lame translation of a passage from Grotius, 
 which the Bishop of Wmchester had quoted, appends to it the following animad- 
 version: '* In respect of Grotius, I would, once for aU, say, that I consider 
 " him as one of the most able and plausible, yet most decided, enemies of genuine 
 " Christianity, that modern times have produced." — ^In Mr. Scott's vocabulary, 
 " genuine Christianity" and " Calvinism" are terms synonimous, though with 
 the latter system, which he warmly defended, it wiU afterwards be shewn, he had 
 a very confused and imperfect acquaintance, especially with that modification of it 
 which the Synod of Dort promulged. That he should account the learned arid 
 pious Grotius " a most able and decided enemy" to Calvinism, v/Ul not appear 
 wonderful when the reader is told, that the passage, upon which Mr. Scott animad- 
 verts, commences thus : " Incautious expressions produce dangerous consequences. 
 After hearing or reading such words as these, We are justified by faith alone 
 without any works, many persons continue in a course of sinning, and do not 
 amend their lives, yet they promise themselves salvation,'' &c. 
 
 For the very same reason, the celebrated Euceh and Melancthon might, 
 with equal injustice, be traduced, as two of the most plausible, yet decided, ene- 
 mies of " genuine Christianity,'' if the followers of Calvin be allowed with their 
 characteristic arrogance to apply exclusively to their own system this sacred title. 
 For those two great men, — who, by their piety, prudence, and talents, contributed 
 more than any of their cotemporaries to the success of the Reformation, — made 
 dreadful havoc of some of Calvin's dogmas, as is apparent by the following extract 
 from GaoTxi Votum pro Pace Ecdesiastica : " The honour and glory of all the 
 
XXXll INTRODUCTION. 
 
 be used by man either in a good or in an evil manner, and, on 
 account of this use or abuse of it, he may either be rewarded or 
 punished according to his deserts. 
 
 lighteousness which is found in Christians, return to God and Christ : For faith is 
 the gift of God, through Christ ; not of works, but of Him that calleth. And this 
 is the seed of righteousness ; but, in all seeds, their fruits are likewise reckoned. 
 The facility with which this reconciliation is effected [between faith and its fruits], 
 when metaphysical trifling and a mind averse to peace are discarded, is shewn by 
 BucER on the Second Psalm, not in the edition of Stephens, (which, like most 
 of the books published at Geneva, is evidently corrupt and vitiated,) but in that 
 printed at Strasburgh : ' I cannot do otherwise than wish that certain persons were 
 ' possessed of a sounder judgment, who have created much confusion among many 
 ' people in these days by this paradox. We are saved by faith alone ; when, at 
 ' the same time, they have perceived this expression is wrested, as if they defined 
 
 * righteousness solely by a mental estimation, and excluded good works. What 
 
 * charity is that which would disdain to apply a remedy to this evil ? This might 
 . * be done by declaring. We are justified by a faith which is actually formed 
 
 ' [within us] ; or, Through faith, we obtain a will for the performance of good 
 ' works, and also righteousness itself; or. Faith is the foundation and roof of a 
 ' just life, as St. Augustine has expressed himself. These truths ought to give no 
 ' offence to any person.' — The Preface, which the same Bucer prefixed to his 
 Commentaries on the Four Evangelists, is worthy of a perusal, although- it is 
 purposely omitted in the Genevan edition by Stephens. Melancthpn likewise often 
 complains, in his letters to Joachim Camerarius, ' that no objections were made 
 ' against him, except that he [Melancthon] was a little too diffuse in his praise 
 ' of GOOD WORKS ; and yet, that he uttered nothing which equalled the horrid 
 
 * sayings of others, but, on the contrary, such as were both true and useful.' 
 
 " To come to a man's assurance of his future condition, — St. Augustine, and 
 others of the Fathers, deliver this doctrine, ' we may be assured of the reward 
 ' which awaits us if we persevere ; and this is a faith which is infallible. But we 
 ' are not assured of our perseverance itself : Yet the greater degree of profi- 
 ^ ciency which any man makes in piety, excites within him stronger hopes, though 
 ' not to the entire exclusion of fears.' But St. Augustine's words will not admit 
 of such a reconciliation, as Rivet desires to produce ; and that Father's meaning is 
 rendered very manifest in several parts of his writings. In his 107th letter, 
 addressed to Vitalis, he says : ' No man is certain [assured] of his predestination, 
 ' unless a Divine Revelation on this point be made to a particular person. Rege- 
 
 * neration, and faith united with charity, aie not sure marks of predestination ; 
 ' because many of those who have possessed this faith and charity, and have been 
 
 * regenerated, not only fall away, but perish eternally. Some persons who have 
 ' received the grace of Faith and Holiness, are delivered up to live here till they 
 ' fall.' — In his treatise on the Benefit of Perseverance, St. Augustine says, ' Some 
 ' regenerate persons persevere till their departure out of this life ; others are detained 
 ' in the present world till they fall.— To certain persons, whom God has regenerated 
 ' in Christ, and on whom he has bestowed faith, hope, and love. He does give per- 
 
 * severance.— Therefore, no man can be in a state of security, except when he has 
 ' finished his course in the present life, which is a state of earthly trial.' — But, as 
 Melancthon writes to Joachim Camerarius, it is no subject of wonder, ' that certain, 
 ' paradoxes'have been fabricated in the Portico of Zeno, [the name by which he 
 
 ' generally designated Calvin,] of which St. Augustine is not properly the 
 ' author.' " 
 
 These extracts from the Fourth Article in the Wishes for the Peace of the 
 Chufctii, (which was one of the last works written by Grotius,) when connected 
 with the fine commencement of that Article, descriptive of the peace and joy 
 enjoyed by those whose sins are forgiven, will exhibit the evangelical views which 
 that great man entertained, and which are partially elucidated in other parts of 
 
INTRODUCTION. XXXIJl 
 
 " (4.) Besides, while some persons wish unduly to extol tlve 
 MERITS OF Good Works, as if of themselves such worthiness 
 belonged to them, as renders it impossible for eternal life to be 
 justly denied to those who perform them ; and while, on the con- 
 trary, others depress them so much as to suppose, that they have 
 nothing in them to obtain from God a life of eternal blessedness : 
 The Remonstrants do not deny it to be impossible for good works 
 to obtain life eternal, but they affirm that this is the act of the 
 grace of God, or rather, that life eternal is a consequence of good 
 works through the gracious promise of God. For this reason, 
 the scriptures declare, in more passages than one, (Heb. vi, 10; 
 2 Thess. i, 4 — 11.) that immortality is bestowed upon us through 
 justice. 
 
 " (5.) When a similar discussion arose respecting the Per- 
 severance OF Faith, some men affirmed, ' that we have no assur- 
 ance of it in this life/ and others described it as 'an absolute 
 certainty bestowed on every man who is a believer.' But the 
 Remonstrants, assenting neither to the former nor to the latter, 
 prudently judged it possible for every believer to determine with 
 
 this volume. It would not be difficult to produce passages, from other parts of 
 his Works, as highly evangelical as any of those which his accusers have com- 
 posed in their happiest moments. But the real grievance lies in this^Grotiws 
 refers every doctrine to practical purposes. In this extract, he does not discard 
 the doctrine of Assurance, but adapts it to a believer's fkesent expe- 
 rience, and his actual condition at every moment of his Christian career. This 
 Apostolical mode of applying the gracious attestations of the Holy Spirit has 
 always been a high offence to the Calvinists, who complain, that, instead of 
 remaining perpetually alike, spiritual consolations are thus rendered variable and 
 dependent upon a Christian's humble and faithful walk with God. See page 139. 
 I adduce Grotius in this note, because he has been industriously, yet most 
 unjustly, maligned by some of my countrymen, who were hot Arminians, as 
 " a man inimical to the grace of God." This reproach was first taken up against 
 him, and has since been repeated, chiefly on account of some opinions contained 
 in his Annotations on the Epistles, which were published in a very imperfect state 
 about five years after his decease. After all the quibbling exceptions which the 
 principal republican Calvinists (in 1654) made against the following account by 
 Dr. Hammond, it remains historically true, and is, on every point, unimpeach- 
 able ; " For the passages in his Posthuma, those especially on the Epistles, it is 
 evident that they had never been formed by him or fitted for the public, but were 
 put together by somebody else, after his death. Finding many things in his 
 Adversaria thrown into paper books as he had at any time occasion, either from 
 his reading of Scripture or others' writings, (it being ordinary for every man to 
 note, not only what he approves, but what he dislikes, and what he thinks matter 
 ■of farther consideration,) somebody else hath, as he thought fit, made a body of 
 Annotations, and published them under his name." 
 
 From those posthumous passages alone, has each succeeding calumniator gleaned 
 the frail proof^ of the heterodoxy of Grotius, many of which receive the most 
 satisfactory refutation in the two last of his accredited publications, which are 
 peculiarly interesting to Britons, because they were written chiefly for the noble 
 and disinterested purpose of inspiring pacific and loyal principles into the minds 
 pf the belligerent Calvinists m England and Scotland. See the succeeding page* 
 i270_293, and 630. 
 
XXXIV INTRODUCTION. 
 
 certainty about himself,* that he is in a state of salvation, and 
 also that he will remain in that state, since the grace of God will 
 
 " The evangelical sentiments on this subject, which Arminius entertained, are 
 briefly recorded in a succeeding page, (143,) and the Tenets of his immediate 
 followers may be seen in pages 138 — 150. They accommodated the strong 
 testimony of the Spirit of God, which is implied in the assurance of salvation, 
 to holy and practical purposes. " We acknowledge," say the Remonstrants, 
 " that true believers, as such, are certain and fully persuaded concerning their 
 " salvation ; and that this certainty is unchangeable and invariable, as long as 
 *' true believers have a diligent regard to their duty." 
 
 The following extract from a letter which EpiscopiUs addressed to Taurinus 
 in 1642, contains the opinions of that great man, on other points connected with 
 Assurance : 
 
 " 1. No one doubts the possibility of a man being certain [assured} in this 
 life of the remission of his sins, which had been committed prior to his conver- 
 sion, although they may have been of the most grievous description. 
 
 " 2. It is usual to dispute the possibility of a man, in this life, being assured, 
 at least with the same degree of certainty, of the remission of those sins, even 
 of the most grievous of them, which have been committed since his conversion : 
 And perhaps it is better for this question to remain a matter of controversy, than 
 to be confidently decided ; though I have never yet been able to perceive any 
 reason sufficiently weighty, to induce me to deny the possibility of this certainty. 
 But, however this may be decided, a Christian cannot lawfully doubt that it is 
 possible for him to be assured of the remission of his lighter offences, of those 
 which TertuUian calls ' sins of daily occurrence.' 
 
 "3. It is possible for a man to obtain this assurance, (1.) from the certain 
 knowledge of the Divine rule, or of that will according to which God declares 
 himself to be willing to pardon sins ; (2.) and from the consciousness of his own 
 spirit well-approved before God, and of his actions which are regulated according 
 to this rule. For ' if our heart condemn us not, then have we confidence toward 
 God. And whatsoever we ask, we receive of Him, because we keep his command- 
 ments and do those things that are pleasi^ig to his sight.'' (1 John iii, 22.) 
 
 " 4. But the man who is assured with this certainty, is bound, notwithstand- 
 ing, to pray all the days of his life, ' Forgive me my trespasses /' by havii.3 
 respect to the trespasses which he committed before he became a believer and 
 was converted ; because God will not forgive them, unless the pardon of them 
 be asked of Him to the very close of life. With regard to trespasses which are 
 called ' offences' and ' slighter lapses of daily occurrence,' a believer is bound to 
 pray every day for the pardon of them, if he have committed them, or if he 
 perceive that they have been committed ; though they are so frequent, various, j 
 and secret, that the man himself frequently either does not observe that he com- 1 
 mits such trespasses, or does not remember that he has committed them, or 1 
 neglects them after being committed: So that it is much the safer course to 
 pray, with David: ' Who can understand his errors 9 Cleanse thou me from 
 secret faults. "" (Psalm xix, 12.) Or to declare, with St. Paul: '•For I am 
 conscious to myself of no one thing ,• yet am I not hereby justified : But He that 
 judgeth me, is the Lord."" (1 Cor. iv, 4.) 
 
 " 5. No ABSOLUTE Certainty [such as the Calvinists assert] concerning the 
 remission of sins has place in this life, but qply a, conditional certainty,. 
 
 which is two-fold First. If I am such a character as, according, to the Divine 
 
 Command, I ought to be. — Then. If I continue to be such a character, and 
 therefore if I likewise daily pray to God for the forgiveness of all my trespasses, 
 both those of a grievous kind perpetrated before my conversion, and those which 
 are lighter offences and imprudently committed in my daily life or conversation. 
 For the perpetration of grievous sins, which may daily occur in my life, cannot 
 
INTRODUCTION. XXXV 
 
 never abandon him if he never desert it, which he hopes in God 
 he will never do. Thus a middle course is excellently steered 
 
 possibly consist with a certainty and confidence of remission, although I may, 
 every day and still more frequently, pray, Forgive me my trespasses /" 
 
 It was the coNDiTiONALiTY, to which Episcopius here alludes, that gave 
 the greatest umbrage to the Calvinists. In another place I have given a short 
 histofy of the variations in the Protestant and scriptural doctrine of the Wititess 
 of the Spirit, or the Assurance of Salvation. I am aware that many respectable 
 divines, in our days, cannot endure the idea of the Holy Spirit having any share 
 in the grace of Assurance, which they almost uniformly confound with the Un- 
 conditional Assurance of the Calvinists : They readily grant, that a Christian 
 may and ought to enjoy the testimony of his own spirit concerning his upright- 
 ness and sincerity. I should be gratified to see some attempt made, by such 
 divines, to reconcile these two passages of Scripture, ' The conscience [of the 
 Gentiles] also hearing witness, and tlieir thoughts the mean while accusing or else 
 excusing ojie aiwt/ier.^ (Rom. ii, 15.) ' Our rejoicing is this, — the testimony of 
 our consciences, that in simplicity and godly sincerity, not icithfleshly ivisdom, but 
 iy the grace of God, we have had our conversation in the world.' (2 Cor. i, 12.) 
 The first of them refers to the Heathens, who are deprived of the light of 
 Gospel ; and I should be pleased to know in what respect the testimony of a 
 christian's conscience excels that of a heathen's, if the powerful ijifluence of the 
 Holy Spirit be withheld from the former, which is the hypothesis of the divines 
 to whom I have alluded. 
 
 In their earnest endeavours to avoid Fanaticism, these divines have adopted 
 one of the chief principles of the Mystics. The latter argue, that, as God is a 
 Being without passions or parts, every believer will display a greater degree of 
 placidity or quietism the nearer approaches he makes towards Divine perfection ; 
 that virtue, being its own reward, must be loved for its own sake alone ; and 
 that, on this account, the passions, those gross instruments, ought to remain 
 perfectly quiescent and not disturb the current of this disinterested love Divine. 
 This is not the religion which the Bible teaches : Christianity is eminently a 
 religion of motives, — of powerful motives addressed most skilfully by God 
 himself to every passion in the human heart, as well as to the understanding. But 
 these divines wish to make mankind believe, that spiritual influences and the 
 grace of God exercise themselves solely in enlightening the intellect, without 
 refining, elevating, or warming the affections, and diverting them into a purer 
 channel : On this subject their Creed is well expressed by the Deistical poet : 
 
 What conscience dictates to be done. 
 
 Or warns me not to do. 
 This teach me more than hell to shun, 
 
 Tfmty more than heav'n pursue. 
 
 This ill-defined faculty called " conscience," is, in their system, to achieve every 
 
 thing, to subdue all tumultuous passions, and to impel men to the performance 
 
 of their duties, — without the direct and immediate aid of the Holy Spirit. Yet 
 God, in his infinite wisdom, has been pleased to propound in various forms, " the 
 avoiding of hell," and " the wish to gain heaven," as two grand motives 
 addressed to the affections. Present peace, hope, joy and comfort, are also 
 represented in Scripture as the immediate effects of the Holy Ghost : Therefore 
 to ask and to expect his blessed influences on the human heart, cannot be un- 
 scriptural or displeasing to God, who has promised to bestow his Holy Spirit on 
 those who ask him. 
 
 Perhaps the plain language of that famous old Puritan, Dr. Richard Sibbes, 
 may afford some light on this subject : " After this, it pleaseth Christ by his 
 Spirit to open a door of hope, to give some hints of mercy, to let in some beams 
 
 c2 
 
StitXVi lNTItODUCT10>r. 
 
 between Scylla and Charybdis, so as to threaten no harm of peril 
 to pious souls, on the one hand by a listless security, or on the 
 other by a headlong despair. 
 
 of love, and, withal, to raise up the soul, by a spirit of faith, to close with par- 
 ticular mercy opened and offered by the Spirit, whereby the soul sealeth to the 
 truth of the promise : ' He that believeth, hath set to his seal that God is true.' 
 (Johniii, 33.) God stoops to have his truth, power and goodness, ratified and 
 confirmed by us ; when we believe the promise of God in Christ, though it be by 
 the help of the Spirit, we seal God's truth. And then God honoureth that 
 sealing of ours by the sealing of his Spirit. ' After yoti believed., you were 
 sealed,^ saith the Apostle ; that is, the gracious love of Christ was further con- 
 firmed to them. He that believes in God, by believing, seals that God is true ; 
 and God honours that seal again, by sealing it to the day of redemption. He 
 that believeth, hath the witness in himself, that grace promised belongeth to him ; 
 for he carries in his heart the counterpane of the promises. The Spirit not only 
 revealeth Christ and the promises i7i general, but, in attending upon the ordi- 
 nances, by a heavenly light the Spirit discovers to us our interest in particular, 
 and saith to the soul, God is thy salvation, and enableth the soul to say, / am 
 God''s. I am my Beloved''s, and my Beloved is mine. Christ loved me, and 
 gave himself for me. Whence came this voice of St. Paul? It was the still 
 voice of the Spirit of God, that, together with the general truth in the Gospel, 
 discovered in particular Christ's love to him. It is not a general faith that will 
 bring to heaven, but there is a special work of the Spirit, in the use of means, 
 discovering and sealing the good-will of God to us, that He intends good unto 
 us ; aiid thereupon our hearts are persuaded to believe in God, and to love God as 
 OUR God, and Christ as our Christ. Holy and good men, by this work of 
 the Spirit, are distinguished — from civil men, by the work of holiness, which 
 mere civil men have not at all, but despise ; — from seeming good men, by the 
 depth of that work, &c. A christian is God's, in a more peculiar manner than 
 others : There is not only a witness of the Spirit that God is his, but the Spirit 
 works in him an assent to take God again. There is a mutual appropriation. 
 Where the Spirit seals, God appropriates. God chooseth the righteous man to 
 himself; and we may know this appropriation by appropriating God again : 
 Whom have I in Heaven but Thee 9 And what have I in earth in com. 
 parison of thee ? There is no action that God works upon the soul, but there is 
 a reflect action by the Spirit to God again. It is the oflice of the Spirit, as to 
 work Faith and other Graces, so to reveal them to us. Every grace of God is a 
 light of itself, coming from the Father of lights : And it is the property of 
 light, not only to discover other things but itself too ; and it is the oflRce of the 
 Spirit to give further light to this light, by shining upon his own grace in us. An 
 excellent place for this is 1 Cor. ii, 12 : ' We have received the Spirit that is of 
 God, that we might know the things which are freely given to us of God.'' In 
 the mouth of two or three witnesses shall every thing be confirmed : One wit- 
 ness is THE SPIRIT OF MAN, which knows the things that are in man: 
 The other witness is the Spirit of God, loitnessing to our spirits that we 
 are the children of God. Here is light added to light, witness added to wit- 
 ness, the greater witness of the Spirit to the less of our spirits : The 
 Apostle joins them both together, (Rom. ix, 1.) ' My conscience bears me 
 witness through the Holy Ghost.'' " 
 
 This passage from Dr. Sibbes contains much sound Theology, in which both 
 the Arminians and the Calvinists of the old school could heartily agree ; and it 
 will serve to shew some modern divines, that the very testimony of a man's own 
 spirit, which they are accustomed injuriously to oppose to that of God's Spirit, 
 is wrought in the heart by the Blessed Comforter himself. 
 
 In SiBBEs's "Fountain Sealed" are many other excellent sentiments, to 
 
INTRODUCTION. XXXVli 
 
 *' (6.) Lastly. What shall I say in conclusion about the con- 
 gregations of the Lutherans and Anabaptists } These people 
 
 ■which every Arminian, who knows the nature of the scriptural system he has 
 espoused, can readily subscribe. To the commencement of the subjoined para- 
 graph no -evangelical Arminian will object, because it is cautiously expressed: 
 " There is a distinction between men in God's eternal purpose ; but that con- 
 •cerns not us to meddle with further, than to know it in general. God knoweth 
 who are His, and who are not His : But in time the Holy Spirit distinguisheth, 
 and ranks men as they were distinguished before all worlds, and as they shall be 
 at the day of judgment. The beginning of that distinction which shall be 
 afterwards, is in this life : A seal maketh the impression of an image. The 
 prince's image useth to be in his seal : So is God's image in his, which destroy- 
 
 eth the old image and print that was in us before The work of sanctifying 
 
 grace upon the heart is a seal. Whom the Spirit sanctifieth. He saveth. The 
 Lord knoweth who are his : But how shall we know it ? By this seal. Let 
 every one that nameih the name of the Lord, depart from iniquity, not 
 only in heart and affection, but in conversation ; and that shall be a seal of his 
 Sonship to him. None are children of God by adoption, but those that are 
 children also by regeneration : None are heirs of heaven, but they are new- 
 born to it. This seal of sanctifieation leaves upon the soul the likeness of Jesus 
 Christ, even grace for grace. — This love the Spirit teaches the heart ; and love 
 teaches us not only our duty, but to do it in a loving and acceptable manner. 
 It carries out the whole stream of the soul with it ; and rules all, whilst it rules, 
 and will not suffer the soul to divert to by-things, much less to contrary. The 
 graces that areconversantabout that condition of which the Spirit assureth us, as Faith 
 and Hope, are purging and purifying graces, working a suitableness in the soul 
 to the things believed and hoped for : And the exceUer.cy of the things believed 
 and hoped for, hath such an effect upon the soul, that it will not suffer the soul 
 to defile itself. Our hopes on high will lead us to ways on high ; therefore 
 whilst these graces are exercised about these objects, the soul cannot but be in a 
 pleasing frame." 
 
 An Arminian ought to object to some of the following sentences, because it 
 must be his wish to see the humble relentings, and the subsequent reconciliation, 
 of a contrite spirit, described with greater accuracy : "■ But oft it falls out, that 
 our own spirits, though sanctified, cannot stand against a subtle temptation 
 strongly enforced : Goid therefore super-adds his own Spirit. Guilt often pre- 
 vails over the testimony of blood ; that of water, by reason of stirring corrup- 
 tions, runneth troubled : Therefore the third, the immediate testimony of the 
 Spirit, is necessary to witness the Father's love to us, to us in particular, 
 saying, ^ I -am fny salvation: Thy sins are pardoned!^ And this testimony 
 the Word echoeth unto, and the heart is stirred up and comforted with joy 
 unexpressible : So that both our spirits and consciences, and the Spirit of 
 Christ, JOINING IN ONE, strongly witness our condition in grace that we are 
 the sons of God,'''' 
 
 It is also on such points of Assurance as the following, that an Arminian is at 
 issue with a Calvinist. " Sometimes after this sealing," says Dr. Sibbes, " there 
 may be interrupting of comfortable communion, so far as to question our condi- 
 tion. Yet this calling into question comes not from the Spirit, which, where it 
 once witnesseth for us, never witnesseth against us : But it is a fruit of the flesh 
 not fiilly subdued ; it is a sin itself, and usually a fruit of some fomier sin." — 
 Now, an Arminian believes, that, if this " interrupting of comfortable. commu- 
 nion" proceeds from a sinful act, on the part of a believer, by such an act he 
 has uDchristianized himself. Whatthen is the work of the Holy Spirit ? Hav. 
 ing " once witnessed for" the man, will He " never witness against him ?" Just 
 the contrary : For Christ says, " When the Comforter is come, He will reprove 
 [or convince] the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment." The 
 
 c3 
 
XXXVIU INTRODUCTION. 
 
 have divided and are now dividing the Church into parties, on 
 account of the right understanding or practice of one ceremony 
 or another. Though at the same time they contribute nothing 
 fay such efforts towards the promotion of solid piety, either by 
 instilling it with more efficacy, or by establishing it with greater 
 firmness; on the contrary, they injure religion the more by their 
 too pertinacious contests about their own opinions. Though the 
 observance of ceremonies must, as far as possible, be accurately 
 retained, because they have been prescribed by God ; yet they 
 are the shadotvs and representations of the inward probity of the 
 soul, rather than the effecters of it by their own nature, or, as the 
 
 man, who by his own sinful act has disinftanchised himself, must therefore 
 always experience this " reproving" or convincing influence before he can hope 
 to find the Holy Spirit approach him as the Comforter. An Arminian 
 also trembles at that fearful declaration of the Lord of Hosts : " My Spirit shall 
 not always strive with man." From the solemn exhortations, in the New Tes- 
 tament, neither to grieve nor to quench the Spirit^ he acknowledges the solemn 
 import of this passage: " Now the just shall live by faith : But if any man 
 ■draw back, my soul shall have no pleasure in him." (Heb. x, 38.) On those 
 who believe in the possibility of a man " drawing back" from the good and right 
 ways of the Lord, such texts must have a proper deterring effect ; but they are 
 lost on others, who consider a falling away from grace to be impossible. But the 
 language which the Doctor here employs, is only another version of the soothing 
 Calvinistic axiom, " Once in grace, alivays in grace !" 
 
 For the same reason, the phraseology of the following sentence is exceedingly 
 reprehensible : " Sometimes God leads his children to heaven through some foul 
 way, by which he lets them see what need they have of washing by the blood 
 and Spirit of Christ ; which, otherwise, perhaps they would not so much value : 
 When they grieve the Spirit, and the Spirit thereupon grieves them, and that 
 grief proves medicinal ; the grief which sin breeds, consumes the sin that bred it." 
 
 God never leads his children through any foul way : On the contrary, all his 
 exhortations direct them to the way of holiness. His children indeed sometimes 
 ■sinfully run into a way which is displeasing to his purity : They cry to Him out 
 of the deeps, into which their sins have plunged them. God hears dieir cry : In 
 great mercy he brings them up out of an horrible pit, out of the miry clay, sets 
 their feet upon a rock, and establishes their goings. (Psalm xl, 2.) To assert, 
 therefore, in opposition to the uniform tenour of Scripture, " that God leads . 
 his children to heaven through some foul way," is to make God at once the 
 Author of sin, and affords an alarming inlet to all the desecrating deductions of 
 Antinomians. How different is the fine description which Isaiah gives, (xxxv, 8,) 
 hi the way to heaven by the Gospel ! " And a highway shall be there, and a 
 way; and it shall be called the way of holiness; the unclean shall not 
 pass over it ; but it shall be for those : The wayfaring men, though fools, shall 
 not err therein." The holy provisions of the Gospel for the salvation of man are 
 entirely of this sanctifying character ; and God is not so deficient in means for 
 effecting the purification of his people, as to require the aid of sin for its own 
 destruction. 
 
 These brief animadversions on the words of Dr. Sibbes, in the substance of 
 which that pious divine had the concurrent testimony of his Puritan brethren, 
 will shew the point of difference between the Arminian and the Calvinistic signi- 
 fication given to " the Assurance of salvation :" While in the former sense it is 
 applied solely as a Divine evidence of a christian's present experience, in the 
 latter it is presumed to be an evidence of absolute election and continued per* 
 severance. 
 
INTRODUCTJON. XXXIX 
 
 expression is, by means of oput operatum. We must never be so 
 foolish, as to place the principal part of our religion in external 
 rites ; because God desires now to be worshipped in spirit and 
 truth, and is most urgent concerning the cleansing of the heart. 
 But charity herself is lost, while such long disputes are main- 
 tained about the bond of charity ; and purity of soul is disturbed 
 and violated, while contests without end are indulged about the 
 baptism of water. It was a declaration of the prophets, which 
 has often been repeated, and must now again be inculcated, / 
 will have mercy and not sacrifice. But a principal part of mercy 
 consists, in not injuring or disturbing those who are in error, but 
 in nourishing them in the bosom of the Church, that they may 
 by this method become better instructed. Knowing, therefore, 
 that the kingdom of God consists not of meat and drink, hut of right- 
 eousness and peace, — and that we are saved in baptism, not by the 
 putting away of the JiUh of the flesh, but by the a?iswer of a good 
 conscience towards God, — we Remonstrants recommend, offer, and 
 exercise christian liberty in no matters more readily than in 
 external rites, if we are not able to persuade other people to 
 embrace our sentiments on this subject which we defend as true." 
 
 II.— THE DESIGN OF THIS WORK, 
 
 ■ These extracts display with tolerable fidelity the real bearings 
 of Arminianism : It now remains that I render to the public some 
 account of the origin and progress of this production. Upwards 
 of two years ago, I had nearly completed a translation of the First 
 Volume of the Works of Arminius, which also comprises a Memoir of 
 his Life and Writings, more ample than any that had been previ- 
 ously published either in English or Latin. It was my desire 
 to derive from his private letters and other authentic sources of 
 information, the rise and gracious aspect of his doctrines, and the 
 workings of his ingenuous mind while weighing in the balances of 
 the sanctuary the apparently opposite propositions to which I 
 have already alluded, (p. xi.) and I wished to publish these, with 
 a brief account of his learned Dutch cotemporaries and the 
 spread of his principles in foreign countries. My design, how- 
 ever, I soon found, was too comprehensive to be executed in 
 an adequate manner in one volume. Of English Arminianism, 
 respecting the commencement of which the greatest misrepresen- 
 tations have prevailed, I could give no account: And as I was 
 desirous of presenting to the public a Syllabus of the doctrines of 
 the Dutch Remonstrants who succeeded Arminius, I resolved to 
 reprint Bishop Womack's Examination of Tilenus before the Triers. 
 The close of that pamphlet contains an excellent English 
 translation of the Tenets of the Remonstrants, which were presented 
 to the Synod of Dort, and to which the pious Bishop has added 
 
Xl INTllODUCTION- 
 
 some scriptural proofs and valtrable comments. When I had 
 nearly printed the whole of the Tenets, I obtained possession of 
 a copy of Mosheim's History of the Synod of Dort hy John 
 Hales, which I had not seen when I wrote the notes to 
 Arminius. The perusal of that very interesting volume offered 
 nje the first excuse for increasing the size of this work. For 
 I found that the learned and amiable ecclesiastical historian 
 had adopted the same mode as I had done, of ascertaining the 
 sentiments and proceedings of the Dort Synodists, by a careful 
 attention to the garbled accounts given in their own Acts, and 
 by comparing those accounts with the despatches which Hales 
 and Balcanqual transmitted, generally every week, to the Eng- 
 lish Ambassador at the Hague, and with other Calvinistic, yet 
 tolerably impartial, documents. That there should be a degree 
 of similarity between his deductions and mine, was not wonder- 
 ful, since both had pursued one course ; but the points of co- 
 incidence with regard to sentiment and language were so numer- 
 ous and striking, as to induce me to translate some of his 
 remarks, which, while they elucidated Bishop Womack's pam- 
 phlet, confirmed the view 1 had given, in the work just cited, 
 of that Calvinistic Convention. 
 
 This was the first temptation which I felt to augment the size 
 of the publication. But in translating, for the benefit of the mere 
 English reader,* the Latin Theses of Parker, which Bishop 
 Womack had appended to the conclusion of his pamphlet, and 
 had enriched with his own able annotations, another temptation . 
 presented itself. I had been long acquainted with the secret 
 history of those Theses, and had often smiled at the eulogies 
 bestowed upon them by some Predestinarian writers,t who must 
 have had an uncommon grasp of intellect, if they could collect from. 
 Parker's barbarous language the exact opinions which it was his 
 purpose to convey. These Theses constituted in reality an addi- 
 tional futile attempt to modify Calvinism, so as to conceal under 
 the harshest and most recondite terms of scholastic jargon, its 
 objectionable and half-discarded dogmas. In introducing them . 
 to the notice of the reader, the editor, who gives us the initials 
 
 • I know, that, by this attempt at translation, I shall be liable to the just 
 remark of Bishop Woraack : (page 194:) " The reason why tliese Theses yet 
 " remain untranslated, is this, — no man could, in my opinion, render them into 
 " English so as to be grasped by the comprehension of mortals, or could himself 
 " understand them when translated." If, therefore, the reader cannot understand 
 the translation, the cause of his mental faUure must be ascribed to the Theses, 
 and not to himself. 
 
 -J- Richard Baxter, in his Saints'" Rest, (Pt. i, c. 8,) when describing 
 " the people of God," speaks in the following fulsome manner of Parker's 
 Theses : " They that would see this work of God on ilie soul J^andled most 
 " exactly, judiciously, scholastically, and briefly, let them read ]\Ir. Parker's 
 " excellent T/ieses dc Traductione Peccatoris ad Vitam. If you cannot get the 
 "book, it is in tlic end of Amesius against Grevinchovius, but maimed of iifteen 
 " Theses left out." 
 
INTRODUCTION. xU 
 
 oF his name H. S., has extolled them as " entirely studded with 
 gems," and has described, in the language of hyperbole, the reputed 
 victories achieved by various Calvinistic authors over their supine 
 Arminian adversaries. His mention of these individuals of differ- 
 ent denominations, suggested to me the first idea of illustrating 
 the history of Arminianism during the interesting period between 
 1600 and 1662, by brief memoirs of six or seven of the principal 
 Calvinists whose names are cited in the Preface to Parker's 
 Theses, and by elucidatory extracts from their productions, and 
 from those of their learned cotemporaries in various parts of 
 Europe. 
 
 In Appendix A, therefore, I have given some account of 
 Maccovius, who with the younger Parker was joint author of the 
 Theses ; and in B, have corroborated one of the Prefacer's most 
 judicious hints. 
 
 In Appendix C, the reader will find a biographical notice of 
 John Camero, and a description of the system of religious doc- 
 trines of which he was the author, and which is commonly known 
 in England under the term Eaxterianism. The extracts which 
 I have given from the letters and pamphlets of Grotius, Cour- 
 celles, Du Moulin, Rivet, Amyraut, Poelenburgh, and others, 
 furnish a fair history of the nature of this system and its progress. 
 A long note, in page 714, affords a still clearer view of its 
 consequences. I have reserved some valuable observations from 
 Episcopius, for insertion in " Womack's Calvinists' Cabinet Un- 
 locked." — As Camero received his death-blow from one of the 
 furious zealots, who, in those days, had begun to manifest a spirit 
 of insubordination in almost every State throughout Europe, in 
 which Calvinistic churches were planted ; I have in a summary 
 manner exposed the origin of that spirit, and have traced it from 
 the Genevan Fathers down to the aera immediately previous to 
 the memorable Synod of Dort. 
 
 In Appendix D, I have more minutely marked the spread of 
 the same restless and revolutionary spirit, in a biographical 
 account of Dr. William Twisse, the famous Moderator of the 
 Assembly of Divines at Westminster. The contents of that Ap- 
 pendix, which occupies nearly three-fourths of the present 
 volume, (in tw^ parts,) I shall specify in a separate article. But, 
 as the conclusion of Appendix D is inserted in the commencement 
 of the second volume, part of which is already printed off, I pro- 
 ceed to the enumeration of the particulars it embraces. An entire 
 and interesting chapter on Cromwell's " Triers and Ejectors," 
 from Jackson's Lfe of Goodwin, occupies the first place in the 
 second volume, and is succeeded by the Rev. Tobias Conyers's 
 ' celebrated dedication, to the Protector, of his English version of 
 "the Declaration" of Arrninius. The state of society and of 
 public morals, at the beginning and the termination of the Civil 
 Wars, is afterwards exhibited from various unexceptionable 
 
Xlii INTRODUCTION. 
 
 aitthoritles ; and I think I shall have irrefragably proved, to all 
 impartial persons, that, after Calvinism had exerted its influence 
 uncontrolled under almost every varying form among the inha- 
 bitants of Great Britain, public morals were in a worse condition 
 a year prior to the Restoration, than they were in l637.* 
 
 Appendix E will contain a short Life of Thomas Parker, the 
 young man, who, when these Theses were subjects of reprehen- 
 sion in the Synod of Dort, was charged with having been the 
 author of them, and who thus very conveniently removed a 
 great portion of blame from Maccovius. 
 
 In Appendix F, I shall expose the ignorance of those who are 
 accustomed to class Arminianism with Socinianism, and shall 
 prove the far more numerous points of agreement between Cal- 
 vinism and Socinianism. Among modern Calvinistic writers, I 
 have met with no one that has so frequently and unjustly pre- 
 ferred this unsupported accusation, as the late Rev. Thomas Scott. 
 I shall therefore present the reader in that place with a few ani- 
 madversions on his inconsiderate expressions. 
 
 I shall devote Appendix G to the Life of Robert Parker, the 
 father of Thomas ; and Appendix H to that of Ames and of 
 Robinson. These three biographical sketches will afford me an 
 opportunity of communicating some rather novel information on 
 the rise and character of Independency, the very slender grounds 
 of the Puritans' objections against the ceremonies and ritual of 
 the Established Church, and the nature of the persecution which 
 ** the unconformable clergy" were compelled to endure.f The 
 
 • This is ingenuously confessed by many of the Preacliers before the Long 
 Parliament, as will be shewn in a subsequent part of this Introduction, 
 
 In William Bridge's Sermon before the Commons, Nov. 5, 1C47, he 
 said : " And now of late, what bitterness of spirit among professors ! What 
 divisions, oppressions instead of justice ! What new-fangled prides ? What 
 unwillingness to be reformed ? Time was heretofore when we did call 
 for Truth, and cried aloud for Truth. Oh that we might know the Truth • But 
 now we deal by Truth, as the Friar said the people did by their Holy Water : 
 * Ye call and cry,' said he, ' for Holy Water ; but when the Sexton sprinkles it, 
 ' ye turn away your faces and it falls on your backs !' So the times were here- 
 tofore, that we called and cried out for Truth, Truth ! It is now come unto you : 
 We would sprinkle it upon you ; but ye turn away your faces from it, and it 
 falls on your backs. 
 
 " And is there not as much swearing, drunkennesss, profaneness still as 
 before ? I read of a street in Rome, called Vicus Sobrius, ' the sober street,' 
 because there was never an ale-house to be found in it : And, upon this account, 
 I think, there will be never a sober street in England, or very rare. 
 
 " As for the precious ordinances of Jesus Christ, [they were] never so slighted 
 and rejected as now. Nevertheless, the Lord hath saved us : Yea, he hath 
 saved us with a great salvation, I may say, a miraculous salvation !" 
 
 Thus, when Calvinism, in all its variations, had been indulged with unbounded 
 sway for seven years, the state of society was not amended, and the people 
 shewed their strong aversion to the PredestinariAn rigours. 
 
 •\- The subjoined paragraph commences with a quotation from Ames, which 
 will prove, that, the e^ily Puritans, as well as their successors who flourished 
 
INTEODUCTION. xliii 
 
 account of Ames will also furnish me with an occasion of insti- 
 tuting a comparison between the arbitrary measures of Arch- 
 bishop Abbot, and those of his great but ill-fated successor 
 Archbishop Laud : When, notwithstanding the popular yet ill- 
 founded prejudices against the latter, I shall adduce proofs suffi- 
 cient to convince every equitable man, that Laud excelled his 
 predecessor both in the libei:ality of his sentiments, and in the 
 actual execution of his measures.* 
 
 during the Civil Wars, had no just notions whatever either of civil or religious 
 liberty, in the modem acceptation of these terms. The only Toleration which 
 they acknowledged, was the laiv of retaliation ; and the axiom, by which they 
 regulated their conduct towards those who differed from them on any doctrinal 
 or ceremonial point, was that of Kill, or be killed ! 
 
 Obadiah Sedgwick, in his sermon before the Commons, on the same 
 day and from the same chapter as Hussey's in a subsequent page, says to the 
 members of the Honourable House : " It was but the scornful speech of Ti- 
 berius, ' that the Gods alone must remedy the injuries offered unto them.' O 
 no ! You are custodes utriusque tabula. You are designed to be nursing- 
 fathers : You have received the sword, to be a terror to the evU. Pious and 
 and learned Amesius, {Cases of Conscience, 1. 4, c. 4,) speaking to that ques- 
 tion, ' Whether Heretics are to be published by the Civil Magistrate ?,' answers 
 thus : ' It is his place and duty to repress them and restrain them, if they be 
 ' noxious and turbulent.' Yea, and he adds more than every one will be patient 
 to hear, namely, ' that, if also they be manifestly blasphemous and pertinacious, 
 ' they may be cut off supplicio capitali, [by capital punishment,] according to 
 ' that in Leviticus, xxiv, 16.' " — The passage to which Ames refers, is the fol- 
 lowing: ' And he that blasphemeth the name of the Lord, he shall surely be put 
 to death, and all the congregation shall certainly stone him : As well the stranger, 
 as he that is born in the land, when he blasphemeth the name of the Lord, shall 
 he be put to death.^ Obadiah then specifies "nine ways," by which " the danger- 
 ous flood" of heresies might be stopped. In the third of them he says, " If 
 the discipline [of the Presbytery] were fuUy and generally established, you 
 should not have a heresy, or blasphemy, or any erroneous opinion, creeping out 
 in any part of the kingdom, but there would be a timely discovery of it, and 
 likewise a spiritual remedy to recover erring persons, and to prevent their further 
 spreading." The ninth way is, " By using your co-ercive power, with such 
 methods and proportions as the real safety of truth and souls doth require, and 
 the repression of dangerous errors doth need : So managing the distributions 
 thereof, that, under the notion of restraining heresy, you by no means injure 
 real sanctity, nor yet, under the pretence of sanctity, you do not favour the 
 growth of heresy." 
 
 • Perhaps the following passage from Louis Du Moulin's " Appeal of 
 all the Nonconformists in England to God, and all the Protestants of Europe^ 
 in order to manifest their sincerity to God and the King,'" in 1680, will serve 
 as an explanation of this matter : " The Assembly of Divines in Westminster, 
 " chosen by the Parliament, were all Confohbiists, and none of them Si- 
 ". I.ENCED Ministers, except eight or nine, and four Scots." — This, unlike 
 many of that rash man's assertions, is almost correct, and corroborated nearly 
 verbatim hj Ricu Ann Baxter, in the First Part of his Nonconformists^ Plea ; 
 in which work he also describes " the Houses of Lords and Commons, excepting 
 " an inconsiderable number, the Lord Lieutenants whom the Parliament chose, 
 *' and the far greater part of the General Officers, &c., of the Earl of Essex his 
 " army, and of the sea-captains," &c., as consisting of " those that had still 
 lived in Conformity." The fallacy of these remarks will be exposed in another 
 part of this Introduction, by the difference between 1640 and 1643. Now, to 
 
Xliv INTRODUCTION. 
 
 Appendices I and K will not occupy much space, — the former 
 consisting solely of a short account of Parker's Theses,— -and 
 the latter of a few remarks on the deficiency of learning in the 
 vaunting Prefacer. 
 
 Appendix L will be very long : After alluding to Arminius, 
 Corvinus, and Tilenus, jt will embrace many curious particulars 
 cancerning the origin, the genius, the progress, and the effects 
 of Arminianism in Holland and Great Britain. The decidedly 
 Arminian complexion of the Articles of the Church of England, 
 will also be summarily described, in valuable quotations from 
 a few of our best divines. Among some of the conclusions, which 
 I shall endeavour to deduce from undisputed historic fects, i 
 be the very important one,— that the adherents to all the reli- 
 gious systems which have passed the golden mean maintained 
 by Arminianism, (between Baxterianism and Calvinism on the 
 one hand, and between Semi-pelagianism and Pelagianism on the 
 other,) have fallen into errors on the important doctrine of the 
 Trinity, while those who have adhered to the evangelical Armi- 
 nian scheme, as propounded by its founder, have retained all the 
 grand verities which distinguish the orthodox both among the 
 Ancients and the Moderns. 
 
 In Appendix M, the doctrine of Scientia Media will be com- 
 pendiously exhibited ; and, in N, Bishop Womack's remarks on 
 the absurdity of several metaphysical reveries about Christian 
 doctrines will be strenuously enforced. 
 
 These are the subjects which were suggested by a perusal of 
 the Preface to Parker's Theses, and of Bishop Womack's anno- 
 tations ; and this is the outline of the plan, according to which 
 I have attempted to inMittite a ccnnparison between Calvinism and 
 Arminianism, and to demonstrate the favourable bearing which the 
 LATTER SYSTEM has had upon the civil and religious liberties of 
 nffinfcind. 
 
 evince Arclibishop Laud's superior moderation, I only require any man, who is 
 acquainted with the general history of that period, to peruse the list of the far- 
 famed Assembly of Divines, and then deliberately to declare if, at any former 
 period, such pragmatical Divines, as three-fourths of the members had then 
 proved themselves to be, would have been permitted to be unsilenced ministers. 
 Under none of Laud's predecessors, even those of them who were most Calvin- 
 istically inclined, would the majority of those who afterwards composed the 
 JPredestinarianAsaembly haveheen allowed to remain in the circumstances described 
 by Du Moulin ; on account of their previous mal-practices, they would either 
 have been suspended or banished. That restless old Xonconfomiist, Cartwright, 
 in the days of Archbishop Whtigift, was a petty offender against the ecclesiastical 
 laws of the realm., when compared with many of these disaffected though " con- 
 formable" individuals, ^^'^ith the exception of two or three members, the Divines 
 summoned to the Assembly were Calvinists; and, at the very commencement of 
 the Civil Troubles, arranged themselves either in t'.ie ranks of Presbyterianism 
 or Independency. (See page 400.) Of the few very able Episcopal Clergy, who 
 were nominated to that office, Archbishop Usher, Dr. Sanderson, Dr. Gauden, 
 aad other worthies, had not then become Arminians. 
 
IKtRODtJCTION. xlv 
 
 III.— DESCRIPTION OF THE PURITANS UNDER THE 
 COMMONWEALTH. 
 
 Before I proceed to an enumeration of the contents of Appen- 
 dix D, which occupy the greater part of this vokime, I will pre- 
 sent the reader with a brief description of the race of men upon 
 whose doctrines and practices I have ventured to animadvert. 
 The term Puritans is applied to those individuals who, during 
 eighty years, dissented either mentally or practically from the rites 
 and institutions of the Episcopal Church of Enjijland as established 
 by law • But this extensive application of the name is rather 
 inaccurate, on account of the complex nature of the scruples 
 under which different classes of these Dissidents laboured. Some 
 account of the early Puritans will occur in the second volume. 
 That class of them who, soon after the Restoration, refused, on 
 grounds somewhat novel, to unite with the National Church, and 
 received the appellation of " Nonconformists," I do not pretend 
 to describe. But my remarks are directed against those Predes- 
 tinarian divines who, under a pretence of bringing the Church 
 of England to a greater conformity wih the admired platform of 
 Calvin, overturned both Church and State, Episcopacy and 
 Monarchy. 
 
 They were a race of the Puritans entirely stii generis, distinct 
 from their predecessors ; for, with the exception of the Scotch 
 Presbyterians, these reforming Christians commenced offensive 
 operations, not as seceders from the Church, but as Calvinists. In 
 a preceding note, (p. xliii,) it has been shewn how boldly two 
 men, of the rival Predestinarian sects of Independents and Preshy- 
 terians, could each boast, that the divines who first engaged in 
 that seditious enterprise were conformable Episcopalians. The 
 fact was in substance as they have related it, and I place it to 
 the benefit of Archbishop Laud's character, who suffered such 
 artful Nonconformists so long to shelter themselves under the 
 wings of Conformity : Had he exercised those inquisitorial powers 
 with which, it is allowed by all parties, he was then invested, he 
 would have previously ferreted all those concealed Nonconform- 
 ists out of their fastnesses, and would have compelled them to 
 appear in their real colours. But the persons " with whom he 
 had to do," were full of artifice and design. In all European 
 countries, wherever the doctrines of Calvin obtained countenance 
 and support, they were invariably accompanied by a love for 
 the platform of his ecclesiastical discipline, which was extolled by 
 his zealous adherents as the sole means of rendering his evangelical 
 doctrines fridful and prosperous. Such encouragement had doc- 
 trinal Calvinism received in England under the injudicious admi- 
 nistration of Archbishop Abbot ; and a secret relish for " the holy 
 discipline of Geneva" was consequently created. When, there- 
 fore, under the circumstances related in the succeeding pages. 
 
xlvi INTRODUCTION. 
 
 (242—- 357,) the Scots, who had embraced Calvinism both in its 
 doctrine and discipline, made a hostile irruption into England, 
 they found their Predestinarian friends " on this side the Tweed" 
 prepared to give them a welcome reception. In the subsequent 
 warm work of Reformation, the English Calvinists, though 
 almost universally nommal Conformists, had little to sacrifice in 
 renouncing Episcopacy and in ranging themselves, according to 
 their several inclinations or opportunities, under the banners of 
 Independency and Presbyterianism. From the eventful year of 
 1640, Episcopacy became the test by which to ascertsim. Arminians 
 and Calvinists, — the former, with scarcely a single exception, 
 adhering to "their Bishops and their King,"' — ^and the latter 
 deserting both, and armii>g themselves against their lawful autho- 
 rity. A few Calvinists, very few indeed, also adhered to Epis- 
 copacy and Monarchy ; but a favourable change in their doctrinal 
 sentiments was generally the consequence of this laudable attach- 
 ment, and they became followers either of Camero or of Armi- 
 nius : An instance of this salutary alteration of principle will 
 be found (page 707) in good Bishop Hall, who begun at length 
 to think, that even the Ai*minians could not be "righteous 
 over much," — a crime with which he had foolishly charged 
 them in his remarkable sermon before tlie Synod of Dort. 
 Thus did Episcopacy continue to divide Calvinists from Ar- 
 minians during the twenty years of Predestinarian misrule, 
 till in the year 1662 it was constituted, accidentally and not by 
 design, a more efficient test of those who professed the doctrines 
 of Particular or of Ge?ieral Hederaption. (See page 788.) The 
 rigid Calvinists then almost unanimously became Nonconformists ; 
 and the more moderate Predestinarians, with nearly all the Armi- 
 nians, took refuge under Episcopacy. ' 
 
 This view of the English Calvinists or Puritans, the only one 
 historically correct, is commonly ill-received by their admirers ; 
 and I have frequently read, in other authors, such ex-parte and 
 palliative sentences as the following by the Rev. Thomas Scott : 
 " Among those who adhered to the royal party and to the Estab- 
 " lished Church in her abject state, even the faults and successes 
 " of the Puritans, Presbyterians, and Independents, were argu- 
 " ments, (and indeed they still are so,) against Calvinism ; Sa 
 " that, without studying the subject, they became more and 
 " more Anti-calvinistic, by a sort of heart-revolting* against 
 
 • The Divines described by Mosheim, in a subsequent page, (790,) as converts 
 to Arminianism during the inter-regnum, (among whom are numbered Arch- 
 bishop Tillotson, Bishops Stillingfleet, Burnet, Pearson, Womack, Sanderson, 
 &c., Drs. Cudworth, Pierce, and several others, the memory of whom is deserv- 
 edly held in high estimation,) can by no means be said " not to have studied the 
 subject :'' Their works, on the contrary, prove their very accurate acquaint- 
 ance with the contending principles of Arminius and Calvin. 
 
 That these eminent individuals, and hundreds besides of less consideration, 
 were induced to change their religious principles by no secular interests what- 
 
INTRODUCTION. xlyn 
 
 " principles, which, they erroneously supposed, had produced 
 ** these terrible effects. I say erroneously ; for, except among a 
 " few honest but undiscerning men, and a company of wild 
 " enthusiasts, religion, as to the leaders in these tragical scenes, 
 *' was merely the pretence : And if the nation had been divided 
 " into zealots for Popery, and for Mohammedism, the designing 
 " sagacious leaders would have known how to avail themselves of 
 " their prejudices, and the event would have been nearly the 
 *' same; as the affairs of the late twenty years on the Continent 
 " may evince. However that may be, at the Restoration a large 
 " majority of the Clergy, who kept their stations in the Church, 
 " or who succeeded to those which became vacant, were Anti- 
 *' Calvinistic, and have continued so to this day." 
 
 Several assertions in this paragraph require explanation. The 
 "principles" of Calvinism are here said "to be erro72£'OM*/j/ sup- 
 posed to have produced the terrible effects" of the Civil Wars, and 
 the dreadful subversion of Church and State. In pages 210-20, I 
 have shewn, in as brief and inoffensive manner as possible, the 
 Genevan origin of these destructive principles, and how far Cal- 
 vin, Beza, Parfeus, Buchanan, and Knox were involved in this 
 crimination. But the fairest and most unexceptionable method of 
 deciding this matter will be, by the testimony of Milton, the 
 defender of the Regicides. In his " Tenure of Kings and Magis- 
 trates," published in the very year in which his Majesty was mur- 
 dered, Milton defends that foul deed and the general proposition 
 of the right of the people against their tyrants, by quotations from 
 Calvin and his followers. This circumstance roused the indigna- 
 tion of the celebrated Alexander More, (better known by his 
 Latin name Morus,) who had been educated at Geneva, and 
 who, both as a Calvinist and asthe son of a Scotchman, attempted 
 in 1652 to wipe off the foul aspersion, in his Begii Sattguinis 
 Clamor ad Cceluni adversus Parricidas Anglicanos. To this futile 
 attempt Milton replied in 1654', by his Pro Populo Anglicano De- 
 fensio Secunda, and unceremoniously decided that part of the 
 controversy in the following manner : " I have at greater length 
 
 ever, but by " a sort of heart-revolting against principles which had produced 
 these terrible effects," — is not very wonderful : But the greatest matter of 
 wonder is, that, in the warmth of their " heart-revolting," they did not recede 
 still further from the principles of the Puritans, and run into the opposite extreme. 
 Of those Divines whom I have designated by name, Burnet, Pearson, and Cud- 
 worth, retained all the least objectionable parts of their former system, and 
 may be justly styled, " Evangelical Arminians." 
 
 The only correct sentence in the whole extract from the Rev. Thomas Scott, 
 is the last, in which he properly says : " At the Restoration, a large majority 
 " of the Clergy, who kept their stations in the Church, or who succeeded to thos^ 
 " which became vacant, were Anti-Calvinistic, and have continued so to this 
 " day." — This is a fact, for which Mr. Scott is evidently at a loss to account, but 
 which receives ample confirmation from the remarks in pages 788 and 803. 
 
Xlvlli INTRODUCTION. 
 
 taught this doctrine, [Jhe rights of the People against their Ti)ranls,~\ 
 in that book which is entituled in our vernacular language, Tlte 
 Tenure of Kings and Magistrates. — In that work, passages are 
 quoted, even verbatim, from Luther,* Zuinglius, Calvin, Buceh, 
 Martyr, Parous, and lastly from Knox, 'whom,' you say, 'I 
 'indicate as a Scotchman, [^unurn Scotum,'2 and whom all the Cal- 
 * vinists of that age, and especially the Reformed in France, con- 
 ' demned in that particular/ But, on the contrary, Knox, as is 
 there related, affirms, * that he had derived the doctrine from 
 'Calvin,' whom he specifies by name, ' and from others of the 
 'principal Divines of that age with whom he lived Jn habits of 
 ' intimate friendship.' " Whatever may have been Milton's early 
 prepossessions in favour of Calvinism, it is certain that he was 
 cured of it during the Inter-regnum ; and the forth-coming posthu- 
 moiis publication of this great man on Religion will probably teach 
 us, more particularly, the mode of religious belief which he after- 
 wards embraced. But he was too good a casuist not to know, that 
 the rash and unscriptural sayings of the Genevan Fathers would 
 reconcile many of their disciples, in Great Britain and on the Con- 
 tinent, to the infamous deed of the regicides ; and, notwithstanding 
 the partial and politic clamour raised in a few quarters by the 
 Calvinists, the event proved Milton's artful mode 5f defence to 
 have been exceedingly palatable to a vast majority of that party. 
 A convincing evidence of this latter fact is seen in the restricted 
 sale and confined circulation of the pamphlets published by Sal- 
 masius, Morus, and other loyal writers on the Continent. 
 
 Another of Mr. Scott's assertions is, that " except among a 
 " few honest but undiscerning men and a company of wild enthu- 
 " siasts, religion, as to the leaders in these tragical scenes, was 
 " merely the pretence." In pages 729, 562 — 3, I have given 
 expression to my own views of the character of this unchristian 
 enterprize; and have shewn, (pp. 242-S08,)that it was a general 
 Calvinistic crusade against Arminianism and Episcopacy. Mr. 
 Scott ought to have specified more particularly the persons whom 
 he intended to comprise under this appellation, "the leaders in 
 these tragical scenes ;" for, on examination, it will be found, that 
 the principal " leaders" were Calvinistic pastors. If a modern 
 divine of their persuasion choose to call them, as Mr. Scott has 
 here done, " a. few hottest hut undiscerning men," I am afraid his 
 epithets will not be relished by some of his better-informed Pre- 
 destinarian brethren ; because the charge of tvatit of discernment 
 will apply to such champions in the cause, as Simeon Ashe, Samuel 
 Annesley, John Arrowsmith, Robert Baylie, Samuel Bolton, John 
 
 * Milton places Luther's name in the front of the Predestinarian supporters 
 of his licentious doctrine. But though the great German Reformer was, early in 
 life, sufficiently imprudent both as a politician and a divine, (p. 158,) yet, it will 
 be seen, (p. 730,) that in his mature years his sentiments concerning laicful 
 resistance were entirely changed. 
 
IN'TRODUCTIO^'. xlix 
 
 Bond, Oliver Bowles, Thomas Brooks, C and A. Burgess, Kd- 
 mund Calamy, T. and W. Carter, Joseph Caryl, Francis Cheynef, 
 John Conant, William Cradock, John Dury, George Gillespie, 
 Thomas Goodwin, William Gouge, John Green, Alexander Hen- 
 derson, William Jenkyns, John Lightfoot, Christopher Love, 
 Thomas Manton, Stephen Marshall, Matthew Newcomen, John 
 Owen, Herbert Palmer, Edward Reynolds, Samuel Rutherford, 
 Henry Scudder, O. and W. Sedgwick, William Spurstowe, Edward 
 Stanton, Peter Sterry, Francis Taylor, Thomas Thorowgood, An- 
 thony Tuckney, Richard Vines, Thomas Watson, and John White. 
 These are only a few of the very eminent and clever men, who, as 
 Preachers before the Long Parliament, alternately encouraged the 
 readiness and chided the tardiness of both Houses, in perfecting 
 the Calvinistic "Reformation," and who are generally, and in 
 most cases very justly, admired for other productions than their 
 sermons before the reforming Senators. If to these, we add the 
 many equally clever individuals whose Parliamentarian discourses 
 were not sufficiently "heart-searching" to entitle them to the 
 honour of publication, who were efficient members of the Assembly 
 of Divines, or who employed theh* youthful talents in composing 
 treatises to forward the grand desigm, we shall have a list of some 
 of the greatest divines who have graced the Annals of Protestant 
 Dissenters. Now, it would, in more senses than one, be too great 
 an abuse of language to style these men " undiscerning ;" for they 
 possessed discernment enough to keep their oAvn interests in sight, 
 and to cry aloud whenever, in their apprehension, those interests 
 were Compromised or impugned. But though I should be afraid 
 of calling them "undiscerning," I consider the epithet "honest," 
 if applied without restriction to the whole of those whom I have 
 specified by name, to be a still greater misnomer. The flexible 
 principles and unjustifiable acts of some of them, during the twenty 
 years of Calvinian misrule, have exposed their names to merited 
 execration : Respecting such ministers of the gospel, the Ian-- 
 guage which I have employed concerning one of their number, 
 (p. 382,) will not, when all the facts are taken into consideration, 
 appear unjust: "It was a happy circumstance, both for them-. 
 " selves and mankind, that they were soon afterwards compelled 
 " to retire from public life, and had abundant leisure afforded 
 " them of amending their ways ; and that they Avere left to lay a 
 " less exceptionable foundation for fame in the composition of 
 " works of piety." Several of those productions of their mature 
 years I have read with admiration, and to my great personal be- 
 nefit; and so far am I from cherishing any personal pique against 
 them or their subsequent labours, that I have frequently blessed 
 God for having " put it into the heart of these His ser- 
 vants" to compose works of such sterling worth and importance. 
 J —But, after all this concession, I am persuaded, my readers will 
 I too soon be convinced, that the individuals whom Mr. Scott haa 
 1 d 
 
1 INTftODUCTIOX. 
 
 here designated *'a fe\^ honest but undiscerningmeu" yfevemveaXxiY 
 "a company o^ wild enthusiasts" and gloried in identifying them- 
 selves with " the leaders in these tragical scenes," with whom, be 
 truly asserts, " religion was merely the pretence." 
 
 To afford every impartial man an opportunity of forming a cor- 
 rect judgment of the part taken at that period by various Calvi-^ 
 nistic ministersofeminence,andof the degree of criminality which 
 actually attaches to their principles and actions, I shall transcribe 
 a few passages from their Sermons before the Long Parliamenti 
 Of those extraordinary productions, which are among the very 
 best chronicles of that eventful aera, I possess nearly an unbroken 
 series of original quarto editions — the form in which they were 
 oi'dered by the two Houses to be printed : 
 
 J.-^The Puritan Ministers the grand Instigators of the Civil Wars. 
 
 The first extract, illustrative of the intimate connection between 
 the Puritan ministers, and " the designing sagacious leaders," is 
 from "honest John Durve," who had for many yeai's preceding 
 been employed under the auspices and at the expence of Arch- 
 bishop Laud, in trying to effect a general union among the Pro-, 
 testants of Europe. His sermon is entituled " Israel's call, to 
 march out of Babylon unto Jerusalem," and was preached before 
 the House of Commons, November 26, 1(545. It is scarcely nCi 
 cessary to say, that Episcopacy, then in ruins, is the thing intende(4 
 by the term Babylon in the following sentences : " God hath, 
 since the beginning of the Reformation of His church from Popery- 
 and anti-christian superstition, intended to bring his vessel* 
 out of Babylon unto Sion. The way hath been opened, by the.- 
 preaching of the Gospel, a long while ago. The nations of Europe,' 
 some more, some less, frequently have begun their marches in^ 
 several troops ; and the spirits of many Magistrates and of many. 
 Ministers have been stirred up, and called upon to bear the ves- 
 sels of the Lord, and, by their care, power, authority, assistance, 
 and vigilancy, to bring them to Sion, ihere to be fully settled in 
 the right use of the ordinances of God. But none of all the Ma- 
 gistrates or Ministers of other nations have ever given such an 
 answer to this call, as you and we of the ministry and this peo- 
 ple hath done: For we all have undertaken the cause in the 
 full extent thereof; therefore we are, in this employment, nearer 
 unto God than any others ; and he is more interested in you and > 
 in Scotland, than in any nation whatsoever. And if this be so, do 
 not you think, that God will have a nearer respect unto you, 
 than unto others ; and that He doth expect a more exact perform- 
 ance of this charge from you, than from others ? You, and we all, 
 have fastened the cause we have in hand upon Him ; and, for this 
 cause, we have no foundation to build on, but upon Him : And 
 He hath none other emplo)'ment for us, but that we all should 
 carry his vessels carefully out of Babylon. If you do this faith- 
 
f^jTRODUOTloy, li 
 
 fully according to your promise, and make it your aim to fulfil 
 your Covenant to this effect with Him, you may be sure that He 
 will bear you up, and bear you out, in all your difficulties. But 
 if you have any other aim, and do not make this your glory thai 
 the vessels of the Lord are covimitted to your trust, — if 3'ou cast them 
 off in your heart, and think them a wearisome burden and heavy 
 to be borne, — if, I say, any doth hit in his heart quit the charge 
 committed unto him, will not God require it at his hands ? — 
 The only way, then, for you to be supported by Him is this, that 
 you be sure to support with all your heart and might his vessels : 
 For, you must know, that it is only for their sake that you are and 
 shall be a sure nail fastened in the wall of this kingdom; only, I say, 
 for this end — that the vessels of your Lord's house, and the glory 
 thereof may be hung upon you. But if you cannot be made use 
 of by Him to this effect, though the nail be never so strong, and 
 fastened in a place never so sure, it shall be broken and pulled 
 down, for the Lord hath spoken it !" 
 
 My remaining extracts shall be confined to discourses delivei'ed 
 in the year l64<6'-7 when the Parliamentary interest was most flou- 
 rishing, when their enemies were vanquished, and the King in the 
 hands of the Army. The prosperous state of their affairs, and the 
 deliberative as well as active employments of the Calvinistic Pastors, 
 are well described in the dedication to the House of Commons, 
 Afrhich Herbert Palmer prefixed to a sermon preached before them, 
 September 30, 164)6, and in which he says: 
 
 "The Reformation of England is the great expectation of the. 
 world, I think I may say, of Angels as well as men ; and the Par- 
 liament OP England, under God, is the great hope of the Chris- 
 , tian world, to bring this reformation about. If any would set 
 [ himself to study abstractly, how God might prepai-e a company 
 I of men to carry on such a work, he would not easily find out any 
 thing, which God hath not already fitted the Honourable Houses 
 : with: — Great pressures, to help to make them humble before their 
 I meeting : — Manifold dangers all along from the beginning of their 
 i meeting, to help keep them humble: — A mighty concurrence of 
 , provide?ice, to necessitate their meeting together : — ^And art Jinpo" 
 ! ralleled over-ruling of hearts, for their continuance together, without 
 ; limitation of time, other than their own prudence should determine : 
 ! —A watchful eye and a strong hand, to preserve them from all sorts 
 , of attempts to dissolve their meeting: — Marvellous and manifidd 
 I actings of God's Almighty power and rich grace, in making their 
 enemies fall before them, notwithstanding their frequent expecta- 
 ! tions and most probable hopes of swallowing them up suddenly ; 
 ; and in making the people every where to stoop to every part of 
 ' reformation by them promoted, notwithstanding all their habitu- 
 .ated and doted-on customs to the contrary : — The most solemn en" 
 ^gagements to carry the work on for God, and accordingly to God, 
 I that are to be found upon earth or are directed by heaven : — A 
 1 ' d2 
 
fir IXTEODUCTION. 
 
 s^pirit of reformation in the hearts of many thousands throusfhout 
 the Kingdom, and more particularly near inito the place of their 
 sitting, breathing out prayers and supplications to God for them 
 day and night, with giving of thanks, that the reformation may 
 prosper in their hands and be perfected by their hands : — And 
 finally, moslfrcqueni intercourses between God and them, by his send- 
 ing to them, (and even directing them to call to themselves,) his 
 servants in great variety and frequency to pray yfixh them daily^ 
 to fast and pray with them monthly, besides extraordinary days 
 of humiliation, and to pray and give thanks with them upon ex- 
 traordinary days of thanksgiving, and these extraordinary days 
 both of the one and the other sort being not a few, put them all 
 together; and upon all these public and solemn occasions, to speak 
 to them, in the name of God, words of direction and encourage- 
 ment ; and all this as a Joint body together, with the advantage of 
 having every affecting sermon perpetuated to them, by printing 
 such as they see cause, or approve ; while in the mean time the 
 several members have the opportunity of constant hearing from 
 God every Sabbath, and many of them every morning : — And, with 
 all this, to have a selected number of men, chosen by themselves to 
 attend years together, merely upon giving them advice about this 
 reformation: — May I not now say in the close of all, what could, 
 have been done more for such a company of men, to make them willing 
 and able to do God's whole work for his Church and people, for a 
 full and perfect reformation ? And is not this your story, honour-; 
 able and worthy ? Is it not the manifest story of God's provi- 
 dence toward the Parliament of England ? And what doth he 
 now expect from you, or what may we expect further from Him ? 
 Surely from Him, for my part, I can expect no less but that his: 
 intents are (though yet through some further difficulties, perhaps,) 
 to carry your spirits, and the spirits of the whole Parliament 
 strongly and powerfully on, to finish this so blessed a work. He 
 hath pardon,* and grace, and wisdom, ai>d strength enough ta 
 answer and overcome all that can be said or thought to the con- 
 trary ; in this persuasion I have divers years lived, and I hope in 
 it I shall die, if I must die before the work be perfected." 
 
 The activity of these ministers, and the dehght which they felt 
 in adverting to their pragmatical behaviour, will be apparent to 
 evei y one, in the three extracts subjoined : 
 
 Thomas Valentine preached before theCommons,September 29^ 
 iS^G, from Rev. iii, 18, / counsel thee to buy of me gold tried in the 
 
 • These men needed pardon from Heaven : But this method of applying the 
 holy doctrines of Christianity, as sacred unction, to the consciences of men then 
 openly engaged in rebellion against their Sovereign, was one great cause why 
 evangelical piety, or true experimental religion, came afterwards into much dis- ' 
 repute, and was greatly neglected. This sad consequence, the reader will per- 
 ceive, is adverted to and lamented in pages 296 and 804, as well as in other 
 passages. 
 
INTRODUCTION. lili 
 
 .y?re, that ihoii may est be rich ; and while raiment, that thou mayest he 
 clothed, 4'C. In his " use" of the doctrine, he says : " Give me 
 leave to make a further application to you that are the Great Coun- 
 cil of the kingdom ; and let me tell you, that the people of this 
 land look for this pure gold and white raiment ; and, to purchase 
 them they have offered fair — their plate, their money, their horses, 
 their servants, and their sons ! They begin to fear they shall not 
 have these commodities which they have bidden well for, because, 
 in all this time, they had little else than ends of gold and silver. 
 We will persuade them to wait longer, and to help you by their 
 prayers, that you may become the happy instruments of the king- 
 dom's good, in making the gold and raiment in the text as plenti- 
 ful, as the material gold was in Solomon's time." 
 
 Thomas Case, in the sermon quoted page Ixviii, describes the 
 following, as some of the advantages which the Long Parliament 
 possessed to execute the designs which he has there proposed : 
 *' A ministry neither ignorant, nor unfaithful, nor driving their 
 own interests to serve you, to bring in the hearts of the people to 
 you, which (till some taught otherwise) they did with such suc- 
 cess, that your interest in the affections of the subjects was such, 
 that you commanded their purses and their persons, their liveli- 
 hoods and their lives, with as much freedom as ye did the wives 
 of your bosoms or your hired servants. Oh that it were with 
 you as in the days of old !" 
 
 In his Sermon before the Commons, August 26, 1646, Jeremiah 
 BuRROUGHES makes the following pertinent remarks concerning 
 the early labours of himself and his Puritan brethren : " It is 
 righteous, that those that are delinquents should be punished. 
 What was the great title of our war, but 'the raising of the Posse 
 ' RegHt for the taking of delinquents, and bringing them to con- 
 ' dign punishment .-'' We made very much use of this argument 
 continually, for the satisfying men in the justice of the war. If 
 a judge in the country shall have the command of the Posse Co- 
 mitaius to fetch in delinquents that are rebellious, then the Parli- 
 ament hath the power of the Posse Begni. Now then, if God hath 
 given them into your hands, there will not appear that righteous- 
 ness as heretofore was thought to be, if they escape without 
 condign punishment." 
 
 2." — 'Tlte spirit of Railing with which the Puritans ivere infected, and 
 the lurking Attachment of the People to Episcopacy. 
 
 One of their own body, the Rev. William Jenkyn, "Minister 
 of God's Word at Christ Church, London," has also well described 
 that race of Puritans who overturned Church and State, in a ser- 
 mon which he preached in the Abbey-church at Westminster, 
 before the House of Peers, on the 27th of January, 1646. The 
 Biohops had then been expelled from the Upper House, and in al- 
 lusion to this event, the preacher informs their Lordships in his 
 
 d3 
 
llV IXTllODtUTION. 
 
 Epistle Dedicatory : " The Lords spiritual (so called) grew too 
 temporal ; but the Lords tempoi'al cannot be too spirilual. Temporal 
 pragmaticalness ruined them ; spiritual practices must uphold you. 
 The power of Godliness is the only means to save your souls, and 
 the best to silence your foes." — In the discourse itself he thus 
 icomplaius of " the insensibleness" of the Long Parliament : " In- 
 sensible we are of noises and stirring. How loud hath been the 
 voice of the word in our ears, but how deaf have we been ! Rare 
 is the operation of the word in our congregation ; the helloivs are 
 burnt, the lead is consumed, and yet the foimdcr meltcth in vain. 
 (Jer. vi, ?9-) Ministers are spent both in strength and numbers, 
 and yet our lusts in neither : And, for the Parliament, it is a com- 
 mon observation, that it is sermon-proof ! You command us to 
 preach before you : Oh that God would command you to practise 
 uefore us ! You enjoin us to print : But it will be an unanswer- 
 able dilemma another day — either the sermofis you caused to he 
 jyrinied mere good or bad : If bad, why were they so much as 
 printed. If good, why not -more than printed and practised 
 also.?"— -He then describes himself and brethren, in the following 
 language : " Painful zealous ministers, that will tell us of our 
 sins, are now looked upon as busy men, as those that meddle with 
 the State : They ai-e bid to keep to their texts ;* as if that preach- 
 
 * Some of the Puritans attended strictly to this advice : Thus, in his sermon 
 before the House of Commons, January 27th, 1G47, from Rev. xii, 1, 2 : — 
 " A woman clothed with the sun, &c. and she, being with child, cried, travailing in 
 *' birth, and pained to be delivered ;" — Dr. John Arrowsmith kept well to his text, 
 as the reader will perceive when he has perused that discourse. 
 
 Stephen IVIarshall, before the House of Lords, October 28, 1640, also kept 
 well to his text, ' Oat of tlie mouth of hahes and sucklings hast thou ordained 
 ' strength^ becfmtse of thine enemies,' Sec, (Psalm viii, 2.) " I principally speak 
 to your Lordships," said Stephen, " to take care that this magazine of the mouth, 
 the powers that come out of the mouth of babes and sucklings may be preserved 
 and recruited, and not any-ways disbanded. It is now a great dispute, among 
 you that are wise statesmen, what we should do with our armies ? Whether^ 
 there being no visible enemy in the field, it would not be fittest to disband our 
 present armies ? A dispute I have nothing to do with : But this I have to do 
 with, and malce bold to tell you, whatsoever you do with other armies, you must 
 not disband the Forces of the Babes and Sucklings, out of whose mouth comes 
 your strongest help. You are far from having your work done as yet : Ireland is 
 in a sad condition ; England is woefully unsettled : Terrible divisions are found 
 every where. Look to it, that you have a force about you. What other Forces 
 are needful, I leave to your wisdoms ; but, sure I am, these Babes and Sucklings 
 are ihe Triarii, the Veter.ani, the old soldiers, the life-guard of England. Dis» 
 band them once, and you are lost. — Give all the assistance possible, that these 
 soldiers may be encouraged and multiplied in all parts of the land : I mean, that 
 the gospel may spread, the preaching of the gospel, that saints might be won, 
 .and that the church might be enlarged, be settled in peace, that there might be 
 freedom to seek God, and to serve him according to his will ; and know you for 
 certain, tliat every soul which shall be won to Christ,— be it the soul of a woman, 
 or of an old man that stoops for age, or of a child, — yet every soul won to Christ, 
 and so numbered among these Babes and Sucklings, will be as stout a soldier 
 as ever you did employ, and will, in your extremity, do more than all the expe. 
 aenccd Captains that triad on English ground," &p. 
 
INTRODUCTION. 1^ 
 
 ing which is a coming close up to your lusts, were a going away 
 from our texts. In the Bishops' times we were suffered to preach 
 any thing, so we came not near their sins : And this prelacy is 
 still kept up among us. Hence it is that faithful ministers are 
 denied their maintenance, are abused by the nick-names of A?iti- 
 christian, are voiced enemies to the Parliament, (are you and your 
 lusts so near, that we cannot be enemies to one, but we must be 
 enemies also to the other ?) "^that they have changed their princi- 
 * pies, that they are turned Maligriant^ :' Whereas it is not the 
 shore that moveth, but the boatman. The ministers are still the 
 same men, and walk by the same rule, — still are for you, the 
 Covenant, and a pure Reformation. The Lord will one day 
 judge who they are that continue faithful and firm both to Him 
 and you, and who are unfaithful to Him, to us, and to your- 
 selves." 
 
 In one of the most judicious sermons* preached before the House 
 of Peers, on May the 26th, l647, by the Rev, William Hussey, 
 
 • I call this " one of the most judicious sermons preached before the house of 
 Peers." Two or three extracts will corroborate my favourable judgment of it i 
 Their Lordships were then dwindling fast in public estimation ; and the King, 
 though a prisoner, was in treaty with his rebellious subjects. Instead of insulting 
 fallen Majesty, and exciting the rage of the populace against the King, as was 
 the practice of many ef his co-pastors, Hussey made the following remarks : " I 
 cannot but confess, these times have involved your Lordships in very great diffi- 
 culties : But the greatest difficulty is, to amend yourselves. If you could but 
 give testimony to the world, that you see yourselves, (partly by the fault of your 
 ancestors, and partly by your own,) disabled from doing your country that ser- 
 vice which the duties of your places do require, and that you earnestly desire a 
 refonnation of yourselves ; if you could but undertake the principal duty of your 
 places, to be reconcilers of the King and people^ and propose such terms of agree- 
 ment as may be fit for Prince and people to receive, God would certainly assist 
 you. You ought to deal plainly with King and people. Where you find 
 the fault, lay the blame. Press the King to his duty, and the people to theirs. 
 Let your propositions be legal, reasonable, and wholesome for the State. God 
 And good men will not leave such endeavours without comfort and success. You 
 bught not to join with the King against the Commons, nor with the Commons 
 Agahist the King ; but carry the balance of justice so justly and friendly between 
 them, that they may join in friendship one with another. You are trusted with 
 flie honour of the Crown, the justice of the people, the setting up the honour of 
 Christ's kingdom : Ye must not suffer any of these to sink." 
 - Speaking in favour of a better maintenance for himself and his Puritan breth- 
 ren, Hussey says : " There was great pretence of honour done to the Clergy, in 
 the Court of England. 'Were the Bishops so much honoured at Court, that 
 Christ might be honoured in them, that religion might be advanced by them ? 
 No such matter, but that they might be popular orators to draw over the people 
 to put on the yoke of slaveiy, and that hath drawn so much envy of the people 
 on them. The principle, notwithstanding, that was pretended, was a good prin- 
 ciple — that he who laboured in the word and doctrine, is worthy of double honour, 
 {1. Tim. V. 17.) But the honour must be joined to the work, that the work 
 iiiay be done. Certainly it is the duty of Christian Kings and Princes, to use 
 all means that come to their hands to encourage the choice of men for parts and 
 feducation to become ministers, to make such public provision for ministers that 
 jnenmay by that obtain more honour, more maintenance by it, than by any other 
 
Ki IXi'RODUCTION. 
 
 Minister at Chiselhurst, in Kent, the following observations are 
 made, by a professed adversary, in behalf of the Bishops who had 
 
 public profession. — So that Kings and States cannot receive the Gospel, unless 
 they honour the messengers of Christ, according to the command of Christ ; not 
 as beggars and private men give honour with cap and knee, but with honourable 
 maintenance ; and command that honour be given them from private subjects." 
 — He then successfully combats the common arguments for an ignorant ministry, 
 and observes in conclusion : " This is the common cry of the multitude, Ye may 
 see what gowl learning did in the Bishops'' time : We must never look for better 
 from it ! Therefore down with it! Yet this I say, that if the value of but one 
 Bishopric were bestowed on seven honest and able Divines that might maintain a 
 School of Divinity, and [were] the scriptures interpreted by them according to 
 the best improvement of human skill, such satisfaction would be given, tliat the 
 mouths of those who fill the world with new fancies would be stopped, the hard 
 places of scripture made plain, unity and piety much advanced : Which no one 
 man's skill will ever be able to bring to pass, that would make more for the 
 s.afety of the kingdom^than all the forces and power of the sword." 
 
 With such sentiments as these about the superiority of the Puritans over the 
 Bishops, it is not wonderful that Hussey should plead in the following manner 
 for abetter maintenance : "Were any ministers received into this state as Com. 
 missioners to preach the Gospel ought ? Have any sort of ministers been re- 
 ceived as Ambassadors from a King to his own subjects ? Were not those Bishops 
 that were honoured by this State, first sized to the Prince's humour and good ex- 
 perience had of their servile condition, then sent out to stop the mouths of all that 
 were not fitted to the same last, not with the commission of Christ to preach what 
 He commanded^ but with a new CGramission to preach what the Prince and his 
 Commissioners should allow ? And was all this done with intelligence, accord- 
 ing to principles of christian religion ? Or have not all these strivings to keep 
 the ministers of the Gospel under, come from a more corrupt fountain, that they 
 might not be bold to preach against their corruptions, or lay the yoke of 
 Christ too heavily on the necks of kings, princes, and people ! — Were not Bishops 
 nursed up to keep the ministers of the Gospel from speaking boldly in the name 
 ■of Christ ? Was not this their style ? No Bishop^ No King ! I never heard 
 No Bishop, No Christ ! But had they relied on Christ, and heard Christ freely 
 speaking to them out of the Gospel, He would have kept them safer than the 
 Bishops did. And I dare boldly say. No honour and freedom given to the 
 ministers of the Gospel, No Christ received in that Commonwealth ! I\Ien dare 
 not say, ' Christ is proud : A course must be taken to bring Christ a little 
 ' lower !' But, Ministers are proud ; they must be taken doivn ; they must come 
 'under the gentry. If that be the end of taking down the Bishops, to make the 
 Clergy belotv the Gentry, I would fain know, by what principle must wealth needs 
 be of more esteem than religion ? But let these men speak plain, and tell us they 
 will bring Christ below the Gentry. Indeed, I have heard a gentleman that had 
 some influence on the placing of a minister in a country church, should say, ' he 
 * scorned any minister should be so saucy as to tell him his faults :' And surely 
 the carriage of iheijen try has been such, as if they were above the commands of 
 .Christ." 
 
 The fact is, the character here drawn of the Bishops is much more applicable 
 to the Puritans themselves : For no man was permitted to become a Court 
 Preacher before the Long Parliament, unless he had first jwoved himself "to be 
 sized to their humour, and good experience had of his servile condition." He 
 was then qualified to be sent, as all the Assembly of Divinca were commissioned 
 by Parliament, August 10, 1C43, "to go into the country to stir up the people to 
 rise for their defence,'' or, as Hussey quaintly expresses it, " to stop the mouths 
 ef all that were not fitted to the same last." Where are the records of the 
 Bishops, or of the Episcopal Clergy, engaging in a warlike crusade, and exciting 
 
INTKODUCTION. Ivli 
 
 then been suppressed : " War is the breaking out of the Lord 
 upon an unjust people. I dare say, had the judges walked in 
 judgment according to the Petition of Right, — punished those that 
 first took monopolies, tonnage, and poundage, not exacted, because 
 not granted in Parliament, or [^had^ the exacters Qbeen]] pu- 
 nished in judgment, — [[had] ship-money not [[^been] judged to he 
 law contrary to law, — it had been impossible to have brought the 
 
 their fellow-subjects to arouse themselves, and destroy their republican invaders ? 
 The sermons preached by Hammond, Sanderson, Usher, and others, before the 
 Court and the Army, are still extant : Let a comparison be instituted between 
 these pacific and truly christian discourses, (of which many specimens will be 
 found in the subsequent pages,) and those of their adversaries. It will then be 
 instantly seen, that the adherents to Arminianism and Loyalty were better 
 instructed in the school of Christ Jesus, and did not return railing for railing, 
 but contrariwise blessing. 
 
 • Old Dr. Thomas Manton, though he also was a Presbyterian, had the 
 same view of the bad consequences of suppressing Episcopacy. In his Sermon 
 before the Commons, June 30, 1647, he said : "I confess, God loveth to '•pour 
 contempt upon the sons of Levi that are partial in the Covenant^'' (Mai. ii, 9,) 
 and it is his way many times to cf^use ' the voice of many iraters,^ that is, of the 
 confused multitude, to go before ' the voice of mighty thiinderings,'' (Rev. xix, 6,) 
 that is, the regular act of the magistrate, whose sentences and decrees are terrible 
 as thunder. And therefore I do adore the justice of Divine Providence, in causing 
 the former ministry to become base and contemptible before all the people. But, 
 however, I cannot but sadly bewail the mischiefs that abound amongst us by the 
 neglect of men. Though the corruptions of Episcopacy made it justly odious, 
 yet it would have been better it had been, rather than jested down. Arguments 
 would have done more good than scoffs, beside the danger of returning to folly. 
 Do but consider the present inconveniences of making so great a change without 
 more public and rational conviction ; when things that before were of reverend 
 esteem, are of ^ sudden decried. What is the effect ? Why, religion itself is of 
 less esteem : Men suspect all, can as well scoff at truth as error. Calvin's obser- 
 vation is excellent : He saith, that ' in times of changes there are many that are 
 ' of Lucian's temper, who, by jesting against all received rites, insensibly lose all 
 ' sense and awe of religion ; and, by scoffing at false Gods, come the less to 
 ' dread the true.' Consider, and see if the former liberty of tongues and pens 
 hath not begotten that present irreverence and fearlessness that is in the spirits of 
 men against things that undoubtedly are of God. But this is not aU : Do but 
 consider how many are hardened in their old ways, and prejudiced against the 
 reformers, as if they were men that did proceed, not to perfection, but to per- 
 mutation, were men given to changes, merely to love things out of passion and pre- 
 sent dislike, or, which is worse, out of self-aims." 
 
 The truth is, the Puritans had " raised a spirit which they could not lay." 
 They had taught the common people to ridicule the decent observances of Epis- 
 copacy, and they could not prevail with them, after having abandoned the form 
 of religion, to shew any attachment to the substance. Besides, all these Puri- 
 tanic complainers studiously conceal the important fact, that Calvinism was inade- 
 quate to produce any good effect upon a people that had been carefully instructed 
 in their Christian duties, as the great mass of the nation had been by many of the 
 Bishops and Episcopal Clergy. Though the political might of Calvinism in the 
 Civil Wars gained the ascendancy here, as it had previously done in Holland, 
 yet its " moral power'' was gradually diminislied during the whole of the Inter- 
 regnum, notwithstanding the strenuous exertions which were made for its estab- 
 lishment, and which had never before been made for that of any other religious 
 system. I could quote several confessions similar to this, from the Calvinistic 
 sermons preached before the Long Parliament, 
 
Ivlii IICTKODUCTIOX. 
 
 people into such a distemper as to fall one upon another. The 
 fault was laid upon the Bishops and Clergy of the land. I will 
 not excuse them as far as they had any hand in over-swaying the 
 Judges, putting down the good ones, and setting up such as were 
 servile and might easier be bent to serve the lust of the Court 
 against law, — or as they were active themselves in arbitrary 
 Courts to the oppression of the people, such as were the High 
 Commission, Star Chamber, Council Table. But this I dare say, 
 the most immediate causes of breach of peace have been failings 
 in judgment. All failings in judgment are oppressions; therefore 
 is judgment opposed to oppression." 
 
 The next quotation, from Thomas Case's sermon before the- 
 Commons, May 26, 164-7, describes the havoc which this Calvi- 
 nistic Crusade had made in the belief and the practice of the 
 nation, compared with which, the preacher says, the abolished cere- 
 jnojiies of Episcopacy were childre?ts sport : " Is there any thing 
 refused and opposed so much as Reformation ? Oh that Popery 
 were so much opposed as Reformation ! Oh that Blasphemies 
 were so much opposed as Reformation ! Oh that Anti-christi- 
 anism and Atheism were so much opposed as Reformation ! Happy 
 we then ! Would ye know when all these abominations are 
 broken out in England ? Oh, it is in a time of Reformation ! In 
 a time of the breaking out of gospel-light and liberty, such as the 
 world never saw since it was christian : In a time when we had 
 sworn ourselves to God by Covenant ' to extirpate Popery, Prelacy, 
 ' Superstition, Heresy, Schism, Profaneness, and whatsoever shall 
 * be found to be contrary to sound doctrine and the power of god- 
 ' liness.' Alas ! we run in such a contrary motion, that a man 
 might almost think there was a word in the Covenant mis-printed, 
 and the next errata should bid the reader read establish instead 
 o£ extirpate. Oh, God may say of us. When I would have healed Eng" 
 land, then the iniquity thereof was discovered ! England was never 
 so bad as in a time of Reformation. Witness the numerous and 
 numberless increase of errors and heterodox opinions even to blas- 
 phemy among us ! The world once wondered to see itself turned 
 Arian. England may wonder to see itself turned Anabaptist, An- 
 tinoraian, Arminian, Socinian, Arian, Anti-trinitarian, Anti-scrip- 
 turist, what not ! Alas, what were Ceremonies to these things, 
 but (as Calvin once called them) tolerahiles inepttice, 'children's 
 sport ' in comparison ! How much less an evil was it, think ye, 
 to bow at the name of Jesus, than to deny, to blaspheme the name 
 of Jesus? (2 Pet. ii, 1.)" 
 
 These topics are still more amply treated in the next quotation, 
 and might soon be confirmed by numbers of others. In the per- 
 usal of this volume, the reader will find that I have frequently 
 alluded to the attachment of the people of England to Episcopacy, 
 and have (p. 779,) called the influence of the Episcopal Clergy, 
 " DEEP ROOTED :" No oDC, I think, who reads the following il-. 
 
INTRODUCTION. llX 
 
 lustrative passages from Richard Kentish's sermon before the 
 Commons, Nov. 24, l647, will consider that epithet to have been 
 inappropriately applied: 
 
 " Oh that the Lord would persuade the people of England, to 
 remember J'rorn whence they arej'allen. (1.) The people of England 
 once loved the Saints, and honoured those that feared the Lord ; 
 but now they loath them. They once longed for a Parliament, 
 petitioned for a Parliament, honoured a Parliament, thought they 
 could not be happy without a Parliament; but now how is the Par- 
 liament slighted ! their order and ordinances contemned ! and 
 how many are there that say to the Parliament, as the Gadarenes 
 to Christ, Oh that it would depart out of our coasts ! Oh how is 
 England fallen ! 
 
 " (2.) The people of England once desired reformation, 
 petitioned for reformation, covenanted for reformation. But 
 now they do hate to be reformed ; they are like Israel of old 
 in their travel towards the promised land ; they prejerred thegarlick 
 and onions of' Egypt, before the milk and honey of Canaan ; so now a 
 prelatical Priest, with a superstitious service-book, is more de- 
 sired, and would be better welcome to the generality of England, 
 than the most learned, laborious, conscientious Preacher, whether 
 Presbyterian or Independent. Oh how is England fallen ! 
 
 " (3.) Again : About six years since sin began to be ashamed, 
 to creep into corners, to be out of fashion. But now sin is grown 
 brazen-faced, walks in the open streets, is come in great request 
 again. Sabbaths are profaned, ordinances slighted, swearing is 
 accounted gainful, drunkenness goes unpunished, and whoredom 
 the people are apt to think lawful now, because, since the Bishops' 
 Courts went down, we have scarce any law against it. 
 
 " Now here (by the way) I do most earnestly beseech you, (ho- 
 noured worthies of Parliament,) if you have not been acting that 
 ■*vay already, to hasten out some order for the punishment of that 
 heinous sin of adultery. We read in God's law, (Lev. xx, 1 0.) 
 that he that committeth adultery with his neighbour's wife, the 
 adulterer and the adulteress, shall surely be put to death. Was 
 it to be punished with death then, and shall it go unpunished now i* 
 I beseech, let some course be taken that such kind of transgres- 
 sors may be made to smart. 
 
 " (4.) Again : Oh how is England fallen ! Time was when we 
 rejoiced that we had days of fasting ; we looked upon them as 
 none of our least mercies. But now we are ready to say with 
 those in Amos viii, 5 : When will the new moon be gone, that we 
 may sell corn ? and the Sabbath, that roe may set forth wheat ? So 
 say our people, ' When shall we have an end of these fasting days, 
 ' that we may follow our callings, look to our shops and our other 
 ' occasions ?' And these poor simple creatures are mad after 
 superstitious festivals, after unholy holidays. Alas ! why should 
 we be weary of well-doing .-* Are England's dangers all over ? 
 Is not Ireland's case as bad as it was ? And shall we give over seek- 
 
Ix nCTRODUCTION. 
 
 rng of God ? Oh that we would remember from whence we are 
 Jallen ! 
 
 " (5.) Yet it were somewhat tolerable, if there were such a 
 declining only among the generality of England, if it were only 
 among the riff-raffs of the people. But alas ! how are England's 
 professors fallen from hot to cold, from better to worse ! They are 
 not like the people they were. Do they not neglect Sabbaths, 
 slight sermons, grow weary of Manna .-' Is not their love to 
 Christ, to Christians, grown cold ? Do they not love the world 
 better than they were wont } Are they not grown more foolish 
 and fashionable, more contentious and complimental than form- 
 erly } You cannot know a professor from a prodigal, a christian 
 from a carouser, now a-days. Oh how are England's professors 
 fallen ! Oh that England, that the people of England, both high 
 and low, rich and poor, one and other, from Dan to Beersheba, 
 would this day begin, to remember from whence they are fallen, and 
 repent !" 
 
 Evidence sufficient has now been adduced to prove, from the 
 men themselves, the erroneousness of Mr. Scott's assertion, and 
 that the most active " leaders in those tragical scenes" were, in 
 reality, the Predestinarian Divines. 
 
 S.'—The Puritans who embraced Presbyicrianism, were not favourable 
 to Civil or Religious Liberty. 
 
 But it is gravely asserted, by some of our most popular his- 
 torians, that these " Puritans were the renowned fathers of Eng- 
 lish Liberty." This proposition is true in the same sense as, that 
 the devil was the cause of Job's final earthly prosperity ; but in no 
 other acceptation can it be deemed correct, either in regard to the 
 Presbyterians or Independents as a body. 
 
 The ideas entertained, by the leading Puritans, on the subject 
 of Toleration, shall be expressed in the very language which 
 they employed in their discourses before the Long Parliament : 
 
 In a sermon before the House of Peers, Feb. 24, l646, Natha- 
 niel Hardy made the following improvement upon the Solemn 
 League and Covenant into which their Lordships and all the 
 Revolutionists had entered : " Remember, I beseech you, you 
 are within the bounds of a Covenant ; for what .'' for a Tolera- 
 tion ? No, for an extirpation of all heresies, schisms, and profane- 
 ness. What, if, while the Ark was floating on the waters of 
 strife, you were enforced to entertain wolves and lambs together, 
 yet now that the waters are abated and the ark in some measure 
 settled, send out the wolves from the fold. Oh, let your thank- 
 fulness to God, for. preserving the bounds of your possessions, 
 appear, by your maintaining the bounds of his worship ! Suffer 
 not yourselves, I beseech you, by self-respects and politic prin- 
 ciples, to be withdrawn from this work. He that pieceth God's 
 Providence with carnal policy, is like a greedy gamester, who, 
 having got all his game in his own hand, steals a needless card 
 
INTRODUCTIOX, JX;i 
 
 to assure himself of winning, and tliereby loseth all. It is a hawl 
 question, ' Whether is greater idolatry. — to prefer reasons of state 
 before principles of piety, — .or to worship a golden calf?' O let 
 policy ever give place to piety, your private aiFections be swal- 
 loAved up in the common cause, as small rivers lose their name in 
 the ocean. 
 
 " But as you take with you words, so take to you the sword, 
 and think God saith to you as he did to Joshua, Wherefore lie on 
 your faces ? Up and be doing ; take away the accursed errors from 
 among you! That of St. Bernard is true, if taken cum grano salts, 
 ' Faith is wrought by persuasions, not by compulsions :' Yet 
 that of Tertullian is as true, ' Obstinacy must be forced, not 
 wooed.' It was a divine speech of Seneca, ' Divers nations ap- 
 point various punishments, all some for those that violate reli- 
 gion.' — I have learned so much state-divinity as to distinguish 
 between voluntas signi et beneplaciti : I well know, the biassed 
 Bowls may fetch a compass to touch the Jack. Dumb Zachary 
 begat him [the Baptist^ who was the voice of a crier : Neither 
 doubt I but your former silence will end in a loud decrying of all 
 heterodox opinions and practices. My only aim is to add spurs 
 to your pious intentions, that they may appear by such peremp- 
 tory actions, as the people may not deceive themselves with vain 
 hopes of unsufferable liberties. It is to be supposed, that, — as in 
 the sweating-sickness in England, the sick persons, when beaten 
 on the face with sprigs of Rosemary by their friends, would cry 
 but. Oh you kill me ! you kill me !, whereas indeed they had killed 
 them in not doing it, for had they slept they had died, — so those 
 •whom the sickness of error hath surprised, being suppressed, 
 will exclaim and say. Oh you perscctde them ! you persecute them !, 
 whereas indeed it is not a persecution that lets out the life-blood, 
 but a prosecution that lets out the corrupt blood. Oh happy 
 violence, which pulls men out of the fire ! Blessed bonds, that 
 tie men to Christ ! Comfortable fetters, which keep our feet in. 
 the way of peace !" 
 
 On the afternoon of the same day. Dr. John Lightfoot thus 
 pursued the same argument : " It is not yet four years since we 
 entered into as solemn a Covenant as ever did nation : And will 
 it be believed in the next generation, if our guilt upon it do not. 
 make it too evident, — or would it be believed in any remote parts 
 of the world, but that the fame of it is blown through all na- 
 tions, — that, in so short a time, after so solemn an obligation, and 
 the Parliament that brought on the Covenant sitting, the Cove- 
 nant should be so forgot as we dolefully see daily that it is .'' — We ■■ 
 vowed against Error, Heresy, and Schism, and swore to the God 
 of Truth and Peace, to the utmost of our power to extirpate I hem, and 
 to root them out.. These stones, and walls, and pillars, were wit- 
 nesses of our solemn engagement. And now, if the Lord should 
 come to enquire what we have done according to this vow and 
 
Ixii INTRODUCTIOK. 
 
 covenant, I am amazed to think wliat the Lord would find 
 amongst us. Would he not find ten schisms now fiar one theii, 
 twenty heresies now for one at that lime, and forty errors now for 
 one when we swore against them ? Was there ever more palpable 
 walking contrary to God, or more desperate crossing of a cove- 
 nant? If we had sworn, to the utmost of our power, to have 
 promoted and advanced error, heresy, and schism', could these 
 then have grown and come forward more, than now they have 
 done, though we swore against them ? — And so we entered in as 
 solemn an engagement for Rejbrmation in matters of Religion ; 
 and this was the joyful sound that stirred up the hearts of the 
 people, and this was their hopes. Five or six years ago it was 
 proclaimed, and between three and four years ago it was cove- 
 nanted, and our hearts danced within us for the hopes we had in 
 this particular. But what hath been done ? / looked, saith God, 
 Jbr grapes, and behold sour grapes, and nothing else ! When Re-* 
 formation was first spoken of, we had order and ordinances ; but 
 now, how is the one lost and the other slighted ! We had then 
 Sacraments, full congregations, a followed ministry, and fre- 
 quented churches; but now sacraments laid aside, — congrega- 
 tions scattered, — the ministry cried down, — ■ churches empty,— 
 church-doors shut up, equestres Samnitum in ipso Samnio ! If you 
 look for Reformation upon our Covenanting for Reformation, 
 how little to be found, and how much clean contrary \" 
 
 Richard Vinks, in his sermon before the House of Commons, 
 March 10, l6'4<6, inveighs most vehemently against a Toleration, 
 and informs his honourable audience, that such a measure would 
 produce the restoration of Episcopacy. Alluding to the inter- 
 ference of King James, in the case of Vorstius, who had been 
 chosen to the Divinity Professorship at Leyden, the preacher 
 says : " He bears himself upon that common rule, wheti a neigh- 
 bour's house is on Jirc, it concerns all in the neighbourhood to look 
 about them. This vigilancy condemns our (I know not what to 
 call it, I wish no worse might be said than) insensibleness and' 
 security. For, what were those sparks at that time smoking in 
 a remote corner, in comparison of that fire which now flames' 
 forth at every corner of our house, blown up by that liberty of aW 
 rcligio7is which may justly be called the Golden Calf of these 
 times ! Whereunto many are not unwilling to contribute their 
 strength and policy, and whose birth-day they would not fear to' 
 call Festum Jehovce, an acceptable day unto the Lord. Are not 
 the errors which are rife amongst us, either by infecting person^ 
 of place and quality, grown into that boldness ?* or, by carrying 
 
 • The patronage of Toleration by " persons of place and quality" is 
 alluded to, in a subsequent part of this Introduction, as one of the grand causes 
 which prevented the persecution of one Calvinistic sect by another. Though all 
 these sects combined to crush Episcopacy and Arminianism when they could, yet 
 the interest of the Statesmen was frequently exerted to screen the sufferers. 
 
INTRODUCTION. IxiU 
 
 away Barnabas* also, crept into that credit ? or, by spreading far 
 and wide, risen to that strength ? that they do face, if not seem 
 able to put into danger of routing, our common faith, public 
 worship, authorized ministry, long and much expected and pro- 
 mised Reformation ! This, to the common enemy, is the Cape of 
 Good Hope. The sound part are afraid lest the truth should come 
 to beg for poor quarter, and be led captive, following the chariot 
 of triumphant liberty. Some think, that Episcopacy in his Pon- 
 tificalibus may by this means be retrieved, and recalled from exile, 
 to which it was sentenced by the Covenant. Many that are as 
 distant as the two poles, yet, moving upon one axle-tree, or tied 
 together by the tails of common interest, doubt not but, by laying 
 their stocks together, they shall be able to bid fair for a Tole- 
 ration. And, that we might not be left alone to wonder at our- 
 selves, our sympathizing brethren abroad do wonder also, that we 
 should be made the common sewer to receive the garbage of 
 other churches, and their stinking snujfs should be allowed can- 
 dlesticks here in England. — I wish that our military men had 
 not transfused error into the several parts of our body. If it be 
 said, that many of those who are charged with teaching of errors or 
 heresy are holy men,f I answer, that a holy man cannot easily be a 
 
 • The " Barnabas," of whom mention is here made, was, I think. Dr. John 
 Owen, whose name certainly gave " credit" to such "• a liberty of all religions," 
 as his rigid Calvinism would allow him to indulge. Tolerant principles, it is seen, 
 were " spread far and wide," and those who patronized them became in conse- 
 quence very popular preachers. (Seepage 448.) The " military men " are also 
 here blamed, for " having transfused error into the several parts of the body." 
 See page 
 
 ■f What a remarkable difference between this uncharitable sentiment, and that 
 of " the ever-memorable Hales," quoted in a succeeding page : " He would often 
 " say, that he would renounce the religion of the Church of England to-morrow, if 
 " it obliged him to believe that any other Christians should be damned," &c. 
 
 Still greater is the contrast between the unhallowed zeal of these tyrannizing 
 Calvinists, and "the heavenly flame'' which is beautifully described in the only 
 Arminian sermon preached before the Long Parliament. After an eloquent 
 apostrophe to Divine Love, Dr. Ralph Cudworth, on March 31, 1647, made 
 the following just remarks : 
 
 " Let us express this sweet harmonious affection, in these jarring times ; that 
 so, if it be possible, we may tune the world, at last, into better music. Especi- 
 ally, in matters of religion, let us strive with all meekness to instruct and con- 
 vince one another The Gospel at first came down upon the world gently and 
 softly, like the dew upon Gideon's fleece ; and yet it quickly soaked quite through 
 it : And, doubtless, this is still the most effectual way to promote it further. 
 Sweetness and ingenuity will more powerfully command men's minds, than pas- 
 sion, sourness, and severity ; as the soft pillow sooner breaks the flint, than the 
 hardest marble. Let us '■follow truth in love ;' and, of the two, indeed, be 
 contented rather to miss of the conveying of a speculative truth, than to part 
 with love. MTien we would convince men of any error by the strength of truth, 
 let us withal pour the sweet bahn of love upon their heads. Truth and Love 
 are two the most powerful things in the world ; and when they both go together, 
 they cannot easQy be withstood. The golden beams of Truth, and the silken 
 cords of I<ove, twisted together, will draw men on with a sweet violence, whether 
 
IxW INTROHL'CTION. 
 
 heretic ; nor are all the errors of holy men to be called heresy, 
 though they may be hay and stubble upon the foundation. But it 
 hath been observed of old, that some Hcresiarchs, or heads of 
 heresy, have been well reputed for strictness and unblameable- 
 ness of life : We learn out of Austin, that Pelagius had a very 
 good testimony ; and scripture tells us, Ihcy come m sheep's cloth- 
 ing and speak lies in hypocrisy. Lies would not take, if they were 
 not commended by the holiness of the person, and gilded over, 
 as a rotten nutmeg, with gold. There is a transformation of 
 
 they will or no. Let us take heed, we do not sometimes call that zeal for God 
 and his Gospel, which is nothing else but our own tempestuous and stormy 
 passion. True zeal is a sweet, heavenly, and gentle flame, which maketh us 
 active for God, but always within the sphere of love. It never calls for '■Jire 
 from heaven,'' to consume those that differ a little from us in their apprehen- 
 sions. It is like that kind of lightning, (which the Philosophers speak of,) that 
 melts the sword within, but singeth not the scabbard : It strives to save the soul, 
 but hurteth not the body. True zeal is a loving thing, and makes us always 
 active to edification, and not to destruction. If we keep the fire of zeal within 
 the chimney, in its own proper place, it never doth any hurt ; it only warmeth, 
 quickeneth, and enliveneth us : But if once we let it break out, and catch hold 
 of the thatch of our flesh, and kindle our corrupt nature, and set the house of our 
 body on fire, it is no longet zeal, it is no heavenly fire, it is a most destructive 
 and devouring thing. True zeal is an ignis lambens, a soft and gentle flame, 
 that will not scorch one's hand ; it is no predatory or voracious thing : But carnal 
 and fleshly zeal is like the spirit of gunpowder set on fire, that tears and blows up 
 all that stands before it. True zeal is like the vital heat in us, that we live upon, 
 which we never feel to be angry or troublesome ; but though it gently feed upon 
 the radical oil within us, that sweet balsam of our natural moisture, yet it lives 
 lovingly with it, and maintains that by which it is fed : But that other furious 
 and distempered zeal, is nothing but a fever in the soul. Our zeal, if it be hea- 
 venly, if it be true vestal fire kindled from above, will not delight to tarry here 
 below, burning up straw and stubble and such combustible things, and sending 
 up nothing but gross earthy fumes to heaven ; but it will rise up, and return 
 back pure as it came down, and will be ever striving to carry up men's hearts to 
 God along with it. It will be only occupied about the promoting of those things 
 which are unquestionably good ; and when it moves in the irascible way, it will 
 quarrel with nothing but sin. Here let our zeal busy and exercise itself, every, 
 one of us beginning first at our own hearts. Let us be more zealous than ever 
 we have yet been, in fighting against our lusts, in pulling down those strong 
 holds of sin and Satan in our hearts. Here let us exercise all our courage and 
 resolution, our manhood and magnanimity. 
 
 " There is a straitness, slavery, and narrowness in all sin. Sin crowds and 
 crumples up our souls, which, if they were freely spread abroad, would be as 
 wide and as large as the whole universe. No man is truly free, but he that hath 
 his will enlarged to the extent of God's own will, by loving whatsoever God loves, 
 and nothing else. Such an one doth not fondly hug this and that particular cre- 
 ated good thing, and envassal himself unto it •, but he loveth every thing that is 
 lovely, beginning at God, and descending down to all his creatures, according tO' 
 the several degrees of perfection in them. He enjoys a boundless liberty, and a 
 boundless sweetness, according to his boundless love. He inclaspeth the whole 
 world within his outstretched arms ; his soul is as wide as the whole universe, 
 as big as ' yesterday, to-day, and for ever.'' A^'^hosoever is once acquainted 
 with this disposition of spirit, he never desires any thing else ; and he loves the 
 life of God in himself, dearer than his own life." 
 
INTRODUCTION. IxV 
 
 £atan into an angel of light, of false Apostles into (lie Apostles of 
 Christ, of Satan's ministers into the ministers of righteousness ; 
 (2 Cor. xi, IS — 15.) and therefore we must not measure or judge 
 of Faith by the Person, but of the Person by the Faith. Truth 
 may be as a jewel in a dunghill, and error carried (as Hannibal 
 carried his poison) in a gold ring. That horse of superstition and 
 idolatry, upon the back of which the Devil hath in former times 
 made war against the Church, is slain under him ; and now he is 
 mounted upon a fresh horse of another colour, called Liberty 
 OF Opinion, falsely called Liberty of Conscience. I..et us not be 
 ignorant of his devices ! — Let not Reformation and Religicn be 
 cried up for design and to serve turns : Settle it speedily. Send 
 forth the Confession, that it may testify to the world that you 
 hold the form of sound and wholesome words. Let some govern- 
 ment and order be established. Religion is the ball of conten- 
 tion : Many men's hopes lie in our differences, and their interests 
 are served upon them. We have professed enough for Reforma- 
 tion and Purity, and have covenanted to endeavour it. The world 
 is weary of ivords, they look for fruit. Let this day set an edgie 
 upon you : No man take a BaEAK-fast of this Fast. Let not our 
 ruin be under your hand ! There was a but in Naaman's story : 
 He was such and such, but a leper. You have done worthily, 
 covenanted seriously ; but the matter of Reformation lies most of 
 it as yet in the Covenant. It may be, ' the foolishness of many 
 
 * opinions on foot makes you slight them,' as Calvin said of Ser- 
 vetus's first onset, securuvi me reddidit ipsa doamatumfatuitas. But 
 be not secure ; a great fire may rise out of a small spark. Let 
 the souls of so many thousands of people be precious in your 
 eyes ; and the Lord make your name like the name of those who 
 have built the house of God ! — I pray you, let me not be under- 
 stood to ship, in one and the same bottom, every error or mis- 
 take with damnable heresies. ' Some differences of opinions,' as 
 one (Lord Verulam) elegantly saith, * are as the strivings of one 
 
 * Israelite with another : And these Moses quiets, and parts them 
 
 * fairly. And some are like the Egyptian striving with the Israel- 
 
 * ite, whom Moses smites down.' There must be differences 
 made between EiTor and Heresy, Erroneous and Heretics, Se- 
 ducers and Seduced. I would I might entreat, nay, press it 
 upon, those that are called pure Independents, that they 
 ■would zealously and seriously declare against the doctrinal errors 
 and heresies of these days ; that such pernicious errors may not 
 shelter themselves under their name or wing, nor ever any 
 Indulgence or Toleration be either desired or granted upcn 
 such a reason, as all may come in at the same breach or port : 
 For^hat would be but a selling of the Church into a liberty of 
 being in captivity to destructive confusions and errors." 
 
 At the subsequent monthly Fast, April 28, 1646, Simeon Ash 
 spoke thus to the House of Commons: " Lately you appointed 
 
 e 
 
Ixvi INTRODUCTIOX. 
 
 a solemn general Fast, that we might be humbled before God, and 
 pray, in regard of the inundations of errors and heresies. Give me 
 leave to ask you, whether you only intended to speak to God, and 
 to act nothing? If you do not act according to your orders and 
 prayers, God will judge you as hypocritical abusers of his name 
 and ordinances. Doubtless, proportionable to your sincerity in 
 appointing that Fast, will be your zeal to suppress that for 
 ■which you professed humiliation before God," 
 
 On the same day, and to the same Honourable audience, Wil- 
 liam Strong uttered many similar sentiments. But the most 
 amusing parts of his Discourse are those in which he employs 
 scriptural threats. One of them is thus expressed : " God doth 
 commonly put men out of their stewardship, secondly, by the 
 tumults of the people ; there is a particular curse of God upon 
 the magistracy, in taking off the hearts of the people from them : 
 — (1.) Either openly and at once, as in the case of Rehoboam and 
 Nebuchadnezzar, for their cruelty and oppression, destroying 
 their land and slaying their people j God giving them up unto 
 such cursed ways, that their own subjects cast them out of their 
 own dominions. — (2.) Or, secretly and hy degrees. For God is 
 not always a Lion to a State, but sometimes a Moth ; and the 
 prophet Zechariah, (xi. l6,) speaks of the ' withering oj the S hep- 
 nerd's right arm' which is the decay of his authority and ruling 
 power by degrees. Some seditious libels, you know, have been 
 scattered abroad, of ' the people's re-assuming their power,' 
 which doubtless is wicked ;* for God never put the sword into 
 
 • These Calvinistic pastors delivered political doctrines in their sermons, to suit 
 different periods ; thus, Richard Heyricke, before the Commons, May 27, 1646, 
 preaching from Queen Esther's expression, And if I perish, I perish /, said : 
 " The poorest subject may have liberty to prefer his petition, a privilege that 
 Esther, though a Queen, could not have ; but if she would go uncalled to the 
 King, she must run the hazard of the law, for it was not acccrding to the law. 
 How far such laws do bind, I cannot determine : ' He is no transgressor,' saith 
 the Civil Law, ' that crossethnot the mind of the Law -giver,' though he break the 
 letter of the law : And a reasonable cause, as the Casuists and Schoolmen agree, 
 ever excuseth the breaking of a human law. I heard it very lately from the Autho- 
 rity of the Honourable House of Commons, What laws, ordinances, or orders so- 
 ever, that are against the aw of God,are, by the lau'S of this land, nulled. The 
 observation of laws is very commendable ; but when exigencies are so violent, 
 when confusion hath turned all upside-down, when the State is disturbed, when 
 wicked men are combined, when all order is perverted, then men are to look to 
 the main chance, then to solicit the principal business ; and so much the more 
 zealously, as Esther did, by how much there is less possibility of compassing it 
 the ordinary way. When necessity is so urgent, that it makes the observing of 
 the laws impossible, Nature, Reason, Laws, Religion, all instruct us to betake 
 ourselves to that which is most necessary. Prerogative, Privilege, Liberty, all 
 must be laid aside. It was a reproach unto Cato, he would rather suffer the 
 Commonwealth to run into all extremity, when he might have succoiYred it 
 wouli he have a little transgressed the laws : And contrarywise, Epaminondas is 
 commended, that in case of necessity he continued his charge beyond his tune, 
 though the law, upon pain of life, did prohibit it. The Parliament shall ever be 
 
IXTliODUCTION. J'Xvif 
 
 the people's hands. But yet, though it may be the sin of tlie 
 people, it may be the punishment of the magistrate, and the 
 judgment of the kingdom." 
 
 At the next monthly Fast, May 26, 1646, Thomas Case 
 delivered a Discourse before the House of Commons, and gave it 
 the title of " Spiritual Whoredom." In his application of the 
 doctrine, he says: " To you, honourable and noble patriots, 1 
 would humbly move, that you would exert that power and 
 authority which God hath given you, to the punishing and sup- 
 pressing of the adulteries and whoredoms of the land, which do 
 stare heaven and earth in the face, and do provoke the jealousy 
 of God, even to give England a bill of divorce, and to put us 
 away. Arise, I say. Oh ye rulers and governors of England ! 
 * Gird yotir sword upon your thigh, and ride on provperoitsli/ because 
 of tridh and righteousness, and let your right hand teach you ter^ 
 rihle things!' (Psalm xlv. 4.) You know what Phineas did, in 
 the case of corporal whoredom, committed in the face of God and 
 the congregation. ' Then stood up Phineas, and executed ven- 
 geance, or judgment :' And you remember how well the Lord 
 took it at his hands, ' The plague was stayed, and it ?vas imputed 
 to kim for righteousness.' (Psalm cvi. 31.) Oh that the spirit oi' 
 Phineas may come upon you, that you may she ith your sword in: 
 the bowels of these monstrous whoredoms of all sorts, corporal 
 and spiritual, which are committed in the sight of all Israel, yea 
 in the sight of all the Churches round about us, that the bless- 
 ing of Phineas may come upon you, and the plague may be 
 stayed ! Doth not indeed the punishing aixl suppressing of 
 spiritual whoredoms against God, — idolatry, heresy, blasphemy, 
 and the rest, — doth it not belong unto you, as well as the punish- 
 ing of bodily whoredoms, theft, murder, &c. ? Doth it indeed 
 belong to you, only to look to the Civil Peace, and to let Religion, 
 and Truth, and the Worship of God, stand or fall to their own 
 master.? Fight God, fight devil, fight Christ, fight Antichrist ! 
 Catch, that catch can ! You have nothing to do, but to stand by 
 and look on ! Say so, then ; speak out ; publish it in your De- 
 clarations to the world, and let the people of England know, 
 ' that it is the right and liberty, to which the subjects of England 
 
 * are born, that every man hold what he please, and publish an<l 
 ' preach what he holds ; that it is the birth-right (as some would 
 
 * have it) of the free-born people of England, every man to wor- 
 
 * ship God according to his own conscience, and to be of what 
 ' religion his own conscience shall dictate !' Do so, and see, 
 fathers and brethren, how long your Civil Piiace will secure you 
 when Religion is destroyed, how long it will be ere your Civil 
 
 famous ; they have not only followed precedents, but made them." — This sooth- 
 ing doctrine might suit the Long Parliament % but the private interpretation of 
 NECESSITY must always, on these principles, be dangerous to the community. 
 
rxrili 
 
 I\TR(>T)U(,'TIOX. 
 
 Peace be turned into Civil War ! For, no doubt, if this once be 
 granted them, but they may in good time come to know also, 
 (there be them that are instructing them even in these principles 
 too,) ' that it is their birth-right to be freed from the power of 
 ' Parliaments and from the power of Kings ; and to take up arms 
 * against both when they shall not vote and act according to their 
 ' humours !' Liberty of conscience (falsely so called) may in good 
 time improve itself into liberty of estates, and liberty of houses, 
 and liberty of wives, and, in a word, liberty of perdition of souls 
 and bodies ! — Prevent the further departure of the land from 
 God, by keeping out seducers, — those seducing, malignant. Po- 
 pish, Prelatical priests, whom you have cast out, who have been 
 one great cause of the apostacy of England. The sins of the 
 teachers have been the teachers of sin r They are the men, who, 
 with Hananiah and Zedekiah, have taught rebellion against the 
 Lord. Certainly, if ye did well in putting of them out, ye will 
 do extremely ill in taking of them in again. Hath the King's 
 army bettered them .'' Hath Oxford changed their principles ? 
 I call heaven and earth to witness this day, that if ye suffer them 
 to recover their stations again, or whoever of you shall for favour, 
 reward, relation, or any other respects whatsoever, use your 
 interest to re-invest them again into their places, you destroy 
 what ye have builded, and will be found transgressors, and 
 translate the blood of poor souls upon your own heads I" 
 
 4. — How far the Independents, as a Body, were favourable to Tole^ 
 
 ration. 
 
 But these, it will be said, were only " the absurd ravings of 
 Presbyterian Intolerants." What then were the mature opinions 
 of the liberal Independents on this important subject ? Consisting, 
 as the name imports, of numerous small churches of professing 
 Christians, quite distinct from each other and completely inde^ 
 pendent, their very existence as separate religious communities 
 under one denomination implied a mutual and enlarged Tolera- 
 tion of varieties in doctrine and discipline. (Page SSp.) But the 
 man who entertains such an idea has been deceived by the mere 
 name; for he will find, that their toleration of varieties in doc- 
 trine extended only to those who held the opinions of Calvin, in 
 common with themselves : and that, with regard to varieties in 
 DISCIPLINE, it was not allowed to reach, in every case, to those 
 of their Predestinarian brethren who were attached to Presbyteri- 
 anism, much less to those who were unfortunate enough to be 
 Episcopalians. In page 449, I have said, " Cromwell, that wary 
 politician, seems to have acted upon the maxim of King James, 
 in balancing the power of one party by that of its opponent ;" 
 (p. 566;) and on no matter was the Protector's cunning more 
 warily evinced, than in the futile attempt in which the Inde- 
 
iNtRofitrctto!*. Ixix 
 
 pendents engaged, by his direction, when the delegates of their 
 Churches met at the Savoy, in l658, to compose "A Declaration 
 of the Faith and Order ovraed and practised in the Congregational 
 Churches in England, &c." They had been exceedingly impor- 
 tanate with him, and with the rest of the Republican Statesmen, 
 who generally ranjred themselves under the banners of Indepen- 
 dency, to grant them the supremacy after which their Presby- 
 terian brethren had been fruitlessly aspiring ; (p. 448 :) and, 
 " though the Independents had the best preferments left in the 
 Church, and opened and shut the door of preferment to others," 
 (p. 447.) yet they were dissatisfied with this high degree of favour 
 which they enjoyed, because it was not accompanied with powers 
 still more extensive. (P3ge 444.) Cromwell., therefore, under 
 the pretence of a wish to ascertain what security they could give 
 to the civil magistrate for the integrity and harmlessness of their 
 tenets as a religious body, ordered them to prepare a Confession 
 of Faith in which they coiJd all agree. The arch politiciati 
 knew, that if they prepared any public instrument of this descrip- 
 tion, which might be considered binding on the whole denomi- 
 nation, their Churches would immediately cease to be " Inde- 
 pendent," except in name, and would by that single act assume 
 a mild Presbyterian aspect. The pitiful subserviency of their 
 principal men, in those days,* has inrluced many people to sup- 
 pose, that a great majority of their Churches would have fallen 
 into the rich snare which the Protector had laid for them, had 
 the latter lived ; and that the rest would have preferred their 
 real Independency, though accompanied with secular disadvan- 
 tages or civil penalties. But Cromwell died prior to the comple- 
 tion of their famous "Declaration;" in consequence of which, 
 their hqpes being dashed to the ground, no symptom of effective 
 ecclesiastical power appeared in that document, except the very 
 vague appointment of " Messengers of Churches holding com- 
 munion together," who were empowered " to meet in Synod or 
 Council, to consider and give advice [\n cases of difficulties or 
 diflicrences] to be reported to aU the Churches concerned." 
 
 Had the Independents succeeded in their wishes under the 
 Protector, there is no doubt the following prophecy concerning 
 them, from one of their Calvinistic brethren, would have been 
 
 • The reader will find Dr. Owen's sycophancy to the regicides related in page 
 382 ; and, in page 448, shrewd reasons are given for '' the pliability of Indepen- 
 dency" in that age of changes. Owen's biographer boasts of the rich members of 
 theit Churches ; and, we are told by Robert Baylie, (p. 404.) that Philip Hyc 
 was " cried down as impertinent'''' in the Assembly of Divines, while speaking 
 against the Presbytery. " The day following," says Robert, " when Philip 
 "• saw the Assembly full of prime nobles and chief members of both 'Houses, he 
 " entered on that argument again, and very boldly offered to demonstrate, that 
 " our way of drawing a whole kingdom under one National Assembly, is formi- 
 " dable," -&c. Further instances of their politic subserviency will be seen in o(.her 
 parts of this volume. 
 
 eS 
 
JXX IM'KODUCTION. 
 
 litej-ally fulfilled. It was pronounced by the Rev. Thomas Case, 
 in his Sermon before the Commons, May 26", l6'46 : " Is there 
 not idolatry found among us ? Ye have pulled down idols in the 
 Chnrches, and ye have done Avell ! But, Oh ! idols are multi- 
 plied in the land : Every man's opinion is become his idol, which 
 lie adores and worships v/ith highest veneration. We have 
 cause to be humbled for our old Popery, and our old Popish 
 ceremonies : You, our Honourable Senators, told us so once in 
 an Ordinance of Parliament ; and ye did well. But Popery was 
 but one way of false worship : There be a generation of men in 
 the land that stand up for all kinds of false worship, that every 
 man may worship God afier his own conscience; or if they will 
 not own it in words at length, they Avill have it in figures : And 
 if they may not, are ready not only to cry, but to act 
 persecution,* and that to purpose : For while they cry perse- 
 
 * Beside their unwearied persecution of the Episcopalians and Arminians, 
 Richard Baxter. as.serts, in the subjoined extracts from his Church Divisions, 
 that the Independents did not treat their Presbyterian brethren with too much kind- 
 ness : " Was it no persecution, when many Anabaptists and Separatists made 
 «uch work in England, Scotland, and Ireland, in Cromwell's time and after, as 
 they did, wlien so many were turned out of the Universities for not eiigaxiing^ and 
 no many out of the Magistracy and Corporation Privileges? And when an ordi- 
 nance was made to cast out all ministers, who would not pray for the success 
 of their wars against Scotland, or that would not give God thanks for their vic- 
 tories ? When I liave heard them profess, that there were many thoiiscuid godly 
 men that ivpre hilled at Dunbar, (to instance in no other,) and yet we were all 
 by their ordinance to be cast out, that would not give (iod thanks for this. — 
 What more harsh kind of persecution could there be, than to force men to go 
 hypocritically to God against their consciences, and take on them to beg for the 
 success of a war, wluch they judged unlawful, and to return him a public coun- 
 terfeit thanks for bloodshed, yea, for the blood of thousands ?" 
 
 This, certainly, is a very trifling display of persecution ; and, if the .^sde- 
 pejidents could be charged with no higher a degree of criminality than this towards 
 the Arminians, they would appear in the foremost ranks of friends to Toleration. 
 On the doctrines of General Redeinption, they had been egregiously misinformed. 
 They had seen Arminianism only in the form which Archbishop Laud had com- 
 pelled it to assume, (p. 691,) and which undoubtedly was not the most attractive ; 
 and for many years they manifested no wish to be made better acquainted with 
 its native purity as taught by the Dutch Founder of the system. "N^hen these 
 -obnoxious doctrines did not intervene, the Independent divines were almost 
 uniformly found to possess a greater portion of philanthropy than their Presby- 
 terian brethren : But the Independent statesmen were generally more lenient and 
 generous than the divines of their persuasion. One of the most outrageous 
 High Church-men that ever wrote, has given us the following just description 
 of the Independents, in a reply to Richard Baxter's complaint at the conio 
 meuGement of this note : 
 
 " Presbytery is too tyrannical for the spirit of an Independent to bear. The 
 " stomach of that jjarty would not brook it; and so they cast it up again : For 
 " there is, though a licentious, yet somewhat of a practical and accommodable 
 " generosity in that party. But are not you aware, gentlemen, that the worse 
 *' you speak of these people, the greater is your condemnation for making the 
 " Tjiiscopal Party still more insvpportaldc than these [j/'ivtI at the very icorst ?'* 
 ~-L'E5TKA>"i;E's Castdst Uncased. 
 
INTHODUCTrON. IxXI 
 
 cutton gladio oris, p with the sword of the mouth/") they are 
 ready to act persecution ore gladii \J at the point of the sword']. 
 I pray God. it may never be Englished !" 
 
 What defence of themselves did the Independents publish 
 against this charge of a General Toleration, which, they knew, 
 was intended to apply to them ? Jeremiah Burroughes, one of 
 the chief of this party, thus disclaims " such a Toleration," in 
 his Sermon before the House of Peers, Nov. 26, l645 : " Let not 
 violence be used to force people to things spiritual that they 
 know not. If those who now have but food and raiment should have 
 great penalties inflicted upon them, for not submitting to what 
 they yet have no means to instruct them in, how grievous would 
 it be ! The votes of Parliament are to be honoured, and the 
 judgment of an Assembly of' godli/ and learned men is not to be 
 slighted; but that which must subject men's consciences, in mat- 
 ters concerning Christ and his worship, must be light from the 
 word. Let not the greatness of your power be exercised upon 
 those who do what they can to know the mind of Jesus Christ, 
 and would fain understand and practise more, only they dare go 
 no further than they see Christ before them. You cannot say. 
 Men ai-e obstinate and will not see ; for what means hath the gene- 
 rality of the kingdom had to see ground out of Scripture for such 
 great changes ? To use force upon people before they ha,ve 
 means to teach them, is to seek to beat the nail in by the ham- 
 mer of authority, without making way by the wimble of instruct 
 lion. Indeed, if you have to deal with rotten or soft sappy wood, 
 the hammer only may make the nail enter presently : But if you 
 meet with sound wood, with heart of oak, though the hammer 
 and hand that strikes be strong, yet the nail will hardly go 
 in ; it will turn crooked or break : Or, at least, if it enters, it 
 may split that wood it enters into ; and, if so, it will not hold 
 long, you have not your end. Consider, you have to deal with 
 English consciences ; there is no country so famous for firm strong 
 oaks as England; you will find English consciences to be so. 
 
 " My Lords, you are advanced to high power and honour, in 
 a kingdom where Christ hath as many dear saints of hife, as (I had 
 almost said) in all the world besides ; He expects you should use 
 them kindly. They have been faithful to you ; even such as 
 cannot fully come up to you, in some things you have published 
 to the world. Where hath any one of them (though cried out 
 upon, as troublers of the kingdom) falsified their trust in any thing 
 you have committed to them } You sit here in peace, and enjoy 
 your honours with abvindance of mercies ; in part, through the 
 blessings of God upon their faithfulness and courage in venturing 
 their lives for you : God forbid you should fall upon them, when 
 your turns are served by them ! Listen not to any who shall 
 whisper such suggestions, or boldly vent such things as tend to 
 the exasperation of your spirits this way. There is a gx-eat out- 
 
IXXH IKTROIJLCTIOK. 
 
 cry against ihe toleration of all religions, and we are willing to join 
 against such a toleration ; but that which fills the mouths of 
 raany in this, is the heat of their spirits against those that differ 
 from them in any thing, that they might with the more strength 
 be able 6y Mi* to strike at them: Suffer not your power to be 
 abused to serve men's designs. Be faithful with God ; encourage 
 those that fear him ; and God will take care of your honours ; 
 He will do good to you, and your posterity after you. Do not 
 hearken to those who tell you. These men would lay all level ; they 
 would make no difference between the Nobleman and Tradesman. Yes, 
 we know, honour is to be given to whom honour belongs. God 
 hath made a distance between man and man ; it is fit it should be 
 acknowledged and observed." 
 
 This is certainly a noble description of the consciences of Eng- 
 lishmen ; and the warning is very proper against using violence 
 " to force people to things spiritual that they know not." In a 
 preceding page, (Ix,) the Presbyterian tyranny has been 
 depicted, by Nathaniel Hardy, before the house of Peers, as 
 consummate " Piety !" He has there most ingeniously urged 
 their Lordships to commit the foul deed which Burroughes so 
 feelingly deprecates. " If, while the Ark was floating on the 
 waters of strife," says Hardy, " you were enforced to entertain 
 MtJLVES and LAMBS together ; yet now that the waters are abated, 
 and the Ark in some measure settled, send out the wolves from, 
 the fold." The Independents remembered, for a long time after- 
 wards, this " exasperation of their Lordships' spirits," and Bur- 
 roughes intreats them " not to listen to any who shall whisper 
 such suggestions." 
 
 On this subject, another Independent Preacher, " William 
 Dell, Minister of the Gospel, attending on his Excellency Sir 
 Thomas Fairfax," speaks thus, in the Dedication oi' the sermon 
 which he delivered before the House of Commons, Nov. 25, 
 i 64-6 : " Here lies the mystery of iniquity in this— that they \jhe 
 Presbyterians] make the whole kingdom a Church ; and then 
 require a power, authority, and jurisdiction in their church- 
 kingdom, which the Magistrate is not to deal withal, but them- 
 selves. — What a balance they may prove against the State where 
 they live, in turning and tumultuous times, as they themselves 
 know, so I hope you clearly perceive. How do they manifest 
 their discontents against you, in pamphlets and pulpits, in their 
 sermons and prayers, because you have not settled the govern- 
 ment l^which] they have studied out for you as Jus Divinum and 
 the certain and unchangeable mind of God, though they can 
 neither make it out to yourselves, nor to any body else, by the 
 Word, that it is so ! And how do they labour to instil into the 
 people their- own discontents, persuading them you have done 
 nothing at all, because you have not done all that ever they would 
 Jiave you do, though you can see neither reason nor scripture 
 
\ 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 for it! Some discoveries of this spirit you might see in Mr. 
 Love's sermon, telling you before your faces, and before the 
 people, that sotne called you a mongrel Parliament ! Telling 
 you also. The Clergy had done as much service for you in their Pul- 
 pits, as your Regiments in the Field; that, by this means, he 
 might mind you what they can do against you, as well as for you, 
 if you be not servants to their designs !— I shall trouble you no 
 further with any such stuff, but only with a smart expression from 
 one, it seems, of some note in the Assembly Qof Divines] who said, 
 
 * If the Parliament approved Mr. Dell's Sermon, it were no blas- 
 
 * phemy to say, they mere no Parliament !' So that it seems you 
 shall be no longer a Parliament, than you approve what the 
 Assembly approves ! But the kingdom hopes,you are built upon 
 a better foundation." 
 
 In his Sermon, Dell relates the following anecdote, and adds 
 a few just reflections : " I read, in Frithe's Answer to the Bisfiop 
 of Rochester, ' that a youth, being present at his father's burning, 
 ' the officers, seeing him, resolved to examine him also, to try if 
 
 * they might find him a sectary or a heretic : But the youth, dis- 
 ' mayed at the sad sight of his father's death, and fearing the like 
 ' end himself, being asked of one of them, ho7v he believed ?, 
 
 * answered. Sir, I believe even as it pleaseth you.' And so, the 
 more outward and violent power is used upon men, the more of 
 this kind of faith and obedience you shall have. When men shall 
 see prisons, and banishments, and loss of goods, and death, walk- 
 ing up and down the kingdom for the Reformation of the Church, 
 you shall at last have men say, ' Sirs, we will believe and do, even 
 as it pleaseth you : We will believe as the State pleaseth, or we will 
 believe as the Council pleaseth ; and let them make what coiifession 
 they will, we had rather believe them, than endure them !' And 
 thus by fear and punishment may men be brought to say and do 
 that which they neither believe nor understand : And how 
 acceptable such Popish faith and obedience is unto God, all 
 spiritual Christians know, and every man's conscience, me 
 thinks, should be convinced." 
 
 Deir8^,3ermon contains sentiments more tolerant and liberal, 
 than those of the other Independent ministers, who gave public 
 expression in those days to their opinions. He may be con- 
 sidered as the Army's representative at that period,* having pow- 
 
 • Dell was one of the most fanatical of the Army Chaplains ; yet, with all 
 his eccentricities, he and his multiform brethren of the Independent persuasion 
 were the only persons qualified to cope with the intolerant Presbyterians. The 
 worst feature in his character was that which generally attached to the men of hia 
 denomination, a suppleness of principle in accommodating his tenets to the vary- 
 ing circumstances of the times, and to the prejudices of the people or the 
 Army. 
 
 In Richard Baxter's Second Admonition to Bagshaw, it is said : "Alas ! 
 how common was this in the Army — to set up and pull down, do and undo, own 
 
l»Jtir INTRODUCTroW. 
 
 erfuUy pleaded their cause in his Sermon. Yet, by consulting 
 "the humble Petition of the Officers of the Army," in a succeed- 
 ing page, (779j) it will be seen, that even they, who, from the 
 number of their discordant sects, required the most extensive 
 indulgence from each other, were very careful to except Po- 
 pery and Prelacy, and under the latter term they always 
 included Arminiaiiisna, The same exceptions are made by Dr. 
 Owen, (p. 4 16,) against " Papists' Images and Prelates' Service- 
 book ;" and his open avowal, that " the zeal of them that put Ser- 
 retus to death may be acquitted," identifies his views on this sub- 
 ject with those of Vines in a preceding page (Ixv). Indeed, 
 ,, I have not met with an Independent Minister of that 
 \ era, (with the exception of John Goodwin,) who, when speaking 
 i without ambiguity or circumlocution on the subject, did not 
 I bear his testimony against tolerating Episcopalians, who were 
 ,^ usually depicted under the epithets of Delinquents, MalignantSf 
 I Prelatists, or Arminia^ts ! 
 
 The reader will find, in page 791j some reasons for the great 
 extent of John Goodwin's Catholicism, and his superiority in this 
 respect to his famous cotemporary Dr. Owen. It is there shewn, 
 that both of them acknowledge " their doctrine of Rel/giouj 
 " Liberty to have been derived from the writings of the Remon- 
 " strants : But, with this doctrine, Goodwin almost simultane- 
 . " ously imbibed that of Getieral Redemption ; and the latter 
 " rendered the amplitude of the former much move distinct and 
 " apparent. Owen, on the contrary, borrowed only just as much 
 *' of the Dutch doctrine of mutual toleration as served a tempo- 
 " rary purpose, and fenced it about with many restrictions, which 
 " might enable its advocate virtually to disclaim it at a convenient 
 "season. Owen's views of toleration partook of the narrowness 
 " of his religious system," &c. But, though the glory odhejirst 
 promulgation of tolerant principles does not belong to the Calvin istic 
 Independents, it is undoubtedly due to the Arminian branch of that 
 denomination. Indeed, in what quarter soever Dutch Armini.. 
 anism in those days achieved her conquests, — whether among 
 Episcopalians, Presbyterians, or Independents, — she almost inva- 
 riably rendered them favourable to the civil and religious liberties 
 of mankind : Of her early trophies among these three denomi- 
 nations, John Goodwin, Ralph Cudworth, and Lawrence 
 WoMACK were admirable specimens, that entitled her to the 
 Veneration of all the lovers of piety and freedom. I would have 
 substituted Jeremy Taylor in the place of Womack, had not 
 the former been an Arminian in the days of Laud ; while the 
 
 and disown^ as by the Spirit of God ! There was Mr. Erbury, Mr. Saltmarsh, 
 llr. Dell, Mr. William Sedgwick, who, as from God, wrote one week to the 
 Army a<j<dnst their putiiuff the King to deaths and the next week wrote quite to 
 them on the other side ; and who set liondon, by si prophecy or vision, on looking 
 for the Day of Judgment, on a set day." 
 
INTBODLfCTIOX. JXXV 
 
 famous Trio, whose names I have classed together, were converts 
 to the doctrinal system of the Remonstrants during the Civil 
 Wars. The Presbyterians, perhaps, have the greatest cause to 
 complain of the manner in which the history of British Tolera- 
 tion is generally related : For, the great body of " the Latitude 
 men," (p. 796,) who at the Restoration placed themselves under 
 the wings of Episcopacy, were liberal Arminians. They had 
 either become Presbyterians by education, or by the preference 
 which, in the multitude of contending parties, they had given to 
 that form of ecclesiastical regimen: But they found the doctrinal 
 as well as the ceremonial restraints of the Presbytery too strict for 
 them ; and as soon as Episcopacy was, by the good Providence 
 of God, restored to her former pre-eminence, in vast numbers 
 they joined her truly catholic communion. 
 
 In the preceding extracts, one of the Presbyterians intimated, 
 that " Episcopacy in his Pontificalibus might, by means of" the 
 the Toleration for which the Independents pleaded, " be retrieved 
 and called from exile." (Page Ixiii.) Yet the same preacher, who 
 knew the wishes of his party as Calvinists, (p. 454,) " intreats 
 the PURE Independents," — that is, those -vvtro" adopted all the 
 Westminsfer Confession of Faith except the parts which relate to 
 Church-government, — '' to declare zealously and seriously against 
 the doctrinal errors and heresies of those days." The manner in 
 which the latter complied with their brethren's request, and by 
 which they brought themselves within the amicable arrangement 
 of their Calvinistic " strivings," (being " those of one Israelite 
 with another," whom " Moses quiets and parts fairly,") will be 
 described in the commencement of the second volume. In that 
 part, I expose the conduct of the Triers and Ejectors, of 
 whom " the Independents formed the majority, and were the 
 most active in the use of their delegated powers." — " These 
 " Thiers," says Granger, " for the most part, brought the test 
 " to a short issue : If a Minister readily gave up the Five Points \ 
 " of Arminius, embraced the tenets of Calvin, and was orthodox 
 " in politics, he was generally qualified to hold any benefice in 
 " the Church." 
 
 The obnoxious view which both Presbyterians and Independents 
 took of Arminianism, has been shewn in several of the preceding 
 pages. This will be still more apparent from the following 
 extract of a sermon, preached before the House of Commons, 
 December 30, l646, by Matthew Newcomen, who, as one of 
 the famous Smectymnyan faction, had pleaded for Presbyterian 
 liberty against good Bishop Hall : 
 
 " Ther« is yet another dying object of your pity ; and that is 
 
 Truth, Religion, the Gospel, the Lord Jesus Christ, that lies a 
 
 bleeding, that is drawn to death, ready to be slain : O do not, I 
 
 beseech you, forbear to deliver them. There is scarce any truth 
 
 i of Christ, any doctrine of the gospel, any point of our religion, 
 
 \ but by some temerarious hand or other hath been invadeJ, as- 
 
saulted, tnaimed, ready to be slain. The doctrine of the Trinity, 
 of the Godhead of Christ, and of the Holy Ghost, of the verity of 
 the scriptures ; the doctrine of election, of redemption, of voca- 
 tion, of justification, of satictification ; the work of the Spirit, the 
 rule of life, of holiness ; the doctrine of the sacraments, of the 
 immortality of the soul, &c. — Truth it is, right honourable and 
 beloved, that, when first you met in Parliament, we were in great 
 danger of losing our religion. There was a Popish Arminian 
 faction, that had a design to rob us of our religion . God gave 
 you hearts to be very sensible of that danger, and to be very 
 zealous for the prevention of it : I, and thousands more, must 
 and will bear you record, that, if it had been possible, you would have 
 plucked out your own eyes, rather than have parted with the least 
 apex or iota of divine truth, out of a lenity or indulgence to Papist 
 or Arminian, or any other Heretic :* Where is then your former 
 
 * On the same day and to the same audience, Stephen Maashall ddivered 
 the following harangue : 
 
 " Our times are times of errors, horrible errors. I mean not such errors as are 
 to be found among God's people, to whom he never hath given an equal light ( 
 and, notwithstanding which errors, Himself bears with them, and would have his 
 people bear one with another. But I mean, our times are times of such errors as 
 are heretical and blasphemous, such as concern our christian faith, and holy con- 
 versation, in a very high degree. It would weary you, but to tell you the things 
 that are generally known to spread as a gangrene. A new generation of men are 
 yisen up, and spread all the points of Arminianism, Universal Redemption, 
 Apostasy frofti Grace, Mail's Free-will. IMultitudes of others cry down the law, 
 as not having any thing to do with God's people, others denying that the Saints of 
 fcod should ever any more confess sin to God in prayer : Others questioning 
 I'fcrhether there be any church or ministry this day upon the face of the earth, and 
 ■whether there shall be any till new apostles arise. Nay, beyond all these, many 
 denying the liord Jesus, that bought us with his blood, to be God, or the Holy 
 Ghost to be God : Others denying the Three Persons in the Trinity, and, conse- 
 quently affirming that we, and all the christian world with us, do worship idols 
 instead of God ; for if these men be right, they are idols whom we worship. — 
 These, and abundance of such horrid things as these are, do spread and scatter 
 like wild-fire every where in all corners of the land, to the great provocation of 
 God's wrath, and our reproach through the christian world. And what have our 
 heads to do at such a time ? Certainly you, and all others, ought to mourn for 
 these things, and tear your clothes, and your hairs, and your hearts, that God 
 should be so dishonoured. 
 
 " But for your duties who are in high places, for what is peculiar to you, I'll 
 not dispute any controversy at this time, but set down two things which I know 
 you must yield to. One is : Certainly you must search diligently into the 
 scriptures, and enquire whether Jesus Christ would have you oppose yourselves 
 against these things that are so opposite to him : — If, upon a diligent search, you 
 find that he hath not authorized you, do not you arrogate any authority that 
 Christ hath not given you : — My lie will never honour God, though I should tell 
 it for God's glory. And your thrusting yourselves into an oflSce Christ hath not « 
 called you unto, will never be accepted by him. But if, Secondlv, Upon a ^ 
 diligent search, it appears he hath given authority unto you, then I am as assured 
 that he hath not left it to your arbitrement whether you will use it, or no ; 
 he hath not left it to your will, whether you will punish them. But if you have 
 power to stop them and do not, he will lay them all at your doors, and require 
 them at your hands. Therefore search diligently what you have power to do. 
 
isTRODueTioN. Ixxv/i 
 
 2eal ? Is religion and truth less dear and precious now, than ft 
 was before ? God forbid ! Is it in less danger ? Oh that it 
 were ! But surely, beloved, our danger in this particular is but a 
 little changed, not quite removed. Then indeed religion was in 
 danger of a more violent and quick dispatch, and now it is in 
 danger of a more lingering, but as sure a death : Then it was like 
 to have been dispatched with one thrust of a sword, or one chop 
 of a hatchet, by the hand of known and undoubted enemies; now 
 it is like to be stabbed to death with bodkins, with variety and 
 raiultiplicity of errors, that have wounded our religion in every 
 vein ; and this assassinate upon religion, committed by those that 
 would be counted her chief and only friends. 
 
 "Truly when I behold the face and state of religion among us, 
 it is in mine eyes, as if the Lord Jesus Christ were crucified afresh, 
 and put to open shame in the midst of us — Here comes a blas- 
 phemous Arian, and he wounds his head, by denying him to be 
 God — There comes a sectary that is a flat Armiman, though he 
 hath not wit enough to know it, and he wounds him through the 
 heart, by maintaining universal redemption, and that Christ shed his 
 blood for all men, a thing that never entered into the heart of 
 Christ! — There comes an Antinomian, and he pierceth his hands 
 and his feet, by denying that exact walking and working by the 
 rule of the moral law, which Jesus Christ came not to give an 
 indulgence or dispensation from, but to give himself an example of: 
 Atque hcec impune. Can you plead ignorance of these things, and 
 say. Behold me know it not? You cannot. Blessed be Gofl, you do 
 not ; you have begun to set your faces against these blasphemies 
 and heresies, that (servis dormientibus ) are broken in upon us. 
 Go on in this your might, to stop the mouth of all ungodliness, 
 and the zeal of the Lord of Hosts be your strength ! I know it 
 hath been said by some, ' that because a heart to know and em- 
 
 * brace the truth is the gift of God, and the Magistrate cannot by 
 
 * forcible means work such a heart in men, therefore the Magis- 
 
 * trate must use no compulsion or co-ercion in matters of religion.' 
 But certainly, though the Magistrate cannot give grace, yet he^ 
 may compel men to attend upon those means where God doth 
 usually give that grace: (2 Chron. xxxiv, 11. Ezra, x, ?> 8.) 
 
 and then let not these things go on to God's dishonour. But supposing you have 
 authority, What tlien is to be done f I answer, you must not take blasphemies, 
 errors, and heresies to be such upon the reports of other men, but as the Lord 
 ordered them in the 13th of Deuteronomy, so likewise must you do, search dili- 
 gently whether indeed such and such things are done ; and when they appear to 
 be done, out of the zeal of God do that against them which the Lord would have 
 you do ; let not your religion be thus contaminated ; suffer not your children to 
 whom you ought to be nursing-fathers, to be thus poisoned by such corrupt doc- 
 trines, nor devoured by such wolves : This I know you will all subscribe unto : 
 
 This I desire above all may stick with you, that if the Lord hath given you 
 power, he hath not given you liberty to forbear such men : God in mercy make 
 you zealous for him that hath been zealous for you in all your troubles !" 
 
Ixxviii INTRODUCTION*. 
 
 Else you must not only repeal the laws that enjoin Papists to 
 come to our churches, but repent of them, as yours and the 
 nations sins. And though the Magistrate cannot give men a heart 
 l^^o know and love the truth, yet certainly the Magistrate may make 
 laws to restrain and punish errors and blasphemies that are against 
 the truth ; (Dan. iii, 29.) else, pari ratione, because a chaste heart, 
 or a true and loyal heart, is the gift of God, and the Magistrate by 
 all his penal laws, cannot make men have such hearts, therefore 
 the Magistrate may not make laws to punish adultery, incest, theft, 
 treason : Were this good divinity, or good policy ?" 
 
 This was the common strain in which all the English Calvinists 
 spoke concerning Arminianism ; and their acts corresponded with 
 their sayings. When, therefore, the two grand parties, into 
 which the Predestinarians were divided, had scarcely sufficient 
 charity to tolerate each other in the small matters about whicli 
 they disagreed, it is not surprising that they would not suffer 
 the Arminians, whom they classed with " heretics and blasphem- 
 ers," to enjoy the exe;rcise of their religious privileges without 
 molestation. In pages 4*96 and 552, I have shewn the origin of 
 this deadly antipathy to those who were attached to the doctrines 
 of General Redemption. Gomarus declared, " that he durst not 
 ** appear in the presence of his Maker, if he maintained the 
 v" opinions which Arminius professed;" and all the subsequent 
 champions of Calvinism, in Great Britain and in Holland, had 
 studiously perpetuated this infernal feeling, by exhibiting the 
 Predestinarian differences between themselves and their Arminian 
 brethren, as Jundamental verities and esserdial to salvation ! — The 
 Englisfi Independents, therefore, who acted upon this excluding 
 principle to the time of the Restoration, when they were com- 
 pelled to resign their " power*^ ecclesiastic," have in reality as 
 slender a claim as their Presbyterian friends to the title of " the 
 earliest and best friends to Toleration." 
 
 In several of these sermons before the Long Parliament, the 
 army is blamed as "the grand hot-bed oi errors, heresies, and hlas^ 
 fhemies." That the different military corps were far removed from 
 unijormify both in doctrine and discipline, and that they had imbibed 
 7na7ij/ egregious errors, no impartial person will deny. But the 
 wonderful economy of the Providenceof God is here again strikingly 
 displayed, in over-ruling the spread of these evils for the attain- 
 ment of a greater good. If the army had contained no Arians, 
 Socinians, or Jntinotnians, with whom Arminians were likewise 
 invidiously classed, the parties who held the htindred and four-score 
 new opinions, to which Bishop Hall alludes, (p. 707,) would have 
 had nothing to tolerate in each other : But as their religious senti- 
 ments were exceedingly multiform, and as they soon proved to 
 the nation that they held the Supremacy in their own hands, 
 though sufficiently zealous for their several principles, (p. 778,) 
 they saw the propriety as well as the safety of yielding much 
 
INTKODUCTION'. IxxJK 
 
 liberty to each other, " in things of the mind," as it is expressed 
 (p. 452) by one of their arch commanders. It is to the honour of 
 Abminianism and Episcopacy, that they were both as such form- 
 ally excluded from the benefits of Toleration, even in the repub- 
 lican Army. Both of them, however, were ultimately gainers by 
 this exclusion : For, in that inquisitive age, after the first intem- 
 perate heat against the two obnoxious terras had subsided, people 
 began to examine the reasons for such partiality against some of 
 the best men in the nation. (See page 803.) The result was 
 just what might have been expected, — after one outrageous error 
 had expended its fury upon another, the sober and thoughtful 
 part of the community became enamoured with the beautiful and 
 chaste features of Truth, and gladly embraced her at the Restora- 
 tion, under the form of Episcopacy,* Arminianism, and Monarchy. 
 
 • " These considerations of the unproportionableness of smy other Church- 
 government than a right Episcopacy to the temper of England, moved the super- 
 cilious, yet very learned, Salmasius, — in his advice to the Prince Elector [Pala- 
 tine] then in England, and to some other of the Long Parliament and of Scotized 
 Assembly, (who desired his judgment upon the then hot and parboiling, yea, pas- 
 sionate and overboiling debates touching Episcopacy,) — to tell them, ' that, as 
 
 * the Episcopal government, rightly constituted and executed, is very agreeable to 
 
 * the word of God and most conform to all Antiquity ; so it was, of all other, 
 ' most suitable to the Etiglish spirit and constitution : The want of which, he 
 ' already foresaw, was and would ever be the cause of much disorder and dis- 
 
 * traction, of infinite factions, heresies, schisms, and confusions.' — Thus the 
 great Dictator of Learning (as he esteemed himself) was pleased, in this passage 
 and other- where, graciously to express his judgment and pleasure, according to 
 the humour he was in or to the interest xvMcli he was pleased to adopt. Some- 
 times he is Walo Messalinus, and ashamed to own his name against Epis- 
 copacy : He was, in that disguise, to gratify the pretensions of Presbytery, and 
 the adherence or dependence which he had to the French and Dutch Churches. 
 Otherwhile he puts off the vizard, and with open face owns the eminency, autho- 
 rity, antiquity, and universality of Episcopacy ; yea, the incomparable utility of 
 it, when joined with a grave and orderly Presbytery, besides a particular aptitude 
 in it to the English genius." — Gauden's Ecclesice Anglicana Suspiria. 
 
 Salmasius ynjis, a very learned and clever man, but addicted to the love of money 
 and of changes : His changeableness and mercenary habits rendered his writings 
 against Milton of little estunation, though, abating his childish personalities, they 
 were in many respects worthy of his great reputation. His character also will 
 not be much enhanced, after the reader has perused the following extract from 
 the last letter which the illustrious Grotius addressed to his brother in 1645, the 
 year in which he died : " I do not know whether the account which I have heard 
 ' ' be correct, that letters have been written in the English Parliament to Sal- 
 " masius, to engage him in the defence of their [the Presbyterians'] ecclesiastical 
 " government against the Bishops and the Independents ; and that he wiU do this 
 " in the book which he is writing concerning the Primacy." AVhen the English 
 Presbyterians had contributed their share towards the murder of their king, 
 (p. 385,) Salmasius wrote vigorously against the whole Calvinian phalanx ; but 
 his pen was represented as a venal one by his former employers, and his fame 
 suffered much in consequence of this report. His injustice to the memory 6f 
 Grotius, by whom he had been invariably treated with particular delicacy and atten- 
 tion, (p. 593,) operated to his disadvantage. In his ungenerous attack upon Epis« 
 copacy, then in ruins, he had a compeer in the famous Datid Bloxdel, who, 
 though nominally a Cameronist, afterwards succeeded G. J, Vossius in the Chair 
 
ixXX INTRODUCTION, 
 
 5 The culpable share which the Calvinists had in the Murder of 
 
 King Charles the First. 
 
 The guilt which attaches itself to the two grand denominations 
 of Calvinists, on account of the murder of King Charles the 
 First, is impartially awarded in some of the following pages. 
 
 of History at Amsterdam. In a letter to Isaac Vossius, dated April 25, 1645, 
 Grotius says: " I desire greatly to behold all Blondel's productions : For he 
 *' is exceedingly skilful in history, but the party to which he has addicted himself 
 *' sometimes transports him in a wrong direction." 
 
 It is to this last trait in the character of both, that Dr. Gauden alludes in the 
 following passage : "Shall one David Blondel, or Walo Messalinus, (that is, 
 Salmasius,) men indeed of excellent learning, yet obliged, (as Peter Moulin con- 
 fesseth of himself, in his epistolary dispute with the most learned Bishop Andrews,) 
 to ' plead what might be for the enforced stations and necessitated conditions of 
 ' those Presbyterian churches with which they were then in actual fellowship and 
 ' church-communion,'— shall, I say, these two men, who are the greatest props for 
 Presbytery, be put into the balance against all the ancient and modern assertors 
 of Episcopacy ? Or shall the votes of the late Assembly [of Divines] be a just 
 counterpoise against all the chief Reformed Divines at home and abroad ?" 
 
 Dr. Gauden here ascribes the conduct of these men to their " obligations to 
 plead what might be for the enforced stations of the churches with which they 
 were in actual fellowship." I have read Calvin's and Beza's vituperative remarks 
 on English Episcopacy, and was always accustomed to attribute to their native 
 French politeness, the facility with which those great men "• swallowed their own 
 words,'' and broke out afresh into fulsome praises of well-regulated Episcopacy. 
 But when I behold the same practice in several of their eminent successors, such 
 ^ Du Moulin, Diodati, Salmasius, Blondel, Le Moyne, De L'Angle, and 
 i Claude, (all of whom were» with a single exception, likewise Frenchmen and 
 V exceedingly polite,) I am tempted, did not charity forbid, to impute their apparent, 
 '. (yet ottea Jforced,) tergiversation to the native hoUownessof the Calvinistic system. 
 Much, indeed, of this " blowing hot and cold''' proceeds from the violence of the 
 party, and the awkward predicament in which ministers are placed, when the 
 letters which contain their private opinions about their Calvinistic brethren are 
 published. Such were the painful circumstances in which Le IMoyne, De 
 I'Angle, and Claude, were placed, when their confidential letters, (one of which 
 I have quoted in page 421,) were published by Bishop Stillingfleet, at the close 
 of his " Unreasonableness of Separation:" And, after all the ingenious argu- 
 ments produced by Robert Robinson, of Cambridge, in his " Life of Claude," 
 those who have perused both sides of the question, will at once perceive, that the 
 first letters of these foreign Presbyterians contained their unbiassed opinions, and 
 that their subsequent explanations only went to save their character with the party. 
 1 must not conclude this note without informing my readers, that Dr. Ham- 
 mond wrote an able Reply in Latin to Blondel and Salmasius, the latter of whom 
 (through a feeling of loyal gratitude for his writings against the regicides,) is pur- 
 posely treated with uncommon respect, for which the Doctor briefly gives this 
 reason in his Preface. The Doctor's production is entitled, Dissertationes Qua- 
 tuor, quibus Episcopatus Jura ex S. Scripturis et PrinuBva Antiquitate adstru~ 
 untur. To these erudite Dissertations, and to the several English pamphlets 
 written in vindication of them, I acknowledge myself indebted for the more cor- 
 rect views which I have happily gained of Episcopacy. The labours of Dr. Hara. 
 mond on this argument afford another proof of the immense advantage which an 
 accurate knowledge of the Ancient Fathers gives to a Polemic writer, and the 
 great superiority of the £nglish Clergy in that department of sacred literature. 
 
15*TR0DUGTI0N. IxXXt 
 
 (S79— 391.) The craft and sophistry of the Presbyterian Cal- 
 vinists, in this affair, are well expressed by the famous Daillee, 
 one of that party, in his congratulatory letter on the Restoration 
 of King Charles the Second (p. 606) : " When our adversaries 
 " formerly would charge the blame of the death of the late king 
 " of England on our religion, you know we could very well guard 
 " ourselves from this reproach, by casting it entirely on the sectaries, 
 " who indeed were only guilty of that horrible crime." — One of 
 these sectaries, Lt-wis du Moulin, thus removes the burden from 
 his own friends, the Independents, and throws it upon the army ; 
 " As for the odium that is cast upon the Congregational Way, and 
 " upon those who are called Independents, — as being the more 
 " immediate authors and abettors of the King's murder, and of 
 " taking away Monarchy, — it can easily be wiped off and made 
 " out, that Oliver Cromwell's army, like that of King David's in 
 " the wilderness, was a medley or a collection of all parties that 
 •* were discontented, as some Courtiers, some Episcoparians, few of 
 ** any sect, but most of none, or else of the religion of Thomas 
 " Hobbes and Dr. Scarborough ; not mentioning the Papists, 
 " who had the greatest hand in the death of King Charles the 
 " First, the success of which made them so daring and impious, 
 " as to contrive another most damnable and hellish plot to cut off 
 " the life of his Sacred Majesty [^Charles II.] that now is, his 
 " royal son, and our most gracious sovereign." — The Republican 
 OFFICERS and soldiers, by Moulin's special pleading, were fur- 
 nished with a good excuse for their share of criminality, in the 
 assertion, ' thatJthePajpjsts had the greatest hand in the death of 
 "the King." — See also Ricliaxd' Baxter's assertion to the same 
 effect, in pnge SQ^. The Long Parliament was vindicated, I 
 believe by Daniel de Foe, from all guilty participation in this 
 foul deed, in the following manner : " How the Long Parli- 
 " ament was by military force turned into the Rump, and reduced 
 " to a small party of factious members, who with the army hatched 
 " that barbarous tragedy, — 'is so universally attested by historians 
 " of all sides, that he must be altogether unacquainted with those 
 " times who does not know it. For the Parliament, who proposed 
 ** no other end in their war, than to keep the prerogative within its 
 " just limits, and to preserve the nations from the unjust invasions 
 " which had been made upon them by evil councillors under 
 " colour of Royal Authority, — having upon a treaty obtained such 
 " concessions from the King as they voted satisfactory for the 
 " ground of a treaty, — were proceeding to accomplish that great and 
 I " noble work, until the Sectarian Party in the Army, that had 
 " then conquered the Commanding Part of it, subverted and over- 
 ^^ turned all. 'The members,' says Coke, 'met upon the first of 
 " ' December l64S, and vote the King's concessions to be a suffi- 
 '** ' cient ground for peace; and then adjourn for a week. But 
 •* * when the members were to meet again, they found all the 
 
 f 
 
IxXXli IKTROBUCTION. 
 
 " ' avenues to the house beset with soldiers, who exclude all 
 " ' which were not of their faclmi from entering the House, which 
 " ' were not one-fourth part, and make the residue prisoners. So 
 *' ' farewell Presbytery, &c.' " 
 
 Unfortunately for the parties, who thus ingeniously tried to 
 exculpate themselves, they were all severally guilty participators 
 in this high offence; and though their criminality differed in 
 degree, the members of the Long Parliament were certainly not 
 the least culprits. (P. 406.) On this topic an eminent writer has 
 very justly observed : " How far that part of the Parliament 
 " v/hich sat at Westminster were inclinable to a peace and recon- 
 " ciliation with their most injured monarch, their voting his con- 
 ** finement to Warwick Castle, (when he was not in their hands,) 
 *' and their making choice of such a set of preachers, might be 
 *' sufficient to convince us, had Ave no other proofs, of their dis- 
 *' affection to their lawful sovereign. For, notwithstanding they 
 *' have been called ' A Parliament of Patriots, who stood up 
 " aa-ainst tyranny both in Chirch and State ;' and all their pretences 
 '' from first to last were, that they werejighting to rescue their sove-- 
 " reign aid of the hands of wicked Councillors, and to bring him in 
 " Ivononr to his Parliament, (a thing frequently suggested by their 
 *' preachers ;) yet, besides what has been said, it is very apparent 
 '* from what follows, how consistent their public declarations and 
 " actions were with each other. For when Mr. Nathaniel Ward, 
 " one of their preachers, (in other respects incendiary enough !) 
 "^ chanced to speak favourably of the King, and of bringing him 
 " back to the Parliament, they did not desire him to print his 
 *' sermon, or return him thanks for the great pains he took, accord- 
 " ing to custom: A favour that, I am convinced, was never 
 "' reifused before, in the compass of seven years, from near two 
 " hundred and thirty sermons I have in my custody, which were 
 " preached before the Two Houses, from November, 1640, to 
 " February, l648 !" 
 
 Their apologist gives the date of " the breaking-up of the 
 Long Parliament, Decembers, 1648;" and Ward's sermon was 
 preached before the House of Commons, June 30, 1647- His 
 text was Ezek. xix, 14; and when, in application of the words, 
 he urged the Senators to lamentation, he addressed them in the 
 following language : 
 
 " Let us also lament our present martial sceptre. We have 
 slighted God's moral and evangelical law ; he hath now brought 
 us in some sort under martial law. Let us lament that so good 
 an army should be so ill-guided, as to do what they do without 
 warrant from God or State, so far as wise men can yet discern. 
 
 " Let us lament, that a sceptre made of so much gold and 
 silver, and true English metal, should have any part of it of a 
 V/cstphalian temper. Let us lament that such honourable and 
 serviceable troops should have any mounted upon any saddles. 
 
INTRODUCTIOX. IxXXui 
 
 of John a Leyden's make. — Let us lament that so good an army 
 should advance toward so ill a work, at least in their shows and 
 our fears, as to deliver a Parliament of some eminent members by 
 a Cassarian section. 
 
 " Let us very sadly lament, that some of them of a mechanic 
 alloy should be so bold, as, without warrant from their chief 
 leaders, to plunder us of our King; it was so malepart an act, 
 an act that would have better become a John a Leyden, Knipper 
 Dolling, or Jack Cade, than a loyal English subject I But what 
 if the sword contemn even the. rod, what ? It is great pity but 
 that sword should meet with a sound rod. If nobody else will 
 provide it, I hope God will. But I trust, Gentlemen, some of 
 you will call to mind what an old Roman, a wise Statesman, 
 wrote to Marcus Brutus in the like case. 
 
 " It was too great a disparagement to make our King, who is 
 the Lord paramount of all our freeholds, such a moveable. I 
 believe there have been spirits in the world which would almost 
 scorn to be King again after such a handling. If he went will- 
 ingly, let us bewail his error. 
 
 " Let us lament that there should be any Korahs, Dathans, 
 and Abiraras, in an army that lays so much claim to piety. — Let 
 us lament with much spiritual grief, that many of this army 
 have bemeazled so many ignorant countrymen and towns, with 
 impious and blasphemous opinions and rude manners. I marvel 
 much, that any man who fears God closely and uprightly, should 
 fear this army, whereof a great part is said to be so good, that 
 surely they 7vill not, and others so bad, as surely they cannot 
 hurt us. 
 
 " In the first of Ezekie!, there is a description of a strange 
 wheel ; it was a wheel, and wheels, and a wheel within a wheel, 
 and four wheels, and there were four flashing and sparkling 
 creatures, guided by a spirit that was in the midst of them ; 
 whither the spirit went, they went. The form and motion of 
 this wheel made the heavens look terrible. I could parallel our 
 army to this wheel allusively, but not abusively. If they can so 
 drive their wheels, that they overthrow not Charles his wain, nor 
 break the axletree of the State, I mean the Parliament, and run 
 not the wheels over some of their own loins, and can be so wise 
 as to unload on this side Munster, before they come to battle and 
 slaughter, I dare be bold to say, with all reverence, that either 
 the General or Christ his General, hath more skill in carting than 
 I ever look to have while I live. 
 
 " Let us lament, that these our brethren have embarked them- 
 selves into an act unparalleled, and an enterprize so snarled and 
 imbranched, that, I dare say, all the eyes amongst them cannot 
 see to the end of all its issues, by a thousand leagues. Let us 
 seriously lament, so seriously, that we may prevent all lamenta- 
 tions by these our brethren and Riore than fellow-subjects.— 
 
 f2 
 
 i \ 
 
Ixxxir INTRODLCTIOIC. 
 
 Let us lament, that such au English army have cast so much 
 well-deserved honour in the dust, and such a black veil over the 
 face of the Gospel. 
 
 " Let us also lament the whole State and people, who feel in 
 part, but do not sufficiently see their sin and sorrow. The anger 
 of the Lord was moved against the people, and moved David to 
 sin against them. (2 Sam. xxiv, 1.) Kings can sin fast enough 
 of themselves, and kindle fires upon themselves and the people. 
 But usually people, by their sins, blow the coals to a flame. 
 
 " Lament, that they have a suspended King. Did they know 
 what the Egyptian and Russian States, and what the kingdom 
 of Fez suffered, for more than seven years together, for want of a 
 King, they would lament to purpose.— Israel shall say, we have 
 no King, because we feared not the Lord ; what then should a 
 King do to us.'' (Hos. x, 3.) He that can tell what a King should 
 do to a people that will not fear the Lord, I could earnestly wish 
 him our King's Vice-roy in a country that I know ; I should hold 
 him as good and as wise a man as ever was Papirius Censor. 
 What should a King do to his people, embroiled in so many divi- 
 sions, commotions, and distractions .'' What should a King do, in 
 a country where there are so mamj Kings and so Jew subjects ? 
 I dare freely say, that Claudius Gordianus nor the Barbarian 
 Hermite would not willingly at this time take the royal sceptre 
 into their hands, though the subjects, in the plight they are, 
 would swear fealty to them with their hearts pinned upon their 
 tongues' ends. It may be, an Abimelech, or a Perkin, or a 
 Michael de Lando would, if they might, 
 
 " Let us lament, that, through these distractions and people's 
 clamours, there is not balm enough, nor sufficient physicians, left 
 in our Gilead to r( cover our healths." 
 
 After this faithful warning, both to Senators and people, of the 
 sad consequences of the army's detention of the person of their 
 King, it cannot be said with truth, that the Long Parliament 
 
 Were guiltless of th«ir Monarch's blood! 
 
 They could not have been induced to refuse their thanks to Ward, 
 merely on account of the bluntness of his harangue ; for several 
 other preachers were still more caustic and severe in their per- 
 sonal remai-ks.* But the Long Parliament is ^generally, yet very 
 
 * The following remarks occur in a sermon preached before the House of Com-, 
 mons, May 2G, 1047, by George Hughes : 
 
 " See the woe and weal of states. Happy land whose King is ennobled by 
 God, and Princes made gracious, and taught by Hun even to the use of meat 
 and drink ! There our Lord hath the kingdom and his Christ. But woe to that 
 state, where a King, a child, a fool shall reign, an enemy to the Lord ; and 
 Princes lustful, gluttonous, drunken, and lascivious, such as must have a 
 breakfast every morning in sin, shall steer by their counsels ! Christ is no Law. j 
 giver there. Tliis is woeful: ' The people must mourn when th^ tvickcd beareth 
 
INTRODX'C TTOX. Hxxr 
 
 erroneously, depicted as that virtuous body of representatives 
 who occupied its benches in iGW, and who opposed the aggi-et- 
 sions of lawless power ; while there is a studious concealment of 
 the immense defections from its ranks,* which occurred in the 
 
 rwfe.' (Prov. xxix, 2.) They say there are such among you, if I may speak in 
 usual terms, impious, childish, cock-pit counsellors : If so, such are bad trustees 
 for laws, liberties, and religion. A Roman or Spartan state would provide 
 against some of those, and not hazard kingdoms in the hands of fools : Much 
 more should that state which is Christian. I know ye are not electors, but the 
 scum of people send such unto you ; and will spoil all your boilings, unless you take 
 it off. It is a voice of fear, among them that love you and pray for you in the 
 West, and other parts, that such as could not overcome you bt/ the sword, labour 
 to do it by votes, even by sending such as will vote God from among you. 
 Ever Honoured Worthies, see if it be so ; let the sight of one root of bitterness 
 among you humble you ; and now shew forth Christ ruling in you. Methinkg^ 
 it is possible for a Christian Parliament, by a law, to purge and prevent such 
 profane Paganish leaven, and to honour Christ's kingdom so much, as to make 
 gross sin uncapable of a membership among you. Surely, if that be allowed, 
 our Lord rules not ; and this is woful. 
 
 " Our Lord takes no reward in judgment, neither must the stewards that act 
 for him ; such as do. He curseth. The voice of people is, there is such a fault 
 among you. I confess, it is incredible to me, that such a Judge as a Parliament, 
 consisting of so many heads, can be the subject of such corruption ; and I am 
 confident the body is free in judging. But it is replied, though the judgment a t 
 last come free, yet motions many times cost men dear. I cannot charge it 
 upon any, and I wish that they who complain would testify to the faces of the 
 guilty at your own bar. I am confident the just hands among you, would be 
 against such a man, to thrust him out of your assembly." 
 
 * The same casuistry is employed by various Dissenting Historians, in 
 speaking of the Long Parliament. Thus, Brook, in his Lives of the Puritans, 
 informs his readers, that " the members of this Parliament were all members 
 of the Church of Englaml, and nearly all advocates for Episcopal government."' 
 Richard Baxter, when writing about the impressions which Hooker's prin- 
 ciples had made upon him, (p. xcvii,) says, " when the war begun" he did " not 
 hear of two Presbyterians among all" the members of that Parliament : He also 
 employs similar language, in a preceding page, (xliii,) and says very cautiously, 
 " they had lived in conformity." 
 
 To shew to what class of Conformists these Calvinistic or Republican Epis. 
 copalians belonged, one of Baxter's opponents very justly observes : '•'■ You do 
 well, Richard, to say that ' they had lived in conformity ;' for the complyino- 
 humour was now going off apace ; insomuch that a professed opposition to the 
 orders of the Church became quickly a distinguishing mark of the disloyal party r 
 And all those Parliament men. Officers, and Assembly Divines, contributed 
 unanimously in their several stations toward the common ruin — On Friday, 
 December II, 1G40, a petition was brought into the House by Alderman Pen- 
 nington from the Citizens of London, in the name of 15,000, complaining of the 
 Church discipline, in having Archbishops, Bishops, &c. ; using the cross in 
 baptism ; kneeling at the Communion-table, as unlawful in the Protestant 
 Church. — (Diwrnat Occurrences.) — Jan. 13. Petitions against the government 
 of Bishops from several counties. — Jan. 13. The Remonstrance with 700 hands 
 
 against the Bishops and their Prelacy was read March 7- A Bill against 
 
 Episcopacy read in the House of Commons, &c March 10, 1640. Bishops' 
 
 Votes in Parliament taken away.— In November, 1641, several tumults against 
 Bishops ; and December 11, 12, Bishops accused of High Treason : The Bishops 
 in the mean time petitioning his Majesty, and entering a protest of their privi- 
 
IXXXYI IN'TRODUCTION. 
 
 persons of those who went over to the Royal Party, and those 
 who retired to their estates, as soon as they discovered the inten- 
 tions of the dominant members. These two classes of seceders 
 included some of the most upright, able, discernii p-j and honour- 
 able men that had sat in either House of Parliament. To this 
 circumstance Stephen Marshall alluded, in his sermon befoi-e 
 the House of Lords, (and his remarks would have applied as well 
 to the Commons,) October 28, 1646, when he said: 
 
 " Wlien the Church is sinil^d upon, and countenanced by 
 Kings and Princes, it is no marvel though wise, rich, and great 
 men do join with it. But when wars and persecutions are raised 
 against it, which hath most-v/hat been the Church's lot hitherto, 
 wonder not though wise men withdraw from it, when they can 
 see nothing but ruin attend them who take with this side : And 
 this is the very reason of their withdrawing ; and this also abund- 
 antly satisfies me in our present trouble, wherein we have had so 
 many Lords, so many gentlemen, so many learned men, so many 
 great and rich men, to have deserted the cause that the Parlia- 
 ment was engaged in. I solemnly profess, I rather wonder that 
 any wise man, if not sanctified, hath stayed ; that any man, not 
 guided by the Spirit of God, should venture himself in a cause 
 that appeared so desperate as this cause of Christ hath done to the 
 eyes of flesh and blood. I justly call it the cause of Christ and his 
 Church, because it is apparent that the Parliament's engaging 
 themselves for reformation of ReUgio7i, as well as preserving Civil 
 Liberties, hath provoked most of these enemies against them. 
 Therefore, let this satisfy you abundantly, when the multitude 
 of the world generally go against the cause of Christ, they think 
 it folly to own it, because they look upon it as a lost cause." 
 
 Stephen here plainly informs their Lordships, that all the wise, 
 great, learned, and rich men, who were " notsan ctified," that is, 
 who Avere not those " babes and sucklings" of Calvin's school, 
 described in the same sermon, (p. iiv,) had withdrawn from 
 their cause ; and his statement is corroborated by that of the old 
 historian in page 36 1. 
 
 •5 — The Republiean Statesmen, a7id the Arminians of the Nero School, 
 were the real Fathers of Religions Toleration. 
 
 But though I have awarded the highest palm of merit, talent, 
 and integrity, to those statesmen who effected a timely retreat 
 
 leges, and against tumults.— April 9, 1642. A due and necessary Reformation 
 of the Government and Liturgy of the Church pretended. {Ew. Col.) 
 
 " It is to be hoped, that all these violences upon the Ecclesiastical State, and 
 the persons of the Bishops, were not acted by Conformists. And it will not 
 be denied, I suppose, th&it, after the posting and proscribing of the greater part of 
 the Clergy's friends, (as well as the King's,) the schismatical interest was carried 
 on by the major vote of the remaining fragment ; and all this was before the 
 erjuption of the war ; the Earl of Essex not receiving his commission, till July 12, 
 1642. Unless you'U say that Epkcopa^l men tfienuelves iv ere for th€ ejctirpatiun 
 (\f BMops.'!'' 
 
INTBODUCTIOX. JxXXVU 
 
 from the arena of faction and sedition, yet I consider it one of tlie 
 many mercies, mixed with the distinguished judgments of those 
 days, that some men of piety, honour, ability, and discernment, 
 •were left in both Houses, to keep down the bold aspirings of the 
 Calvinistic divines, and to check the arrogance of " the fmatics" 
 among their own members. They contrived for some time to 
 keep the two great rival sects of Calvinists in abeyance ; bxit, 
 having commenced the war out of hatred to Archbishop Laud, 
 as the chief and most responsible adviser of King Charles, and 
 under the semblance oi religmis zeal against Popery and Armin- 
 lANisM, (a most discordant association !) they either did not always 
 possess the power, or did not on every occasion account it politic, 
 to protect, in the exercise of their religious privileges, the pro- 
 fessors of General Redemption, who were almost universally 
 attached to Episcopacy. The proceedings against " scandalous 
 ministers," in 16'43, wei-e directed entirely against the Arminian 
 Clergy : For the profession of their scriptural tenets was con- 
 sidered one of the greatest public " scandals" of the age; and 
 there is scarcely an instance on record, of an Arminian Clergy- 
 man retaining his benefice, during the heat of that inquisition, 
 except through the patronage of some nobleman or official person 
 in the government, who possessed influence with the party, and 
 exerted it in behalf of the sufferers. Yet, in the course of other 
 ten years, it was discovered, that the number of the Clergy who 
 had embraced the doctrines of Arminius was greatly increased : 
 Afresh inquisition was therefore instituted, in lt»53, against those 
 (excellent men, many of whom were cast out by the Commission 
 of Ejectors, while Arminian candidates for Holy Orders were 
 effectually prevented from entering the ministry by the cognate 
 Commission of Triers. 
 
 In the history of religious intolerance it ought always to be 
 remembered, that this second hot inquisition against Arminianisni 
 (in 1653) was undertaken at the earnest solicitation and under 
 the immediate conduct of the Indepenoents ; and that the first, 
 in 1643, was by the advice and under the direction of the Pres- 
 BYTTERiANS. Whether under the forms of Independency or Pres- 
 bytery, therefore, the Calvinists adhered throughout to their 
 first grand principle of persecuting the Episcopalians : And the 
 number of the latter, who were also converts to the doctrinal 
 system of Arminius in the latter days of the Commonwealth, ha$ 
 been egregiously under-rated by all the Predestinarian historians 
 of that period. But in some of the following pages, (788 and 
 803,) I have afforded the reader two important criteria by which 
 to form an accurate judgment of their astonishing increase. Evi- 
 dence of the immense numbers of Arminians and Episcopalians 
 under persecution, has also been already adduced from Calvinistic 
 writers, (pp. lix, Ixiii, Ixxvi,) and other curious testimonies will 
 given in the second volume. 
 
IxXXViu IXTHODUCTIOX. 
 
 In no proper sense, then, can the Puritans be said to have 
 been " the fathers of EngHsh Liberty," unless the term is 
 intended to apply to the Statesmen, who, as Erastians or Inde- 
 pendents, as orthodox Christians or as undisguised Deists, (pp. 779 
 • — 781,) controlled as far as practicable, the impetuosity of the Pre- 
 destinarian Ecclesiastics, though, to effect their own purposes and 
 to preserve the peace of the realm, they were occasionally forced 
 to comply with some of their intolerant humours. To the 
 patriotic and praiseworthy exertions of these individuals, in the 
 Senate, in the Assembly of Divines, in the Army, and in. the 
 subordinate departments of Government, I have done ample 
 justice, in pages 352, 400, 436, 444, 448, 452, 469, 779, &c.— 
 From the letters and private papers which they have left, several 
 of them seem to have been really noble-minded, though, like 
 other mortals, they did not always perceive the course and issue 
 of the measures which they advised or adopted, and in which 
 they had unhappily involved themselves ; and, from this source, 
 impure in some respects as it certainly wa;*, the streamlets of 
 British Freedom, civil and religious, first began to flow in that 
 disturbed period. The first principles of liberty were then dis- 
 cussed with great ability in the writings of some accomplished 
 laymen, whose religious sentiments were exceedingly loose ; while 
 John Goodwin,* Tobias Conyers, the General Baptists, and the 
 
 , • The following extract, from the preface to Goodwin's Banner of Justifi- 
 1 cation displayed, will prove, that the labours of this great man and -of his co- 
 adjutors had been extensively useful and highly approved : 
 
 " Whereas my accuser chargeth me with having my hand against all men, 
 neither is he orthodox in this, unless he takes sanctuary under the wing of the good 
 figure Synecdoche^ which hath had a privilege, time out of mind, to grant a 
 pardon to men for this delinquency in speaking, viz. when meaning oriVy somBy 
 they say all ; or intending only apart, yet mention or name the whole. But it is 
 a good sign on the Truth's side when her enemies retreat and flee to their 
 Patheticals: For this argues, that their Intellectuals fall short, and 
 
 that their heart serveth them not to confide in them any further Yet I cannot 
 
 but mention this by the way, as matter of sad consideration, although of too fre- 
 quent occurrency, that men, — who have competent gifts and parts of wit and 
 learning, whereby they might serve their generation and be useful unto many, yet 
 suffering themselves to be over-grown with a conceit that these gifts and parts are 
 far greater than they are, — they hereby stifle their opportunity, and give hostages 
 unto sin and Satan that they will never do any great matters against them ! 
 
 " The remaining article of his charge — that I have provoked all men, eve7i to the 
 common pamphleteer, to lift vp a hand against me, — will keep him out of the 
 New Jerusalem also, without the mediation of the said figure Synecdoche : See 
 Jievelalionsxxi, 27, xxii, 15. I know it would be offensive to the gentleman, 
 if I should relate how many letters, and messages otherwise, — of tharkful acknow- 
 ledgments of the grace of God given unto me for the clearing of those doctrines 
 of Election, Reprobation, &c., and of Christian encouragement to proceed in my 
 way, &c., — I have received, time after time, from several persons of considerable 
 worth for godlintss and knowledge, inhabiting in several parts of the nation, some 
 of them ministers of the Gospel, and others of them students in the University 
 of good standing, &c. But because such a story as this would, I presume, be 
 a heavy burden to a tender and weak shoulder, I shall forbear it. In the meaa 
 
IXTttODUCTIOX. Ixxxl* 
 
 Arminian members of their Independent Churches, promulgated 
 throughout the land their truly catholic opinions on the subject 
 of Toleration. — Milton, Selden, and others, had digested Hale&'s 
 Tract on Schism, and were familiar with some of the most admii-ed 
 productions of the Dutch Arminians: Yet as the war against the 
 King had been undertaken with the avowed intention o\' rendering 
 the religion of the English people more uniformly Calvinistic, these 
 politicians were aware that they could not succeed with the more 
 clamorous part of the nation, unless they permitted themselves 
 to be constantly addressed as Calvini«ts. Cromwell was accus- 
 tomed to excuse himself to his intimate friends, for this easy 
 compliance with the Calvinistic humour, by saying, / must talk 
 to these men after their own way ! " This created in his relative, 
 Mr. Waller, Qhe Poet,] an opinion, that Oliver secretly despised 
 those whom he seemed to court:" And a similar aversion must 
 have been ultimately produced on the minds of all enlightened 
 men, who had transactions with such servile individuals. 
 
 Whether the ears of the republican Statesmen had been so 
 accustomed to the sweet and soothing strains of their Calvinistic 
 flatterers, (who, it is seen, occasionally became their fierce 
 accusers,) or whether loyal Ai-minianism was known to be of too 
 unbending a character to stoop to such a degrading employment, 
 certain it is, that all divines of the three great denominations who 
 laboured even under any suspicion of being Arminians, were 
 carefully excluded from the court-pulpits till the period of the 
 Restoration. - John Goodwin's early services had been of vast 
 importance to thexause of the infant Republic, but he was badly 
 remunerated for them : If any Arminian, therefore, was entitled 
 to stand up as a court-preacher, John was, without doubt, that 
 individual. The liberal sentiments^ however, which he had then 
 
 time, Mr. Hickman must give me leave to tell him and all the world this plain 
 story, that I know certainly, infallibly, above and beyond all possibility of mis- 
 take, that he spake not by the Spirit of God when he said, that my hand hath 
 provoked all men, even to the common pamphleteer, &c. He is an Athenian, 
 and seems to have some sympathy in blood with him that laid claim to all the 
 ships, that came into Piraeus, as his own. But he may know, if he please, 
 that there are seven thousand, (and seven thousand more to them twice told,) 
 amongst the Israel of God in this nation, who either never bowed the knee of their 
 judgment to the bloody Moloch of his Reprobation nor to any of his confederates, 
 or else have repented of that superstitious and unadvised homage !" 
 
 After all the harsh measures employed by the Calvinists, Arminianism could 
 never be eradicated out of our two Universities. On this subject, T. Hodges 
 made the following remarks before the Commons, March 10, 1646 : 
 
 " Take- special care of our Fountains, the Universities, that learning may be 
 encouraged ; and [that] doctrines contrary to soundness of faith, or [to] holiness 
 of life and manners, be wholly there suppressed. For want of this, because there 
 have been errors in the first concoction, they could never, in many, be mended to 
 this present day ; but many congregations have been poisoned with Arminianism, 
 Socinianism, yea, downright Popery. It was the milk they sucked in at the 
 University from ill tutors ; and their people must either take that or none, for 
 they have no better to give tbem." 
 
Xe TNTRODUCTTOM. 
 
 recently embraced, excluded him effectually from the favour of 
 the great Republicans ;* and while pastors of far inferior talents 
 basked in the sunshine of Whitehall, this highly-gifted person, 
 though an Independent, was suffered, after many struggles, to 
 instruct his congregation in comparative privacy and quietness. 
 Many of the stories circulated concerning him, after the murder 
 of King Charles the First, evidently belong to Dr. Thomas 
 Goodwin, who, in the capacity of chaplain to the Protector, was 
 a man of eminence, while the doctrinal views of his reputed 
 relative precluded him from all such marks of Puritanic distinc- 
 tion. But though the English Arminians gained no ill-scented 
 laurels of this kind, numbers of their opponents stood ready to 
 receive the commands of their political superiors. 
 
 Many circumstances concurred to render those of the Arminian 
 Clergy who either adhered to Episcopacy, or were recent converts 
 to it, a neglected race. They could not boldly refer, like many 
 of the Puritan Divines before both the Houses, (pp. lii, Ixi,) to 
 any previous mighty stirrings on their part in the cause of sedi- 
 tion; for they were then under persecution, principally on 
 account of well-tried loyalty to their sovereign, and of warm 
 attachment to the ancient institutions of their country. They had 
 no clerical friends at the Republican Court, who could give a 
 modest hint in their favour, — as Vines the Presbyterian has done 
 (p. Ixv,) for his Calvinistic brethren " the pure Independents," 
 when all other resisters of Predestinarian ordinances were omi- 
 nously compared to "the Egyptian striving with the Israelite, 
 rvkom Moses smites down ;" — or as Marshall has done, (p. Ixxvi,) 
 when describing " the horrible errors" of the times, he excepts , 
 
 • Speaking of the great benefit which Mr. Hickman or any of his Calvinist 
 friends would confer on him, by producing such arguments against his theolo- 
 gical tetiets as would " put him to a stand," John Goodwin says, " They 
 would be the best benefactors unto me in the good things of this world, that I 
 have met with these many years. Especially they would have been such unto 
 me, had they befriended me in that kind heretofore, whilst and when I was more 
 capable of the courtesies and benefactures of ihe world than now 1 am, expecting 
 daily to remove into that climate where the sunshine of this world hath no warm- 
 ing or cheering influence at all. For certain I am, that those [Arminian] tenets, 
 from under the conscience whereof I might well have been delivered by the 
 means specified, have divided between the world and me, and kept many of the 
 good things thereof from me, by reason of their unsupportableness unto the 
 greater part of men, and more especially unto the great men in the state of my 
 sojourning, and to those who, by their consent, (yea, they love to have it so,) 
 exercise dominion over their faith, under the importune claim of being wthodoxy 
 and sound in their judgments from the one end of them even unto the other, in 
 matters appertaining unto God. I have neither any disposition within, nor 
 occasion without, to turn plaintiff against the world ; a man with a competency 
 of wisdom may very well be content with my portion in it. For my good God 
 hath fed me and mine, with food convenient, yea, and clothed and harboured us 
 accordingly : And the truth is, that, for things greater than these, it is best 
 receiving them at the Resurrection." — Goodwin's Banner of Justijicatiaih 
 dinplayed. 
 
TNTRODUCTIoX. Xci 
 
 " such as are to be found among God's people, to whom He 
 never hath given an equal light, and notwithstanding which 
 errors. Himself bears with them, and would have his people bear 
 one with another!" On the contrary, Marshall points out in the 
 same discourse, not the old silenced ministers, but a " new gene- 
 ration of men" who were then " risen up and spread all the points 
 of Arminianism, Universal Redemption," &c. as those whom 
 the " Lord had not given" the Parliament " liberty to forbear." 
 When the Calvinists alone were thus numbered and treated as 
 " God's people," though according to their own eloquent descrip- 
 tions they were surrounded with swarms cf heretics and unbe- 
 lievers, of their own or of the Parliament's formation, (pp. xlii, 
 Ivi,) we cannot wonder at the ignorant admiration of those 
 " blessed days" which has been expressed by certain of the ill- 
 informed of their modern successors.* — Some persons have said, 
 
 • ]Mr. Orme, in his Life of Dr. Owen, gives the subjoined glowing account 
 of that period : '• During the Commonwealth, no system of church-government 
 can be considered, as having been properly, or fully established. Ihe Presby- 
 terians, if any, enjoyed this distinction. But the ministers who occupied the 
 parish churches, were of very various sentiments. Many of them were secret 
 friends to the old Episcopacy and the liturgy. Many were for a reformed Epis- 
 copal govermnent. Others thought no form of ecclesiastical polity of Divine 
 right, or gave themselves no concern about the matter. Some were Independents, 
 and a few were Baptists. Cromwell's policy encouraged this diversity, as he 
 dreaded the ascendancy of any one party. If the ministers attended to their own 
 duty, and did not interfere with his affairs, whatever their sentiments were on 
 church government, it did not prevent the enjoyment of his favour. This state 
 of things may be considered anarchy and confusion by many, but it may be ques- 
 tioned, whether the great ends of the gospel ministry were ever more effectually 
 accomplished in this country, than during this period. No sacrifice of conscience 
 
 was demanded — no encroachments on religious liberty were practised no bounds 
 
 were prescribed to zealous exertion for the good of the souls of men. Every man 
 sat under his vine and his fig-tree without fear. The word of the Lord had free 
 course and was glorified." 
 
 If, by " the great ends of the Gospel Mip'tstrt/,'' Mr. Orme means " the 
 great ends" which Calvinism then had in view, — the attainment of political 
 power and of ecclesiastical patronage, — his assertion wiU be correct ; for never 
 were those •' ends more efTectually accomplished in this country, than during this 
 period," by one race of Predestinarians or another. Btit, if "• the great ends" 
 of converting sinners from the error of their ways, and of teaching them to lead 
 holy and quiet lives, be those which he intends, the preceding copious extracts 
 from the sermons of Calvinistic pastors will prove, that these good effects were not 
 produced by the promulgation of their peculiar doctrines ; and that the nation at 
 large was, under their management, in a state of deeper moral wretchedness than 
 in the days of the Bishops. 
 
 But the concluding sentences of Mr. Orme's remarkable paragraph are untnie, 
 and could never have been written by any man minutely acquainted with the 
 history of that ara. The assertions are untrue as they regard the conduct of the 
 dominant Calvinistic sects towards each other ; for their mutual complamts and 
 recriminations were concerning attempted " sacrifices of conscience" and 
 " encroachments on religious liberty." But they are most glaringly untrue with 
 regard to Episcopalians and Arminians, who, after Cromwell had seized the reins 
 of empire, constituted no inconsiderable portion of the people whom he ruled with 
 a rod of iron. Were no "demands" made {o sacrifice cojiscience, when Epis- 
 
XCll TNTRODUCTTON. 
 
 *' that if the ministers of the gospel attended to tlieir own duty, 
 " and did not interfere with Cromwell's affairs, whatever might 
 " be their sentiments on church-government, they were not ex- , 
 " eluded from the enjoyment of his favour." Adopting this as an 
 undoubted maxim, many amiable writers have been led to sup- 
 pose, that as the Protector's persecuting ordinance of l655 was 
 particularly directed against the Episcopal Clergy, they were a 
 race of divines, as seditious and pragmatical as those by whom 
 they had been supplanted. The reverse of this will, however, be 
 found to be correct ; and when the great number of Episcopa- 
 lians, who had been ejected froin the ministry in 164-3, are added 
 to the hosts of young men, who, in the latter days of the Repub- 
 lic, were prevented from entering into Holy Orders on account of 
 their Arminian principles, they present to the world the grand 
 spectacle of a company of courageous yet humble sufferers, worthy 
 
 copalians were ejected from their livings, for their conscientious attachment to 
 the Liturgy ? "N^'hat was the nature of the Calvinistic Coi^enant, which, in 1643, 
 was appointed by Parliamentary Ordinance to be taken ? "It was the test of the 
 " faction. No man was allowed to practise the Law, no man admitted into the ! 
 " Ministry, that had not taken it ; and it was imposed, under a penalty, upon 
 " the whole nation. Then, after the taking of it, it was made death for any 
 " man to return to his allegiance [to his King] ; and all the deserters of the con- : 
 " spiracy, that were murdered under a form of justice, were put to death for 
 " Breach of Covenant .'" Omitting all mention of the Engagemeiit and othei 
 Republican Oaths, how can Mr. Orme venture to say, that " no sacrifice of con- 
 science was demanded," when this solemn League and Covenant became an 
 intolerable burden to his own denomination ? Were " no encroachments prac- 
 tised on religious liberty," and did "■ every man sit under his own vine and fig- 
 tree without fear," when a whole congregation of Episcopalian believers was inter- 
 rupted and seized by armed soldiers, while in the solemn act of receiving the memo- 
 rials of their Saviour's death ? (P. 451.) And can " no bounds " be said to have 
 been " prescribed to zealous exertion for the good of the souls of men," when, in 
 the early days of the Inter-regnum, the Presbyterian discipline was established by 
 Parliamentary ordinance throughout England, — and when in Cromwell's time the 
 Independents, by means of the cognate Commissions of " Triers and Ejectors," 
 opened and shut the door of preferment to other denominations ? " The word- 
 of the Lord had free course,^' indeed, and was often quoted for the encourage- 
 ment of seditious and rebellious enterprizes before the Long Parliament itself : 
 But the vapid manner in which it was " glorified" under their administration, 
 the Puritans themselves have described in the preceding pages. 
 
 The following brief allusion to the liberty of Cromwell's aera is more correct 
 than the description given by JMr. Orme. It was written by a man, whose grand- 
 father and great-grandfather were actors in those turbulent scenes, and whose 
 father was early initiated in the same principles. (See pages 812—815.) In his 
 Calm Address, on the subject of the American War, the Rev. John Wesley 
 says : " Do not you observe, on the other hand, the perfect liberty which we 
 enjoy ? Not, indeed, derived from our forefathers, as some writers idly talk. 
 No ; our forefathers never enjoyed it, either before or after William the Conqueror, 
 and least of all in the time of the Long Parliament or under Oliver Cromwell. 
 English Liberty commenced at the Revolution. And how entire is it at this 
 day ! Every man says what he will, writes what he wiU, prints what he will. 
 Every man worships God, (if he worships him at all,) as he is persuaded in hia 
 own mind." 
 
 i 
 
INTROBUCTION. XCllt 
 
 of the early days of Christianity. On this subject, one of the 
 
 most eminent men among them published the following remarks 
 
 -in the days of Cromwell : " Since the latter spring of Reformation 
 
 in England, I am confident there is not one instance of any one 
 
 Bishop or Episcopal Divine, that either wrote or instigated any 
 
 christian subjects to act, upon any religious pretensions, contrary 
 
 to the rules of civil subjection to that Prince or State under which 
 
 I they lived ; no, not to bring in or restore Episcopacy itself, which 
 
 I hath far more pleas for it from Catholic antiquity and universal 
 
 prescription, &c. together with its own ancient, catholic and 
 
 national rights, which aggravate its injuries, and exasperate men's 
 
 I spirits. Yet these are not enough to animate or heighten Episco- 
 
 I pacy, so far as to make or restore its way into any Nation, Church, 
 
 State, or Kingdom, by armed power or tumultuary violence, 
 
 against the will of the Chief Magistrate or the laws in force. It 
 
 "^ humbly attends God's time, and the sovereign's pleasure, for 
 
 its reception or restitution." 
 
 Mr. Scott's remark is exceedingly just, (p. xlvii.) these 
 
 " designing sagacious leaders knew iiow to avail themselves of 
 
 the prejudices" of the different Calvinistic pastors: And when 
 
 one Republican General or Erastian member of Parliament was 
 
 allowed to nominate the preacher of a Fast-day sermon before 
 
 either of the Houses, as an expounder of the principles of the 
 
 Independent persuasion, a similar privilege was claimed and 
 
 exercised on the next solemn occasion by a Presbyterian 
 
 divine, under the patronage of some General or Statesman of his 
 
 denomination. Though much artifice was apparent in thus 
 
 opposing the liberal and occasionally licentious opinions of the 
 
 Independents to the intolerance of the Presbyterians, yet many 
 
 I benefits resulted from the practice. The violent conflicts, between 
 
 the extreme opinions of the two parties, produced at length a 
 
 happy medium ; and Christian moderation about things indifferent 
 
 began to find some countenance. These, however, were but the 
 
 j infant struggles of British Liberty ; and, in the twenty years 
 
 t immediately succeeding the Restoration, the legal rights of a free 
 
 I people were better understood, and gained a glorious triumph at 
 
 i! the Revolution in l6S8.* (See page 692.) 
 
 ; • The Episcopal Clergy of those days shewed themselves the consistent and 
 
 i1 intrepid admirers of " the new sect of the Latitude-mex." Even some of 
 
 'y those who had been eminent Tories, were, on that occasion, carried out beyond 
 
 1 the narrow principles which they had imbibed ; they loudly declaimed against, 
 
 t^ and manfully resisted, the attacks of Popery and Tyraimy. The following 
 
 || extract from Bishop Heber will prove, that those eminent Whig Divines have 
 
 ;j stUl able successors in the Church of England : 
 
 |i " Taylor, however, makes another admission, which, if his life had been 
 
 1^ prolonged a few more years, might have involved him in a very serious difficulty 
 
 I. of conscience ; and would have divided him, if he had acted on it, from all the 
 
 ;■ best and wisest of his own order and religion : ' The unlawful proclamations 
 
 'j ■'• and edicts of^a true prince may be published by the Clergy in their several 
 
 I' 
 1! 
 
XCIT INTRODUCTION. 
 
 In a succeeding page, (69O,) I have said, " It would be singu- 
 lar, indeed, and a circumstance altogether anomalous in the moral 
 history of mankind, were those narrow principles which are 
 peculiar to Calvinism accounted the parents of a liberal Tolera- 
 tion, either civil or religious." One of the best-informed of- 
 modern Calvinists, (p. 802,) has on this subject made the follow- 
 ing just remark: " The same temper of mind which led Armi- 
 " nius to renounce the peculiarities of Calvinism, induced him 
 " also to adopt more enlarged and liberal views of church- govern- 
 " vient than those which had hitherto prevailed. While he main- 
 " tained, ' that the mercy of God is not confined to a chosen ferv,' 
 " he conceived it to be quite inconsistent with the genius of 
 " Christianity, that men of that religion should keep at a distance 
 " from each other, and constitute separate churches, merely 
 " because thcij differed in their opinions as to some of its doctrinal 
 " articles." — This is the principle which runs through "the ever- 
 memorable Hales's" tract on Schism, and which that great man 
 defended, both in person and by letter,* to Archbishop Laud : 
 
 ' charges !', — I wish I had not found this in Taylor; and I thank heaven, that 
 this principle was not adopted by the English Clergy in 16S7. Yet, for Taylor, 
 many allowances may be made ; and many excuses offered for this and the other 
 ultra-monarchical features of his creed. Accustomed as he was to see and feel all 
 the tyranny which then plagued the land, from those who, under the colour of 
 freedom, had disturbed and enslaved their country, it was hardly to be expected 
 that his attention could be equally alive to the possibility of the same evils occur- 
 ring under a legitimate Sovereign. And, above all, let it be remembered, that 
 his inclination for absolute monarchy, if it were unwise, was, at least, not inter- 
 ested or servile ; that if he carried too high the power of a lawful king, it was 
 when that lawful king was in exile. The Duclor Dubita.ntmm., though pub- 
 lislied at the moment of the Restoration, was written and printed while no such 
 event could be looked for, and when all that could be gained by an unlimited 
 loyalty, was the suspicion or persecution of the ruling powers, — imprisonment, 
 fine, and aggravat-;d indigence." 
 
 * As every fact connected with this small treatise is important, I subjoin the 
 narrative, which Lord Clarendon has given us in the account of his own Liff, 
 of the personal interview between Hales and Archbishop Laud : " Nothing 
 troubled him more than the brawls which were grown from religion ; and he 
 therefore exceedingly detested the tyranny of the Church of Rome, more for their 
 imposing uncharitably upon the consciences of other men, than for the errors in 
 their own opinions ; and would often say, ' thathe would renounce the religion 
 ' of the Church of England to-morrow, if it obliged him to believe that any other 
 ' Christians should be damned ; and that nobody would conclude another man 
 ' to be damned, who did not wish him so.' No man more strict and severe to 
 himself; to other men so charitable as to their opinions, that he thought that 
 other men were more in fault for their carriage towards them, than the men them- 
 selves were who erred ; and he thought that pride and passion, more than con- 
 science, were the cause of all separation from each other's communion ; and he 
 frequently said, ' that that only kept the world from agreeing upon such a 
 ' liiturgy, as might bring them into one communion ; all doctrinal points upoif 
 ' which men differed in their opinions, being to have no place in any Liturgy.' 
 Upon an occasional discourse with a friend, of the frequent and uncharitable 
 reproaches of ITeretkk and Schismalkk, too lightly thrown at each other, amongst' 
 men wlio diflcr in their judgment, lie writ a little Discourse o/5'fAwm, contained 
 
IXIRODUCTION. XCT 
 
 His boldness and consistency did not alienate the affections of the 
 Prelate from him, nor did they prevent him from obtaining high 
 ecclesiastical patronage. That tract had been very extensively 
 circulated, especially among his Arminian friends, either in 
 manuscript or in print, Avithout Hales's privity or consent, five 
 
 in less than two sheets of paper : which, being transmitted from friend to friend 
 in writing, was at last, without any malice, brought to the view of the Archbishop 
 of Canterbury, Dr. Laud, who was a very rigid surveyor of all things which never 
 so little bordered upon schism ; and thought the Church could not be too vigilant 
 against and jealous of such incursions. 
 
 " He sent for Mr. Hales, whom, when they had both lived in the University 
 of Oxford, he had known well ; ard told him, that he had in truth believed him 
 to be long since dead ; and chid him very kindly for having never come to him, 
 having been of his old acquaintance ; then asked huu, whether he had lately 
 writ a short Discourse of Schism, and whether he was of that opinion which that 
 discourse implied ? He told hun, ' that he had, for the satisfaction of a private 
 ' friend, (who was not of his mind.) a year or two before, writ such a small tract, 
 ' without any imagination that it would be communicated ; and that he believed 
 ' it did not contain any thing that was not agreeable to the judgment of the 
 ' primitive Fathers.' Upon which, the .4rchbishop debated with him upon some 
 expressions of Irenaus, and the most ancient Fathers ; and concluded with 
 saying, ' that the time was very apt to set new doctrines on foot, of which the 
 ' wits of the age were too susceptible ; and that there could not be too much care 
 ' taken to preserve the peace and unity of the Church ;' and from thence asked 
 him of his condition, and whether he wanted any thing, and the other answering, 
 that he had enough, and zeanted or desired no addition, so dismissed him with 
 great courtesy ; and shortly after sent for him again, when there was a Preben- 
 darj' of Windsor fallen, and told him, the King had given him the preferment, 
 because it lay so convenient to his Fellowship of Eton ; which, (though indeed 
 the most convenient preferment that could be thought of for him,) the Archbishop 
 could not, without great difficulty, persuade him to accept ; and he did accept it 
 rather to please him than himself, because he really believed he had enough 
 before. He was one of the least men in the kingdom, and one of the greatest 
 scholars in Europe. Jlr. Chillingworth was of a stature little superior to ]Mr. 
 Hales, and it was an age in which there were many great and wonderful men of 
 that size." 
 
 It is probable, that, in this conversation, the Archbishop had pointed out 
 to him the disregard which he had evinced towards Christian Antiquity m. that 
 tract, and the undue slight which he had put upon Church-authority. On both 
 these points he explained himself in a letter, which is supposed to have survived 
 the wreck of the learned Prelate's papers. '• MTiereas," he says, " in one 
 " point, speaking of church-authority, I bluntly added, u-hich is none ; I must 
 *' acknowledge it was incautiously spoken ; and, being taken in a generality, is 
 " false, — though, as it refers to the occasion which I there fell upon, it is (as I 
 "think I may safely say,) most true — I count, in point of decision of church. 
 " questions, if I say of the authority of the Church that it is none, I know no 
 " adversary that I have, th& Church ^f Rome only excepted. For this cannot 
 " be true, except we make the Church jW^e of controversies; the contrary of 
 " which we generally maintain against that Church." 
 
 The Archbishop, who loved frankness and hated an untruth even when uttered 
 •with a jocose intent, (p. 709,) admired Hales for his meek, yet manly, spirit, and 
 took him under his protection. His Grace knew the source from which Hales's 
 aversion to church-authority sprung, and which he had imbibed through dis<nist 
 ^t what he had seen of the unwarrantable assumptions of the Dort Synodists. 
 ^:§ee page 579, in which the Archbishop's conduct towards Hales and Chilling, 
 worth is satisfactorily explained. 
 
leCTl INTRODUCTIOK. 
 
 years prior to the Archbishop's downfall and the beginning of 
 the Civil Wars. * The salutary effects which it produced on the 
 luind of Jeremy Taylor, who was then a mere youth, were soon 
 afterwards manifest in his " Liberty of Prophesying :" an able 
 defence of which, from the nervous pen of Bishop Heber, will 
 be found in page 808. What effects Hales's tract produced upon 
 the minds of many other moderate men of different religious per- 
 suasions, during the Commonwealth, is apparent in the numerous 
 quotations which they gave from its pages ; but its fruits were 
 most conspicuous in the-writings and opinions of the new race of 
 Arminiarts, who then arose in England, and Avho are well 
 described by Mosheim under the name of " Latitudinarians." — (See 
 pages 789—800.) 
 
 But those earlier Episcopal Divines whose theology was 
 applied to practical purposes', rather than to nice Predestinarian 
 disquisitions, were more decided friends to religious liberty than 
 their Calvinistical cotemporaries. Such great men as Bishops 
 Hooper, Bilson, Andrews, and Overal, Dr. Saravia, and Richard 
 Hooker, might with the strictest propriety have been called 
 " Arminians," had Arminianism, in their youthful days, had an 
 existence as a system of religious doctrines. But they, and mul- 
 titudes of other moderate and learned Divines, who were gene- 
 rally styled " Augustinians," thought it quite sufficient if they 
 adhered to the first and sounder opinions of St. Augustine on 
 Predestination, which had a sanctifying and practical tendency, 
 and which Arminius himself never exceeded. The grand enemy, 
 with whom the chief of these great men were compelled to con- 
 tend, was the Papist ; and in managing the usual arguments 
 against him, especially that first of rational Protestant axioms, 
 " THE Bible alone is- the Religion of Protestants," and 
 the absence of an infallible interpreter,- they naturally learned 
 and gave expression to the most Jiberal sentiments.f These tole- 
 
 " It is said, by Wood, to have been written at the particular desire of his 
 friend Chillingworth, when the latter was engaged in the composition of his 
 immortal book, the RelUiion of Protestants, which was commenced in 1634, 
 and printed in 1637. Hales's tract must therefore have been in circulation, at 
 least nine years before the murder of the Archbishop. 
 
 ■f In the year 1617, the amiable Bishop Overal, having twngratulated Grotijigj. 
 in a letter, on " the bright prospect, which then shone, oi greater concord and 
 more Christian toleration among the Dutch Divines," added the following just 
 remarks : " But I am unable adequately to express my astonishment, that there 
 are some persons among us in England who indulge such a dreadful antipathy 
 against your party, [the Arminians,] since it was long ago acknowledged, in 
 our arguments against the Papists, — as is sufficiently manifest among us from the 
 publication of Jewei/s Apology, — ' that these dissensions of Protestants do not 
 
 * relate to the principles, foundations, or heads of our own religion, but to 
 
 * lighter matters and questions of less importance.^ I hear that a certain treatise 
 by the present Bishop of Salisbury, who is the Archbishop of Canterbury's 
 brother, has been some time in the press. It is written against the Arminians. 
 and Thomson's Diatribe, At this circumstance I am net much surprised, 
 
IXTRODUCTIOK; XCvii 
 
 rant opinions, however, became somewhat reduced in Catholic 
 amphtude when the same individuals were under the necessity of 
 defending the Church, of whose unity in too restricted a sense 
 they were profound admirers, against the incroachments of the 
 Presbyterians and Brownists. Yet it is remarkable, that Richard 
 Hooker, who wrote against both parties, (the Papists and the 
 Disciplinarian brethren,) is far more liberal and tolerant in his 
 views of Religious Liberty than Richard Baxter,* Bishop Overal 
 than Dr. Lightfoot, (p. 467,) Dr. Hammond than Dr. John Owen, 
 
 siuce he formerly defended Perkins and his Reformed Catholic. How desir- 
 able, that we sliould discuss and determine Theological matters, and those 
 questions which concern the Christian Faith, not according to party prepossessions 
 and private opinions or feelings, but according to the sure ^Vord of God, and the 
 consent of the Ancient Church ! 'We might then entertain better hopes about 
 Evangelical Truth and Concord." 
 
 • In Baxter's Second Admonition to Bogshaw, he enumerates some of 
 the faults committed by himself during the Civil Wars, of which he then saw 
 cause to repent : 
 
 " I do repent, (again,) that I no more discouraged the spirit of peevish quar- 
 relling with Superiors and Church-orders ; and (though I ever disliked and 
 opposed it, yet) that I sometimes did too much encourage such as were of this 
 temper, by speaking too sharply against those things which I thought to be 
 Church-corruptions ; and was too loth to displease the contentious, for fear of 
 being uncapable to do them good, (knowing the profane to be much worse than 
 they,) and meeting with too few religious persons that were not too much pleased 
 with such invectives. 
 
 " I do repent also, that I had not more impartially and diligently consulted 
 with the best Lawyers that were against the Parliament's cause ; (for I know of 
 no controversy in Divinity about it, but in Politics ani Law;) and that I did not 
 use all possible means of full acquaintance with the case : — And that, for a little 
 while, the authority of such writers as ]Mr. Richard Hooker, (Lib. i, Eccles. 
 Polit.,) and Bishop Bilson, and other Episcopal Divines, did too much sway 
 my judgment toward the principles of Popular Power : — And, seeing the 
 Parliament Episcopal and Erastian ; and not hearing, when the war began, of 
 two Presbyterians among them all, nor among all their Lord Lieutenants, Gene- 
 rals, Ulajor-Generals, or Colonels, tiU long after; I was the easilier drawn to 
 think, that Hooker's Political Principles had been commonly received by aU; 
 which I discovered soon after, upon stricter enquiry, to be unsound, and have 
 myself written a confutation of them /" 
 
 This quotation is exceedingly important, for other reasons than that of shewing 
 the more tolerant character of the writings of Hooker and Bilson : It corrobo- 
 rates the remarks whicli I have made (page 379) upon Baxter's casuistry, about 
 the authority to which the allegiance of the people teas due. It is likewise 
 highly confirmatory of the correct view which I have given, (in pages 563 and 
 728,) of the true difference between Christian Subjection and Unchristian 
 Rebellion. I have there shewn how "■ the Puritans and the minor sects, in 1640, 
 in the capacity of Christiaxs, enrolled themselves under the banners of 
 ieditiou." Baxter, though full of subterfuges on this point in several of his 
 writings, here plainly owns, " that the controversy about the Parliament's Cause 
 " was not in Divinity, but in Politics and Law." If Richard, therefore, 
 had again entered on his lepublican career, and had resumed his former fighting 
 attitudes, he would have done so, not on principles of Divinity, (for by such 
 rebellious acts he would have unchristianized himself, according to his own 
 shewing,) but on principles of Law and Politics ; that is, merely as " a man of 
 the world." 
 
XCVIU TNTKODUCnOX. 
 
 (pp. 413, 41 6, 654,) and even Archbishop Laud (pp. 575, 577,)thim 
 that lusty pleader for Presbyterian Toleration, Stephen Marshall ! 
 
 6 Specimen of an Arminian Sermon before the Long Parliament. 
 
 Among the numerous anomalies perceptible in the fashion- 
 able Calvinism of the Civil Wars, was that of its being sud- 
 denly transformed into a system of powerful motives to 
 activity. The stirring and astute preachers before the Repub- 
 lican Senators, with scarcely one exception, called them to 
 the diligent performance of public duties ; and, instead of encou- 
 raging them to rely on their personal irrespective electio7i, (as they 
 had formerly been accustomed to encourage others,) they saw it 
 to be their province, as well as their interest, to give plain and 
 broad intimations to their political superiors, that their acceptance, 
 rvith the Almighty, sinA consequently their future salvation, depended 
 materially upon the conscientious and able manner in which they 
 discharged their high functions. Several traces of this strange 
 yet wily transformation of Calvinism may be seen in the preced- 
 ing pages, and a still greater number might readily be produced. 
 In some instances, the system seemed to be absolutely changed 
 into the ancient legal one of " Do this, and live ;" and the attempts 
 to prevent its assuming such an appearance were exceedingly 
 clumsy and awkward.* This strenuous mode of exciting men to 
 the performance of their duties, had those duties been of a lawful 
 ki?id, would have been strictly Arminian ; and the men by whom 
 
 • To give one instance out of many, — Thomas Valentine, preaching 
 before the House of Commons, Sept. 29, 1647, took for his text. Rev. iii, 18, 
 " / counsel thee to buy of me gold, and white raiment,''^ ^c, applied the 
 doctrine in the following manner : 
 
 " To counsel us is a rational way, and fit to work upon a man ; and God, that 
 tries always to do us good, takes this course to counsel us. ' I have, drawn thee 
 with cords of a man and bands of love.' (Hos. xi, 4.) I have dealt with thee, 
 more humano ; for man is counselable, but so is not a beast. Cage pecus, you 
 force a beast ; but man is to be persuaded. Speak reason and express love, and 
 you cannot be despised or slighted ; reason cannot be gainsayed. Though the 
 man will not confess he is conquered by your argument, yet the understanding 
 secretly must assent, and love cannot be contemned ; the party may, but love 
 cannot. But when the wise God shall speak reason, and manifest his love, we 
 
 should not despise his counsel It is very fit and proper for the action of buying, 
 
 you should not be compelled to buy the commodities here offered ; but you sh^ 
 use your reason, whether a poor man should not do all he can to get good gold, 
 and a naked man clothing." 
 
 This is all very good, and strictly Arminian. But, to remove all misappre- 
 hension on the subject, Valentine adds, in the next sentence : " But here I 
 must needs explain this point, lest we should think that a man ivere left to his 
 own liberty in the point of his conversion ; and this simile oi counselling to buy 
 must not be extended beyond the scope. And we say, that the will of man is 
 ,1 over-ruled and overpowered by the Spirit of Christ, so as it cannot but come in 
 i. upon the offer of grace ; and the will is determined to one thing, not left to itself 
 . I* to take or refuse what is tendered to it. And it is no absurdity, (whatever Ar- 
 ■,i! minians think,) to say, ' In the conversion of a sinner, there is a violence offered 
 -/''>' to the corruption of the will, and yet the will not wronged; a suspending of 
 ' the liberty of the will, and no destroying of it !' " - 
 
IKTRODUCTION. XClX 
 
 they were inculcated, really, though undesignedly, assisted in 
 the propagation of a religion of motives, conditions, and duties, 
 and of corresponding rewards and punishments, — 'which, when 
 severally propounded according to the lively oracles of God, constitute 
 pure and unsophisticated Arminianism.* On many subsequent 
 
 • This remarkable circumstance is mentioned in the following eloquent and 
 humourous manner, by John Goodwin, in his very able pamphlet entitled 
 The Banner of Justification displayed^ which was published in 1659 : 
 
 " Christian Reader, I weU know with which of my hands these papers are 
 offered unto thine : But I am somewhat doubtful with which of thine they will 
 be received. For I am far from judging thee unworthy the salutation of Christian, 
 because my thoughts may not be thine in matters of a more arduous and difficult 
 contemplation. Only the evil genius of these times worketh so effectually, acteth 
 so imperiously, yea, tyrannically in the minds and fancies of many, that it peraiits 
 them not the use of their right hand in receiving any thing from another, which is 
 not already an ingredient in the composition or body of their faith. But persons 
 of this character seem, not so much to desire to be free from error, as to presume 
 themselves so to be. The cross of Arminius is grown so heavy amongst us, and 
 the generality of professors so weak, that the greater part of them are not able to take 
 it up, though Truth be tied fast to it, and the burden of it hereby made much 
 more easy and light. Yet, if many of those who occupy the places of the learned, 
 were not more contradictious than their opinions, or, at least, than many of their 
 sayings, the cross we speak of would soon be abolished, and the offence of the 
 innocent doctrine, disguised with the vizard of Arjiiniaxism put upon the face 
 of it, would presently cease. And the certain truth is, that the unhappy dividing 
 character — between those who, measuring themselves by themselves, call them- 
 selves orthodox, — and those whom, because they cannot and do not measure them- 
 selves by their measure, they vote Arminian^—dLoih not stand in this, (as most 
 men take for granted,) viz. ' that the latter hold or teach things contrary unto or 
 ' inconsistent with the doctrines or opinions, delivered and taught by the former ;' 
 but rather in this, that the latter, [the Arminians,] in their judgment and doc- 
 trine, are Yea and Amen, the former [the Calvinists] Yea and Nay. My 
 meaning is, that the latter [the Arminians] are more uniform, steady, and coherent 
 with themselves in their notions and doctrines ; whereas the former [the Calvinists] 
 are desultory, and themselves as it were possessed of a spirit of Amphibology, 
 which sometimes taketh and casteth them into the fire of Calvinism, and otherwhile 
 into the waters of Arminianism so called. And this declaring of themselves, 
 toties quoties and from time to time, for the Contra-remonstrant tenets, is their 
 expiatory sacrifice, to cleanse them from the guQt of being thought Arminian, 
 notwithstanding their never so palpable and clear asserting the Remonstrant prin. 
 ciples at other times. Yea, let the minister commit the foul crime of Arminianism 
 never so openly in one part of his sermon, and but do penance in a fair contra- 
 diction in another part of it, hereby he stands rectus in curia : Orthodoxism 
 and SOUNDNESS in the Faith are imputed unto him. Yet it is no great 
 matter of commendation for such men to be orthodox, who, if truth lieth in either 
 part of the contradiction, (as it always doth, and of necessity must,) will be sure, 
 I cannot say so properly to tiold it, but to teach it. AVhereas they who shall, in 
 their doctrine, deliver the express matter and substance of what was taught by 
 the other, yea, though they should deliver it in the self-same words and expres- 
 sions, yet, unless they shall ever and anon be pulling down with their left hand 
 what in this kind they build up with their right, they shall be debtors, and be 
 compelled to bear the cross of Christ, under the name and notion of Arminius. 
 That whosoever helieveth in Jesus Christ sliall be saved, is the frequent, constant, 
 and most avouched doctrine of those men whose eye is so evil, against their 
 brethren, for standing at the left hand, as they suppose, of the Truth in the 
 
 g2 
 
C- IJiTRODUCTIOK. 
 
 occasions, Calvinism has been compelled to abandon for a season 
 her theory of personal Quietism, and of desecrating Uncondition- 
 ality, and to employ as powerful exhortations as ever her rival 
 did ; and the fruits of such scriptural labours have generally been 
 still more advantageous to the cause of God and Truth, than 
 even in the particular instance now adduced. 
 
 But though the crafty Predestinarian Divines perceived the 
 propriety of inciting their hearers to energetic endeavours, yet 
 they never lost sight of the secular interests of Calvinism : All 
 the pathetic Discourses, delivered before the Long Parliament, 
 were therefore addressed to them as Calvinists. One Sermon, 
 however, was preached to them, "the scope of which," its learned 
 author said, " was not to contend for this or that opinion, but 
 only to persuade men to the life of Christ, as the pith and kernel 
 of all religion." But the preacher, as might very naturally be 
 inferred, was never more invited to fill the pulpit of St. Marga- 
 ret's. This was the famous Dr. Ralph Cudworth, whose" Puri- 
 tanic education and connections, with his former Predestinarian 
 tenets, had prepared him for easily complying with the changes 
 which occurred in l643. But in prosecuting his metaphysical 
 studies, he compared the two contending systems, and, in com- 
 mon with Dr. Thomas Jackson, of Oxford, preferred the bene- 
 ficial and enlightening turn which Arminianism gave to those 
 speculations, — though in such studies he may be said to have 
 been "brought up at the feet of Gamaliel;" for his honoured 
 father was editor of Perkins's Works, and added some elucida- 
 tions to them in an Appendix. His son Ralph ultimately became 
 an Arminian, and consequently, at the Restoration, a Conform- 
 ist, and a noble champion not only for Revealed but also for 
 Experime?ital Religion. 
 
 Quinquarticular Controversies : I do not insist upon the doctrine specified, a» 
 the only ground or proof upon which I conclude, that those who profess and teach 
 the clear and direct sense of those whom they expose to the hatred and reproach 
 of poor ignorant souls, under the aspersive character of Arminiaks. The 
 truth is, that very many sermons are preached by them, wherein, though the face 
 of the doctrine they teach be set against one or other of those opinions, yet, in 
 their use and application, they reconcile themselves unto them. And, as the 
 Boman Orator observed, "• that the force of Justice is such and so great, that even 
 ' thieves and robbers, both by sea and land, who live upon injustice and rapine, yet 
 ' cannot live upon their trade without some practice of it [Justice] among them- 
 ' selves :' In like manner, the necessity and power of those tenets or doctrines, 
 nick-named Arminian, is so great for the accommodating and promoting the 
 affairs of Christianity, that even those persons themselves who get a good part 
 of their subsistence in the world by decrying them, and declaiming against them, 
 yet cannot make earnings of their profession, are not able to carry on their work 
 of preaching, with any tolerable satisfaction to those that hear them, without 
 employing and asserting them very frequently. Yea, the truth is, that the 
 grounds and principles of the Remonftrant Faith, (for so we have been and are 
 unhappily constrained to distinguish them,) are, as it were, some of the choicest 
 and most useful implements or tools, with which they work upon their art whereby 
 they get their living." 
 
JNTRODUCTION. CI 
 
 When Cudworth preached that Sermon before the House of 
 Commons, March 31, 164^7, he might not himself be conscious 
 of " contending for this or thai opinion;" but-as Arminianism 
 has been shewn to be practical Christianity, the rc-«der, .after a 
 perusal of the following passages, will not so far mistake his 
 *' scope," as to suppose that he was then pleading „in 'p-ehelf o£. 
 Calvinism : ''-•..-,." 
 
 " He that builds all his comfort upon an ungrounded persua- 
 sion, ' that God from all eternity hath loved him, and absolutely 
 ' decreed him to life and happiness,' and seeketh not for God 
 really dwelling in his soul ; he builds his house upon a quick- 
 sand, and it shall suddenly sink and be swallowed up: 'His hope 
 shall be cut off, and his trust shall be « spider's web ; he shall lean 
 upon his house, but it shall not stand ; he shall hold it fast, but it 
 shall not endure.' We are no where commanded to pry into these 
 secrets ; but the wholesome counsel and advice given us, is this, 
 * to make our calling and election sure-' We have no warrant in 
 Scripture to peep into these hidden rolls and volumes of eternity, 
 and to make it our first thing that we do, when we come to 
 Christ, to spell out our names in the stars, and to persuade our- 
 selves that we are certainly elected to everlasting happiness, 
 before we see the image of God, in righteousness and true holi- 
 ness, shaped in our hearts. God's everlasting decree is too daz- 
 zling and bright an object for us at first to set our eye upon. It is 
 far easier and safer for us to look upon the rays of his goodness 
 and holiness as they are reflected in our own hearts ; and there 
 to read the mild and gentle characters of God's love to us, in our 
 love to him, and our hearty compliance with his heavenly will : 
 As it is safer for us, if we would see the sun, to l(*ok upon it 
 here below in a pail of water, than to cast up our daring eyes 
 upon the body of the sun itself, which is too radiant and scorch- 
 ing for us. The best assurance that any one can have of his 
 interest in God, is doubtless the conformity of his soul to him. 
 Those Divine purposes, whatsoever they be, are altogether un- 
 searchable and unknowable by us ; they lie wrapt up in everlasting 
 darkness, and covered in a deep abyss : Who is able to fathom 
 the bottom of them? The way to obtain a good assurance, 
 indeed, of our title to heaven, is, not to clamber up to it by a 
 ladder of our own ungrounded persuasions, but to dig as low 
 as hell by humility and self-denial in our own hearts: And 
 though this may seem to be the furthest way about, yet it is 
 indeed the nearest and safest way to it. We must, as the Greek 
 epigram speaks, ascend downward and descend upward^ if we would 
 indeed come to heaven, or get any true persuasion of our title to 
 it. The most gallant and triumphant confidence of a Christian 
 riseth safely and surely upon this low foundation, that lies deep 
 under ground ; and there stands firmly and stedfastly. When 
 our heart is once tuned into a conformity with the word of God, 
 
 g3 
 
Cll INTRODUCTION. 
 
 whfen we feel our will perfectly to concur with his will, we shall 
 then presently perceive ' a Spirit of adoption' within ourselves, 
 teaching us t© cry 'Abba, Father!' (Rom. viii, 15.) 
 
 " fint;I: w*j?Ja It were not the distemper of our times, to scare 
 and friglil men ,oijly with opinions, and make them only solici- 
 tous- abDUt Chf. •entej'taining of this and that speculation, which 
 V'l^l not render them any thing the better in their lives, or the 
 liker unto God ; whilst, in the mean time, there is no such care 
 taken about keeping of Christ's cainmandments, and being renewed 
 in our minds according to the image of God, in righteousness 
 and true holiness. We say, ' Lo, here is Christ !' and ' Lo, there 
 is Christ !,' in these and these opinions ; whereas, in truth, Christ 
 is neither here, nor there, nor any where but where the Spirit of 
 Christ, where the life of Christ is. Do we not now-a-days open 
 and lock up heaven, with the private key of this and that opinion 
 of our own, according to our several fancies as we please .'' And 
 if any one observe Christ's commandments never so sincerely, 
 and serve God with faith and a pure conscience, that yet haply 
 skills not of some contended-for opinions, some darling notions ; 
 he hath not the right Shibboleth, he hath not the true watch-word, 
 he must not pass the guards into heaven. Do we not make this 
 and that opinion, this and that outward form, to be the wedding- 
 garment, and boldly sentence those to outer darkness that are 
 not invested therewith.^ Whereas, every true Christian finds 
 the least dram of hearty affection towards God to be more cordial 
 and sovereign to his soul, than all the speculative notions and 
 opinions in the world : And though he study also to inform his 
 understanding aright, and free his mind from all error and mis- 
 apprehensions, yet it is nothing but the life of Christ deeply 
 rooted in his heart, which is the chemical elixir that he feeds 
 upon. He feeleth himself safely anchored in God : and will not 
 be dissuaded from it, though perhaps he skill not many of those 
 subtleties which others make the Alpha and Omega of their 
 religion. Neither is he scared with those childish affrightments, 
 with which some would force their private conceits upon him : 
 He is above the superstitious dreading of mere speculative 
 opinions, as well as the superstitious reverence of outward cere- 
 monies : He cares not so much for subtlety, as for soundness and 
 health of mind. 
 
 " I wish it may not prove some of our cases, at that last day, 
 to use such pleas as these unto Christ in our behalf: ' Lord, I have 
 'prophesied in thy name; I have preached many a zealous sermon 
 ' for Thee ; I have kept many a long fast ; I have been very 
 ' active for Thy cause in Church, in State ; nay, I never made 
 ' any question but that my name was written in thy Book of 
 ' Life :' When yet, alas ! we shall receive no other return from 
 Christ, but this, ' I know ymi not; depart from me, ye workers of 
 iniquity.' 
 
I 
 
 INTRODUCTION. ClU 
 
 " What is it that thus cheats us, and gulls us of our religion ; 
 that makes us thus constantly to tread the same ring and circle 
 of duties, where we make no progress at all forwards, and, the 
 further we go, are still never the nearer to our journey's end ? 
 What is it that thus starves our religion, and makes it look like 
 those kine in Pharaoh's dream, ill-favoured and lean-fleshed; that 
 it hath no colour in its face, no blood in its veins, no life nor 
 heat at all in its members ? WTiat is it that doth thus be-dwarf 
 us in our Christianity ? What low, sordid, and unworthy prin- 
 ciples do we act by, that thus hinder our growth, and make us 
 stand at a stay, and keep us always in the very porch and 
 entrance, where we first began ? Is it a sleepy, sluggish conceit, 
 
 * That it is enough for us if we be but once in a state qjf grace ; if we 
 ' have but once stepped ovei- the threshold, we need not take so 
 
 * great pains to travel any further ?' Or is it another damping, 
 choaking, stifling opinion, ' Thac Christ hath done all for us 
 ' already without us, and nothing need more to be done within us ? 
 
 * No matter how wicked we be in ourselves, for we have holiness 
 'without us; no matter how sickly and diseased our souls be 
 ' within, for they have health without them !' Why may we not 
 as well be satisfied and contented, to have happiness without us 
 too to all eternity, and so ourselves for ever continue miserable ? 
 ' Little children, let no man deceive you : He that doeth 7-ighteousness, 
 is righteous, even as He is righteous ; but he that committeth sin, is of 
 the devil.' I shall therefore exhort you in the wholesome words 
 of St, Peter : ' Give all diligence to add to your faith, virtue ; and to 
 virtue, knowledge ;' S^-c." 
 
 I linger with much complacency over this single specimen of 
 Arminian preaching before the Long Parliament ; because it 
 exhibits, in such a conspicuous manner, the practical and hallow- 
 ing tendency of the principles of General Redemption. This 
 "Discourse presents the first-fruits of that glorious harvest which 
 sprung up from the seed sown by the Dutch Remonstrants during 
 the Inier-regnum, (p. 785,) and not from the school of Laud, 
 "who " did not permit this scriptural system freely to develope 
 itself." (Page 691-) I prize it the more highly, because it con- 
 tains a distinct recognition of that spirituality and holiness which 
 I have pointed out, (pp. xxvi, 803,) as distinguishing character- 
 istics of the doctrines which genuine Arminianism derives from 
 the Scriptures, and which it uniformly inculcates. Of the spirit- 
 ual religion, here described, Dr. Cudworth was not ashamed 
 after the Restoration, when all the wit of man was employed in 
 exposing it to ridicule, on account of the abuse of it by the Puri* 
 tans: (Page 296:) For he reprinted this Sermon in the first 
 edition (I678) of his immortal work, " The true Intellectual 
 System of the Universe," without any omission except that 
 of the Dedication to the House of Commons. Every man of piety 
 
CIV IXTKODIJCTIOX. 
 
 ■will be charmed by such manly and scriptural eloquence ae 
 breathes in the following passages : 
 
 " The Gospel is a true Bethesda, — a pool of grace, — where such 
 poor, lame, and infirm creatures as we are, upon the moving of 
 God's Spirit in it, may descend down, not only to wash our skin 
 and outside, but also to be cured of our diseases within. And 
 ■whatever the world thinks, there is a powerful Spirit that moves 
 upon these waters, the Avaters of the Gospel, for this new crea- 
 tion, the regeneration of souls : The very same Spirit, that once 
 moved upon the waters of the universe at the first creation, and, 
 spreading its mighty wings over them, did hatch the new-born 
 world into this perfection ; 1 say, the same Almighty Spirit of 
 Christ still worketh in the Gospel, spreading its gentle, healing, 
 quickening wings over our souls. TKe Gospel is not like Abana 
 and Pharphar, those common rivers of Damascus, that could 
 only cleanse the outside; but it is a true Jordan, in which such 
 leprous Naamans, as we all are, may wash and be clean. ' Blessed, 
 indeed, are they, whose iniquities are forgiven, and whose sins are 
 covered ! Blessed is the man to wJiom the Lord will not impute sin !' 
 But yet, rather blessed are they, whose sins are removed like a 
 morning-cloud, and quite taken away from them ! ' Blessed,' 
 thrice blessed, ' are they that hunger and thirst after righteousness, 
 for they shall he satisfied : Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall 
 see God.' 
 
 " Now, therefore, I beseech you, let us consider, whether 
 or no we know Christ indeed ; not by our acquaintance with 
 systems and models of Divinity ; not by our skill in books and 
 papers; but by our keeping of Christ's commandments. All the 
 books and writings which we converse with, they can but repre- 
 sent spiritual objects to our understandings ; which yet we can 
 never see in their own true figure, colour, and proportion, until 
 Ave have a Divine light within, to irradiate and shine upon them. 
 Though there be never such excellent truths concerning Christ 
 and his Gospel, set down in words and letters, yet they will be 
 but unknown characters to us until we have a living Spirit within 
 us, that can decipher ' them ; until the same Spirit, by secret 
 whispers in our hearts, do comment upon them, which did at 
 first indite them. There be many that understand the Greek 
 and Hebrew of the Scripture, the original languages in which 
 the text was written, that never understood the language of the 
 Spirit. There is a caro and a spiritus, a flesh and a spirit, a body 
 and a soul, in all the writings of the Scriptures. It is but the 
 flesh and body of Divine truths, that is printed upon paper ; 
 which many moths of books and libraries do only feed upon ; 
 many walking skeletons of knowledge, that bury and entomb 
 truths in the living sepulchres of their souls, do only converse 
 uith : Such as never did any thing else but pick at the mere 
 
INTRODUCTIoK. CT ' 
 
 bark and rind of truths, and crack the shells of them, But there 
 is a soul and spirit of Divine truths, that could never yet be con- 
 gealed into ink, that could never be blotted upon paper, which, 
 by a secret traduction and conveyance, passeth from one soul 
 unto another ; being able to dwell and lodge no where but in a 
 spiritual being, in a living thing, because itself is nothing but 
 life and spirit. Neither can it, where indeed it is, express itself 
 sufficiently in words and sounds, but it will best declare and 
 speak itself in actions : As the old manner of writing among 
 the Egyptians was, not by words, but things. The life of Divine 
 truths is better expressed in actions than in words, because 
 actions are more living things than words. Words are nothing 
 but the dead resemblances and pictures of those truths, which 
 live and breathe in actions ; and ' the kingdo7n of God,' (as the 
 Apostle speaketh,) * consisteth not in word, but in life and poiver.' 
 — ' Sheep do not come,' saith the Moral Philosopher, ' and bring 
 
 * their fodder to their shepherd, and shew him how much they 
 
 * eat ; but, inwardly concocting and digesting it, they make it 
 ' appear, by the fleece which they wear upon their backs, and 
 
 * by the milk which they give.' And let not us Christians affect 
 only to talk and dispute of Christ, and so measure our knowledge 
 of him by our words ; but let us shew our knowledge concocted 
 into our lives and actions ; and then let us really manifest that 
 we are Christ's sheep indeed, that we ai*e his disciples, by that 
 fleece of holiness which we wear,* and by the fruits that we daily 
 
 • The following beautiful description of Holiness is in the best style of " the 
 judicious Hooker," and will prove, both to the critic and the Christian, that 
 Dr. Cudworth had read with the deepest attention the productions of that great 
 Divine : 
 
 " Grace is holiness militant, — ^holiness encumbered with many enemies and 
 difficulties, which it still fights against, and manfully quits itself of: And 
 Glory is nothing else but holiness triumphant, — holmess with a palm of victory 
 in her hand, and a crown upon her head. ' God himself cannot make me happy, 
 ' if he be only without me ; and unless he give in a participation of himself, and 
 ' his own likeness into my soul.' — Happiness is nothing, but the releasing and 
 unfettering of our souls from all these narrow, scant, and particular good things ; 
 and the espousing of them to the Highest and most Universal Good, which is 
 not this or that particular good, but goodness itself : And this is the same 
 thing that we call Holiness. 
 
 " Holiness is no solitary neglected thing ; it hath stronger confederacies, 
 greater alliances, than sin and wickedness. It is in league with God, and the 
 whole universe ; the whole creation smiles upon it : There is something of God in 
 it, and therefore it must needs be a victorious and triumphant thing. — Wicked- 
 ness is a weak, cowardly, and guilty thing, a fearful and trembling shadow. It 
 is the child of ignorance and darkness ; it is afraid of light, and cannot possibly 
 withstand the power of it, nor endure the sight of its glittering armour. It is 
 allianced to none but wretched, forlorn, and apostate spirits, that do what they 
 can to support their own weak and tottering kingdom of darkness, but are only 
 strong in weakness and impotency. The whole polity and commonwealth of 
 devils is not so powerful as one child of Light, one babe in Christ : They are not 
 all able to *■ quench the least smoking flax,' to extinguish one spark of grace. 
 
CVl INTKODUCTION. 
 
 yield in our lives and conversations. For ' herein,' saith Christ, 
 * is my Father glorified, that ye bear vmch fruit : so shall ye be my 
 disciples.' Let us not, I beseech you, judge of our knowing 
 Chrjst, by our ungrounded persuasions that Christ from all 
 eternity hath loved us, and given himself particularly for us, 
 •without the conformity of our lives to Christ's commandments, 
 withoijt the real partaking of the image of Christ in our hearts. 
 The great mystery of the Gospel doth not lie only in Christ 
 tvithout us, (though we must know also what he hath done for 
 us,) but the very pith and kernel of it consists in Christ inwardly 
 formed i?i our hearts. Nothing is truly ours, but what lives in 
 our spirits. Salvation itself cannot save us, as long as it is only 
 without us ; no more than health can cure us and make us sound, 
 when it is not within us, but somewhere at distance from us ; 
 no more than Arts and Sciences, whilst they lie only in books 
 and papers without us, can make us learned." 
 
 7.'—The Re-establishmetd of Episcopacy, and a comprehensive View 
 of the Act of Uniformity. 
 
 In a preceding page, (xciv,) and in other parts of this work, 
 I have shewn the close affinity which subsists between Armin- 
 ianism and Civil and Religious Liberty. In the long note, page 
 687, I have also tendered much information concerning the 
 relative political circumstances, in which the English Calvinists 
 and Arminians were placed at the commencement of the Civil 
 Wars. In the preceding extracts from Dr. Cudworth's sermon, 
 he has expressed the same sentiments concerning liberty of con,' 
 science, and his being not greatly scrupulous about the externals of 
 
 Darkness is not able to make resistance against light, but ever, as it comes, flies 
 before it. But if wickedness invite the society of devils to it, (as we learn by the 
 sad experience of these present times, in many examples of those that were pos- 
 sessed with malice, revengefulness, and lust,) so that those cursed fiends do most 
 readily apply themselves to it, and oiFer their service to feed it and encourage it ; 
 because it is their own life and nature, their own kingdom of darkness, which 
 they strive to enlarge, and to spread the dominions of: Shall we then think, 
 that holiness, which is so nearly allied unto God, hath no good genius at all 
 in the world to attend upon it, to help it, and encourage it ? Shall not the kingdom 
 of Light be as true to its own interest, and as vigUant for the enlarging of itself, as 
 the kingdom, of Darkness "i — Holiness is never alone in the world, but God is always 
 with it ; and his loving Spirit doth ever associate and join itself to it. He that sent 
 it into the world is with it, as Christ speaketh of himself, ' The Father hath not 
 left me alone., because I do alivays those things that please him.'' Holiness is the 
 life of God, which he cannot but feed and maintain wheresoever it is; and as 
 the devils are always active to encourage evU, so we cannot imagine but that the 
 heavenly host of blessed angels above are as busUy employed, in the promoting of 
 that which they love best, that which is dearest to God whom they serve, THE 
 Life and Nature of God! ' There is joy in heaven at the conversion of 
 one sinner ,•' Heaven takes notice of it ; there is a choir of angels that sweetly 
 sings the epithalamium of a soul divorced from sin and Satan, and espoused unto 
 Christ." 
 
INTUOUUCTIOlf. CVM 
 
 relis^hnj (p. 800,) as the English Latitude-men did in the year 
 l6(32. Though attached to the chaste ceremonies of the Church 
 of England, they were not so unreasonable as to number them 
 among the essentials of salvation. They lived to see the truth of 
 that opinion which I have quoted, in page 635, from Grotius, 
 when he recommends the Dutch Remonstrants to adopt Epis- 
 copacy by " receiving imposition of hands from the Irish Arch- 
 bishop" then in Holland, " and so commence their return to 
 customs which are at once ancient and salutary." This is a high and 
 disinterested compliment to the rites of the Church of England, 
 then in ruins. " Whenever those customs have been despised," 
 Grotius adds, " the licence for framing new opinions has in- 
 " creased, and has created new churches ; and what the articles 
 " of belief in such churches will be a few years hence, we cannot 
 " determine." — Having beheld with their own eyes a sad exempli- 
 fication of this religious licentiousness, Tillotson, Burnet, Cudworth, 
 and other great and good men, declared themselves in favour of 
 Episcopal government, as soon as the former unjust restraints 
 upon it were removed, and before that species of regimen was 
 re-established by law. The reader will find, in a subsequent part 
 of this Introduction, the grievous lamentations of the Noncon- 
 formists when these eminent individuals refused to join their 
 ranks, and to oppose the rising interests of Arminianism. 
 The accession of such divines as these was most important to 
 Episcopacy. Their principles were generally of a milder and more 
 tolerant complexion, than those of their predecessors; and the 
 fine description, in page 801, is exceedingly appropriate : " They 
 seemed to be the very chariots and horsemen of the Church," &c. 
 
 These excellent men had not obtained much influence in 1662: 
 Their share, therefore, in the permanent settlement of the Church 
 at that period, was exceedingly slight; and the religious persecu- 
 tion which ensued, does not attach to the Arminians of " the new 
 learning." But had their conduct been different, had they even 
 become active partizans in that persecution of Dissenters, many 
 excuses might have been made for them, on the common prin- 
 ciples of human nature, and from the peculiar circumstances in 
 which the Episcopal party had been previously placed. 
 
 The Act of Uniformity and its concomitants are industriously 
 represented, by the advocates of the party aggrieved, as insulated 
 occurrences unconnected with former transactions. To those 
 who are inclined to give implicit credence to such representations, 
 and, without accurate information, to circulate such reports, it 
 may be well to submit the following account from one of the 
 finest and most impartial biographical notices that was ever 
 written in the English language :* 
 
 • The high authority of Parr's Li/eo/ Archbishop Usher was demonstrated at 
 the period of its first issuing from the press, which was in the tyrannical reign of 
 King James the Second, who interposed his power to prevent its publication. 
 
 ^ 
 
crm IXTRODCCTION. 
 
 " About this time, 1648, whilst his late Majesty was kept pri- 
 soner at Carisbrook Castle in the Isle of Wight, the Lord Primate 
 [^Archbishop Usher] was highly concerned at the dislo3'al actions 
 of the two Houses towards their lawful prince : To express which, 
 he preached at Lincoln's Inn on this text, Sai/ ye not a confede- 
 racy to all them to whom this people shall say a confederacy ! 
 neither fear you their fear, nor be afraid. Sanctify the Lord of 
 hosts Himself, and let Him he your fear, and let Him be your dread. 
 (fsai. viii, 12, IS.) Wherein he sufficiently expressed his dislike 
 of those Covenants and Confederacies into which they had now 
 entered, contrary to that oath they had taken already, and that 
 we should not fear man more than God, when we were to do our 
 duty to our prince or country. Not long after which, the Pres- 
 byterians, finding the Independent party too strong for them, had 
 no way left to secure themselves, but by recalling their votes of 
 non-addresses, and to vote a treaty with his Majesty in the Isle 
 of Wight. And because the differences concerning church- 
 government were not the least of those that were to be settled 
 and concluded at this treaty, and for which it was necessary for 
 his Majesty to consult with some of his Bishops and divines, the 
 Lord Primate was sent for by the King, among divers others, to 
 attend him for that purpose. When he came thither, he found 
 one of the greatest points then in debate, was about the government 
 of the church, the Parliament Commissioners insisting peremptorily 
 for the abolishing and taking away Archbishops, Bishops, &c. 
 out of the churches of England and Ireland. His Majesty 
 thought he could not with a good conscience consent to that 
 demand, viz. totally to abolish or take away Episcopal government. 
 But his Majesty then declared, that he no otherwise aimed at the 
 keeping up the present hierarchy in the church, than what was 
 most agreeable to the Episcopal government in the primitive and 
 purest times. But his Majesty (since the Parliament insisted so 
 obstinately on it,) was at last forced to consent to the suspension 
 of Episcopacy for three years, but would by no means agree to 
 
 This circumstance is thus related with much artlessness and judgment by Evelyk, 
 in his Diary : 
 
 "April 18, 1686 In the afternoon I went to Camberwell, to visit Dr. Parr. 
 
 After sermon I accompanied him to his house, where he shewed me the Life and 
 Letters of the late learned Primate of Armagh^ (Usher,) and among them that 
 letter of Bishop Bramhal's to the Primate, giving notice of the Popish practices to 
 pervert this nation, by sending a hundred priests into England, who were to con- 
 form themselves to all sectaries and conditions for the more easily dispersing their 
 doctrine amongst us. This letter was the cause of the whole impression being 
 seized, upon pretence that it was a political or historical account of things not 
 relating to theology, though it had been licensed by the bishop ; which plainly 
 shewed what an interest the Papist now had, that a Protestant book, containing the 
 life and letters of so eminent a man, was not to be published. There were also 
 many letters to and from most of the learned persons his correspondents in 
 Europe. The book will, I doubt not, struggle through this unjust impediment." 
 
INTRODUCTION. CfA 
 
 take away Bishops absolutely. But now, to stop the present 
 career of the Presbyterian discipline, the Lord Primate proposed 
 an expedient, which he called Episcopal and Presbyterial g^overn- 
 ment conjoiiied, and which he, not long after he came thither, 
 delivered into his Majesty's hands, who, having perused it, liketl 
 it well, saying, ' It was the only expedient to reconcile the pre- 
 ' sent differences,' For his Majesty, in his last message to the 
 Parliament, had before condescended to the reducing of Episcopal 
 government into a much narrower compass, viz. not only to the 
 Apostolical institution;, but much farther than the Lord Primate 
 proposed or desired, even to the taking away of Archbishops, 
 Deans, Chapters, &c. together with all that additional power and 
 jurisdiction which his Majesty's predecessors had bestowed upon 
 that function : Which message, being read in the House, was by 
 them, notwithstanding, voted unsatisfactory. So that the Pres- 
 byterian party was so absolutely bent to abolish the very order 
 of Bishops, that no proposals of his Majesty, though never so 
 moderate, would content them. Till at last, (when they had 
 wrangled so long till they saw the King's person seized by the 
 army, and that the power was like to be taken out of their hands,) 
 they then grew wiser, and would have agreed to his proposals 
 when it was too late : And so the Presbyterian party saw them- 
 selves, within a few days after, forcibly excluded and turned out 
 of doors, by that very army which they themselves had raised 
 and hired to fight against their prince; which, as it was the cause 
 of his Majesty's destruction, so it proved their own ruin. 
 
 " It was not the Lord Primate's design or intention, in the least, 
 to rob the Bishops of any of those just rights which are essentially 
 necessary to their order and constitution, and M-ithout abasing 
 Episcopacy into Presbytery, or stripping the church of its lands 
 and revenues, both which the Lord Primate always abhorred : 
 For he was of his Majesty's mind in his excellent Icoiv Basilicon, 
 ' that Presbytery is never so considerable or effectual, as when it 
 ' is joined to and crowned with Episcopacy.' — And that the king 
 himself was then convinced, that this was the best expedient for 
 the settling of the church at that time, you may likewise see by 
 ■what he writes in the same chapter in these words, viz : ' Not 
 ' that I am against the managing of this presidency and authority 
 
 * in one man, by the joint counsel and consent of many Presby- 
 ' ters: I have offered to restore that, as a fit means to avoid those 
 
 * errors, corruptions, and partialities which are incident to any 
 ' one man.' — And so likewise, in the chapter about the reformation 
 of the times, he has this pasage : ' I was willing to grant or 
 ' restore to Presbytery what with reason or discretion it can pre- 
 ' tend to, in a conjuncture, with Episcopacy. But, for that, 
 ' wholly to invade the power, and by the sword to arrogate and 
 ' quite abrogate the authority of that ancient order, I think neither 
 
 * just as to Episcopacy, nor safe for Presbytery, nor yet any w^ay 
 
ex TXTRODTJCTIOM. 
 
 ' convenient for this Church or State.' — And that the most pious 
 and learned Dr. Hammond* was, about the same time, of the 
 Lord Primate's judgment in this matter, may appear by this pas- 
 sage in the preface to his treatise of The Power of the KexfS : 
 ' That a moderate Episcopacy, with a standing assistant Presby- 
 ' tery, as it will certainly satisfy the desires of those whose pre- 
 ' tensions are regular and moderate ; craving nothing more, and 
 
 * in some things less, than the laws of the land : So that it will 
 
 * appear to be that which all parties can best tolerate, and which, 
 ' next to himself^ both Presbyterian, Independent, and Erastian, 
 ' will make no question to choose and prefer before any of the 
 
 * other pretenders.' 
 
 " Though it may be true, that divers of the more sober of the 
 Presbyterian party have seemed to have approved of these terms 
 of reconciliation^ yet it has been only since the ill success their 
 discipline hath met with, both in England and Scotland;, that has 
 made them more moderate in their demands : For it is very well 
 known, that, when these terms were first proposed, the ring- 
 leaders of the party utterly cried them down as a great enemy to 
 Presbytery ; since this expedient would have yet left Episcopacy 
 in a better condition than it is at this day in any of the Lutheran 
 churches. But they were not then for Divisum Imperium, [they] 
 would have all or nothing ; and they had their desires. So that 
 it is no wonder if the Lord Primate, in this endeavour of reconci- 
 liation, met with the common fate of arbitrators, to please neither 
 party. But though the church is now restored (beyond our 
 expectation as well as merits,) to all its just rights and privileges, 
 
 • Several other eminent Episcopal Divines were at that period advocates for 
 such an accommodation. The following is Dr. Gauden's scheme for a co- 
 alition of the three great denominations, which he proposed to the world, only two- 
 years prior to the Restoration : 
 
 "All agree in the main Christian graces, virtues, and morals required in a good 
 
 Christian's practice ; yet still each party is suspected and reproached by others 
 
 The brisk Independent boasts of the liberty, simplicity, and purity of his way ; 
 yet is blamed for novelty, subtilty, vulgarity, and anarchy The rigid Presby- 
 terian glories in his aristocratic parity, and levelling community, which makes 
 every petty Presbyter a Pope and a Prince, though he disdain to be a Priest ; yet 
 is taxed for petulancy, popularity, arrogancy, and novelty, casting off that catho- 
 lic and ancient order which God and nature, reason and religion, all civil and 
 
 military policy, both require and observe among all societies Episcopacy 
 
 justly challengeth the advantages, right, and honour of apostolic and primitive 
 antiquity, of universality and unity, beyond any pretenders ; yet is this condemned 
 by some for undue encroachments and oppressions upon both ministers' and peo- 
 ple's ingenuous liberty and christian privilege, by a kind of secular height and 
 arbitrary sovereignty, to which many Bishops in after ages have been betrayed, as 
 by their own pride and ambition, so by the indulgence of the times, the munificence 
 of christian princes, and sometimes by the flatteries of people. 
 
 " Take away the popular principle of the first, which prostrates government to 
 the vulgar; take away the levelling ambition of the second, which degrades 
 government to a very preposterous and unproportionate parity ; take away the 
 
INTRODUCTION'. CXI 
 
 without the least diminution ; yet certainly no good subject or son 
 of the church, either of the Clergy or Laity ,^ at that time when 
 this expedient was proposed, but would have been very well con- 
 tented to have yielded farther than this, to have preserved his late 
 Majesty's life, and to have prevented those schisms and confusions 
 which, for so many years, harrassed these poor nations. But if 
 our king and church are Isoth now restored, it is what then no man 
 could foresee ; it is the Lord's doing, and is marvellous in our eyes !" 
 
 To complete the correct view, which the reader will now have 
 obtained of the ecclesiastical events preliminary to the Act of Uni- 
 formity, it will be necessary to present him with the subjoined 
 elucidatory extract from Bishop Heber's Life of Jeremy Taylor : 
 
 " It has happened almost uniformly, in cases of religious differ- 
 ence, that those schisms have been most bitter, if not most lasting, 
 which have arisen on topics of dispute comparatively unimportant, 
 and where the contending parties had, apparently, least to con- 
 cede, and least to tolerate. Nor are there many instances on 
 record which more fully and more unfortunately exemplify this 
 general observation, than that of the quarrel and final secession of 
 the Puritan clergy from the church, in the year 16'62. Both par- 
 ties, in that case, were agreed on the essentials of Christianity. 
 Both professed themselves not unwilling to keep out of sight, and 
 mutually endure, the few doctrinal points on which a difference 
 existed between them. The leading Puritans were even disposed 
 to submit to that episcopal government, their opposition to which, 
 during former reigns, had created so much disturbance, and had 
 led, by degrees, to such abundant bloodshed and anarchy. And 
 it is no less true than strange, that this great quarrel, which 
 divided so many holy and learned preachers of the common faith, 
 was occasioned and perpetuated by men, who, chiefly resting 
 their objections to the form and colour of an ecclesiastical gar- 
 ment, the wording of a prayer, or the injunction of kneeling at 
 
 monopoly of the third, which seems to engross to one man more than is meet for 
 the whole : Each of them will be sufficiently purged (as I conceive) of what is 
 most dangerous or noxious in them, for which they are most jealous of, and divided 
 from each other. Restore to People their liberty in some such way of choosing, 
 or at least approving their ministers, and assenting to church-censures, as may 
 become them in reason and conscience ; restore to Presbyters their privileges in 
 such public counsel and concurrence with their Bishops as may become them. 
 Lastly, restore to Bishops that primitive precedency and catholic presidency 
 which they ever had among and above presbyters, both for that chief authority or 
 eminency which they ever had in ordaining of presbyters and deacons, also in 
 exercising such ecclesiastical discipline and censures, that nothing be done with- 
 out them : I see no cause why any sober ministers and wise men should be 
 unsatisfied, nor *hy they should longer stand at such distances and defiances, as 
 if the liberties of christian people, the privileges of christian presbyters, and the 
 dignity of christian bishops, were wholly inconsistent ; whereas they are easily 
 reconciled, and, as a three-fold cord, may be so handsomely twisted together, that 
 none should have cause to complain or be jealous, all should have cause to joy in 
 and enjoy each other." 
 
C.Xn IXTFODUfTIO-y. 
 
 the eucharist, were willing, foi* questions like these, to disturb 
 the peace of the religious world, and subject themselves to the 
 same severities which they had previously inflicted on the episco- 
 pal clergy. 
 
 " With these men, whether in England, or Ireland, there 
 were apparently only three lines of conduct for the ruling powers 
 to follow. 
 
 " The FIRST was, the adoption of such a liturgy and form of 
 church government as would, at once^ satisfy the advocates of 
 episcopacy and presbytery. This was attempted in vain ; and 
 was, indeed, a measure, the failure of which, a very slight atten- 
 tion to the prejudices and animosity of both parties would have 
 enabled a by-stander to anticipate. 
 
 " The SECOND was that which was, at least virtuallj', promised by 
 the king in the declaration of Breda; that, namely, uniformity of 
 discipline and worship should, for the present, not be insisted on ; 
 that the Presbyterian and Independent preachers should, during 
 their lives, be continued in the churches where they were settled ; 
 ejecting only those who had been forcibly intruded, to the pre- 
 judice of persons yet alive, and who might legally claim re- 
 instatement ; and filling up the vacancies of such as died, with 
 ministers episcopally ordained and canonically obedient. In this 
 case, it is possible that, as the stream of preferment and patronage 
 would have been confined to those who conformed, as the great 
 body of the nation were strongly attached to the liturgy, and 
 gave a manifest preference to those churches Avhere it was used ; 
 and as the covenanting clergy would have no longer been under 
 the influence of that point of honour, which, when its observance 
 was compulsory, induced them to hold out against it, — the more 
 moderate, even of the existing generation, would have by degrees 
 complied with their own interests and the inclination of their 
 flocks ; while the course of nature, and the increasing infirmities 
 of age, must, in a few years, have materially diminished the num- 
 bers and influence of the more pertinacious. We have found, in 
 fact, by experience, that the liturgy has, through its intrinsic 
 merits, obtained, by degrees, no small degree of reverence even 
 among those who, on other grounds, or on no grounds at all, dis- 
 sent from the church of England, as at present constituted. And 
 it is possible that, by thus forbearing to press its observance on 
 those whose minds were so ill prepared to receive it, a generation 
 would soon have arisen, to whom their objections Avould have 
 appeared in their natural weakness, and the greatest and least 
 rational of those schisms have been prevented, which have de- 
 stroyed the peace and endangered the existence of the British 
 churches. 
 
 "But, while we at the present day are amusing ourselves 
 with schemes of what we should have done had we lived in the 
 time of our fathers, it may be well, for the justification of these 
 
INTRODUCTIOX. CXlll 
 
 last, to consider how little the principles of toleration were then 
 understood by either party ; how deeply and how recently the 
 episcopal clergy, and even the laity of the same persuasion, had 
 suffered from the very persons who now called on them for for- 
 bearance ; how ill the few measures which were really proposed, 
 of a conciliatory nature, were met by the disingenuousness of 
 some of the Presbyterian leaders, and the absurd bigotry of others, 
 and the reasonable suspicion which was thus excited, that nothing 
 would content them but the entire proscription of the forms to 
 which they objected. 
 
 " Nor can we greatly wonder, that, under such circumstances, 
 the THIRD and simplest course was adopted, — that, namely, of 
 imposing afresh on all a liturgy, to which the great body of the 
 people was ardently attached, and the disuse of which, in any 
 particular parishes, (when the majority of congregations enjoyed 
 it,) was likely to be attended with abundant discontent and incon- 
 venience. These considerations are, indeed, no apology for the 
 fresh aggressions of which the episcopalian party were guilty, 
 for their unseasonable though well-intended alterations of the 
 liturgy, and the hostile clauses inserted in their new Act of Uni- 
 formity. Far less can they extenuate the absurd wickedness of 
 the persecution afterwards resorted to, against those whom these 
 measures had confirmed in their schism. But they may lead us 
 to apprehend that, (though a very few concessions more would 
 have kept such men as Baxter and Philip Henry in the church,) 
 there would have been very many whom no concession would 
 have satisfied ;* and that the offence of schism was, in a great 
 degree, inevitable, though a different course, on the side of the 
 victorious party, might have rendered it of less wide diffusion, and 
 of less deep and lasting malignancy." 
 
 IV. CONTENTS OF THIS VOLUME. 
 
 Having given, in the preceding paragraphs, some account of the 
 belligerent Catvinists of 1643, and of their immediate successors, 
 I introduce my readers to Dr. William Twisse, who has been 
 called " a Puritan of the Old School" but to whom belongs the 
 much more appropriate appellation of " a Puritan of the New 
 Scfiool." I connect his personal history with the Synod of Dort, 
 and relate at some length, (pp. 242 — 256,) tUe political conse- 
 quences of the decisions of that Assembly in several countries of 
 Europe. I afterwards (pp. 256 — 307) describe the hosts of Cal- 
 
 • This will be very evident to every one who has had an opportunity of per- 
 using the very able pamphlets which were published by the Presbyterians, between 
 1660 and 1662. The answers of their Episcopalian brethren are likewise deserv- 
 ing of a perusal, on account of the moderation which many of them exhibit. 
 
 h 
 
CXIV INTKODUCTION", 
 
 vinistic prophets tfiat immediately arose to predict great things to 
 Calvinism, and the resistance which Grotius, Hammond, and a 
 few others gave to this prophesying humour. Without a. brief 
 exposition of this kind, the reader would not be able to form any 
 conception of the origin of that fanatical spirit which was excited 
 among the common people by a few artful Predestinarians, andt 
 which never ceased to operate till it had engendered civil discord 
 in every European state in which Calvinism received encourage- 
 ment. This subject is resumed in another part of the -volume, 
 (pp. 499 — 532,) in which it is shewn, that, when the interests of 
 Calvinism were to be promoted by arts like these, the cool meta- 
 physical head of Dr. Twisse could busy itself in auspicious pre- 
 dictions respecting the overthrow of the Arminians ; and that, 
 when the mild and ingenuous Joseph Mede would not sing to his 
 sanguine tune, and prophesy smooth things to those whom he 
 accounted " the Lord's people," the old Doctor became very 
 wroth and renounced his acquaintance. From the whole of thi» 
 minute recital I have shewn (p. 515) how " Divine Providence 
 then permitted the experiment of a reputed holy republic tol>e 
 made in this countiy, and undoubtedly intended that its disastrous 
 issue should be a warning to the nations 7iot to infringe the royal-r 
 ties of Heaven, by assigning the precise titne for the accomplishment 
 of particular events predicted in God's Holy Word, to which perverse 
 and designing men gave a plausible meaning, and under it concealed 
 their 07vn secular and corrupt designs !" 
 
 After due reprehension of this perversion of Christianity 
 through pretended inspirations, (pp. 307 — 377,) I subjoin a brief 
 detail, from Dr. Heylin's History of Presbyterianism, of the 
 seditious practices of the Calvinistic cabal in Scotland ^nd Eng- 
 land from 1637 till the murder of King Charles the First, ^ _ 
 description of which catastrophe is quoted from Lloyd's 
 Worthies. I then endeavour (pp.379 — 391,) most impartially to 
 decide between the Presbyterians and Independents, " respecting 
 the degree of blood-guiltiness vi^hich attached to each of the pre-, 
 vailing parties," and have presented my readers (p. 387) with 
 extracts from sermons delivered before the Long Parliament, by 
 celebrated Presbyterian divines, only a few months prior to that 
 fatal tragedy. The Assembly of Divines and their revolutionary 
 labours at Westminster are afterwards described, (pp. 392 — 446,') 
 when Dr. Twisse's personal history again connects itself with . 
 the public events of the kingdom. 
 
 In the language of Mr. Reid, one of the old Doctor's biogra- 
 phers, I give all the leading circumstances of his life, (pp. 452—^ 
 472,) and some curious particulars concerning the arrangements 
 and conduct of the Westminster Assembly, over which he was 
 appointed to preside. The Doctor's famous Latin book against 
 Arminius is the next subject, (pp. 472 — 494,) on which I have 
 offered animadversions. Of his prophesying predilections I have 
 
iNTRonurnoy, cxv 
 
 already made mention ; and his correspondence with the Rev. 
 Joseph Medie on this subject is introduced (pp. 494—546,) with 
 the ulterior view of affording my readers a good opportunity of 
 forming a judgment concerning the alleged innovations by Arch- 
 bishop Laud in the public worship of the church. Mr. Mede had 
 publicly defended bowing towards the altar, and other rites revived 
 by Bishop Andrews, (p. 532,) long before Laud had attained 
 any influence at Court : In the letters, therefore, which passed 
 between him and Dr. Twisse, both of whom were accounted more 
 excellent and moderate than their cotemporaries, the case of 
 reputed novel ceremonies is discussed with the greatest coolness ; 
 and every thinking man will soon decide for himself, whether 
 those innocent observances deserved to be represented in such an 
 obnoxious light as they have generally been, or to be charged 
 exclusively to the black account of one to whom they do not 
 appertain. Mr. Mede's testimony on these topics is the more 
 valuable, because he is generally depicted by modern Dissenters 
 as A Puritan, though, by a perusal of the notes in pages 741, 
 487, and 525, the reader will feel some hesitation about the par- 
 ticular class under which he ought to be ranged. 
 
 All this discussion about rites is preliminary to a history of 
 Fundamental Articles of Religion, the devising of which in 
 that age engrossed the attention of the greatest and most philan- 
 thropic individuals in different Protestant communities. Omitting 
 particular mention of those devised by the enlightened Catholics, 
 Cassander, Erasmus, Wikelius, and others ; I commence (pp. 546 
 —7809;,) with a notice of the acts of pacification by Arminius, Du 
 Moulin, M. A. De Dominis, Grotius, Laud, Dury, and Mede, 
 and conclude with those of Cromwell's Committee of Funda- 
 mentalists, the Officers of the Republican Army, Milton, and the 
 new race of Arminians in the depressed Church of England who 
 were reproachfully called " Latitudinarians," but whose liberal 
 and benevolent principles had taken deep root during the Inter- 
 regnum. I have been purposely diffuse on this important topic, 
 that I might demx>nstrate the extreme aversion of all the higli 
 Predestinarians to such broad foundations of Christian concord, 
 and might contrast the narrowness of the most famous of the 
 Calvinistic schemes of Fundamentals with those of the more 
 liberal Arminians. It was with a feeling of well-founded con- 
 fidence, that I knew I could take hold of one of' the most objec- 
 tionable of the reputed English Arminians, Archbishop Laud, 
 and could prove the great superiority of his benevolent views to 
 those of the most admired of his Calvinistic cotemporaries. Like 
 every youthful student who knows nothing of Laud except what 
 the most popular of our historians have delivered,* I had imbibed 
 
 * Thus, for instance, the Rev. John Wesley, with whose writings 1 was 
 familiar when quite a boy, gave, in 1777; t^e members of the Established 
 
 h2 
 
CWi INTRODUCTTON. 
 
 early prejudices against him, and considered the following; • 
 description of him and of his noble predecessor on the scaffold, 
 though the composition of an eminent writer, as greatly over- 
 charged : " The two ministers that stood in the gap betwixt the 
 " conspiracy and the government, (and who were only cut off, 
 " as appeared by the sequel, to clear the passage to the King 
 " himself,) were the Earl of Strafford and Archbishop Laud : So- 
 " that their first attack was upon the Earl, and their next upon 
 " the Archbishop, under the notion of evil councillors. Upon the 
 '* common charge of Popery and Arbitrary Proceedings, their 
 " impeachments were carried on by tumults ; and these brave 
 " men were rather baited to death by beasts, than sentenced with 
 " any colour of law or justice: And as they lived, so they died, 
 " the resolute assertors of the English Monarchy and Religion — 
 *' the Earl of Strafford in May, l64l, but the Archbishop was kept 
 *' languishing in the Tower till January, 1 644. And their crime 
 
 €hurch, and then the Dissenters, the following wholesome advice and reproof, in. 
 his Calm Address to the Inhabitants of England., on the subject of the American 
 
 war : " How is it that any of you, who fear God, are not afraid to speak evil 
 
 of dignities, to speak evil of the Ruler of your people., as well as of those that are 
 put in authority under him ? Do you believe, that Michael the archangel durst 
 not bring a railing accusation against Satan ? And dare you bring or retail a 
 hundred railing accusations against your lawful governors ? Now, at least, humble 
 yourselves before God, and act more suitably to your character. Wherever you . 
 are, far from countenancing, repress the base clamours of the vulgar, remembering 
 those awful words. If any man among you seemeth to be religious., (rather be ever 
 so religious.) and bridleth not his tongue., that man's religion is vain. 
 
 " Are not you, who dissent from the Established Church, in whatever kind 
 or degree, particularly concerned to observe this, for wrath., as well as for con. 
 science sake ? Do you imagine, there are no High Churchmen left ? Did they 
 all die with Dr. Sacheverel ? Alas ! how little do you know of mankind ! Were 
 the present restraint taken off, you would see them swarming on every side, and 
 gnashing upon you with their teeth. There would hardly need a nod from that 
 sacred person, [King George the Third,] whom you revile, or at least lightly 
 esteem. Were he to stand neuter, in what a condition would you be, within one 
 twelve-months ? If other Bonners and Gardiners did not arise, other Lauds . 
 and Sheldoks would, who would either rule over you with a rod of iron, or 
 drive you out of the land. Know the blessings you enjoy. Let common sense 
 restrain you, if neither religion nor gratitude can. ' Beware of the wrath of a 
 patient man.' Dare not again to open your lips agamst your sovereign — [shall 
 
 I say.l lest he fall upon youf No ; but lest he cease to defertd you. Then, 
 
 farewell to the liberty you now enjoy !" 
 
 I hope some of the succeeding pages of this volume will shew, that Archbishop 
 Laud was deserving of a better and milder station, than that which is here assigned 
 to him and to Sheldon : Both of them lived in troublous times, and had to restrain 
 some most impetuous spirits. 
 
 ■ But this extract is exceedingly valuable on another account : It exhibits the 
 personal wishes and feelings of his late Majesty, on the subject of an extended 
 Toleration. None of the biographers of King George the Third has given a 
 prominence to this lovely trait in his character and conduct, though it is that for 
 which all the godly part of the kingdom long held his royal name in veneration. 
 By a diligent author, it would be found, that the materials are , neither few nor 
 meagre which serve to elucidate this interesting portion of religious history. 
 
IIOTIIODUCTION. CXVll 
 
 ** was not, in truth, their being men of arbilrai-y principles them- 
 *' selves, but for being the opposers of those principles in others." — . 
 But my subsequent researches convinced me of my mistake, 
 arid taught me to venerate, though not always to admire, several 
 of those sterner virtues which the state of this nation and of 
 Europe called into exercise, and which have generally been exag- 
 gerated to the Archbishop's prejudice. But I refrain from all 
 further allusions to this great Prelate, as I shall have another 
 opportunity of adverting to him, and " to his good friend Hugo 
 Orotius," in a succeeding part of this Introduction. — As the doc- 
 trine of Fundamentals and of a General Religious Pacifi- 
 cation could not be introduced without some account of these 
 two great men, and of the state of Europe at that period, I have 
 made a large digression, (pp. SS'i — 766,) in which I have presented 
 the reader with many interesting particulars respecting Laud and 
 <jrotius, which have not been given by any preceding English 
 writer. 
 
 The remaining contents of Appendix D, (pp. 800 — 830,) are 
 soon specified. A brief allusion to the adulterated species of 
 Arminianism which was imbibed and propagated by many of our 
 English divines at the period of the Restoration, and which gave 
 a tone to the public ministry of the English Clergy for sonfie years 
 afterwards, — and three extracts, from Professor Poelenburgh, 
 Bishop Fleetwood, and Bishop Atterbury, — conclude the volume. 
 
 The various subjects which I have now cursorily enumerated, 
 are further illustrated and explained by notes, consisting of slight 
 original observations, but principally of extracts from scarce 
 pamphlets and treatises Several of these elucidations are no-H;-, 
 for the fir^^t time, translated into our language. When I com- 
 menced this part of my undertaking, I resolved to borrow no part 
 of my relation of facts from the histories and remarks of Claren- 
 don, Burnet, Eachard, Grey, Collier, Neal, Walker, Calamy, or 
 from the pamphlets of L'Estrange, Dr. South, Heylin's Quinquar- 
 ticular History, or any other similar authority that is supposed to 
 be in the hands of every Englishman, and that might seem to be 
 too partial to one side or to the other. Freed from these tram- 
 mels, and having no worldly consideration whatever to cloud my 
 understanding or to bias my judgment, I have produced a very 
 impartial account of those transactions which I narrate, and a 
 correct exposition of the principles avowed by the chief actors, 
 and generally in their own expressions. I am quite aware, that 
 violent partizans on all sides, who derive their information from 
 more objectionable sources, may not be inclined to concede to 
 me even the small praise of impartiality ; and that I shall be 
 blamed particularly for the strong opinions, to which I have given 
 utterance, in favour of Episcopacy and of the Clergy of the Estab- 
 lished Church. But when the reader has perused the conclusioa 
 
 h3 
 
CXVUl INTRODUCTION- 
 
 of this Introduction, he will discover reasons why my apparent 
 bias in this last respect ought to secure me from undue censure. 
 
 v.— SUBJECTS DISCUSSED IN THE NOTES. 
 
 I NOW proceed to advert to a few of those discussions which 
 occur in the notes, and to which the title of this work will have 
 called the attention of my readers, 
 
 A perusal of the long note (pp. 679 — ^93,) on the origin and 
 progress of English Arminianism.) v/ill convince every man of can- 
 dour of the falsity of the proposition upon which I have ventured 
 to animadvert, " that in England, Calvinism went along with 
 Civil liberty, and ArminianioM the contrary, and that in Holland 
 it was at the same time the very reverse." The notes, in pages 
 704<-:-709 and 780, respecting Bishops Hall and Davenant, and 
 the note on 798 (in which an allusion is made to Dr. Hall as the 
 Bishop of Norwich,) will add strong confirmation to the one 
 already quoted, and will inject serious doubts into the minds of 
 those who have been accustomed to reckon those two celebrated 
 divines as rigid Calvinists to the very close of life. 
 
 In the account which Mr. Farindon has given of the conversion 
 of "the ever-memorable Hales of Eton" from Calvinism to Armi- 
 nianism, he has introduced a circumstance respecting Episcopius, 
 which has exceedingly puzzled Mosheim, and other writers. The 
 evidence addiiced in pages 577 — 9> will prove, I hope satisfacto- 
 rily, that Martinius was the individual, through whose reasoning 
 Hales " bade John Calvin Good Night !" 
 
 The reputed Popery of Arminianism receives some explanation 
 in pages 677 — '9, 267, and 526. — Some particulars respecting 
 Arminius and his system are related in pages 466, 478 — 83, 548, 
 552, 621, 801, and 828 — Curious acceptation of the the term 
 _" Pelagianism," p. 780. — Remarks on unchristian rebellion, 
 p*p. 561 — 4, 364 — 6, 728, 385, and 270. — Conversions to Armini- 
 anism, 305, 394, 535, 577, 687—91, 704, 713, 780, 788, 800 
 , jind 803. 
 , Contrasts are instituted — in page 285 between the death-bed 
 scene of Grotius, and of Rivet his most acrimonius accuser ;— 
 336 — 341, between the execution of Archbishop Laud, and Mr. 
 Love who exulted at that great Prelate's death ; — 753, between 
 the conduct of Vossius, and that of the brave Grotius, towards 
 Archbishop Laud in his troubles ; — 482 between the Divinity of 
 the schools and that of the scriptures; — ilS — 16, 790, between 
 the tolerant views of Dr. Hammond and John Goodwin, and 
 those of Dr. Owen; — 76l, 765 — 75, between the amplitude of 
 Fundamental Articles of religion devised by the Arminians, and 
 those of the Calvinists ; — 296^ — 306,512, 518, between the pro- 
 phesying humour of the Calvinists, and the common sense of 
 
IKTRODUCTIOX. ^XIX 
 
 the Arminiatis; — 643, between extempore prayers, and written 
 Jbrms ; — 606", between the French Calvinists and Dutch Armi- 
 nians ; — 223, between the Remonstrants, Du Moulin, Amyraut, 
 and Twisse ; — 678 between the labours of the Conformists in the 
 Popish controversy, and those of the Puritan Clergy; — 674, 
 between marriage and celibacy; — 710 — 6, between the political 
 principles of the English Arminians and Calvinists; — 380 — 1, 
 between the suppleness of Dr. Owen, and the firmness of Meric 
 Casaubon ; — and 636, between Grotius and Selden. 
 
 The genius and tendency of Calvinism are well portrayed by 
 Grotius in page 271 — S, and by Dr. Hammond 69O — 2.— 'Calvi- 
 nistic Revolutionary reveries, 512, 515, and 528. — Westminster 
 Assembly of Divines 400 — 9, 435, 413, 464 — 72. — Preparations for 
 the Assembly by the Du Moulins 392. — Remarkable deficiency of 
 the Calvinists in a knowledge of the Ancient Fathers, 430, 524, 
 534, 686. — The craft of the English Puritans, immediately prior 
 to the civil wars, in joining the articles of the Irish Church with 
 those of the Church of England, in argumentative array against 
 the Arminians, 565. — Description of the Calvinists in those days, 
 271, 359,463,512, 528, 705, and 786.— Presbyterian discipline 
 445, and intolerance, 448, 467- — Contests between the Presbyte- 
 rians and Independents, 313, 342, 386, 448, 606 and 733. — Dr. 
 Twisse's curious Predestinarian arguments, &c. 476 — 81, 490 — 2, 
 406, 444 ; his obligations to the Jesuits, 477, 526 ; and his prophe- 
 tical enthusiasm, 506, 510, 512. — A Parliamentary chaplain, 
 described by himself, 457—8. — The Long Parliament 406, 444.— 
 Scotch Presbyterians, 347 — 9, 365. — The French Calvinists, 265, 
 721. — Synod of Dort and its consequences, 425, 572, 587, 592, 
 710, 738. — -The capacity in which the British Deputies appeared 
 at that Synod, and their private disputes, 398, 565, 710. — Dury's 
 pacific labours, 6O8 — 10, 6l7, 748 ; his prophesying humour, 617, 
 7^4 — '9- — Sir Henry Vane's prophecies, 513, 5l6 — 8. — Animad- 
 versions on some of Richard Baxter's assertions, 251, 294, 302, 
 323, 330, 352, 360, 379, 401, 640, 678, 747.— An almost universal 
 and voluntary infliction of self-punishment, in the year I662, on 
 the high Predestinarian ministers, 788. 
 
 To general readers the following notes will probably appear 
 the most interesting: Curious anecdote about Archbishop Til- 
 litson, 785 — 7. — Difficulty of defining with accuracy Whigs and 
 Tories, 812 — 5. — The desire of Grotius to be employed at the 
 Court of England, and the reasons why his request was slighted, 
 634—6, 597, 600. — The family of Vossius, and his invitation to 
 Erigland and Ireland, 659 — 65. — Female branches of the family 
 De Medicis, 719 — 731. — An account of Dr. Cosin's Devotions, 
 502; — The Elector Palatine and the Queen of Bohemia, 6II — 3, 
 734. — The Ancient Fathers of the Christian Church, and their 
 great authority, 428—434, 413, 535, 685, 799.— Escape of Grotius 
 from confinement, 582 ; and his fine letter on the death of his 
 
cxx iktuodu(;tion. 
 
 daughter Maria, 603. — Dr. Featly's trimming conduct, 459—463, 
 403. — Selden's conduct in the Assembly of Divines at Westmin- 
 ster, 470. — Bishop Atterbury on the advantages of a married 
 Clergy, 644 ; and Archbishop Laud's opinion about celibacy, 674. 
 — Ancient and modern ideas about Catholic emancipation, 6^3. — 
 University learning, 36^ — 71.. — Critique upon Du Moulin's Vates, 
 281. 
 
 On the subject of Popery, abundant information will be found 
 in the copious notes, pp. 549 — 784 ; and Cardinal Richelieu's 
 Jinesse is exposed in pages 624 — 30, 734. 
 
 On various subjects connected with our national history, the 
 reader will find some information in the following notes : King 
 James the First, 307, 376, 510, 56l, 649, 7 1 1 —King Charles the 
 First, 376, 648, 716, 719—31, 734; and His Majesty's death, 323, 
 350, 377, 380, 387, 391 — King Charles the Second, 607, 820. — 
 The Electoral Family, 336, 453, 611—3, 647, 724, 734, 740, 
 770, 8 17. 
 
 Moderation of the Episcopal Church, 435, 532, 545, 654, 798. 
 Her rites and ceremonies, 527, 432 — 4, 543 — 4, 799. — At an equal 
 distance from Puritanism and Popery, 656, 67.— -Advantages of 
 Episcopacy, 545, 698, 702, 422.— Jus Divinum of Episcopacy, 
 and of other modes of Divine Worship, 792 — 5. — Episcopal 
 Clergy prior to the Civil Wars, 302, «30, 33$, 335, 525, 811. — 
 Employment of Ecclesiastics in the great offices of State, 585.— 
 Uniformity in Public Worship, 452, 575, 772. — Origin of Eccle- 
 siastical Power, 436. — The observance of Christmas, 411, 419)451 ; 
 and of the Christian Sabbath, 287, 455, 542. — Baptismal Regene- 
 ration, 395. — Conformity, 543. 
 
 The principles of Toleration, 415, 448, 452, 607, 692, 704, 707, 
 729, 730, 783, 791, 796, 800. — Those who oppose Popery are the 
 greatest lovers of Toleration, 783. — Fundamental Articles, 496, 
 552, 762. 772. — Those of the Bremen Divines at the Synod of 
 Dort, 577.' — 'Vile sycophancy and intolerance of the Romish Church, 
 496, 558—61, 621, 624, 628. 
 
 Some of the retributive acts of Divine Providence are briefly 
 pointed out in the notes, pp. 302, 339, 512, 466, 528, 595, 706, 
 788, 826 — 8.— Confirmation of some of Mr. Mede's conjectures, 
 508. — Socinianism, 641—3, 782. — Progress of Independency in 
 England, 451. 
 
 In addition to the notes now specified, some of which will be 
 found extremely long, others are interspersed throughout the 
 work concerning Luther, Melancthon, Calvin, Rivet, Du Moulin, 
 Servetus, Beza, Milletiere, Paraeus, Dr. John Owen, Robert 
 Baylie, Philip Nye, Judge Jenkins, Casaubon, Junius, Lightfoot, 
 Selden, Sampson Johnson, Amyraut, Coiu'celles, John Goodwin, 
 Feuardent, Marets, Bogerman, Du Plessls Marly, Daillee, Cas- 
 sander, Castellio, Prince Rupert, Duke of Hamilton, Hugh Pe- 
 ters, Dr. Samuel Ward, Bishop Morley, Philip Henry, John 
 

 IXTKODUCTION. 
 
 lypA 
 
 Archer, Joshua Sprigge, Bishop Burnet, Dr. PriJeaux, Professor 
 Poelenburgh, Archbishop Sheldon, Dr. Lloyd, Samuel Hartlib, 
 Bishop Andrews, Herbert Thorndyke, Bishop Bedell, Gomarus, 
 Bishop Morton, Gondemar, Archbishop Tillotson, Oliver Crom- 
 well, Gerard Brandt, Archbishop Abbot, Martinius, Crocius, 
 De Barneveldt, Chancellor Oxenstern, Gustavus Adolphus, 
 Prince Maurice, Episcopius, Louis the Thirteenth, Sir Richard 
 Browne, Peter De Marca, Bishop Atterbury, Vossius, Duke of 
 Buckingham, Bishop Juxon, the Archbishop of Cologne, Dr. 
 Walter Balcanqual, Archbishop Dawes, Dr. Hoe Van Henegg, 
 Bishop Hoadly, the Elector of Saxony, John Durie, Tobias Con- 
 yers. Dr. Henry More, Bishop Fleetwood, Samuel Wesley, Sir 
 Henry Wotton, &c. &c. 
 
 Numerous extracts are also given, in the form of explanatory 
 notes, from Bray's Life of Evelyn, Twells's Lfe of Dr. Pocock, 
 Fell's Lfe of Dr. Hammond, Bisliop Hall's Hard Measure, Lord 
 Clarendon's Life hy Himself Bates's Lives, Isaac Walton's 
 Lives, Parr's Life of Archbishop Usher, Jackson's Life of John 
 Goodwin, Bishop Heber's Life of Jeremy Taylor, and other authen- 
 tic and creditable biographical Memoirs. Several elucidations 
 have likewise been borrowed from Burrish's Batavia Illustrata, 
 Sanderson's Preface to his Sermons, Pierce's Divine Philanthropy 
 and Purity Defended, Baker's Chronicle by Phillips, Dr. Ham- 
 mond's Sermons, Mede's & Lightfoot's Works, The Letters and 
 Minor Treatises of Grotius, Rivet's Apology, Dury's Prodromus, 
 Sertnons preached by various Puritan Divines before the Long Parlia- 
 ment, Twisse's Vindication, Bw lk's Dictiotiary, Mcsheim's Eccle- 
 siastical History, Acts of the Dort Synod, Baylie's Dissuasive from 
 the Errorsofthe Time, Curcell^us De Jure Dei, Burnet on the 
 Thirty-Nine Articles, Sfc. 
 
 VL— REMARKS ON SOME OF THOSE WRITERS WHOSE 
 WORKS I HAVE QUOTED. 
 
 1. DR. PETER HEYLIN. 
 
 It was my intention to have given a concise character of a few 
 of the most important of those works which I have now enume- 
 rated ; but the execution of this task must be deferred till the 
 publication of the second volume. One writer, however. Dr. 
 Peter Heylin, whose History of the Presbyterians, and Life of 
 Archbishop Laud, I have occasionally quoted, deserves in this place 
 a brief notice. It has been said of him, " that, in some things, he 
 was too much a party-man, to be an Historian :" He was un- 
 doubtedly a warm writer, yet in general exceedingly correct in his 
 relation of matters of fact, andvery sincere even on those doctrinal 
 topics in which I conceive him to have been in error. But with 
 
*XXU INTIIODUCTION. 
 
 all his defects of temper, and his obviously low views of the eco- 
 nomy of God's grace, I prefer his testimony, on every affair of 
 importance, to that of his virulent revilers; some of whom, 
 though eulogized as " moderate men," I have found to be guilty 
 of the vilest misrepresentations. 
 
 I know only of a single fact in which Dr. Heylin's information is 
 proved to have been essentially erroneous, and that is, the conversa- 
 tion which he reports between Archbishop Laud and " the Ever- 
 Memorable Hales of Eton," and in which the latter is said to 
 have been reclaimed from the errors of Socinianism. Mr. Des 
 Maizeaux, in his " Historical and Critical Account" of that great 
 man, has very satisfactorily controverted Dr. Heylin's premises 
 and conclusion : Yet, after all, the two Socinian publications, 
 of which Hales had then been wrongfully considered as the 
 author, afforded strong grounds for Heylin's assertion. To those 
 who have perused the collection of letters in Parr's Life of Arch- 
 bishop Usher, (Letter 181,) and similar publications, it will be 
 unnecessary to say, that one of these pamphlets (written by Steg- 
 man, a Socinian Minister,) was charged to the account of John 
 Hales. The other, written by Przipcovius, a Polish Knight 
 and a great Unitarian, was also ascribed to him by common 
 report; and in the virulent pamphlets and minor Church-histories 
 of that period, his Patron the Archbishop was indirectly assailed 
 as giving some encouragement to noted heretics. Knowing all 
 this, Dr. Heylin, who appears to have been made very imper- 
 fectly acquainted with the substance of their conversation, natu- 
 rally inferred that it had been on the charge of Socinianism then 
 current against Hales, and seized that opportunity for vindicat- 
 ing the eminent Prelate against Socinian imputations. 
 
 "The following paragraph from " the Life of Lord Clarendon," 
 who likewise relates, in a different manner, the very interesting 
 conversation which passed between him and the Archbishop, is 
 in reality somewhat confirmatory of Heylin's suspicions : " He 
 was chaplain in the house with Sir Dudley Carleton, Ambassador 
 at the Hague in Holland, at the time when the Synod of Dort 
 was held, and so had liberty to be present at the consultations in 
 that Assembly ; and hath left the best memorial behind him of the 
 ignorance, and passion, and animosity, and injustice of that con- 
 vention; of which he often made very pleasant relations, though 
 at that time it received too much countenance from England. He 
 would never take any cure of souls, and was a great contemner 
 of money ; yet, besides his being very charitable to all poor peo- 
 ple even to liberality, he had made a greater and better collection 
 of books than were to be found in any other private library that I 
 have seen ; as he had sure read more, and carried more about him 
 in his excellent memory, than any man I ever knew, my Loi'd 
 Falkland only excepted, who I think sided him. He had, — whe- 
 ther from his natural temper and constitution, or from his long 
 
INTRODUCTION. CXXIU 
 
 retirement from all crowds, or from his profound judgment and 
 discerning spirit, — conti'acted some opinions which were not received 
 nor by him published except in private discourses, and then ra- 
 ther upon occasion of dispute than of positive opinion. And he 
 would often say, his opinions, he was sure, did him no harm ; 
 but he was far from being confident, that they might not do 
 others harm who entertained them, and might entertain other re- 
 sults from them than he did : And therefore he was very reserved 
 in communicating what he thought himself, in those points in 
 which he differed from what was received." — See a continuation 
 of this character of Hales, in a preceding page, (xciv.) 
 . On another subject, that of "the Christian Sabbath," I shall 
 prove, in the second volume, that his information was essentially 
 correct, and especially in relation to the open and allowed pro- 
 fanation of that sacred day by the early Calvinists at Geneva. 
 Some vituperative remarks on the Doctor will be found in a suc- 
 ceeding page, (455,) and the reader will afterwards perceive 
 that the ground on which the English Puritans argued this ques- 
 tion, was the same as that assumed by the celebrated Indepen- 
 pendent, Robert Robinson of Cambridge, in his low and scurril- 
 ous tract, " The History and Mystery of Good Friday," which 
 he wrote against that pious, mild, and excellent Prelate, the 
 late Bishop Porteus. 
 
 2.— BISHOP GAUDEN. 
 
 This eminent man has furnished me with some good quotations, 
 (pp. 540, 560, Q55, 680, 700, 703,) which are the more valuable 
 on account of his connection with some of the highest Puritanic 
 families among the nobility. (Page 700.) At the commence- 
 ment of the Civil Wars, he was nearly in the same predicament 
 as Dr. Featly, (p. 463,) for he was a great admirer of the pacific 
 method of Archbishop Usher ; but he, as well as the amiable 
 Primate, and other Episcopalians who were then moderate Cal- 
 vinists, soon perceived the futility of such a plan of proceeding 
 with those who hated peace, and they became sound converts to 
 Arminianism and better friends to Episcopacy,* Avhen both were 
 
 " In his Liturgical Considerations, Dr. Gauden observes: " A Liturgy is 
 a great defence to true doctrine, and a means to prevent the spreading of corrupt 
 opinions." To this consideration old Giles Firmin replies, " Not every 
 Liturgy : Some may be bad enough. This was the first reason, (as some con- 
 ceive, with laziness,) which first brought in Liturgies, — the Arian and Pelagian 
 heresies. In which time yet ministers did compose and use their own prayers, 
 though they were first reviewed. But, it may be, the Doctor hath an honest 
 design in this : For, he knows well, that abundance of the Episcopal men, now 
 preferred, are stout Arminians, of the same blood with Pelagius ; and he fears 
 these men wUl spread Pelagianism under a little finer dress, and so would have 
 the Liturgy imposed, to keep them from doing this mischief. Ah, Doctor! 
 This will not do ! Such men call for the Liturgy more than any : But if 
 this were your only intent, we thank you for your honesty." — Such were the 
 sarcastic remarks, which the goQil Doctor was forced to endure from some of his 
 former friends. 
 
•CXXIV INTRODUCTION. 
 
 in their low estate, and when neither of them could confer any 
 present earthly emolument on their professors. When the licen- 
 tious soldiers had the murder of the King under contemplation, 
 the Doctor wrote a bold Address to the Army, though it does 
 not exhibit as great ability as that bj Doctor Hammond. What- 
 ever opinion may be formed of him, with regard to the part 
 which he is said to have acted in the composition of King Charles 
 the First's Eikon BasUike, his conduct in every other particular 
 is unexceptionable, and entitled to high commendation. 
 
 He was intimate with those Presbyterian ministers who 
 managed the dispute, with King Charles, concerning Episcopacy ; 
 and heard from their own lips the nndissembled wonder to which 
 they gave utterance at that unfortunate monarch's unanswerable 
 arguments in favour of Episcopal regimen. Dr. Gauden was 
 also privy to those " hortatory though concealed letters," which 
 were addressed by " Diodati from Geneva and by Salmasius 
 " from Leyden,* to the chief sticklers of late for Presbytery in 
 " England, advising them to acquiesce in and bless God for such 
 " a regulated Episcopacy, as had obtained, and might best be 
 ** retained, in England." Gauden took the Covenant. He also tells 
 us, " I was as fully chosen as any to the Assembly of Divines ; 
 and never gave any refusal to sit with them, further than my 
 judgment was sufficiently declared, in a Sermon preached at the 
 first sitting of the Parliament, to be for the ancient and Catholic 
 Episcopacy.f Although myself were, by I-know-not-what sleight 
 
 • For a larger account of these communications, consult the note inpagelxxix. 
 
 -|- Cornelius Burges and Stephen Marshall had preached before the House of 
 Commons, at their Solemn Fast, Nov. 17th, 1640 ; and, in their joint dedication 
 of Burges's Sermon, they thus addressed the honourable members on the subject 
 of Parliamentary assistance in the establishment of Calvinism : " The God of 
 Heaven make you the most accomplished, best united, and most successful and 
 glorious House of Commons that ever sate in that High Court ; but chiefly in the 
 perfecting of the Reformation of Religion ; in the erecting, maintaining, protect- 
 ing, and encouraging of an able, godly, faithful, zealous, profitable, preaching 
 ministry, in every parish-church and chapel throughout England and Wales ; 
 and in the interceding to the King's Sacred Majesty for the setting up of a faithful, 
 judicious, and zealous Magistracy, where yet the same is wanting, to be ever at 
 hand to back such a Ministry : Without either of which, not only the power of 
 Godliness will soon degenerate into formality and zeal into lukewarmness, but 
 Popery, Arminianism, Socinianism, Profaneness, Apostacy, and 
 Atheism itself, will more and more crowd in upon us and prevail against us, do 
 you all you can by all other means." 
 
 On the 29th of the same month, "John Gauden, Bachelor in Divinity^'" 
 preached on a sacramental occasion before the Honourable House, from Zech. 
 viii, 19. After severely animadverting on the undue stress which had been laid 
 upon ceremonies, the preacher expressed himself in the following language, in which, 
 without doubt, "his judgment was then sufficiently declared to be for the ancient 
 and catholic Episcopacy," and could not therefore be relished by those who loved 
 to hear such doctrine as Burges and Marshall delivered : 
 
 " Not that I am ignorant, how far pious anliquUy did use these, and such like words 
 innoveiilly, without ill mind or meaning, and without oflencc to the church, as 
 
INTRODUCTION. CXXY 
 
 of hand, shuffled out of that Assembly, yet the zeal of some men 
 to put Presbytery into its throne and exercise was such, that I 
 was twice sent to by some members of both Houses, and sum- 
 moned by the Committee of the County where I live, to preach 
 at the consecration and installing of ^Aw many -headed Bishop,\\\e new 
 Presbytery : Which work I twice (and so ever humbly) refused 
 to do, as not having so studied its genealogy and descent, as to be 
 assured of the legitimation, right, and title of sole Presbytery to 
 
 then times were: Yet let me tell you: (1.) Such swerving from the 
 form of sound words used in the primitiveand purest times, occasioned, and strength- 
 ened after errors. (2.) They were not then engaged to maintain truth 
 against such erroneous and pernicious doctrines as we now are of the Reformed 
 Church : Which doctrines are now eagerly maintained by a proud faction, who 
 seek to abuse antiquity, and patronize their own errors by using those names and 
 words, to other intents and things, than ever was dreamed of by the ancient Church. 
 (3.) By such dangerous symbolizing with them in words and some outward forma- 
 lities, we do but prepare our minds, and sweeten them, with less distaste to 
 relish their doctrines and tenets ; and, as it were, in a civil way, we com- 
 pliment ourselves out of our truth ; giving the adversaries strong hopes and 
 preiumptions, as they have discovered, that we are inclining towards them : 
 To be ashamed of frequent, serious, and conscientious preaching, which was 
 the work of Christ and the holy Apostles, the honour and chief employment 
 of the primitive and best Bishops, and JNiinisters in all ages, — as tbat deserv- 
 edly famous Bishop Jewel, in his Apology proves out of the Fathers suffici- 
 ently against the Pope, and other idle bellies, which count preaching as a 
 work below their greatness, as indeed it is above their goodness, — Is this to 
 love the truth? 
 
 " Certainly, had divines both small and great been more busied in preaching 
 ai\d practising those great, weighty, and necessary truths, that are able to 
 save tlieir own and others'' souls, they would not have had such leisure to 
 have been so inventive and operative in poor beggarly toys and trifles, which 
 neither bring honour nor profit to God, themselves, or others. Nothing, — I say 
 nothing, — will restore the Church and Churchmen to their pristine honour, love, 
 and authority in men's hearts and minds, but a serious setting of themselves to 
 the study, preaching, and practising of Truth and peace in a holy life. These 
 were the arts, these the policies, these the pious frauds and stratagems by which 
 anciently they won people's hearts to love tfod, his truth, and of themselves the 
 witness of it : To such a height of honour and ecstasy of love, that they received 
 them as Angels of God, Embassadors from heaven, counting them dear as their 
 right eyes ! Humility, piety, and industry laid the foundation of all those mag- 
 nificent structures, dignities, titles, places, revenues, privileges, wherewith 
 Churchmen were anciently endowed : What hath or is likely to waste and demo- 
 lish them is easy to conjecture. lisdem artibus "etinenda quibus olim para- 
 bantm:" 
 
 Gauden, in those days, like his friend Archbishop Usher, considered himself 
 a Cameronist ; and, as the persons of that persuasion were accounted to be a kind 
 of middle-men between Calvinists and Arminians, so may the former part of the 
 following paragraph from this Sermon be recognized as partaking of the kindly 
 nature of the quotation from Cud worth, in page Ixiii, while the latter part of it 
 savoun a little of the persecuting spirit of the more resolute Calvinists, quoted in 
 pages Ixi, Ixv : 
 
 '•' ' Contend then earnestly for the truth ,•' (Jude 3 ;) but with ' the power of 
 God,'' not man's arm of flesh ; with a contention of love, not of foixe ; such as 
 may not destroy men, but their errors, which otherwise will destroy them. Truth 
 
eXXYl INTRODl'CTIO^f. 
 
 succeed, nay to remove, its ancient father Episcopacy, not as 
 then quite dead, nor (I think) fully deposed. Yet such was the 
 double diligence then of many English Divines, (men otherwise of 
 useful abilities,) that they did as officiously attend on the Scotch 
 Commissioners to set up Presbytery, and to destroy Episcopacy, 
 as the maid is wont in pictures to wait on Judith, with a bag for 
 Holoferiies his head. — Besides this. Presbytery had then fortified 
 itself with a special piece of policy, in order to its pre valency 
 and perpetuity ; which was, to engage the better sort of common 
 people (or the Masters of every Parish, and so, in effect, the 
 whole Populacy,) to that party, by indulging them, as Mr. Cal- 
 vin did in Geneva, a formal or titular share of Consistorian or 
 Ecclesiastical Power, under the glorious name of Ruling Elders, 
 on whom, as on less ccnnely members, they were pleased to bestow 
 more abutidant hotiour, at least in words: For few of them could 
 really be fit for, or even capable to use, any actual authority 
 beyond that of Sides-men^, Constables, Church-wardens, or Over- 
 seers for the Poor." 
 
 Such a valiant and disinterested defender, therefore, of Epis- 
 copacy and Good Order, in the worst of times, may assuredly be 
 permitted to speak boldly in his own behalf, as he did, at the 
 conclusion of his Suspiria, in 16.59: "If what I have written 
 may do any good to the present or after ages, I have my design ; 
 if not, I shall, by God's help, hereafter redeem this waste of 
 time and labour, by applying to studies more suitable to my 
 genius, spirit, and age, which may more improve those graces 
 which are least in dispute among good Christians : Yet in this I 
 have not wholly lost my labour ; because I have hereby further 
 discharged my own soul, my conscience and reputation, from 
 any approbation of what I judge to be either the sins or impru- 
 dences, the wickedness or weakness of this age, in which 1 do 
 not so much live, as die daily, weary that my soul finds so little 
 hope of an happy rest or composure, unity or harmony, in our 
 Church ; which I had rather see and enjoy before I die, than to 
 have the greatest preferment in the world- I envy no men that 
 have wrapped up their worldly interests in their religious policies, 
 and daily gain by the shrines of godliness they have made. 
 
 " Episcopacy is now far from being the object of any sober 
 men's flattery or ambition ; yet I cannot but look upon it with 
 
 is so sufficiently armed with its own power, that it needs not the assistance of the 
 sword or canon, which reach not the minds of men, nor can divide them from 
 their errors, nor batter down the strong-holds of prepossessed false opinions. That 
 ' excellency of power ' which is in the Word of God and his Spirit, is only able 
 to subdue the understanding. Yet must not the Magistrate so f."^ be wanting to 
 God's glory and the Church's good, as to fail to defend truth against those that 
 by cunning or force seek to subvert it, setting up the just terror of those laws 
 which may chase av/ay those owls, and bats, and feral birds that love darkness 
 and portend a night wherever they appear ; that cannot endure the light, because 
 their works are evil, as well as their doctrine false." 
 
INTRODUCTIOX- C'XXVH 
 
 Buch an eye of pity and reverence, as primitive Christians were 
 wont to do upon their Bishops, such as Polycarpus, Ignatius, 
 Irenaeus, Cyprian, and other martyrs, when they saw them 
 imprisoned, beaten, tormented, destroyed. 
 
 " I plead for that reverend order, and those reverend persons, 
 who have been made a spectacle to angels and men, such as to 
 this present hour suffer both hunger and thirst, are naked and 
 buffeted, having no certain dwelling-place ; which being reviled 
 do bless, being persecuted have suffered with patience, being 
 defamed do intreat, and, being the glory of all churches, as to order, 
 unity, and government in all ages, are now looked upon by many 
 as * thejilth and off-scouring of all things :' Yet am I one of those 
 angels which attend Lazarus on his dunghill ; I have chosen to 
 follow the clear, though now more exhausted, stream of antiquity, 
 rather than the troubled torrents of any novelties, which may be 
 as short-lived as they have been suddenly started. I have looked 
 upon all men's principles and pretensions, as to ecclesiastic 
 affairs, with what candour, equanimity, and sincerity I could. If 
 in any thing I was inclinable to be partial, it was neither for 
 Presbytery nor Independency, I confess, which I never was 
 catechized in, nor accustomed to, nor convinced of, as to any 
 such piety or policy, wisdom or worth in them, which might 
 make me see cause to desire or esteem them ; but I was swayed 
 against some things, not in the constitution, so much as in some 
 men's administration of Episcopacy. I was originally principled 
 to no small jealousies of Bishops' actions, when they were in 
 their greatest glory and power ; nor do I yet think but that some 
 Bishops might have been greater Masters of pious Arts than they 
 have proved : Yet I find now, that, in many things, people 
 were more afraid than hurt.* For the main, I conclude, no Mi- 
 nisters or Governors, no Superintendencies or Presbyteries, in 
 any Reformed way, exceeded the usefulness, merit, and excel- 
 lency of our English Bishops and Presbyters ; nor is any thing as 
 to Church-government comparable to a primitive Episcopacy, 
 
 • This confession is manly, and tantamount to the frank acknowledgments 
 made on the same subject, at an earlier date, by Jenkyn, Hussey, and 
 Manton. (Pp. liii, Iviii.) 
 
 In the preceding note I have shewn Gauden's " judgment to have been declared 
 for the ancient and catholic Episcopacy," and in p. 535, 1 attribute " the complete 
 change of doctrinal sentiments in Archbishop Usher," and in other Episcopal 
 divines, among whom Gauden may be included, " to their deep and accurate 
 acquaintance with the productions of the early Christian Fathers." The aversion 
 displayed by Calvin, and by his early followers, to these ancient writings, is 
 described in p. 430 : and " the baneful effects of this principle of defection, in 
 the Church of England," are briefly recited in a preceding page, (xlvi,) and, 
 more particularly, in the long note, p. 68G. After a perusal of the following 
 quotation from Gauden's sermon before the Long Parliament, the reader will 
 entertain a similar persuasion to mine, that unless tlie youthful preacher had 
 received a friendly admonition from his aged friend Usher, or from some equally 
 
CXXVin INTRODUCTION. 
 
 which includes the just rights, liberties, or privileges both of 
 Presbyters and People. I neither dispute nor deny any men's 
 morals, intellectuals, devotionals, or spirituals, further than they 
 seem much warped and eclipsed by their over-eager heats and 
 injurious prosecutions against their antagonists the Episcopal 
 Clergy and Church of England : But I absolutely blame those 
 
 wise man, he would, notwithstanding his real love of antiquity, have fallen into 
 the snare of the Calvinian fowlers, to whose sentiments he was greatly inclined : 
 
 " Certainly God will severely exact of this church and nation, of prince and 
 people, of preachers and hearers, an account for our long-enjoyed and undervalued 
 truth and peace. Have we so long been a vine planted, and watered, and fenced, 
 both to necessity and ornament, by an excessive indulgence of God, and do we , 
 bring forth sour grapes, that neither please God nor profit men ? May we not 
 justly fear (what we have deserved) to be laid waste and desolate, to be made a 
 hissing and astonishment to all nations, that God should remove or extinguish the 
 glorious lamp of the Gospel, in whose light we have not rejoiced, because we 
 have not loved it } 
 
 " Do we love the truth, if we are weary of it, tediously and peevishly affected 
 to it, willing to leave it and withdraw from it ? The loathing and nauseating of 
 this heavenly manna, as if we have had so much that it is necessary to recover 
 and quicken men's appetites to it, by a more scanty allowance of it, — is this to 
 love the truth ? The tampering and essays of some to clip, or wash, or new 
 coin, or alloy and abase, with some Homish mixture, the gold and purity of our 
 doctrine, — is this to love the truth ? that pure and refined truth, which hath 
 passed the fiery trial, hath been baptized in the blood of many martyrs, sown in 
 a field, made fruitful with their ashes, who loved not their lives so much as the 
 truth ! To set up lying vanities, pictures, and images, and to cry down praying 
 and preaching, whereby those toils may be useful and necessary to the ignorant 
 (because untaught) people, — is this to love the truth f To suffer idolatry, or 
 superstitious formalities in serving God, to get ground upon our opinions and 
 practices, — is this to love the truth 9 which, the less it hath of painting, the 
 more it hath of true loveliness and native beauty. Are not the lengthening and 
 increase of ceremonious shadows, a presage and sign of the shortening of our day 
 and setting of our sun, or diminishing of our light ? 
 
 " To quarrel at those truths which have been long ago determined by the 
 Scripture, in the public confession of our Church, and in the writings or preach- 
 ings of our gravest and learnedest Divines, Prelates, and others, — as in the 
 points of Justification by Faith alone, of Transubstantiation, of Auricular Con- 
 fession, of Prayer for the Dead, of ^''orshipping before Images, of Fiduciary 
 Assurance, and the like, which some doting and superstitious spirits dare to 
 question and retractate, — is this to love the truth ? What hath been done by 
 preaching and printing, by correcting, or rather corrupting, of books, (where the 
 correctors themselves deserve to be corrected,) your piety and wisdom may best 
 find out. Nay, such hath been the shameless impudence and effrontery of some 
 ridiculous heads, that plain and honest minds shall be scorned, derided, and, in 
 juggling fashion, cheated out of truth and the power of religion, (which is a holy 
 life,) if you do not harden your faces, and confirm your resolutions, against the 
 supercilious vanity of such men : Whether they have any intent to re-edify Babel's 
 ruins, or no, I cannot tell : Some vehemently suspect it. Sure I am, there is 
 such a confusion and novelty of language affectated by some men of Altars^ Sacri 
 Jice, Priests, Corporiety of Presence, Penance, Auricular Confession, Absolute^ 
 that is, blind Obedience, the Holy of Holies, and Adoration, which must be 
 salved from a flat idolatry, or at best an empty formality, by some distinction or 
 notion that must be ready at hand, that most people know not what they mean, 
 what they would have, or what they intend to call for next." 
 
INTHODUCTIOX. CXXIX 
 
 Ministers* want of politics and prudentials, who, by their Anti- 
 Episcopal transports, have so far diminished not only themselves 
 and their order as ministers, but the whole state of this Church, 
 as to its harmony and honour, its peace and plenty, its unity 
 and authority." — See pages Iv, Ivii. 
 
 3.— JOHN EVELYN, ESQ. 
 
 One of the most valuable of the modern publications which I 
 have quoted, is Bray's Memoirs, iUuslrative of the Life and 
 fVritings of Joint Eveli/?i, Esq., F.R.S. Those passages in the 
 Diary, which, to a common reader, will seem to be extremely 
 trivial, are in reality of great consequence,* and have been 
 selected with nice discrimination by the highly accomplished 
 editor. No man of letters, who pretends to any acquaintance 
 with the history of the interesting period in which Evelyn 
 flourished, will neglect this important accession to the authentic 
 records of the kingdom. In the composition of this " Comparison 
 between Calvinism and Arminianism," I acknowledge myself 
 to be under immense obligations to its instructive pages ; and the 
 intelligent reader will discover, especially in the second volume, 
 that it has been my guide in some difficult passages of the Inter- 
 regnum, in which no light is obtained from the cotemporaneous 
 historians. Evelyn's intimacy and correspondence with all the prin- 
 cipal Arminian clergy, render his artless accounts uncommonly 
 affecting and instructive. A deep tone of genuine piety is heard in 
 nearly every paragraph, and his style strongly reminds one of that 
 of our old friend Isaac Walton. The conclusion of the following 
 extract, from his polite and christian letter, addressed in 1664:, to 
 Lord Corneberry, is quite descriptive of the man : " In this one 
 town of London, there are more wretched and obscene plays 
 permitted, than in all the world besides. At Paris three days, at 
 Rome two weekly, and at the other cities of Florence, Venice, &c. 
 but at certain jolly periods of the year, and that not without some 
 considerable emolument to the public ; while cur interludes here 
 are every day alike : So as the ladies and the gallants come 
 reeking from the play late on Saturday night, to their Sundfiy 
 Devotions ; the idea of the farce possesses their fantasies to the 
 
 • Thus, the subjoined brief notices, which occur under the several dates, in 
 different parts of the Diary, are exceedingly important in serving to prove, tiiat 
 the famous Continnator of Baker^s Chronicle, whose authority I have often 
 quoted, was a man well-qualified, both by his talents and from his opportunities, 
 to execute such an undertaking : 
 
 " Oct. 24, 1C63. Mr. Edward Phillips came to be my son's preceptor. This 
 gentleman was nephev/ to JIUton, who wrote against Salmasius's Defensio, but 
 
 was not at all infected with his principles, though brought up by him t'eb. 24, 
 
 1665. Mr. Phillips, preceptor to my son, went to be with tlie Earl of Pembroke's 
 
 son, my Lord Herbert Sept. 18, 1C77. I preferred Mr. Phillips (nephew of 
 
 Milton) to the service of my Lord Chamberlain, [Lord Arlington] who wants a 
 scholar to read and entertain him sometimes." 
 
CXXX INTRODUCTIOK. 
 
 infinite prejudice of devotion, besides the advantajjes it givies to 
 our reproachful blasphemers. Could not Friday and Saturday be 
 spared? Or if indulged, might they not be employed for the 
 support of the poor, or as well the maintenance of some work- 
 house as a few debauched comedians ? What, if they had an 
 hundred pound per annum, less coming in ! This were but 
 policy in them ; more than they were born to, and the only means 
 to consecrate (if I may use the term) their scarce allowable im- 
 pertinences. If my Lord Chancellor would be but instrumental 
 in reforming this one exorbitancy, it would gain both the King 
 and his Lordship multitudes of blessings. You know, my Lord, 
 that I (who have written a play, and am a scurvy poet too some- 
 times,) am far from Puritanism ; but I would have no reproach 
 left our adversaries, in a thing which may so conveniently be 
 reformed. Plays are now with us become a licentious excess and 
 a vice, and need severe censor's, that should look as well to their 
 morality as to their lines and numbers." 
 
 4.-^GR0TIUS AND LAUD. 
 
 A SKETCH of the personal history of these eminent individuals 
 is given in pages 566 — 768, 
 
 Of Archbishop Laud I shall, in this place, say very little, since 
 much concerning him will be found in other parts of the volume. 
 In page 684, I have said, " Grant me but one small and not 
 "unreasonable concession, similar to that which in our days is 
 " demanded for the personal obliquities of every Republican Dema- 
 " gogue, or petty Independent Pastor, under the Commonwealth, 
 " — allow me to plead a consideration of the aspect of the times, the 
 " peculiar difficulties of his situation, and the inflamed state of parties, 
 " — and I will undertake to prove, that Laud's patriotism was in 
 " reality purer and more disinterested, than that of any of his 
 " Calvinistic cotemporaries, who had an opportunity of display- 
 " ing the genuineness of their patriotism in their public action^." 
 — The facts Avhich I have adduced, and the epistolary correspond- 
 em;e which I have translated, will, I hope, stand in proof not 
 only of the Archbishop's trajiscendant love of his country, but like- 
 wise of his exte7isive philanthropy . 
 
 I have already mentioned, (p. cxvi,) the antipathy against this 
 eminent Prelate, which I had conceived early in life : This unfa- 
 vourable impression, however, was afterwards removed by the 
 high character of him which the famous Limborch has given in 
 the preface to that inestimable collection of letters, entituled 
 Proistantium ac Ernditorum FqnstoJa;. In the year 1812, an inti- 
 mate friend, to whom as a lover of learning I am under the 
 greatest obligations, presented me with a fine copy of the first 
 edition of Liniborch's collection, which, both for the sake of the 
 donor and of. its Arminian contents, I perused with the greatest 
 
INTRODUCTION', CXXXl 
 
 avidity ; and to that noble work I acknowledge myself indebted 
 for many of those enlarged views of the ecclesiastical affairs of 
 Europe, and particularly those of England and Holland, which 
 I have obtained, and of which the reader will discover some 
 traces in various parts of this volume. I had learned from Lm- 
 BORCn's correspondence with Locke, that our great countryman, 
 during his exile in Holland, immediately prior to the Revolution 
 in 1688, received from the liberal Dutch Professor ample encou- 
 ragement to those Whiggish principles which he had imbibed, 
 and which he afterwards so ably defended; and I knew, that a 
 man so warmly attached to free institutions, as Limborch had 
 proved himself to be, would never have written the following 
 character of the ill-fated English Prelate, unless he had believed 
 him to be what he h^s here depicted : " But the very reverend 
 William Laud, Archbishop of Canterbury, who, on account of 
 his religion, was beheaded by hot zealots, here shews himself 
 entitled to the highest admiration. Though attacked with grievous 
 accusations, and loaded with numerous calumnies, in his most 
 familiar letters to Vossius he gives no utterance to curses against 
 his ferocious enemies; but, imitating the example of his Saviour, 
 when reviled, he reviled not again, and, when attacked, he 
 threatened not, but blessed them who cursed him, and poured 
 forth the most ardent prayers for his persecutors. In these let- 
 ters, he is so fully acquitted of that monstrous accusation with 
 which his most implacable enemies, openly before all the world 
 and most invidiously, traduced him, — as though his aitcmpts had 
 been directed to bring back the authority of the Pope into the Church 
 ^of England, — -that it is not possible for calumny herself to dis- 
 cover any thing in him on which to fasten her talons. This 
 volume contains his continued importunities, repeated at least 
 ten times in his letters, for Vossius to undertake the province of con- 
 futing Baronius. Indeed, he never desisted from pressing him 
 into that employment : In one of his letters he says, ' I am par- 
 
 * ticularly desirous to behold Bai'onius [t\\e Popish Annalist! 
 ' falling under the force of your weapons, before the destinies 
 
 * open the tomb for me ; you cannot therefore expect to receive 
 ' any letter from me without a repetition of this stimulus.' " — See 
 the preceding part of this letter in page 577. 
 
 Notwithstanding Bishop Burnet's unjust vituperations, this is 
 not a solitary encomium from the pen of a man of acknowledged 
 candour: I have subsequently met with other as ample and 
 impartial testimonies in the Archbishop's favour, from eminent 
 Whig Divines of the Church of England. Several circumstances 
 respecting Laud, and the peculiar situation in which he was 
 placed, receive elucidation from Bray's valuable Memoirs of Eve- 
 lyn; and though I shall introduce a further notice of the ^ood 
 Archbishop in the second volume, yet, from a perusal of what I 
 
 12 
 
 L 
 
CXXXU INTRODUCTION. 
 
 have now written, every man of piety and ingenuousness will, I 
 am persuaded, be induced to conceive a still more exalted opinion 
 of that great man and of his public measures. 
 
 Those who wish to behold the praises to which Hugo Grotius, 
 or Hugh De Groot, is justly entitled, and which he has 
 received in ample measure from admiring friends and reluctant 
 foes, may consult Sir Thomas Pope Blount's Censura celebriorum 
 Aulhormn. His well-earned reputation is founded on too durable 
 a basis to be moved by such petty attacks as those to which I 
 have alluded in a previous part of this Introduction, (p. xxxi,) or 
 those of Mr. Orme in page &41. 
 
 That a man so accomplished, virtuous, fearless, and unfortu- 
 nate, should have had many enemies among his cotemporaries, is 
 not wonderful : But the number of those who evinced their hatred 
 to him, or to his philanthropic labours, increased after his 
 decease, when they could display it with impunity. " This very 
 pious, learned, and judicious man, "says Dr. Hammond, " hath of 
 late, among many, fallen under a very unhappy fate, being most 
 unjustly calumniated, sometimes as a Socinian, sometimes as a 
 Papist, and, — as if he had learnt to reconcile contradictories, or 
 the most distant extremes, — sometimes as both of them together!" 
 
 One cause of the charge of Socinianism being preferred against 
 him, has been already mentioned, (p. xxxiii,) and it is more fully 
 explained in pages 637 — 642. The reader will not require many 
 additional reasons to convince him of the untenable ground for 
 such an accusation, when he is told that Voetius, one of the., 
 most violent of his enemies, laid down this grand axiom- — '-'^to 
 place the principal part of religion in aw observance of Christ's 
 commands, is rank Socinianism !". — 'To such a jyractical observance 
 of the requisitions of the Gospel, by what name soever it might be 
 stigmatized, Gi-otius pleaded guilty. He says, (p. 637,) " I per- 
 ceive this was accounted the principal part of religion by the 
 Christians of the primitive ages ; and their various assemblies, 
 divines, and martyrs taught, ' that the doctrines necessary to be 
 
 * known are exceedingly few, but that God forms his estimate of 
 
 * us from the purpose and intention of an obedient spirit.' I am 
 likewise of the same opinion, and shall never repent of having 
 maintained it." 
 
 But as the charge of Popery is of the utmost importance, I have 
 discussed this topic at great length, (pp. 56Q — 746,) and have 
 proved, (pp. 549, 561,) that Grotius was as little attached to the 
 principles or the practice of the Romish Cliurch, as the most 
 zealous of his accusers. Whatever tends to vindicate the condiict 
 of Grotius in this matter, will operate still more powerfully in 
 favour of Archbishop Laud. The design of Grotius ^is well 
 described by Dr. Hammond in a Digression which he Mded to 
 his Answer to the Aniinadversions on his Dissertations ; in which he 
 says: 
 
INTBODUCTION. CXXXlll 
 
 " For the charge of Popery that is fallen upon him, it is evi- 
 dent from whence that flows,' — either from his prqfest opposition 
 to many doctrines of some Reformers, Zuinglius, and Calvin, S^^c. Or 
 from his Annotations on Cassander, and the Debates with Rivet con- 
 sequent thereto, the Votum pro Pace and Discussio. 
 
 " For the former of these, it is sufficiently known what contests 
 there were, and at length how profest the divisions betwixt the 
 Remonstrant and Contra-remonstrant ; and it is confessed, that 
 he maintained (all his time) the Remonstrant's party, vindicating 
 it from all charge, whether of Pelagianism or Skmi-pelagianism, 
 which was by the opposers objected to it, and pressing the 
 favourers of the doctrine of Irrespective Decrees with the odious 
 consequences of making God the Author and Favourer of' sin, and 
 frequently expressing his sense of the evil influences that some of 
 those doctrines were experimented to have on men's lives. And by 
 these means it is nbt strange, that he should fall under great displea- 
 sure from those M'ho, having espoused the opinion oP Irresj^ect- 
 ive Decrees, did not onlj' publish it as the truth, and trith 
 OF God, but farther asserted the questioning of it to be injurious 
 to God's Free Grace and his Eternal Election, and consequently 
 retained no ordinary patience for or charity to opposers. But 
 then, still, this is no medium to infer that charge. The doctrines 
 which he thus maintained, were neither branches nor characters 
 of Popery, but asserted by some of the first and most learned and 
 pious Reformers. Witness the writings of Hemingius in his 
 Opuscula, most of which are on these subjects. Whereas, on the 
 contrary side, Zuinglius and others, who maintained the rigid 
 way of Irrespective Decrees, and infused them into some of this 
 nation of ours, are truly said, by an excellent writer of ours. Dr. 
 Jackson, to have had it Jirst from some ancient Romish Schoolmen, 
 and so to have had as much, or more, of that guilt adherent to 
 them, as can be charged on their opposers. So that from hence, 
 to found the jealousy, to affirm him a Papist because he was not 
 a Contra-remonstrant, is but the old method of speaking all that 
 is ill of those who differ from our opinions in any thing ; as the 
 Dutchman in his rage calls his horse an Arminian, because he 
 doth not go as he would have him. And this is all that can 
 soberly be concluded from such suggestions, that they are dis- 
 pleased and passionate that thus speak. 
 
 " As for the Annotations on Cassander, c^r., atid the consequent 
 vindications of himself against Rivet, those have with some colour 
 been deemed more favourable toward Popery ; but yet, I suppose, 
 will be capable of benign interpretations, if they be read with 
 these few cautions or remembrances : 
 
 " First. — That they were designed to shew a way to peace, 
 whensoever men's minds on both sides should be piously affected 
 to it. 
 
 i3 
 
CXXXIV IXTIIODITCTION. 
 
 " Sccondlij. — That he did not hope for this temper in this age, 
 the humour on both sides being so turgent, and extremely con- 
 trary to it, and the controversy debated on both sides by those 
 * who/ saith he, ' desire to eternize, and not to compose, contentions^ 
 and therefore makes his appeal to posterity, when this paroxysm 
 shall be over- 
 
 " Thirdly. — ^That, for the chief usurpations of the Papacy, he 
 leaves it to Christian Princes to join together to vindicate their 
 own rights, and reduce the Pope ad Canmies, to that temper 
 which the ancient Canons allow and require of him ; and, if that 
 will not be done, to reform every one within their own domi- 
 nions. 
 
 " Fotirthly — That, what he saith in favour of some Popish 
 doctrines, above what some other learned Protestants have said, 
 is not so much by way o( assertion or juslificatioii of them, as to 
 shew what reasons they may justly be thought to proceed upon, 
 and so not to be so irrational or impious as they are ordinarily 
 accounted ; and this only in order to the peace of the Christian 
 world, that we may have as much charity to others and not as 
 high animosities, live with all men as sweetly, and amicably, and 
 peaceably, and not as bitterly as is possible, accounting the wars, 
 and seditions, and divisions, and rebellions, that are raised and ' 
 managed upon the account of religion, far greater and more 
 scandalous unchristian evils, than are the errors of some Romish 
 doctrines, especially as they are maintained by the more sober 
 and moderate men among them, Cassander, Picherel, &c. 
 
 " Fifthly. — What he saith in his Discussio of a conjunction of 
 Protestants with those that adhere to the Bishop of Rome, is no 
 farther to be extended, than his words extend it. — (1.) That there 
 is not any other visible way to the end there mentioned by him, 
 of acquiring or preserving universal unity. — (2.) That this is to 
 be done, not crudely, by returning to them as they are, submit- 
 ting our necks to our former yoke, but by taking away at once 
 the division, and the causes of it, on which side soever; adding 
 only, in the third place, that the bare primacy of the Bishop of 
 Rome, secundum Canones, such as the ancient Canons allow of, 
 (which hath nothing of stipreme universal power or authority in it,) 
 is none of those causes, nor consequently necessary to be excluded 
 in the diaXXa.x.hx.ov, citing that as the confession of that excel- 
 lent person Philip Melancthon. 
 
 " So that, in effect, thiat whole speech of his, which is so 
 solemnly vouched by Mr. Knot, and looked on so jealously by 
 many of us, is no more than this, ' that such a Primacy of the 
 ^ Bishop of Rome, as the ancient Canons allowed him, were, for 
 ' :SO glorious an end as is the regaining the peace of Christendom, 
 ' very reasonably to be afforded him, nay absolutely necessary to 
 ' be yielded him, whensoever any such catholic union shall be 
 ' attempted ;' which, as it liad been the express opinion of Me- 
 
ITNllODUCTIuN. CXXXV 
 
 lancthori;, one of the first and wisest Reformers^ so it is far from 
 any design of establishing the usurpations of the Papacy, or any 
 of their false doctrines attending them, but only designed as an 
 expedient for the I'estoring the peace of the whole Christian 
 world, which every disciple of Christ is so passionately required 
 to contend and pray for." 
 
 At the conclusion of the Doctor's Cotitinuation of the Defence of 
 Hugo Grotius, he thus expresses himself: 
 
 " As this is an act of mere justice and charity to the dead, — 
 and no less to those who, by their sin of uncharitable thoughts 
 towards him, are likely to deprive themselves of the benefit of 
 his labours, — so is it but a proportionable return of debt and 
 gratitude to the signal value and kindness which, in his life time, 
 he constantly professed to pay to this Church and nation ; express- 
 ing his opinion, ' that, of all Churches in the world, it was the 
 ' most careful observer and transcriber of primitive antiquity,' 
 and more than intimating his desire to end his days in the bosom 
 and communion of our mother. Of this I want not store of wit- 
 nesses, which from time to time have heard it from his own 
 mouth whilst he was Ambassador in France, and even in his 
 return to Sweden immediately before his death : And, for a real 
 evidence of this truth, it is no news to many, that, at the taking 
 his journey from Paris, he appointed his wife, whom he left 
 behind, to resort to the English assembly at the Agent's house, 
 which accordingly she is known to have practised. 
 
 " As far as the English Establishment is removed from Socinian 
 and Popish, so far this learned man stands vindicated from both 
 these aspersions ; which makes me the less wonder, that some 
 others, who have endeavoured to maintain their constancy of 
 adherence and submission to the Church of England, are in like 
 manner most injuriously aspersed by those who have departed 
 from it. ' Lord, lay not this sin to their charge !' " 
 
 With regard to the political principles of Grotius, the reader 
 will discover, that, in advanced life, they were those of a man 
 whom we should designate as "a Whig of 1688." In the Concor- 
 dia discors et Antichristus revelatus, which the celebrated Samuel 
 Marets, (p. 270,) published against Grotius, in l642, it is said : 
 " It is impossible to tolerate this, especially in Grotius, — ^^his 
 " sufficiently open avowal, that kings are not of Divine Institution: 
 " For, he places those kings who are first chosen by the will of 
 " the people, in opposition to those famous (^seventy] judges who 
 " were instituted by God, as is apparent from Numbers xi, 16." 
 On this passage the witty Bayle remarks: "This, to be sure, is 
 singular enough: For Grotius is always refuted upon his having 
 too imich subjected the people to the royal prerogative. After this, let 
 nobody say that none but the Lutherans approve of Grotius's 
 maxims : Here you see a Calvinist minister, who does not think 
 that Grotius liad spoken very favourably of Monarchy !"- — ^When 
 
CXXXVl INTRODUCTION. 
 
 a great man is thus blamed alternately for a bias towards popular 
 and res,al rights, we are not at a loss in what class to place him : 
 He belongs to the class ef persons who are governed by moderate 
 principles. Those who are conversant with the nervous and 
 manly writings on political subjects, in which some of the most 
 famous of our countrymen indulged between I66O and I69O, 
 know, that Grotius was perpetually appealed to, not only by the 
 advocates for Popularity, but likewise by those for RoyaltyI 
 The truth is, Grotius had, by painful experience, known enough 
 of the boasted liberty of a Republic, and therefore retracted 
 some of those unguartled expressions which he had formerly era- 
 ployed in favour of that form of government. Unlike many of 
 his cotemporaries, haAvever, he did not run into the opposite 
 extreme and applaud all the appalling encroachments of tyrants ; 
 but his principles kept him at an equal distance from the licen- 
 tiousness into which liberty too often degenerates, and from that 
 fearful servility which is frequently produced by too ardent a 
 love of' subordination and obedience. 
 
 5.— .RIVET AND DU MOULIN. 
 
 Of Andrew Rivet and some of his performances the reader 
 will perceive, that I have said quite enough in the following 
 pages, 230, 285—92, 745, 748 — 52. He was a most unfair and 
 disingenuous adversary towards Grotius, whose ashes he would 
 not suffer to rest in peace. I have said, in page 284, that " Rivet 
 was the accredited organ of the French and Dutch Calvinists, and 
 was aided," in the composition of his pamphlets against Grotius, 
 " by the whole Calvinian phalanx in Europe :" The truth of this 
 fact is well known to all those who are acquainted with the com- 
 plexity of his virulent productions. 
 
 His bi'other-in-law, the elder Peter Du Moulin, has also 
 received ample notice in this volume; (see pages 215, 223, 230, 
 281, 290, 392, 554, 580,) and those who are aware of the very 
 iniquitous part which he and his family acted, in fomenting the 
 public disturbances of this kingdom, in whose bosom they had 
 been generously cherished, will not think my exposure of their 
 malevolent spirit and pragmatical conduct to be at all misplaced. 
 He had two sons, Louis and Peter, both of whom obtained pre- 
 ferment in England; and the latter of them, during our civil 
 broils, became an exemplary loyal divine, while his brother Louis 
 continued one of the most seditious firebrands in the kingdom. 
 After the Restoration, Louis's indignation was aroused at the 
 great defection from the ranks of Presbytery and Calvinism, in 
 the persons of certain great men, whom he mentions, and who, 
 having received their education at Cambridge, are some of the 
 individuals described under the appellation of " Latitude-men" 
 in page 798. The following are Louis's words; " From all these 
 
INTIlOj;jUCTION. CXXXVU 
 
 hypotheses^ I gather these conclusions, which naturally follow 
 the aforesaid premises. — (1.) That several Bishops and Doctors of 
 the Church of England, as Dr. Floyd, Dr. Tillotson, Dr. Stilling- 
 fleet. Dr. Patrick, that are acknowledged by the Nonconformists 
 to be persons of great learning, worth, and piety, but who are 
 extreme admirers of the Episcopacy of England and all its con- 
 sequences, and who have also preferred its government to all 
 other establishments in Europe, have, by an unlucky accident, 
 contributed more towards the reputation of the English hierarchy 
 and its practices, and towards the perpetuating the feuds and 
 quarrels between the Conformists and Nonconformists, than it has 
 been possible for any other corrupted party to do by all their 
 irregularities and advances towards Rome. 
 
 " (2.) That it may be said of these good Bishops and Doctors 
 before mentioned, what the politic sages have observed of 
 Anselme, Bernard, Thomas Aquinas, John of Salisbuiy, and 
 Gerson, ' that by their great repute of piety and learning, they 
 ' have contributed more to the strengthening of the Pope's tyranny 
 
 * and religion, in the minds of the people, than a hundred such 
 'as Gregory the Vllth and Boniface the Vlllth were able to 
 
 * effect, by their tyranny and the wickedness and impurity of their 
 ' lives, for the discrediting of the Pope and his religion,' 
 
 " (3.) That it is not to be believed how much the Noncon- 
 formists of England suffer in the esteem of our great men of the 
 Protestant party in Europe, who, hearing people talk of the 
 learning and piety of so many English Bishops and Doctors, all 
 Conformists, and who resemble those four Doctors T have just 
 before named, say aloud, ' that the Nonconformists must needs 
 
 * be very unreasonable, and of a very nice and fantastical piety, 
 '' for refusing to conform to the Church of England, after the , 
 
 * example of those four Doctors.' 
 
 " (4.) That how good soever the intentions of some of the 
 Bishops and Doctors of the Church of England may be that are 
 of the same temper of spirit with these four Doctors, and what 
 kindness soever they may have for the Nonconformists, it is 
 impossible they should ever come over to them, and consent to 
 terms of reconciliation and moderation, so long as they remain in 
 this judgment and opinion, ' that of all the established ecclesias- 
 ' tical governments in Europe, that of the Church of England is 
 
 * the most excellent, and the most Apostolical, and that there is 
 
 * nothing of defect in it;' and so long as the multitude of their 
 benefices, and the great honour they are in in the world, blinds 
 their judgment, there being no likelihood nor hopes, that those 
 who are raised so high, and that live in honour and abundance, 
 richly and fatly, (unless they will imitate good Dr. Floyd, who 
 bestows most of his Church-revenues on the poor,) will diminish 
 any thing of their greatness, both as to their retinue or their 
 kitchen, and will descend from high to low ; and that a Bishop, 
 
CXXXVm INTRODUCTION. 
 
 who now goes before the Barons, will quit his place to be only 
 n poor simple Moderator, and watchman over a small company of 
 priests, such as were St. Cyprian and St. Austin. For this 
 eminence of fortune and dignity does absolutely shut up the door 
 to all the overtures of Reformation, which we learn from Mon- 
 sieur Claude in his Defence of the Reformation of the Churches 
 vf France, where he tells us, ' that the Cardinal du Prat, for this 
 
 * very reason, was the most violent of all men, and the most 
 
 * enraged against Luther's Reformation, because he was provided 
 
 * of five Bishopricks, and I know not how many other good and 
 
 * fat benefices.' " 
 
 In another part of the same work, he observes, with all the 
 naivete of a Frenchman: " I will begin with the heat and passion 
 of my friends against me, and with the judgment which they 
 make upon my Short and True Account, &c. They say, ' that that 
 ' book is altogether now unseasonable, when as persons of great 
 
 * learning, piety, and merit, and who, at the bottom, are very 
 
 * sincere and upright in the Church of England, — such as Dn 
 
 * Floyd, Dr. Tillotson, Dr. Stillingfleet and Dr. Patrick,* to 
 
 • In his Advances toicards Rome, Du Moulin is particularly severe nppnpr. 
 Patrick, for ''joining hands with Sherlock, Bull, Bramhall," and other Divines^' 
 *-' in burlesquing upon the doctrine of Imputative Righteousness.''' For proof of 
 this, he " cites some passages from the Doctor's book called the Pilgrim,'''' an 
 allegory which served as a foundation for the " Pilgrim's Progress" by Bunyan. 
 He then makes the following remarks, some of which are exceedingly judicious : 
 
 " If Dr. Patrick, who resembles Gregory the First, the best of bad Popes 
 and the worst of good ones, does in so erroneous a manner run away from the 
 Church of England, as it was about a hundred years ago, and from all the Pro- 
 testant Divines, as well Lutherans as Calvinists, as well English as French ; 
 what sinister judgment may be made of a hundred of his colleagues, who are 
 much inferior to him both in the profession of holiness of doctrine and of life ?, I 
 would take for example Dr. Jeremy Taylou, Bishop in Ireland, one of the 
 most learned men that England or Ireland ever produced, but yet who is the 
 .same, or rather vies with Dr. Patrick, about the doctrines that are quite different 
 from the first Reformation in the time of Edward the Sixth ; for he denies original 
 sin: He says, with the Poet, ~~ 
 
 Le.v est, non pwna, perire ; 
 
 that death is a law of nature, and not a punishment of sin ; that concupiscence 
 is not a sin, neither in those who are baptized, nor in those who are not. He 
 ■establishes the works of supererogation, and the conjunction of the grace of God 
 with the strength of man, which give their mutual assistance to the working of 
 man's salvation. 
 
 " But he has set forth a large book, where he strongly proves, that religion 
 ought not to be established by persecution, for it is contrary to the very spirit and 
 temper of Christianity. Wherein the Doctor's conduct has been diametrically 
 opposite to the carriage of those who are joined with him in the design and endea- 
 vour of his getting near to Rome : For these, at the same time that they have 
 made shipwreck concerning the faith, as the Apostle speaks, have broken off all 
 charity towards their brethren, and have clothed themselves with the spirit of 
 animosity, inalighity, and persecution ; and, after they have abandoned God 
 his truth, they have revenged themselves of that loss, by that of love and affec 
 
INTRODUCTIOK. CXXXIX 
 
 * -whom i might join Professor Burnet, — are making it their 
 
 * business, as they think it their duty, to re-unite the two parties, 
 
 * the Conformists and the Nonconformists, and when they are 
 
 * most industriously employed in reducing to practice the means 
 ' of peace and concord, according to Mr, Richard Baxter's model ; 
 ' and that, instead of lending them my helping hand, and assisting 
 ' them in so good a work, I am doing what 1 can to divide both 
 ' parties, and to exasperate and embitter them one against the 
 
 * other.' " 
 
 The book to which he refers is a vile publication, entituled, 
 " A short and true Account of the several Advances the Church 
 of England hath made towards Rome." Its design, he says, was 
 " to disengage and free all honest persons, such as are the above 
 " mentioned doctors, from the corrupt party of their Church, to 
 " join and confederate themselves with that of the Noncon- 
 " formists ; that so those two parties might consolidate in one, 
 " and consequently be more capable to act with greater zeal and 
 " vigour against the third party, that are making their advances 
 " toivards Uome." — This will appear a vain attempt, if the reader 
 seriously reflect on the noble account which those truly great 
 men have given (page 798,) of their well-grounded and mature 
 attachment to Episcopacy and. Arminianism, when neither the 
 one nor the other had any preferment to bestow: They had 
 imbibed all the Christian liberality of the system of Arminius, 
 ■while the Church of England lay in ruins ; and some of them 
 had quoted Hales's tract on Schism with approbation. It was 
 not therefore to be expected, that they would be induced, by 
 such weak arguments as those of Louis Du Moulin, and " others 
 
 tion towards those whose purity of doctrine, and holiness of life, have been a 
 contipual reproach and eye-sore to them : Which is a thing that Doctor Taylor 
 has never done. For how erroneous soever that Doctor was as to matter of doc- 
 trine, he was yet endowed with two very excellent qualities ; — the one, that he 
 was of a most exemplary life, as he did sufficiently testify it in his carriage and 
 by his writings ; — the other, that he had an affectionate tenderness, and love, 
 mid pity, for those ivho did not agree with him, either in the profession of the 
 same doctrine, or in the practice of its ceremonies. In which he differed very 
 much from his brethren in the work of the ministry, who satisfy themselves with 
 the profession of a superficial piety ; who easily do digest and swallow non- 
 residency, plurality of benefices, and preaching by a deputy, and the divertise- 
 ment of the play-house, or of a pack of cards ; and who insult over such as 
 Baxter, Owen, Annesly, Jenkins, Bates, "Watson, Howe, and the rest, for 
 driving men to desperation, and so to hell, by too rigorously pressing the practice 
 of piety. That is the iraritm causa, et hinc illce lachrymw; and why they 
 mortally hate those holy persons. But I cannot but strangely wonder, why they 
 do not put St. Paul amongst such desperate Divines, from whose mouth and pen 
 issued forth more severe and thundering doctrines and menaces than ever came from 
 Mr. Baxter, &c., and that they do not blot out of their bibles this holy Apostle's 
 rousing saying, (2 Cor. v, 10,) ' Tliat we must all appear before the judg. 
 ment-seat of Christ, that every one may receive according to that he hath 
 done, whether it be goad or eviU And who tells us, that ' Those that live 
 after the flesh shall die,^ " 
 
exl INTllODWCTION. 
 
 of the Congregational way," to abandon the cause which they 
 had deliberately espoused. His pamphlet, however, is a fair 
 specimen of the indecent railing and ignominious treatment which 
 Tillotson and the Latitudinarians were compelled to receive, from 
 those who had at that sera chosen the road of Dissent. Du 
 Moulin quotes the opinion which his elder brother Peter, the 
 loyal divine, entertained of his scandalous conduct: "' I consider 
 
 * my poor brother as a man raised hy the evil spirit, for the destruc- 
 ' tion of the Church : It would be a double fault in me to assist 
 ' him to do evil.' I alledge these words, not out of any ill-will 
 to complain of my brother, but to advance and extol his kind- 
 nesses to me, which are so much the greater and more obliging, 
 in that he acts quite contrary to what he threatens me with." 
 
 To understand this sentence, it is necessary to know, that 
 Louis had been deprived of the Professorship of History at 
 Oxford, and, like many worthies of his class, was then practising 
 medicine in the metropolis. His brother Peter, who enjoyed con- 
 siderable preferment in the Church, augmented Louis's precarious 
 income by his opportune bounty, to which he thus refers in his 
 Advances towards Rome : "As I was just shutting up this dis- 
 course. Monsieur de I'Angle, Canon of Canterbury and Minister 
 of tlie French Church in the Savoy, gave me an entrance into 
 another, in which, after he had declared to me the good inten- 
 tions that my elder brother had to bestow upon me his liberalities, 
 he thought he was obliged, as a Minister of Jesus Christ, and as 
 my near kinsman, to tell me in good earnest, ' that the reason of 
 
 * the diminution of my brother's bounty to me, proceeded from 
 
 * that enmity which I testified with so much heat and bitterness 
 
 * against the Church of England ; that I, (more than all the men 
 ' of the world amassed together,) had an account to make to 
 ' Almighty God, for that my unchristian spirit and rude treat- 
 
 * ment of it ;' and hereupon, having represented to me that the 
 time of my dissolution could not be very far off, being turned 
 of seventy-four, he exhorted me, without any farther delay, 
 ' to fall seriously to the work of making my peace with God, and 
 
 * getting my conscience into a calm and serene temper, by prac- 
 
 * tising the duties of repentance, and by labouring to live and die 
 
 * in the persuasion of the pardon, not only of all my sins past, but 
 
 * especially of those which I had committed against the Church 
 ' of England, which I had so much disparaged and scandalized, 
 
 * both by my writings and speech.' " 
 
 This exhortation to repentance was not unseasonable, for the 
 pragmatical old physician died about six months afterwards; and 
 the reader will perceive an exact similarity between the spirit 
 breathing in the two productions which I have quoted, and 
 that which was displayed by his father, than whom the Church 
 of England had not a more insidious adversary. 
 
INTRODUCTIOX. Oxl'l 
 
 6.— THE REV. WILLIAM ORME. 
 
 This gentleman's Memoirs of the Life and Writings of Dr. John 
 Owen have been severely criticized by me in various parts of this 
 volume: (See pages 91, 380, 389, 402, 4l6, 448, 504,640,747, 
 785.) I have more strictures yet to produce on a few other of 
 his most glaring mis-statements, which (p. 787,) I have charitably 
 imputed to Mr. Orme's weakness rather than to sheer wickedness. 
 Indeed from " the getting-up" of his work, I perceive it to be 
 one of the most easy literary enterprizes that was ever undertaken, 
 to write the Memoirs of any eminent divine, who had distin- 
 guished himself early in life by his pragmatical and ambitious 
 conduct, and afterwards by a forced kind of penitence, and by the 
 composition of various devotional publications. When stubborn 
 facts from all quarters, from Calvinistic friends and Episcopalian 
 enemies, are marshalled in battle-array against such a character, 
 the only thing necessary to repel the troublesome assailants, ac- 
 cording to this modern practice of Biography, is, to substitute 
 one's own unsupported denial of the circumstances adduced, and 
 to say " / believe," or " / am quite satisfied to the contrary !" Ano- 
 ther grand requisite in such productions seems to be, that of 
 collecting together all " the thrice-refuted" slanders concerning 
 other pious and accomplished individuals, whose misfortune it 
 was to differ on some doctrinal or political matters from " the hero 
 of the tale," and by a little address to make such censures bear the 
 semblance of new and well-founded accusations. Petty tricks of 
 this description, I might enumerate in abundance ; but those to 
 which I have alluded, sufficiently indicate Mr. Orme's style of 
 writing, and the extent of his research, as they appear in his Me^ 
 moirs of Dr. Owen. 
 
 In delivering such an opinion^s this, concerning a cotempo- 
 rary author, I know I am offending against very high authority : 
 For the public has been somewhat ostentatiously informed, by a 
 Review in the London Congregational Magazine for October 
 1822, (which Review, some of Mr. Orme's Independent associates 
 rather shrewdly assert, was written by a veri/ friendly hand,) that 
 "in an article in the 71st number of the Edinburgh Review, 
 generally ascribed to Sir James Mackintosh, who is himself a 
 host on any question relating to British History, speaking of the 
 Memoirs of' Owen, it is said, ' In this very able volume it is clearly 
 ' proved, that the Independents were the first teachers of religious 
 ' liberty.' " If, however, Sir James should ever cast his eye on 
 this Introduction, I would refer him to pages Ixviii, and Ixxxvi, 
 in proof, that the Calvinistic part of the Independents were nei- 
 ther the first nor the best "teachers of religious liberty," but that 
 "such honour" belongs in England to the Republican Statesmen, 
 and the Arminians of the New School, nearly all of whom derived 
 
exlil I>JTRODUCTTOX. 
 
 theii" religion and politics from the free institutions of Holland 
 and the liberal writings of the Dutch Arminians. — See pages 
 6 and 791- 
 
 —THE LATE REV. THOMAS SCOTT. 
 
 In this volume I have mentioned the Rev. Thomas Scott's 
 name very seldom ; (pp. xxxi, xlvi, 435, 573 ;) but several other 
 passages will be found, which correct some of the egregious mis- 
 statements in his Articles of' the Synod of Dorl, to which he has 
 prefixed i/ie History of Events which made way for that Si/nod.-^ 
 In the first volume of the Works o/Arminius, (p. 510,) I made 
 a promise, to give the public a refutation of the most glaring of 
 Mr. Scott's errors, in a new edition of Bishop VYomack's Cahinists' 
 Cabinet Unlocked: But as it will be some months before I can 
 commence that publication, I subjoin a few remarks on one part 
 of Mr. Scott's performance. 
 
 I omit all animadversion on the curious circumstance, that an 
 old gentleman, who had been nearly forty yeai's employed in 
 instructing mankind from the pulpit and the press in the doctrines 
 of Calvin, should know so little about them as to be so absolutely 
 ignorant of that grand modification of them which was astutely 
 framed by the Synod of Dort. This fact, however, and its 
 astonishing concomitants, will receive due attention at some other 
 opportunity. 
 
 I. After informing his readers, in the Introduction, that he 
 " makes no pretensions to any thing beyond /ajn^e** and exactness 
 in giving the meaning of the original," Mr. Scott immediately 
 subjoins, " Had I been disposed to aim at it, I do not think 
 " myself competent to the office of translating in such a manner, 
 " as to invest the Latin, fairly and fully, with the entire idiom 
 " of the English language." — Mr. Scott's incompetency to do this 
 " fairly and fully," or even to convey " the meaning of the 
 original," is displayed in the first page of his translation, and, 
 I think without a single exception, in each of the succeeding 
 pages. The passage to which I allude stands thus, in Mr. Scott's 
 English : " It pleased the illustrious and most mighty the States 
 " General, that the Acts also of the same Synod, faithfully tran- 
 " scribed from the public registers, (tabulis,) should be published 
 " in print, for the satisfaction and use of the Churches. And as 
 " in these (records) many things every where occur, which per- 
 " tain to the history of the things transacted in the Belgic 
 " Churches," &c. Some confused meaning might have been 
 gleaned by the mere English reader, from this very bald trans- 
 lation, had Mr. Scott refrained from his parenthetical additions, 
 which amount to four, before we arrive at the close of the lengthy 
 sentence. In two of these additions, the words tabulis and quibtts 
 are rendered into English by "registers" and "records:" The 
 
i>fTRODUCTiox. c:S:liii 
 
 latter term, however, to which quibus refers, slioukl have been 
 " Acts." The translator was led into this error by his lamentable 
 want of accurate information on the subjects which he undertook 
 to elucidate. In the Introduction to this Historical Preface, he 
 has given the following ample, explanation of his very original 
 views of the misconceived and mistranslated word : " In perusing 
 " this Preface and the History contained in it, the reader should 
 " especially recollect, that it was drawn up and published by the 
 " authority and with the sanction of the States General and the 
 " Prince of Orange," as well as by that of the Synod itself; and 
 " that, in every part of it, thie Acts, or public records in which 
 " the events recorded were registered, are referred to with the • 
 " exact dates of each transaction. No History can therefore be 
 " attested as authentic, in a more satisfactory and unexception- 
 " able manner: For, whatever degree of colouring prejudices or 
 " partiality may be supposed to have given to the narration, it 
 " can hardly be conceived, that collective bodies and individuals 
 " filling up such conspicuous and exalted stations would e.\- 
 " pressly attest any thing dh-ectly false, and then appeal to 
 " authorities by which the falsehood of their statement might at 
 *' any time be detected and exposed." 
 
 I cannot anticipate the surprise of the impartial reader, when 
 he is made acquainted with the plain facts of the case, which is 
 thus artfully mystified. " The Acts," that Mr. Scott here attempts 
 to magnify into " Public Records in which the events recorded 
 •were registered," were nothing more than those poriions of the 
 public proceedings of the Synod of Dort, which, after much polishing 
 and altcralioti, it was deemed proper to publish ; and the word 
 " tabulis" which Mr. Scott has rendered by the convertible terms 
 ** Records" and " Registers," were nothing more than the written 
 Journals of the Synod's proceedings, which were composed at intervals 
 BETWEEN or DURING the different sessions, and which were after- 
 wards abridged and modified with great labour, by the secretaries 
 themselves, into what are here called " the Acts !" — If, therefore, 
 either of these, the original or the copy, had " attested any thing 
 directly false," an appeal from the one to the other would only be 
 an " appeal" from the Sy nodical Journal to its Abridgment, or vice 
 versa, and not " to authorities by which the falsehood of their 
 statement might at any time be detected and exposed." For, 
 these Journals of the Calvinistic secretaries, which had been got 
 up in a most objectionable manner, were by no means " Public 
 Records ;" and no place was ever appointed in which they might 
 be deposited for purposes of reference. 
 
 But every Latin scholar, on inspecting the language of Hein- 
 sius, which Mr. Scott has dreadfully mangled as well by his 
 interpolations as by his attempts at translation, will at once per- 
 ceive, that the original phraseology applies solely to the " Acis" 
 themselves, that is, to theex-parle account which the Calvinists 
 
exliv iNTRODumox. 
 
 published of the proceedings of the Synod at each of their ses- 
 sions ; and that it cannot, without wilful force, be so interpreted 
 as to relate at all to those " Public Registkrs" or " Records," 
 which Mr. Scott has at last, by means of his artful comments, 
 made to signify " the Historical Preface" translated by himself 
 into English. This perversion of the obvious meaning of the 
 Latin words will be evident even to a common English reader, 
 after he has perused the subjoined sentence, which immediately 
 follows that already quoted from Mr. Scott, (p. cxlii,) and in 
 which the first mention occurs of this Historical Preface, here cor- 
 rectly said to be an abridgment of the Brief Narrative of the affairs 
 transacted with the Remonstrants, which Nari'aiive had been at first 
 composed by the deputies of' the South Holland Churches, that is, by 
 the most rigid Supralapsarians in Europe. " And as in these" 
 [^Records is Mr. Scott's interpolation, when the relative belongs 
 solely to the Synodical Acts,] " many things every where 
 " occur, which pertain to the history of the things transacted in 
 " the Belgick Churches, and which could less advantageously be 
 " understood or judged of, by readers who were ignorant of these 
 " things : For which cause, even the National Synod (as it may 
 " be seen in the different sessions,) sometimes enjoined, especially 
 " on the deputies of the South Holland Churches, to write a brief 
 " narrative of the affairs transacted with the Remonstrants : It 
 " seemed good to prefix, in the place of a Preface, from it (that 
 " History) some things which were publickly transacted, that the 
 " foreign churches especially might for once know, with good 
 " fidelity, what was the rise and progress of these controversies, and 
 " on what occasion and for what causes the illustrious and most 
 " mighty the States General convened this celebrated Synod at 
 " a very great expence." — Such, in Mr. Scott's own version of 
 *' the Historical Preface," is the real origin of that document : 
 What a difference between it and the splendid account which 
 I have already quoted, (p. cxliii,) from his Introduction to the 
 translation ! 
 
 In elevating this obsolete Preface to a height to which, in all 
 previous Calvinistic aspirings, it had never before been raised, 
 Mr. Scott informs his readers, (p, cxliii,) " that it was drawn up 
 *' and published by the authority and with the sanction of the 
 " States General and the Prince of Orange, as well as by that 
 " of the Synod itself." — This assertion is not correct, as it regards 
 even the Stales General and the Prince of Orange, in the sense in 
 which Mr. Scott composed it. Every one conversant with that 
 vast collection of Predestinarian documents, knows the mystery 
 involved in the signatures of their High Mightinesses, and the 
 reasons why they were appended to the Canons of the Sijnod, while 
 they were purposely Avith-held from other eqvially-important 
 portions: The verbiage of the Historical Preface itself, on this 
 point, betrays the wariness of the Dutch rulers, who never gave it 
 
INTROnUCTTOX. Cxlv 
 
 the sanction of tlieir names, and did not intend to render it such 
 an auikentic exposition of their domestic occiirrejices as its translator 
 has been willing to suppose. — But the assertion is still more 
 incorrect as it regards " the Synod itself," if this term include the 
 foreign divines as well as the provincial. For it was the subse- 
 quent work of a very small portion of the hot-headed Dutchmen, 
 who could not obtain leave, from the States General, for its being 
 printed till it had been wonderfully softened down, and had 
 undergone numerous emendations. — AH these three parties, how- 
 ever, gave their sanction to another Preface, that prefixed to the 
 Canons in the same work, which, it is scarcely possible, for a 
 particular reason which will be afterwards mentioned, that Mr. 
 Scott can have mistaken for their approbation of the Historical 
 Preface. — The latter stands, therefore, as a violent political 
 manifesto, drawn up at first by a few pragmatical divines, 
 and abridged and polished in its style by Heinsius, to 
 answer party-purposes among foreigners. Indeed, a gleam of 
 Mr. Scott's native good sense, in the very next page, has given 
 him a correct view of the nature of this Preface. Forgetting 
 what he had previously said, about its being " A History" which 
 could not be " attested as authentic in a more satisfactory and 
 unexceptionable manner," he subsequently tenders us the follow- 
 ing information : " It is drawn up with a degree of calmness and 
 " moderation, far different from tliat fierce and fiery zeal which 
 " is generally supposed to belong to all who profess, or are sus- 
 " pected of, what many, in a very vague and inappropriate sense, 
 " call Calvinism. And though, according to {.he fas-hion of those 
 " times, epithets are, in some instances, applied, both to men 
 " and opinions, which modern courtesy, nay, perhaps. Christian 
 " meekness would have suppressed ; yet, if I mistake not, they 
 " are more sparingly employed in this than in any contemporary 
 " controversial publication." 
 
 This is a dreadful falling off indeed : Our Authentic His- 
 tory, " attested by collective bodies, and individuals filling up 
 such conspicuous and exalted stations," dwindles all at once into 
 a paltry "controversial publication!" But had Mr. Scott 
 known the character of these " individuals in exalted stations," 
 he would not have prided himself on "the authority and sanction 
 of the States General and the Prince of Orange," if they had been 
 really obtained in the sense in which he intended his assertion to 
 be understood. By a perusal of the note in page 586, it v/ill be 
 seen, that Prince Maurice, and his newly-elected States General, 
 then stood exactly in the same circumstances in Holland, as Crom- 
 well and his mongrel Parliament afterwards did in England, 
 with this single extenuating fact in the Dutchman's favour — that 
 he had not murdered the sovereign as well as the constitution of his 
 country. 
 
 k 
 
 I 
 
CXlvi INTRODUCTION. 
 
 II. — Like many other of liis eccentric illiistralions, Mr. Scott 
 has inadvertently furnished his readers in the next page of the 
 translation, with a proof of the increasing ambition of Prince 
 Maurice, and of the political subserviency of his re-formed States 
 General. It is in the shape of one of Maclaine's attempted cor- 
 rections of Mosheim, in these words : " It was not by the au- 
 " thority of Prince Maurice, but by that of the States General, 
 " that the National Synod was assembled at Dordrecht." It is 
 not improbable, that Mosheim derived his information from the 
 Preface to the Canons ; the first edition of which, under the 
 title Judicium Synodi Natiofialis, habitce Dordrechti, de Quinque 
 Doctrince Capitibus in Ecclesiis Belgicis Controversis, was printed 
 separately, twelve months prior to the appearance of the bulky 
 " Acts" of that Synod, though it also forms a part of their multi- 
 form contents, and was very ably translated into English, and 
 published by King James's learned printer John Bill in various 
 sizes, exactly one hundred and ninety-nine years before Mr. Scott 
 subjected himself to the thankless work of supererogation, which 
 he has most unskilfully executed. In that Preface, the old 
 English translator has well conveyed the sense of the original, 
 thus : " When, in man's understanding, scarce any hope of 
 " remedy appeared, God did put it into the minds of the most 
 " Illustrious and Mighty Lords, the States General of the United 
 " Provinces, by the counsel and direction of the most renowned and 
 " valiant Prince of Orange, to determine to meet with these out- 
 " rageous mischiefs by such lawful means as have been long time 
 " approved by the example of the Apostles themselves, and of 
 ** the Christian Church following them," &c. The States General 
 of that period could be counselled and directed by Prince Maurice 
 to any enterprize whatever ; and these expressions sufficiently 
 justify the assertion of Mosheim. Subsequently, however, they 
 shewed themselves less tractable, and the ambitious design of the 
 Prince of Orange miscarried. See page 5^4;. 
 
 As a sequel to this exposition of Mr. Scott's " Public Records'' 
 and " Registers," which dwindle into the Journal of the Synod's 
 proceedings composed by the two Calvinistic secretaries, it may be 
 proper to add " the cautelous words" of the five British Deputies, 
 which they published in their " Joint Attestation" against Bishop 
 Mountagu six years after their return from Dort. " It may be said, 
 " (and so we ourselves say,) that the disposers and publishers of 
 '' these Synodical Acts had done more right to the Britain Divines, if 
 " special mention had been made of that other matter not approved 
 " by them, and of their particular exceptions against the Articles 
 " which concerned church-government. But, it seemeth, (as in 
 *' most other vocal passages in this Synod,) the Actuary here 
 *' intended abridgment in what he set down, and meant not to 
 " express in particular what was said by any concerning points 
 " not propounded to Synodical deliberation, especially touching 
 
introduction; cxlvit 
 
 " upon so tender a string as the open impeachment of their own 
 " established discipline." — Such an excuse as this for " the Actu- 
 ary's Qthe notorious Festus Hommius'] intended abridgments," 
 iroTci friends, is far worse than the open criminations of enemies. — 
 Mr. Scott also asserts in his Introduction, that the measures of the 
 Remonstrants "evidently tended to subvert the whole system" 
 of the Presbyterian mode of church-government. On the contrary, 
 the British Divines tell us, in their famous Joint Attestation, " In 
 " the Netherlands, the party opposite unto that Synod, and most 
 " aggrieved with the conclusions thereof concerning the points 
 " controverted, are, notwithstanding, as vehement and resolute 
 " maintainers of the ministerial parifi/, as any that conclvided or 
 " accepted the judgment of that Synod." In a subsequent part 
 of this volume, it will be found that Grotius complains of the 
 Dutch Arminians, that they had evinced no disposition to adopt 
 the Episcopal regimen. 
 
 " III. — Omitting many scores of Mr. Scott's intermediate mis- 
 translations and errors, we find, in page 73, the following passage : 
 " But that they \\he Remonstrants^ might the more easily obtain 
 that Toleration by public authority which they always pressed, 
 by the benefit of which they indeed hoped to be able, by little and 
 little, tointroduce their own doctrine in the churches, they employed 
 this artifice : They sent over into England, by Hugo Grotius, a 
 certain writing, in which the true state of the controversy was 
 dissembled, a copy of a letter being also annexed ; and they 
 requested that he would petition from the most serene James, 
 King of Great Britain, seeing this cause could not be settled by 
 any other method than by a Toleration, that his most serene royal 
 Majesty would deign to give letters, according to the form ofthean- 
 nexedcopy, to the illustrious the High Mightinesses the States Gene- 
 ral ; which he (Grotius,) having seized on an opportunity, sur- 
 reptitiously obtained, and transmitted them to the illustrious the 
 States General." 
 
 I do not stop to animadvert upon literas here translated " Let- 
 ters," since it was but "one," as indeed the Latin word signifies ; 
 but I proceed to the affair itself, which will receive further eluci- 
 dation in the second volume. Appendix H, when I display some 
 traits of Archbishop Abbot's character, who, on that occasion, 
 wrote an infamous letter to his creature. Sir Ralph Winwood, the 
 King's ambassador at the Hague, in which he calumniated Gro- 
 tius as "some pedant, a smatterer, a simple fellow, tedious, full of 
 "tittle-tattle, full of words, and of no great judgment!" But 
 Grotius, by the powerful aid of his friends Bishop Andrews and 
 OvERAL, succeeded most satisfactorily with King James, who 
 gloried in the office o^ peace-maker, which he officiously and with- 
 out invitation assumed in regulating the domestic affairs of 
 different States and Kingdoms in Europe. There can be little 
 doubt, that the very wise letter which his Majesty addressed in 
 
 k2 
 
cxlviii IKTRODUCTION. 
 
 French to the States General, (dated, exactly as it stands in the 
 margin of "the Historical Preface," March 6lh, l6l3,) was com- 
 posed at the dictation of Andrews and Overal, both of whom 
 have always been regarded, by all parties, as two of the most able 
 and judicious Prelates that the Church of England ever enjoyed. 
 Knowing the intentions of the States of Holland to issue the 
 famous decree concerning a mutual Toleration, which Grotius had 
 composed, and which I have cursorily described in page 432, the 
 two Bishops, and probably others of their friends, might consider 
 it to be their duty to point out to his Majesty the glorious oppor- 
 tunity which then presented itself of ^//e Ki7tg of England being the 
 Jirst man to propose such a godlike expedient, for composing the 
 religious differences in the Low Countries. The King wrote the 
 letter; and the States of Holland, as if touched with a magic 
 wand, immediately passed their decree, a draught of which was 
 transmitted to England for his Majesty's revision, and emendation. 
 The celebrated Isaac Casaubon, who was at that time the king's 
 literary favourite, officially communicated to Grotius the high 
 approval and encomiums of " his most Serene Majesty, of his Grace 
 the Archbishop [^ Abbot,] and of other prelates of consummate 
 erudition ! " Extracts from the king's letter and from that of 
 Casaubon, are inserted in the Works of Arminius, vol. 1, pp. 
 411, 412. 
 
 The reader has now materials, from which he may form a 
 tolerably accurate judgment of the alleged " surreptitious 
 manner" in which Grotius, like a great Statesman, contrived 
 through his friends to obtain the King's approbation, which was 
 deemed of great importance in Holland, on account of the dis- 
 tant ties of affinity, which had just then linked together his 
 Majesty and Prince Maurice, in the persons of the youthful 
 Elector Palatine and his blooming and accomplished consort the 
 Princess Elizabeth. The disappointed Abbot and his high 
 Predestinarian friends would undoubtedly say, that his Majesty's 
 approval was " surreptitimisly obtained," because it was not pro- 
 cured through their influence, and was contrary to their wishes: 
 But they found the King so pleased with the success of his pacific 
 advice, that, after a little impertinent carping. Archbishop Abbot, 
 who possessed more Calvinistic shrewdness than his admirers are 
 in the habit of awarding to him, concurred in the united admira- 
 tion of che Dutch Edict to which the other Court-divines had 
 given utterance. 
 
 What is Mr. Scott's sage comment on this morsel o^ ecclesiastical 
 or, rather, o^ political history ? He employs it, as he has done 
 more trifling incidents, to enhance the value of his reputed 
 " authentic records." — " It should be noted," he says, " that this 
 " narrative was published several years before the death of 
 '*' James ; who therefore, it must be presumed, was willing to 
 " have it thought, that these letters were surreptitiously obtained 
 
INTRODUCTION. CxImC 
 
 /** by Grotius." Before Mr. Scott wrote this sentence, he ought 
 to have studied the following definition, by Sir Henry Wotton, 
 and the occasion upon which it was written :* Legatus est vir 
 bonus peregre missus ad mentiendum Reipublwce causa, " An ambas- 
 sador is a good man, sent abroad to lie for the sake of his country." 
 Many ambassadors employed by King James, beside Sir Henry 
 Wotton, might have used the double meaning which the English 
 
 • The occasion is thus related by Isaac Walton : 
 
 " For eight years after Sir Henry Wotton's going into Italy, he stood fair and 
 highly valued in the King's opinion, but at last became much clouded by an acci- 
 dent, which I shall proceed to relate. 
 
 " At his first going ambassador into Italy, as he passed through Germany, he 
 stayed some days at Augusta ; where having been in his former travels well known 
 by many of the best note for learning and ingeniousness, (those that are esteemed 
 the virtuosi of that nation,) with whom he passing an evening in merriment, was 
 requested by Christopher Flecamore to write some sentence in his albo, (a book 
 of white paper, which for that purpose many of the German gentry usually carry 
 about them ;) and Sir Henry 'Wotton consenting to the motion, took an occasion 
 from some accidental discourse of the present company, to write a pleasant deiini> 
 ^on of an ambassador, in these very words : 
 
 " Legatus est vir bonu^ peregre missus ad mentiendum ReipubliccB causk. 
 
 " MTiich Sir Henry Wotton could have been content should have been thus 
 Englished : 
 
 " An Ambassador is an honest man, sent to lie abroad for the good of 
 his country. 
 
 " But the word for lie (being the hinge upon which the conceit was to turn), 
 was not so exprest in Latin, as would admit (in the hands of an enemy especially), 
 so fair a construction as Sir Henry thought in English. Yet as it was, it slept 
 quietly among other sentences in this albo, almost eight years, till by accident it 
 fell into the hands of Jasper Scioppius, a Romanist, a man of a restless spirit, 
 and a malicious pen ; who, with books against King James, prints this as a prin- 
 ciple of that religion professed by the King, and his ambassador Sir Henry Wot- 
 ton, then at Venice : and in Venice it was presently after written in several glass- 
 windows, and spitefully declared to be Sir Henry '\t''otton's. 
 
 •' This coming to the knowledge of King James, he apprehended it to be such 
 an oversight, such a weakness, or worse, in Sir Henry ^^^otton, as caused the King 
 to express much wrath against him : And this caused Sir Henry Wotton to write 
 two apologies, one to Velserus (one of the chiefs of Augusta) in the universal lan- 
 guage, which he caused to be printed, and given,. and scattered in the most remark- 
 able places both of Germany and Italy, as an antidote against the venomous books 
 of Scioppius ; and another apology to King James ; which were both so ingenious, 
 so clear, and so choicely eloquent, that his JMajesty (who was a pure judge of it), 
 could not forbear, at the receipt thereof, to declare publicly, ' that Sir Henry 
 Wotton had commuted sufficiently for a greater offence.' 
 
 " And now, as broken bones well set become stronger, so Sir Henry Wotton 
 did not only recover, but was much more confirmed in his Majesty's estimatioa 
 and favour than formerly he had been. 
 
 " And as that man of great wit and useful fancy, (his friend Dr. Donne,) gave 
 in a will of his, (a wUl of conceits.) his reputation to his friends, and his industry 
 to his foes, because from thence he received both : So those friends, that in this 
 time of trial laboured to excuse this facetious freedom of Sir Henry ^Votton's, 
 were to him more dear, and by him more highly valued ; and those acquaintance 
 that urged this as an advantage against him, caused him by this error to grow 
 both more wise, and (which is the best fruit error can bring forth) for the 
 "iuture to become more industriously watchful over his tongue and pen." 
 
cl INTJIODUCTION, 
 
 phrase " lies abroad" implies, had they attempted to describe 
 the nature of some of the services in which they were engaged.* 
 But the nice distinction of the politicians of those days, " that 
 an ambassador acts not in a personal but in a ministenal capacity," 
 generally settled all qualms of conscience; and, in reference to 
 this observation, every man acquainted with the private history 
 of Sir Ralph Winwood and Sir Dudley Carleton, consecutively 
 ambassadors at the Hague during the religious dissensions in 
 Holland, will lament that two men, so generally estimable and 
 judicious, should have been placed, by their Sovereign or his 
 confidential advisers, in circumstances, in which, on account of 
 the part that they were expected to act, they could not possibly 
 gain any accession to their characters or reputation. 
 
 Mr. Scott, however, has mistaken the cause of King James's 
 silence : It was not a token of his conseiit to the imputation against 
 Grotius, conveyed in " the Historical Preface ;" but it was a 
 token of greater prudence than his Majesty usually displayed. 
 For Grotius and his friends were in possession of other letters 
 from King James, which would have put the sincerity of the 
 monarch in a shape somewhat too questionable, had they been 
 contrasted with his subsequent cruel and despicable conduct 
 towards the Dutch Arminians. But Grotius was too noble an 
 adversary, and entertained too high a reverence for the office, if 
 not for the pei'son of his Majesty, to implicate him needlessly in 
 matters in which he had granted his meddling humour an un-. 
 bounded indulgence: In the "Apology" therefore, which. Dr. 
 Bates tells us, (p. 589,) " was the first work published by Grotius 
 after he had regained his liberty" in 1621, King James saw 
 additional reasons for silence on this topic. 
 
 This circumstance will likewise serve to explain the cause of the 
 silence about Mr. Scott's renowned " Historical Preface," which 
 was maintained by Grotius's cotemporaries, the English Calvinists. 
 On the publication of the Apology, those eminent men who had 
 been the British Deputies at the Synod of Dort, perceived that all 
 the " authentic" and all " the public records," with which, in 
 this late age of the world, Mr. Scott has been wishful of bedeck- 
 
 " In the letter which Archbishop Abbot sent to Sir Ralph ^Vinwood, his 
 Grace seems to have been aware of the existence of this qualiiication in the 
 representative of Royalty. But King James did not bestow upon it so gross an 
 epithet as Isaac Walton has done, in his translation of Sir Henry Wotton's Latin 
 line : His Majesty called it " King-craft." After relating the private interview 
 which Grotius and Caron had with King James prior to the departure of the 
 former, Abbot says, "• 1 doubt not but Grotius had his part in this information, 
 " ivhereout, I cnnceive, you ivill make some itse, keeping these things privately 
 " to yourself, as becometh a man of your employment. When his JMajesty told 
 " me this, I gave such an answer as was fit ; and now, upon the receipt of your 
 " letters, shall upon the first occasion give further satisfaction." — In what an 
 artful manner did this Calvinian Archbishop hasten the crisis of the religious 
 differences in Holland ! He was also the principal cause of this country being 
 involved in bloodshed. 
 
TNTRODUOTIOH". cli 
 
 Ing his beloved Synod's " Historical Preface," belonged exclu- 
 sively to the elegant and unansAverable production of Grotius. 
 I feel a satisfaction in bearing record to the real love of learning 
 •which then prevailed, and to the native force of truth, which 
 prevented every man, whether Cahinist or Augustinian, that 
 made any pretensions to literary eminence or even to common 
 equity, from quoting the narrative of Dutch affairs out of " the 
 Historical Preface," that was then in the hands of every one, in 
 preference to the impartial account which Grotius had given. 
 I never met with a quotation from "the Preface" in the authors of 
 that period, except in one or two of no reputation. The most unex- 
 ceptionable man, in whose works I have found a morsel of it, 
 is that voluminous writer. Dr. Thomas Manton. I have also 
 found it quoted in the margin of one or two of the intolerant 
 sermons of the Presbyterian preachers before the Long Parlia- 
 ment, in which short extracts are introduced, as authorities for 
 persecuting the English Arminians. If any men had felt the 
 least inclination to pi'oducethe overtvhehiivg evidence of Mr. Scott's 
 " public records," they would have been the five British divines, 
 who had been deputed by King James to the Synod of Dort, 
 of which they formed no inconsiderable portion ; they were, 
 indeed, with all their failings, the brightest ornaments of that 
 assembly. But they knew, better than Mr. Scott, the apocryphal 
 origm 'and the prejudiced composition of that politic exposure, 
 and were extremely shy about any allusion to it in their long 
 controversy with Mountagu and his defenders. Some writers 
 have been pleased to say, about other authorities, " that these 
 good men durst ?wt adduce them, lest they should give offence to 
 the Court." But they who write in this strain, know little about 
 the matter: For, in that controversy, the authors in the Cal- 
 vinistic interest, though professing due loyalty to his Majesty, 
 treated King Charles himself, on account of his supposed predi- 
 lection for Arminianism, in a manner which modern courtesy 
 would consider to be exceedingly indecorous. 
 
 IV — My next quotation from Mr. Scott's astonishing produc- 
 tion, is one of the most amusing attempts that can possibly be 
 imagined, to enhance the reputed validity of " the Historical 
 Preface :" — " Neither Mosheim, nor his translator Maclaine, men- 
 " tion this history, while they refer to a variety of authorities on 
 " both sides of the question, in their narrative of these transac- 
 " tions : So that, it is even probable, that they had never seen 
 " it. Whether the severe measures by which the decisions of this 
 " Synod were followed up ; and especially the strict prohibition 
 " of printing or vending any other account in Latin, Dutch, or 
 *' French, in the Federated Provinces, during seven years, with- 
 " out a special licence for that purpose ; did not eventually con- 
 *' duce to this, may be a question. The measure, however, was 
 ''impolitic, if not unjustifiable." 
 
clii INTRODUCTION. 
 
 1. — Mr. Scott thinks it "probable," that "neither Mosheim, 
 nor his translator Maclaine, had ever seen this History." The 
 truth is, both of them had seen it ; and the silence about its 
 momentous contents, which is observed by Maclaine, who was as 
 determined a Calvinist as Mr. Scott himself, must have seemed 
 very surprising to one who placed upon it such a high value, 
 while, to every man besides, this fact will be an additional evi- 
 dence of the low estimation in which all well-informed Calvinists 
 hold that paltry production. The Ecclesiastical Historian and 
 his excellent Translator " refer to a variety of authorities, on 
 both sides of the question, in their narrative of these transactions," 
 but (sad oversight !) they never once formally " mention this 
 History" as an authority, because they knew they would in 
 that case have exposed themselves to the derision of all the learned 
 in Europe. Many are the palliations for the intolerance of 
 the Synod, which Dr. Maclaine introduces ; but not a single expres- 
 sion does he quote from what Mr. Scott calls " the public records," 
 because such quotation would have destroyed the semblance of 
 impariialilg, which both he and Mosheim wished to preserve. 
 
 But Mosheim does mention it, with several other as important 
 documents as those which he has quoted. It was Mosheim's 
 manner, when he commenced the history of any large denomina- 
 tion of Christians, to refer his readers, (generally in the first note,) 
 to some well-autlienticated and common publication, in which a 
 complete list would be found of the works relating particularly 
 to that denomination. In the fifth volume of his History, from 
 which Mr. Scott's information about the Arminians is derived, 
 Mosheim has made such a copious reference respecting three or 
 four other Churches. Had he not adopted this method, in some 
 instances the mere enumeration of the title-pages of the several 
 works written on that subject, would have occupied almost as 
 much space as he has been able to devote to the history itself. 
 According to his usual method, therefore, Mosheim, at the com- 
 mencement of that part of the article on the Arminians which 
 relates to the Synod of Dort, refers his readers at once to an 
 ample collection of documents in Fabricii Bibliolhcca Grceca* . 
 
 • ]Mosheim's note reads thus : — " The writers who have given accounts of the 
 Synod of Dort, are mentioned by Jo. Albert, Fabricius, in his Biblioth. Grceo.^ 
 vol. xi. p. 723. The most ample account of this famous assembly has been given 
 by Brandt, in the second and third volumes of his History of the Reformation in 
 ttie United Provinces ; but, as this author is an Arminian, it will not be improper 
 to compare his relation with a work of the learned Leydekker, in which the piety 
 and justice of the proceedings of this Synod are vindicated against the censures of 
 Brandt. This work, which is composed in Dutch, was published in two volumes 
 in 4to, at Amsterdam, in the year 1705 and 1707, under the following title: 
 Eere van de Nationale Synode, van Dordrecht voorpestaan en bevestigd tegen 
 de beschuldingen van G. Brandt. After comparing diligently these two produc- 
 tions, I could see no tnormous error in Brandt ; for, in truth, these two writers do 
 not so much differ about facts, as they do in the reasoning they deduce from them, 
 and in tlicir accounts of the causes from whence they proceeded. The reader will 
 
INTRODUCTION. cUii 
 
 Vol. xi, p. 723. Now, I should consider it a dreadful imputation 
 on a learned man's character, were it even insinuated that this 
 work by Fabricius was not in the possession of such a diffuse 
 commentator on the Holy Scriptures, as Mr. Scott has been, 
 though his notes are said (by his admirers themselves) to be more 
 remarkable for strong sense and fertile imagination, than for the 
 sound learning which they display. In the exact page and volume 
 of the work to which Mosheim despatches all his readers for 
 information about the Dutch Synod, the first article that presents 
 itself is, "DoRDRACEN.E Synodi Acta," of which an able lite- 
 rary notice is there given.* Mr. Scott's famous " History" is the 
 
 do well to consult the Letters of the learned and worthy Mr. John Hales, of Eaton, 
 who was an impartial spectator of the proceedings of this famous Synod, and who 
 relates, with candour and simplicity, what he saw and heard." 
 
 * Having given a critical description of the various Councils which the Roman 
 Catholic authors had collected, Fabricius presents the following account of the 
 Synod of Dort : 
 
 " It commenced on the 13th of Nov. 1618, and continued to the 9th of May, 
 1619. Let no one look for the Acts or Decrees of the Synod of Dort among the 
 collectors of Councils, although they have not hesitated to insert in their volumes 
 
 also many small Councils of those whom they denominate Heretics. Yet, since, 
 
 from the dignity of the subject, and from the number and authority of those by 
 whom the business was transacted, this may possibly seem equal or superior to 
 many Synods, — and since it is even now confirmed by most of the Reformed 
 Churches, — I was unwilling to omit the mention of it. It was held, in the ninth 
 year after the Conference at the Hague., by the Reformed Calvinians against the 
 Arminian Remonstrants, the latter of whom complain, that it condemned them 
 without a hearing. 
 
 " For the publication of the Acts, the Divines chosen out of various districts 
 of the United Provinces were, John Polyander, Anthony WaljBUS, Anthony 
 Thysius, Daniel Heinsius, Festus Hommius, Daniel Colonius, and John Laets : 
 But Dr. Wm. Bates informs us m his Life of A. Walceus, ' that the chief merit 
 ' of the publication is due to Festus Hommius, who was a ready and elegant 
 ' writer, and, as secretary to the Synod, had noted with greater diligence than 
 ' the others, the matters that had been transacted.' — These Acts were published 
 at Dort in the year 1620, in folio, in the neat types of the Elzevirs at Leyden ; 
 and were soon afterwards executed with greater correctness, in the same year, at 
 Hanover, in quarto, with the addition of a copious index. 
 
 " Prefixed to the Acts stand, — the Epistle of their High Mightinesses the 
 States General, addressed to the Blonarchs and Kuigs, to the Princes, Counts, 
 Cities, and Magistrates, [of the Christian world], and vouching for the fidelity 
 and authority of these Acts, — and likewise the ample Preface of Daniel 
 Heinsius, addressed to the Reformed Churches of Christ, concerning the origin 
 and increase of the Dutch controversies, for the purpose of appeasing which, the 
 Synod had been convened. 
 
 " The Acts themselves consist of three parts : (1.) The rules for holding the 
 Synod ; the form of the Synodical oath ; decrees and judgments concerning the 
 translation of the Bible, catechizing, candidates for the sacred ministry, and con- 
 cerning the removal of the abuses of printing ; the Canons against the Five 
 Points of the Remonstrants ; the Confession of the Dutch Churches ; the appro- 
 bation of the Palatine Catechism ; the judgment passed on the doctrine of Con- 
 fad Vorstius ; a writing of the Remonstrants respecting the conditions on which 
 the Synod ought to be held ; the Theses of the Remonstrants on the Five Points, 
 
cliv INTllODUCTTOJf. 
 
 Preface described by Fabricius, as the production of Daniel 
 Heinsius, who had been lay-secretary to the Commissioners, 
 chosen out of the States General to preside over the deliberations 
 of the Synod. Not a word occurs in Fabricius concerning the 
 avouched " fidelity and authority" of this Historical Preface : Those 
 government-attributes are properlj ascribed to the Acts alone, 
 while " the ample Preface/' lately extolled as such a precious 
 morsel of authentic church-histoiy, is awarded to its final reviser 
 and polisher, Daniel Heinsius. Had Mr. Scott consulted the 
 article in Fabricius to which Mosheim referred him, he would 
 have found a list of ten Calvinistic publications in support of the 
 Synod, and fifteen against it ; some of the former of which were 
 more worthy of being translated, than the universally-neglected 
 document which Mr. Scott has, unfortunately for himself, chosen 
 for the exercise of his powers. 
 
 2. — Had he consulted that article, he would not have committed 
 
 the strange mistake into which he has fallen in the 1 ] 2th page of his 
 
 performance. He has there informed his readers of his former state 
 
 of ignorance concerning "the real Articles of the Synod," and that 
 
 his " literal translation of them" was made from a copy " contained 
 
 in theSylloge Confessionum, Oxford, 1804." — He has afforded many 
 
 proofs, beside this, of his knowing very little about the contents 
 
 of the bulky volume, " the Historical Preface" to which he has 
 
 so paiij/ully tried to explain. In the Account of his Life, which 
 
 has been lately presented to the world by his son John, and 
 
 which is highly creditable to his talents and filial affection, it is 
 
 said, " The translation \_oi the Historical Preface^ is made from 
 
 " the Acts of the Synod, published by authority, in a Latin quarto 
 
 " volume." That is the edition which, according to Fabricius, 
 
 and as every learned man knows, contains an index, accurately 
 
 denoting the very page in which those Articles might be 
 
 found. Unfortunately, however, they are there denominated 
 
 " The Canons of the Synod concerning the Five Points of the 
 
 Remonstrants;" and as Mr. Scott does not seem to have been 
 
 aware, that they are indiscriminately (and in some respects 
 
 imjjroperli/) designated by even good writers Caiions, Decrees, 
 
 Articles, [^Se^itentia^ Se?itiments, and Judg?nent, he could find no 
 
 mention of Articles in the original work, but was compelled to 
 
 look for them in the Si/lloge Confessionum, in which they offered 
 
 themselves to his perusal under the more intelligible and familiar 
 
 title of Sententia. 
 
 and the various exceptions and protestations against the Synod ; a writing by 
 Simon Episcopius, in which he defends himself; the confession of the two brothers 
 Geisteeren ; and, lastly, the orations of those very celebrated men, Balthasar Lydius, 
 Blartin Gregory, Joseph Hall, John Polyander, John Acronius, and of the me- 
 morable Episcopius (2.) The Judgments of the Foreign Divines on the Five 
 
 Points of the Remonstrants. — (3.) The Judgments of the Dutch Divines on the 
 same Points." 
 
INTllODUCTIOX. gIv 
 
 A similar instance of his " woeful lack of information" respect- 
 ing the volume in his possession, a part of which he too 
 hastily undertook to elucidate, may be seen in one of his 
 notes, in which he says : " The Five Articles of the Remon- 
 " strants, so often mentioned in this History, do not occur sepa- 
 " rately and all together in the authenticated documents of which 
 " I make use; but, comparing the detached accounts of them 
 " and the arguments used in the Synod of Dort concerning them, 
 " with the folloAving statement from Mosheira, (Vol. v, pp. 444 
 " — 5,) the latter appears sufficiently accurate for our present 
 " purpose :" He then quotes the abridgment from Mosheim. On 
 the interpretation which the reader will give to Mr. Scott's two 
 opposite terms " separately and all together," I do not pretend 
 to offer even a conjecture ; but the Tenets of the Remonstrants 
 occur in the copy of the Acts " of Avhich Mr. Scott made use," 
 separately, under each of the days in which they were presented, 
 and in substance the same as those which Bishop Womack has 
 translated and ably corroborated in the subsequent pages of this 
 volume {^3 — 1 50). Were modern Arminians as testy and queru- 
 lous as Mr. Scott and Mr. Baxter have been, on reading this 
 abridgment they might retort some of the elegant phraseology of 
 these two good yet irritable and prejudiced men, about " bearing 
 false witness against their neighbours, "&c. But Christian courtesy 
 forbids such a course ; and though the materials for a better account 
 of the sentiments of the Arminians were actually in Mr. Scott's pos- 
 session, at the time when he published this scanty exposition of ArmU 
 nianism, they would not adopt the language which he employs, in 
 page 121, " I own, I never before met with so gross, so barefaced, 
 *' and inexcusable a misrepresentation as this, in all my studies 
 " of modern controversy. It can only be equalled by the fabe 
 " testimony borne against Jesus and his Apostles, as recorded in 
 " Holy Writ. But is that cause likely to be in itself good, which 
 " needs to be supported by so unhallowed weapons }" — I 
 refer the reader, for further information on this subject, to 
 the Works of Arminius, vol. i, p. 510. Bishop Womack's cele- 
 brated book, " THE Calvinists' Cabinet unlocked," was 
 written for the purpose of shewing Richard Baxter, that the 
 Abridgment of the Calvinistic Articles of the Synod of Dort, 
 •which the Bishop has inserted in the 39th page of the Exainina- 
 iion of Tilenus, was virtually correct ; and all impartial men, who 
 examine the Bishop's authorities, will not charge him with want 
 of success in that enterprize. 
 
 3. — But the most wonderful part of Mr. Scott's argumentation 
 remains yet to be examined. In proof of " the probability that 
 neither Mosheim, nor his translator Maclaine had seen this His- 
 tory," Mr. Scott adduces this singular reason ; " Whether the 
 " severe measures, by which the decisions of this Synod were 
 " followed up, — and especially tlie strict prohibition of printing 
 
CiVl IXTltODUCTION. 
 
 " or vending any other account in Latin, Dutch, or French, in 
 " the Federated Provinces, during seven years, without a special 
 " Hcence for that purpose, — did not eventually conduce to this, 
 " may be a question."— I will not now allude to " the severe 
 measures, by which the decisions" of the Synod of Dort were 
 enforced. The nature of the prohibition is here not correctly 
 expressed ; but, receiving it according to Mr. Scott's confused 
 statement, was it ever before known, in the history of mankind, 
 that an exclusive privilege, granted under the strongest penal- 
 ties, in favour of a particular work, hindered its sale and. circula- 
 tion .!* The effect must, in the nature of things, be exactly the 
 contrary ; and it was so in this instance. As many copies of the 
 Acts were transmitted, in the form of presents, to the different 
 learned men of Europe, as would have amounted to a good edition 
 by themselves. They had a free circulation, and were extensively 
 pushed among theirade, by the company of industrious Dutch Book- 
 sellers to whom, under curious restrictions, the privilege was 
 granted. Not merely in the Latin language were they sold ; but, 
 being translated into Dutch and. French they were accommo- 
 dated to the capacities of common readers, who, whether friends 
 or foes, desired to obtain some account of the Synod's proceed- 
 ings from the only documents which they could lanifulhj peruse. 
 The most interesting portions of the Acts were also translated 
 into English and German. The several editions of the original, 
 and of these translations, gave a still greater extension to the Acts, 
 the result of which is to this day perceptible in our own country, 
 and in some other States of Europe. For, the Acts of the Re- 
 vionstrants, which were published nearly at the same time, " are 
 exceedingly rare, and very little known in England. Fifty 
 copies at least of the Calvinistic Acts may be met with in the 
 catalogues of the English booksellers, before one of the Acts of 
 the Remonstrants can be found." I never inspected a respectable 
 Dissenting Minister's library, in which the Dort Acts had not 
 obtained a place : And that Mr. Scott, the grand expounder, to 
 the Evangelical Clergy, of what is and what is not Calvinism, 
 should have known nothing till the very close of life about the 
 doctrinal Articles determined in that Synod, — is only anothef 
 lamentable proof how boldly and ignorantly some (otherwise) 
 good men can " talk without book !" 
 
 I have mentioned the adoption of the Decrees of the Synod of 
 Dort, by the French Calvinists ; (pp. 255, 290;) and "the 
 Arminian Acts" with the other works of the Remonstrants, could 
 not have been more effectually excluded from the members of 
 their Churches, had their suppression been enforced by the Popish 
 Inquisition. In England they did not meet with a better fate, 
 according to the narrative of the old historian : 
 
 " But the Remonstrants had likewise some great enemies among 
 tlie Bishops of that Kingdom, particularly Doctor Abbot, the 
 
INTRODUCTION. cK'H 
 
 Archblsfe^Tsf Canterbury, who not long bef«jre shewed his dis- 
 lijte of their opinions. For, when John Narsius, minister of 
 Bommel and of the Remonstrant party, brought into England the 
 Synodical Acts of the Remonstrants, some of the copies were stopped 
 and taken from him, the Archbishop threatening to burn them, 
 and to cause the oivner to he thrown into prison, for bringing into Ike 
 nation and dispersing books ivritten in defence of those error's which the 
 Synod Cjf Dart had condemned ! Those divines in England who 
 adhered to the Doctrine of Calvin, being elevated at the ill fortune 
 of the Remonstrants in Holland, stuffed their sermons continually 
 with disputes about Predestination : But, the more furious they 
 were, the more did the King's [^James's] zeal, which had exerted 
 and still did exert itself against the Remonstrants, begin to cool. 
 He looked back upon what was passed, and by that means grew 
 more and more sensible of the present danger from the other 
 party." — Brandt's History of the Reformation. 
 
 4. — Perhaps this is the proper place to correct another of Mr. 
 Scott's egregious mis-statements : — " The authenticated histories 
 " of the Remonstrants concerning the Synod of Dort have, almost 
 " exclusively, been noticed and credited by posterity, especially 
 " in this country, to the neglect of the authentic records." — This 
 assertion is repeated in different forms, throughout the pamphlet, 
 also by his son, and by other writers who follow him as an oracle. 
 What^ then, are the facts of the case } Mosheim has said in a 
 preceding page, (clii,^ that " the most ample account of this famous 
 Assembly has been given by Brandt." Three-fourths of that 
 large narrative which, soon after its publication, was translated into 
 English, were compiled from the Calvinistic Acts themselves, and 
 from the letters and despatches of two unexceptionable witnesses, 
 both of whom at that time were zealous Calvinists, — " the ever- 
 memorable Hales of Eton," and Dr. Walter Balcanqual. Indeed, 
 the Latin journal of the latter divine, after Hales's departure, was 
 the chief document on which Brandt had to rely for information, 
 respecting those topics of discussion about which the members 
 quarrelled, and on which the Synodical Report observes a prudent 
 silence or a studied brevity. That part of Dr. Heylin's History 
 likewise which relates to the Synod, is compiled principally from 
 Hales and Balcanqual, as well as from Bishop Womack's Arcana 
 Dogmatum Anti-Remonstra7itium. Thus, the chief English narra- 
 tives of the Synodical proceedings are almost entirely copied from 
 Calvinistic authors. — On the Continent, the Predestinarian infor- 
 mation which Hales and Balcanqual transmitted at least twice a 
 week to the English Ambassador at the Hague, was so highly 
 appreciated, that two separate translations of the English letters 
 were published, by Limborch at Amsterdam, and by Mosheim at 
 Hanover, The latter of these editions is elucidated by ample notes 
 and " various observations," an excellent " Life of Hales," and 
 interesting " Considerations on the Authoritv of the Synod of 
 
elvili INTRODUCTIOTf. 
 
 DoRT — ati Asseinbly destructive of Sacred Peace." If favoured with 
 health and opportunity, I intend to give a translation of Mosheim's 
 Volume, as well as of Balcanqual's Latin Journal, neither of which 
 has ever yet been published in English. So much for Mr. Scott's 
 accuracy about " the neglect of the authentic records," — a high- 
 sounding phrase which, in the commencement of the same para- 
 graph, he has applied to " the Historical Preface !" 
 
 V. — In the conclusion of my remarks on a few of Mr. Scott's 
 radical mistakes and rash assertions, I cannot refrain from the 
 expression of my imfeigned regret at beholding an aged and 
 respectable clergyman spend some of the last days of his mortal 
 pilgrimage, in attempting to communicate to an intolerant Dutch 
 Preface an air of validity which it never possessed — except in his 
 own imagination and in that of his admirers. If "the Remon- 
 strants in general," according to Mr. Scott's declaration, (Preface, 
 vii,) " were far more favourable to Pelagians, nay, to Socinians, than 
 " to Calvinists," it was Mr. Scott's duty to have demonstrated the 
 existence of this alleged Pelagianism and Socinianism, since he 
 had the full articles of those good men's belief in his possession. 
 The members of the Synod, who assisted in the condemnation of 
 the Remonstrants, formed a judgment of their doctrines — either 
 from the Articles which had been presented by the persons cited, 
 —or, (which was far more agreeable to the Dutch members,) 
 from the utiaccredited and private writings of a few pamphleteers, 
 who had adopted some of the doctrines of General Redemption, 
 but had not been admitted into the communion of the Arminians. 
 Yet even this last class of Calvinistic Divines, highly culpable and 
 disingenuous as was their conduct, never attempted, in that Synod, 
 to fasten upon the Arminians the double charge of Pelagianism 
 and Socinianism, from such a paltry and unauthenticated pam- 
 phlet as this " Historical Preface" by Heinsicus. I have already 
 referred my readers to the Tenets of the Remonstrants, translated 
 by Bishop Womack into sterling old English, (pp. 90, 150,) and 
 those were the genuine points which should have attracted the 
 theological or metaphysical skill of all the Dort Synodists, and 
 of Mr. Scott their modern defender. But the good Bishop, in the 
 title-page to his Emmiination of Tilenus, has very significantly 
 described the conduct which the Synodists pursued : "The Five 
 Articles were voted, stated and imposed, but not disputed, at the 
 Synod of Dort." This was a safe and prudent course ; for if those 
 reverend divines had entered into a regular logical dispute on 
 those Theses separately, in the hands of such a man as the youth- 
 ful Episcopius, whose literary prowess all admired and the greater 
 portion of them dreaded, they would have suffered such a defeat 
 as would have been injurious to Calvinism, and would have 
 paralysed the politic designs of the Dutch members. It was wise 
 therefore in them, to drive the cited persons from the Synod. 
 The unguarded manner in which some pious yet ill-informed 
 
INTRODUCTION. cIlK 
 
 Arminians praise Mr. Scott's " Christian moderation," has had the 
 tendency to sanctify and perpetuate the gross and unfounded 
 slanders which he has published respecting some of the best men 
 that ever lived. His " Christian moderation" respecting Armini- 
 anism, I could never yet discover ; on the contrary, I have given 
 one instance, (p. civ,) out of many which might be adduced, of 
 his unwillingness either to instruct himself, or to undeceive 
 others, about the real " tenets of the Remonstrants," in that sum- 
 mary of their scriptural belief which they have always professed. 
 If, in the preceding pages, I have shewn the extreme shallowness 
 of Mr. Scott's acquaintance even with the history of his own 
 favourite opinions, (and I could produce still stronger proofs of his 
 woeful deficiency of knowledge on high Predestinarian matters, 
 on which he has pronounced dogmatically, quasi ex cathedra,') 
 I would ask. Was such a writer at all qualified to tender correct 
 information to the public, respecting the character or conduct of 
 those whom he accounted his doctrinal adversaries? His conduct 
 will appear the more reprehensible, when it is considered, that 
 the small work, in which these and many as palpable mistakes 
 occur, boasts of being the result of deeper research and more correct 
 injormation than had been displayed in one of his former publi- 
 cations. In the Preface, he says, " The author had erroneously 
 *' adopted, and aided in circulating, a gross misrepresentation of 
 " the Synod and its decisions, in his Remarks on the Refutation 
 " op Calvinism ; and, having discovered his mistake previously 
 " to the publication of a second edition of that work, he was 
 " induced to do what he could to counteract that misrepresent'^ 
 " ation, and to vindicate the Synod from the atrocious calumnies 
 " with which it has been wilfully or inadvertently traduced." 
 These traducers are said, in the Life by his son, to have " repeated 
 " statements taken upon trust, in a manner little creditable either 
 " to their diligence or their candour !" After a perusal of the 
 preceding pages, I am afraid, all impartial readers will be inclined 
 to award this censure to Mr. Scott and his son. Few of 
 them, I am persuaded, would ever have written, against any of 
 their opponents, such a severe sentence, as the following, which 
 is the conclusion of Mr. Scott's Preface; and though the sug- 
 gestion, Palmam qui meruit ferat, might arise in the minds of 
 some of them, they would not have given it this form of expres- 
 sion : " The groundless charges brought by many against the 
 " whole body, cannot be considered as excusable misapprehen- 
 *' sion : They must be either intentional misrepresentation, or the 
 *' INEXCUSABLE PRESUMPTION of Writing on subjects which the 
 " writers have never studied, and against persons, and descrijDtions 
 " of persons, of whose tenets, amidst most abundant means 
 " OF information, they remain wilfully ignorant. A fair and 
 " impartial opponent is entitled to respect, but I can only pity 
 " such controversialists — Thomas Scott." 
 
clx INTRODUCTION. 
 
 I have called " the Historical Preface" intolerant, and tlie proof 
 is to be had in every section of its multifarious contents.* Both 
 the parties concerned were Px-esbyterians. The Remonstants 
 were patronized by the chief men in the Republic, even by Prince 
 Maurice himself: But a political difference, respecting a truce 
 with Spain, separated Olden Barneveldt and the Prince, and made 
 the latter their enemy. (Pp. 586, 594.) It should, however, never be 
 forgotten, to the praise of the Arminians, that it was during the 
 many years of their having the political ascendancy in the State, 
 they requested their bigotted opponents to allow them barely a 
 toleration. t This, "the Historial Preface" itself plainly intimates, 
 they could with difficulty obtain while the rulers were in their 
 favour: But as soon as Prince Maurice united himself with the 
 Calvinists, and received promises of succour from our King James, 
 the Remonstrants were no longer permitted to enjoy the free 
 exercise of their religion, but were in every direction persecuted 
 and tormented. An open avowal of the persecuting principle is 
 frequently made in the work which Mr. Scott has translated; and 
 it forms a part of his ingenious occupation in the notes, to shew, 
 as usual, without any authentic data, how richly the Arminians 
 deserved such treatment.:}: 
 
 In a succeeding page (573) I have written a few remarks on 
 one of Mr. Scott's unfounded palliations of Dutch Intolerance. 
 
 • Let the reader examine even the partial statements of the Historical Preface 
 itself, in pages 67, 69, 72, 75, &c., and he will soon discover the native intolerance 
 of Calvinism. So far only as any man recedes from the rigidity of that doctrinal 
 system, so far, in general, his principles of Toleration seem to assume a milder 
 and more Christian aspect. 
 
 ■j- See, in page 567, the speech delivered by Grotius in the year 1616. 
 
 X Perhaps a worse instance cannot be adduced than the following, in which, 
 by something beyond a tacit assent, Mr. Scott has identified his opinions on this 
 subject with those of the Bishop of Peterborough, of which, however, all men of 
 moderation grievously complain, whether such " inquisitions" be instituted by 
 Calvinists or reputed Arminians. After relating the audience which the States 
 of Holland granted to Uytenbogart, and in which " he had odiously traduced 
 the "• proceedings of the rest of the pastors as the persons, tvho, by the demand 
 '■^ of a declaration, endeavoured to bring a new inquisition into the Churches, and 
 " one by no means to be endured, he obtained that the same persons should be 
 " forbidden any more to demand this declaration from the Remonstrants," the 
 Historical Preface gives some account of the proceedings of the Calvinists, 
 who " explained in writing their counsel on the best way of peace, and concerning 
 " the conditions by which they thought a Toleration should be circumscribed ; 
 " and that the proposed Theses, concerning which a declaration had been 
 " demanded, were extant, in so many words, in the Confession and Catechism of 
 " the Belgic Churches ; and that the Anti-theses themselves had been delivered 
 " in public writings, by many persons with whom the Remonstrants had much 
 " communication in these regions."— These Calvinistic excuses are the same as 
 are adopted by the friends of the Bishop of Peterborough. The reader will find 
 a long note on this topic in the Works of Arminius, (vol. i, p. 512,) in which, 
 much as I dislike this species of " inquisition," I have demonstrated the supe- 
 riority of the Bishop's plan to that of the dominant Dutch Presbyterians. 
 
IN'TUODUCTTOK. clxJ 
 
 He there says, that the Toleration, for which tlie Arminians 
 pleaded in Holland when their friends were at the helm of govern- 
 ment, " is entirely different from any thing known in Britain." 
 I have briefly proved, that such a Toleration is exactly similar to 
 that which is now allowed in the Episcopal Church of England ; and 
 I know it to be a fact, admitting of most abundant confirmation, 
 that, in those days which, since the Reformation from Popery, 
 have generally been depicted as the worst and most tyrannical, an 
 Arminian sermon might frequently be heard, on a Sunday morning, 
 from the vicar of the parish ; while, in the afternoon of the same 
 day, a Calvinistic Lecturer, was permitted to deliver to the parish- 
 ioners a high Predestinarian discourse. The case of Travers and 
 Hooker is one, out of many, to the point, and is thus related by 
 Isaac Walton : " But Mr. Travers had taken orders by the Pres- 
 bytery in Antwerp, (and, with them, some opinions that could 
 never be eradicated,) and if in any thing he was transported, it 
 was in an extreme desire to set up that government in this nation: 
 For the promoting of which he had a correspondence with Theo- 
 dore Beza at Geneva, and others in Scotland, and was one of the 
 chiefest assistants to Mr. Cartwright in that design. Mr. Travers 
 had also a particular hope, to set up this government in the Tem- 
 ple; and, to that end, used his most zealous endeavours to be 
 Master of it: And his being disappointed, by Mr. Hookei's 
 a Imittance, proved the occasion of a public opposition betwi: t 
 t'lem, in their sermons. Many of which concerning the 
 Doctrines* and Ceremonies of this Church: Insomuch that, 
 
 * 1 am aware, that Mr. Scott has tried most ingeniously to prove Hooker a 
 Calvinist : But, by a far less display, of ingenuity, one might prove Arminius 
 himself to have been a Calvinist ! For every quotation which Mr. Scott has 
 made from that able v/riter, in his " Force of Truth," I will engage to produce 
 a corresponding one from Arminius, that shall equal it in evangelical purity and 
 doctrinal correctness. 
 
 On this subject. Dr. Wordsworth's Ecclesiastical Biography^ (vol. iv, 
 p. 269,) contains an excellent note, an extract from which I here subjoin : — 
 " At the time when Hooker wrote, Calvinism, doctrinal as well as disciplinarian^ 
 had made considerable progress in England ; and Hooker's, unhappily for his 
 own peace of mind, were almost the only works of great extent which were calcu- 
 lated to arrest the progress of the doctrinal Calvinists. In the year 15!)9, a tract 
 was published in 4to. entitled, A Christian Letter of certaine English Pro- 
 testants^ unfaigned favourers of the present state of Religion, authorised and 
 professed in England, unto that reverend and learned man, Mr. R. Hooker, 
 requiring resolution in certaine matters of doctrine, (which seeme to overthrovj the 
 foundation of Christian Religion, and of the Church among us,) expresslie 
 contained in his five books of Ecclesiasticall PoUicie. This book is one of the 
 earliest productions of those mal-contents, who were afterwards called doctrinal 
 Puritans. It is the doctrines of Hooker with which they quarrel ; and they 
 profess (in contradistinction to the abettors of the Geneva Discipline,) an unfeigned 
 attachment to the external establishments of the Church of England. The work 
 is further deserving of notice, as exhibiting, I believe, the earliest ejcaniple, botii 
 in the matter and manner of the argument, of those numerous publications in 
 which some Calvinistic writers have thoughtlessly and intemperately indiilged 
 themselves, from the days of this Christian Letter, and from Prynne and Hick- 
 man downwards, to Edwards, and Toplady, and Bowman, and Sir Richard Hill, 
 
 1 
 
elxM TXTRODUCTIOX. 
 
 as St. Paul ' withstood St. Peter to his face,' so did they withstand 
 each other in their sermons; for, as one hath pleasantly expressed 
 it, * The forenoon sermon spake Canterbury, and the afternoon, 
 Geneva.' In these sermons, there was little of bitterness; but 
 each brought all the reasons he was able, to prove his adversary's 
 opinion erroneous." — This was not a solitary instance, even in 
 those days when Arminianism was not known by that appellation, 
 though "the matter signified" was actually contained in the for- 
 mularies of the Church, and preached by eminent divines. When 
 acting in the capacity of a moderator between them. Archbishop 
 Whitgift had a very delicate office to perform, — he had to decide 
 between his love for Calvinism and his love for Episcopacy ; but 
 the latter eventually prevailed. Considering the great difference 
 between that period and the reign of Charles the First, his Grace 
 was a much stricter disciplinarian than Archbishop Laud. In thfi. 
 days of the latter, even when he was Bishop of London, Arminian 
 and Calvinian doctrines were delivered, in the same churches, 
 throughout the Metropolis, as frequently as they are at present. 
 The eventful history of that period abounds in proofs of this fact ; 
 and we have a remarkable confirmation of it, in a preceding page, 
 (liv,) in which a man well acquainted with city affairs, the Rev. 
 William Jenkyn, " Minister of Christ Church, London," commu- 
 nicates the following information to his noble audience, the House 
 of Peers : " Painful zealous ministers, that will tell us of our sins, 
 " are now looked upon as busy men, as those that meddle with the 
 " State : They are bid to keep to their texts ; as if that preaching 
 " which is a coming close up to your lusts, were a going away 
 " from our texts. In the Bishops' times, me were suffered to preach 
 " any thing so we came not near their sins : And this Prelacy is still 
 
 and Overton. — Can it be believed, the Authors of the Letter in question tax the 
 meek, the wise, the virtuous, the saint-like Richard Hooker, with betraying and 
 renouncing the doctrines to which he had solemnly subscribed ? They charge 
 him with designs of bringing back Popery. They accuse him of a wanton attack . 
 on the memory of Calvin, They condemn him of unsoundness of doctrine 
 respecting Grace, and Free-will, and Justification, and Predestination, and the 
 conditions of the Christian Covenant, and the Sacraments of the Christian Church. 
 It is curious to see the Thirty-nine Articles, the Liturgy, the Homilies, Bishop 
 Jewel's Apology, Dean Nowell's Catechism, and the writings of many others of 
 Hooker's Protestant predecessors, solemnly cited against him, and confronted in 
 due form with extracts from the Ecclesiastical Polity, for the purpose of convicting 
 him of deserting and denying the principles of that Church of which he was a 
 Minister, in whose cause he toiled day and night, and in the defence of which, 
 I believe, it may truly be said, that it was God's good pleasure that he should 
 die." 
 
 The dispute between Travers and Hooker is another illustration of the remark 
 in page 686 : " "With very few exceptions, the most violent Puritans and the 
 greatest sticklers against the prescribed ceremonies, from the dispersion under the 
 persecuting Mary down tb the commencement of the reign of King James, werg., 
 the highest Predestinarians ; and their best and most successful opponents were 
 generally learned and pious individuals, who'were as conspicuous for their attacl" - 
 ment to the d ictrines of Geneial Rede-Tiption as to the decent rites and obser- 
 \ances of the Ancients." 
 
i>jTRODUCTioy. clxiii 
 
 '^' kept up among us." So much for the rash assertion of Mr. 
 Scott, that such a Toleration was "entirely different from any- 
 thing known in Britain !" 
 
 This is a lamentable sight, and strongly indicative of the bigotry 
 of which Calvinism, in some of its reputed mildest forms, seems to 
 be the prolific parent. In page cxxv, I have said, concerning 
 the moderate Calvinism of Dr. Gauden, " As the Cameronists 
 were accounted to be a kind of middle-men between Calvinists 
 and Arminians, so may the first sentence in the following para- 
 graph, be recognized as partaking of the kindly nature of the 
 quotation from Cudworth, in page Ixiii, while the latter part of it 
 savours a little of the persecuting spirit of the more resolute Cal- 
 vinists, quoted in pages Ixi, Ixv." The observation is almost 
 equally applicable to the following sentences, from Mr. Scott's 
 Remarks at the conclusion of his translation : " How far some 
 "kinds of blasphemers should be also exempted []from Tolera- 
 *' tion,] may be a question ; but every species of profaneness or 
 ** impiety, is not direct blasphemy. Yet, if men outrage, or 
 " expose to ridicide or odium, the most sacred services of the reli- 
 " gion of their country, or if public instructors inculcate immoral 
 "" principles, they may, as far as I can see, be restrained, so that 
 " that the mischief may be prevented ; though perhaps without 
 " further punishm.ent, except for actual violation of the peace." 
 There is not much of the semblance of liberality in these expres- 
 sioi\s. I should not wish to have my enjoyment of religious 
 Toleration or of civil liberty dependent upon Mr. Scott's interpre- 
 tation of blasphemers ; for we have already seen him classing Armi- 
 nians with Pelagiansand Socinians, (p. clviii,) and we know his Calvi- 
 nian predecessors during the Inter-regnum required no other proof 
 than this of a man's complete disqualification for civil rights and 
 religious privileges. In the subsequent sentence, the sole differ- 
 ence between Mr. Scott, and Archbishop Laud, would be in the 
 meaning which they might severally attach to the phrase " the 
 most sacred services of the religion of the country." It was only 
 when " those most sacred services were outraged or exposed to 
 ridicule," that Archbishop Laud considered himself engaged in the 
 performance of his duty, by punishing the offenders, not contrary 
 to the usage of his predecessors, but in exact accordance with esta- 
 blished custom. Mr. Scott,- indeed, like a man in a lower sphere 
 who has not made an experiment at enforcing obedience, meekly 
 says, that such offenders " may, as far as he can see, be re- 
 strained ;" but respecting the infliction of " further punishment" 
 on them, he adds a "perhaps!" This is not that liberal and 
 more extensive doctrine of Toleration, on which our Arminian 
 rulers in Church and State have generally acted during the last 
 fifty years ; and it is still more dissimilar to that which they have 
 avowed and practised within the last twelve years. 
 
 Seveifal as objectionable passages as the preceding might have 
 Ijeen selected, from Mr. Scott's notes to his beloved " Historical 
 
 13 
 
clxiv INTRODUCTION. 
 
 Preface ;" but those which I have produced are quite sufficient, 
 to indicate the spirit and character of his performance. It may 
 here be expected of me, that I should make some attempt at 
 fapology for the strictui'es which I have passed on the unsuccess- 
 ul Calvinian labours of this excellent clergyman, recently deceased. 
 Such an apology, however, I consider to be quite unnecessary 
 in this instance ; for it must not be thought, that, in exposing 
 the ei'rors of a dead antagonist, I wish to imitate, even in imagi- 
 nation, the conduct of the Macedonian madman, of whom it is 
 said. 
 
 And thrice he routed all his foes, 
 And thrice he slew the slain ! 
 
 I have made no attempts to injure Mr. Scott's moral or religious 
 character : I highly respect his memory for his conscientious 
 attachment to, what he conceived to be, " gospel-truth ;" though 
 I think one of the anecdotes which his son has introduced into 
 his Life, (p. 233,) will convey, to the minds of some readers, an 
 appearance of tmnming, or an undue compliance with the Calvin- 
 istic prejudices of his hearers, 
 
 All my observations relate to the historical errors which Mr. 
 Scott has committed, and not personally to himself. They are 
 mistakes of such a description, as may be exceedingly prejudicial 
 to all youthful inquirers after the truth ; and their exposure will 
 serve to shew, that, on all subjects, " a little learning is a dan- 
 gerous thing," and that caution and research are necessary quali- 
 fications in every one who pretends to elucidate the most common 
 ecclesiastical occurrences of former ages. But there are men still 
 living, who, by the applause which they have jgnorantly bestowed 
 on Mr. Scott's jejune performance, have virtually made his mis- 
 takes their own. I do not allude to those petty Calvinistic 
 Reviewers, who are now very plentiful in the book-market, and 
 whose reading, on all ecclesiastical matters brought for adjudi- 
 cation before their Critical Tribunals, seldom extends beyond 
 Neal's History of the Puritans, Burnet's History of his own Times, 
 or BoGUE and Bennett's History of Dissenters. To attempt to 
 make any salutary impression upon these regular traders in mis- 
 representation, would be a hopeless effort. The parties to whom 
 I allude, are of a more respectable class ; yet they have praised 
 and re-iterated Mr. Scott's misrepresentations, to the injury of 
 their own reputation. That the Rev. John Scott, the author's 
 son, should have committed such a venial offence, is not wonder- 
 ful, when it is considered, that filial veneration for his excellent 
 father s acquirements would naturally prevent him from searching 
 into the accuracy of any of his assertions. Such an excuse, how- 
 ever, is not available for others, whose names might be mentioned, 
 and who, if their words were quoted, would be seen to have 
 identified their own opinions on these subjects with the opinions 
 of their reverend friend and the Patriarch of their body. 
 
INTRODUCTION. clxV 
 
 VIII CONCLUSION. 
 
 In the preceding article, I have been the more particular in 
 exposing some of Mr. Scott's mistakes, because, — having been 
 personally a sufferer from the want of accurate and extensive in- 
 formation on the part of some eminent writers, whom I venerated 
 for their piety, and whose plausible assertions on ecclesiastical 
 matters I received (when young) without due caution, — I have 
 learnt to pity and assist those who may suffer from similar causes. 
 At a future opportunity, it is probable, I shall relate this chap- 
 ter in my history with more minuteness. For the present, it may 
 suffice to inform the reader, that I received my earliest religious 
 impressions under the ministry of that apostolic man, the Rev. 
 John Crosse, Vicar of Bradford in Yorkshire ; who, for many 
 years and with a fondness almost parental, watched over my pro- 
 gress in virtue and learning. When I was in my nineteenth year, 
 and officiating as assistant in the school of the Rev. Thomas 
 Langdon, (a most liberal and pious Baptist minister,) at the earnest 
 request of Mr. Crosse, and by the advice and with the powerful 
 recommendation of the late Rev. Joseph Whiteley, the highly- 
 accomplished and much-lamented Head Master of the Free Gram- 
 mar School in Leeds, I consented to become a candidate for the 
 Second Mastership in the Free Grammar School of Bradford. 
 This was preparatory to ray obtaining a Title from Mr. Crosse, as 
 soon as I should be qualified by age, for entering into Holy 
 Orders. By his influence, with the kind exertions of Mr. John 
 Blackburn, and that very respectable family the Skeltons, much 
 interest was excited in my favour among the Trustees, who, out 
 of above thirty candidates, selected me and another to be the 
 competitors for the situation. My want of success on the day of 
 examination, had the decision of the Trustees been founded on the 
 principle of " cceteris disparibus," (which, happily, was not the 
 case,) would not have been disreputable to one so young, since 
 the gentleman, who Avas very properly preferred, became a 
 teacher at the age of fifteen, and had been in Holy Ordei's above 
 ten years at the time of his election. This last circumstance, ac- 
 cording to the terms of Lady Elizabeth Hastings's endowment, is 
 always decisive in favour of a clerical candidate who possesses the 
 requisite qualifications. 
 
 The memory of the Rev. Joseph Whiteley I shall always 
 gratefully cherish : To him I profess myself to have been under 
 the deepest obligations, as my sedulous preceptor, my disinter- 
 ested friend, adviser and patron. To this excellent clergyman, 
 and to another esteemed friend who has likewise paid the debt of 
 nature, I made a promise, that, if I did not succeed to the vacancy 
 in the Free Grammar School at Bradford, I would accept the 
 situation of private tutor to the four sons of a gentleman near 
 Harewood. How frequently do circumstances, in themselves 
 apparently trivial, seem to determine the future destiny of our 
 lives ! During a residence of three years in the respected family 
 
dxvi INTttODUCTlblJ. 
 
 of Richard Leak, Esq., I enjoyed frequent opportunities of visit- 
 ing my friends in Leeds, and of associating with Christians of 
 different denominations. On one of those excursions, when din- 
 ing in company with two Dissenting Ministers, I was drawn by 
 the younger of them, a remarkably clever man, into a declaration 
 of my views respecting church-government: It is scarcely ne- 
 cessary to say, that, in the hands of one who had studied the 
 subject, several of my arguments were turned against myself, and 
 my principles shewn to be untenable. When I subsequently 
 reflected upon the topics of our conversation, I at one perceived 
 it to be my duty to have something better than a mere preposses- 
 sion or inclination to offer, in behalf of my attachment to Episco- 
 pacy. " In evil hour," therefore, I betook myself to this unpro- 
 fitable course of study, and began to peruse some of the best 
 authors on both sides of the question. 
 
 Richard Baxter's incompetency to tender correct information 
 on this subject, which ultimately turns on the practice of Anti- 
 quity, I shall prove at some other time : But to his writings 
 against Episcopacy and Prelacy, and to Lord Chancellor King's 
 Enquiry into the Constitution, <^'C., of the Primitive Church, I ascribe 
 the bias which I then received in favour of the Presbyterian form 
 of Church-government, and which was strengthened by a perusal 
 of some of the treatises by Episcopal Divines that are mentioned 
 in a preceding note, page cix. I had read several of Baxter's 
 <levotional works, with pleasure and edification ; but, though in 
 that line he was deservedly one of my favourite authors, I con- 
 fess, the shock which his pertinacious arguments against Episco- 
 pacy gave to my mind, was exceedingly severe. That was the 
 first time in my life, in which the discovery of what I deemed to 
 be Truth was connected with painful sensations ; and the 
 remarks which I have made on the conduct of Arminius, {Works, 
 vol. i, pp. 63 — 6Q,) were dictated by a remembrance of my own 
 tortured feelings, when, from a different cause, I was placed in 
 nearly similar circumstances. My course of reading was, for a 
 considerable time, directed to works written in defence of Pres- 
 byterianism and Independency. But though my paramount 
 desire was, to be devoted to the service of God in the Christian 
 ministry among any denomination, my mental scruples would 
 never allow me to become a Dissenter. Several easy methods of 
 embracing that interest presented themselves ; one of which was 
 particularly captivating to me — that of Classical Tutor in a cele- 
 brated Dissenting Academy : But, " as my thoughts then stood," 
 I could not conscientiously embrace the overture, — ^though the 
 situation would have been highly gratifying to my wishes and 
 congenial to my previous habits. 
 
 I was in this doubtful state of mind respecting the unedifying 
 subject of ecclesiastical regimen, when I joined the society of the 
 Wesleyan Methodists, in which my maternal grandfather had 
 been one of the earliest Itinerant Ministers, and of which ray 
 
INTRODUCTION. clxvii 
 
 pious pai'ents had long been members. Soon afterwards, a most 
 liberal offer was made to me of a partnership in the bookselling 
 business, by a person as ignorant of it as myself. But, as busi- 
 ness of no kind had ever been in my contemplation, and as my 
 pursuits had lain altogether in a contrary direction, I did not 
 attempt to accept of it till I had consulted those of my friends on 
 whose judgment and concern for my welfare I could safely rely : 
 " Accept of the offer," was the kind but injudicious answer of all, 
 except my prudent father, who, in words that proved ultimately 
 prophetic, foretold the unfortunate issue of such an enterprize as 
 that upon which I was about to enter. In justice, however, to 
 those friends, whose advice I followed with a degree of reluctance 
 and hesitation, I must observe that they were professional men, 
 and almost as little acquainted as myself with those requisites 
 which form a complete tradesman. 
 
 When I had contended about five 5^ears with the difficulties 
 connected with the occupation of a retail bookseller, and with a 
 large and unwieldy stock, and had, under the influence of a 
 morbid sort of feeling, discarded all thoughts about the contend- 
 ing forms of church-government, my attention was once more 
 unexpectedly attracted to them in the yeai- 1811, by the Rev. 
 Robert Cox, Perpetual Curate of Bridgnorth, at that time 
 Minister of St. James's Church in Leeds. Although my doc- 
 trinal views differed from those of this philanthropic clergyman, 
 yet he made me a generous proposal, to clear me entirely of all 
 the incumbrances and engagements in which I was involved by 
 my partnership, provided I would enter into Holy Orders. With 
 an earnest affection, that is quite characteristic of the man of God, 
 he tried to remove the scruples which I had unfortunately 
 imbibed. Not satisfied with his own benevolent endeavours, he 
 engaged his judicious and amiable friend, the Rev. John Merry 
 then Curate of Rawden in Yorkshire, but now of Chettle, near 
 Salisbury, to argue the case with me. Though at that time my 
 understanding was not convinced by their arguments, yet their 
 endearing behaviour won my affections; and the manner in 
 which these truly Evangelical Clergymen demonstrated to me, 
 from their own experience, the mildness and liberality of the 
 Episcopal Regimen, and the advantages of a national establish- 
 ment, gave the first clue to my subsequent researches, which I 
 pursued at such intervals as business would permit. It was not 
 however, till a short time after the unfortunate crisis in my affairs 
 to which I have briefly alluded, that I became fixed and decided 
 in my attachment to Episcopacy. 
 
 Having now been settled some years as a printer in London, 
 and entirely unconnected with any other religious denomination 
 than that of the Church of England, I entertain such old- 
 fashioned prejudices as to believe, that the vows of God are still 
 upon me ; and that it is my duty, though in an inferior capacity 
 to that of a minister, to do good to all men as often as I have 
 opportunity. These my first-fruits and earliest offerings in behalf 
 
clxviii INTRODUCTIOX. 
 
 of that Church in which I was first captivatec] witli the loveliness 
 of religion, may seem to be of too polemical a character to be 
 acceptable. But those who are best acquainted with me, know, 
 that controversy is not the element in which I delight. The rise 
 of Arminianism, however, in the Church of England, and its sub- 
 Sequent obligations to that of Holland, could not be elucidated 
 without controverting many of the reproachful and untrue 
 accounts of its most bitter adversaries. Since, therefore, this 
 page of English ecclesiastical History required the aid of one to 
 whom Dutch affairs, and the constitution of the different States 
 which composed that Republic, were familiar, — and my studies, 
 especially in my youthful days, having been turned much in that 
 direction, — I resolved to take this burden upon myself; and, 
 amidst numerous impediments, have been enabled, by the kind- 
 ness of Heaven, to fi ; "sh the First Volume of my arduous under- 
 taking. As its multifarious contents will require, from all parties, 
 a long time for digestion; and as the Second Volume will, like 
 this, consist at least of 1,000 closely-printed pages ; the latter 
 (also in two parts) must not be expected till I have completed the 
 publication of the Works of' Arminius. 
 
 A few of the reasons for giving this short account of myself, 
 are here subjoined: I wish to shew, — that, though attached from 
 principle to the doctrines and institutions of the Chvirch of Eng- 
 land, I am no bigot, but love and reverence good men of every 
 denomination ; — that, from my early scruples on ceremonial 
 and minute matters, while I have learnt to respect those of other 
 persons and to treat them with tendei'ness, I feel desirous to be 
 instrumental in removing them ; — that the indulgence and subse- 
 quent removal of my own scruples, (which, be it remembered, 
 were never about doctrinal matters,) led me into a course of read- 
 ing, that afforded me many advantages for the execution of the 
 work in which I am now engaged ; — that, I have no party or 
 sinister purposes to serve by this publication, having nothing 
 whatever to hope or to fear from men of any religious persuasion ; 
 ' — and that, on several important points, my evidence, corrobo- 
 rated as it generally is by more competent authorities, must be 
 viewed as tolerably impartial and unprejudiced- Indeed, I may 
 venture, with due humility and i7i a qualijied sense, to adopt one 
 of "the ever-memorable Hales's" expressions, and say: "The 
 " pursuit of Truth hath been my only care, ever since I first 
 " understood the meaning of the word. For this, I have for- 
 " saken all hopes, all friends, all desires, which might bias me 
 " and hinder me from driving right at what I aimed. For this, I 
 '' have spent my money, my means, my youth, and all I have, that I 
 «' might remove from myself that censure of Tertullian, suo vitio 
 '' quis quid ignorat. If with all this cost and pains my purchase 
 '' is but ERROR, I may say, ' to err hath cost me more than it hath 
 '' many iojind the iruih _,•' and Truth itself shall give me this testi- 
 " mony at last, that if I have missed of hex*, it is not iny fault, 
 <* but my misfortime." J. N. 
 
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