one of the inseparable concomitants of absolute decrees.

;

Harsnet, too, who was raised by successive preferments from a Fellowship of Pembroke Hall in Cambridge, to the Archiepiscopal See of York, in October of the year 1584, stood forth at St. Paul's Cross, the earnest combatant of absolute decrees. He states, "that, at that time, the opinion of reprobation had grown high and monstrous, and like a Goliah and, that while men do shake and tremble at it, yet never a man reacheth to David's sling to cast it down." Armed with the text from Ezekiel xxxiii. 11. “As I live, saith the Lord God, I have no pleasure in the death of the sinner," &c. he encounters this formidable giant, deducing from his sermon six consequences in direct opposition to the Predestinarian tenets of the school of Geneva. From that pulpit, then, which was usually attended by Bishops and Statesmen, Harsnet, in the face of, the popular reception of these tenets, commits himself in the most unequivocal manner, maintaining," the redemption of mankind without exception, the free offer of effectual grace to all, denying reprobation in all its parts, and ascribing to the contempt and neglect of grace alone, the exclusion of any soul from God's kingdom."(1) He was then but Fellow of Pembroke Hall, and yet, his opinions neither rendered him obnoxious to Ecclesiastical censures at that time, nor presented an obstacle to his subsequent administration of the Church, as one of her highest executive ministers, as Bishop, and finally, as metropolitan. (m)

(1) Mr. Harsnet's Sermon at Paul's Cross, bound up at the end of Dr. Steward's Three Sermons, printed 1658, p. 133, &c. quoted by Heylin.

(m) Heylin's Quinq. History, Part iii. pp. 33-37. London,

We shall not detain our readers by citing more witnesses than these, to the unimpeached freedom, with which the doctrines of reprobation, unconditional election, and irresistible grace were opposed, at a period, when the adversaries of them had to encounter the violence and animosity attendant on the unremitting zeal, with which these tenets were then propagated, and when the penalty of a breach of the Articles would no doubt have been rigidly enforced.

If direct proofs of the import of the Thirtynine Articles on the Predestinarian doctrines, had perished, we take the facts here adduced to be sufficiently strong, to intimate the certain negation they would give to the Calvinistic interpretation of that code. Employed here, as precursors to extant evidence, they enable us to regard, without dismay, the imposing attitude of the voluminous quotations of the Inquiry, and impress an irresistible persuasion, that it will be found, upon examination, that the most considerable of those of our Reformers, who in that production are ranged against us, occupy the station assigned them there only by compulsion, and that, " they who are for us, are more than they that be against us."

In proceeding to the production of these authorities, we congratulate our readers on the paucity of the objects, towards which they will be directed, and the consequent hope, that they will not oppress their patience with their magnitude. We congratulate the religious world indeed at large, that, with what factitious importance soever, differences of opinions are invested, the leading doctrines of our religion are acquiesced in by all the Churches that adhere to the primitive institutions of the Reformers. The differences are confined to speculative tenets,

which would involve no important practical consequences, were their respective members wise and moderate.

The only points at issue between the Author of the Inquiry, and the Ministers of the Established Church who differ from him, may be reduced to this single question-Does the seventeenth Article of the Church of England, which describes Predestination and its good and ill effects, at the same time enjoin the belief of absolute decrees, and their concomitants, upon her Ministers? The Author of the Inquiry maintains the affirmative; the great majority of the Clergy since the Synod of Dort, A. D. 1618, including some of the most pious and learned men who ever adorned the annals of any Church, have maintained the negative. The construction of the Article is the sole point at issue, but, as this will not be granted, before we proceed farther, the truth of the allegation must be proved.

If

"There are," says the Author of the Inquiry, "certain sentiments on the subject of salvation, which usually and naturally go together. a man be not sensible that by nature there is no health in him, he will, of course, conceive that he possesses some portion of spiritual strength, and on the use which he makes of that, he will consider his salvation to be suspended : he of course regards his redemption as a matter of compact between God and himself, and will therefore divide the business of it between the two contracting parties; grace alone he cannot consider as sufficient for his salvation, without the co-agency of his own free-will; nor faith as competent to his justification, without the addition of his own works; his election and perseverance he will consequently consider as conditional, the one resulting from the use which God foresaw

he would make of the portion of spiritual strength which he possessed, together with such aid as he should conditionally give him; the other suspended on the actual use which he makes of his strength, and the conditionally acquired aids of grace considering his salvation as thus suspended on the portion of spiritual strength which he originally possessed, he cannot but attach some degree of merit to the right use which he makes of it, and to the works which spring from that use." (n)

6

How naturally soever the Author of the Inquiry may conceive, these sentiments go together," there are others, who can neither perceive the connexion nor admit the consequence; they cannot perceive why, because the hand, as the servant of the will, is stretched forth to administer the prescribed medicament to a diseased constitution, the consequent cure should be ascribed, not to the skill of the physician and the efficacy of the medicines altogether, but should be divided between them and the will of the patient, which put the hand in motion merely to apply them; and still less reason can they see, if the rational powers minister to the cure of spiritual distempers, by embracing the suggested remedy, that, either the preparation of the medicament or the efficacy of its application will be in the least ascribed to them. Indeed so far are they from perceiving this natural and indissoluble connexion, that, on the other hand, in the annihilation of the "co-agency of his own freewill," they not only conceive the total abolition of moral agency to be involved, but they are utterly at a loss to imagine with what order of beings man should be ranked, when bereft of those

(n) Part ii, pp. 246, 247.

powers that constitute him a rational creature. And though such a man is represented by the Author of the Inquiry, as, "regarding his redemption of course as a matter of compact between God and himself, and thence dividing the business of it between the two contracting parties," there are others, endued with less sagacity, who cannot discern any compact between the grateful receiver of a favour freely bestowed, and a generous unsolicited benefactor. And as they do not admit these premises, they also deny the conclusion-for, while it is peremptorily deduced, that "he cannot but attach some degree of merit to the right use which he makes of it, and to the works which spring from that use," they can disclaim all merit from the interest granted to them in their redemption, which was accomplished by him "who trode the wine-press of God's wrath alone," and can therefore undividedly refer the praise, the glory, and the merit of it to him "who of God is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption."(o) What therefore the Author has indissolubly united, others behold separated, and in the separation, while they can discover no extenuation of the glory of God's free grace, they can with delight behold a brighter lustre shed on both his justice and his mercy, when they see the refreshing waters of the gospel of unbounded love, bestowed on moral agents thirsting after righteousness, than when irresistibly conferred on the struggling slaves of his power, who would reject it if they could.

That unconditional election has neither a natu ral nor an evangelical union with the great principles of the Christian Religion, viz. Original Sin, Justification by Faith alone, and Free Grace,

(0) 1 Cor. i. 30.