So these two Opinions offend much against Gods Goodnesse and Truth yet this second well acknowledgeth that God decreed something upon his foreknowledge what man would doe being permitted That this foreknowledge is so certain that upon it God builded his greatest Counsels of the mystery of the Gospell as upon the foreknowledge of Adams fall the decree to send Christ Secondly It provideth well for the justice of God on Infants dying who have no other desert of death but Originall sin from which as to the paine of eternall death Gods mercy delivereth whom hee pleaseth by Baptisme or the vow thereof in the holy Church Parvulorū autem causam ad exemplum Majorum non patiuntur afferri sayes Hilary of the Massilienses in which they were right for the Election or Reprobation which is of Infants that live not to years of discretion is no necessary pattern for the Election or Reprobation of them that live into a further Age. The Defenders of this Opinion claime our 17. Article as for them and surely better may they doe it than they of the former for those words To deliver from curse and damnation those whom hee hath chosen import a curse and damnation fallen into by those who are delivered But how those words chosen in Christ and the godly consideration of Predestination and our Election in Christ and those words Wee must receive Gods Promises in such wise as they be generally set forth unto us in holy Scriptures How these will stand with a decree of Election made before Christ be thought on otherwise than as the Meanes to bring the Elect to salvation for the Article makes these two things To choose some in Christ out of mankinde and to bring them by Christ unto everlasting salvation or how a generall promise will stand with a particular purpose meaning or intending the promise but to some few let them consider how they can make it good by their Doctrine and I will consider how I can make it good which the Article saith by the Doctrine of the fifth Opinion As to the appeale to Bucer and P Martyr for the sense of our Articles used by Doctor Whitakers in his time and of late by the Bishop of Chichester Carleton the answer is full 1. That Bucer is not of the same Opinion with Martyr nor Carleton with Whitakers in the apprehension of the order of Predestination 2. That it is not true that the Disciples of P. Martyr and Bucer composed our Articles for these Articles on which there is now question were the same under King Edward the 6. and Queene Elizabeth but the Bishops and Divines under King Edw. 6. had composed the Articles and Liturgy before P. Martyr and Martin Bucer came hither as doth appeare in Mr. Fox his story To Bellarmine objecting that England had Bucer and Martyr Seminatores fidei the renowned Doctor Andrews answereth p. 31. Non tamen Si verum volumus seminarunt duo illi viri fidem in Anglia c. Neverthelesse if we will speake truth those two men did not plant the reformed faith in England but sought to weede out some Tares of superstition long since oversow'd by you Papists Although even those Tares themselves before their comming hither were for the most part condemnd and rooted out But these men entred upon others labours and bestow'd their paines also here that they might be helpfull to them in Vniversity matters 3. Whosoever were the chiefe Composers of our Articles of whom it is certain Archbishop Cranmer was one they had more respect to the Augustan Confession than to any other as appeares by the very Identity of many of the Articles and more familiarity with Melanchton and Erasmus than any other Divines singularly approving their Expositions of the sacred Scriptures and of the principall Articles of the Christian Faith insomuch that they caused to be translated into English Erasmus paraphrase on the Gospels and injoyn'd them to be studyed by Priests and to lye ready in Churches for all men to reade and as it were to drinke in the Doctrine of Scriptures according to Erasmus his interpretation whose writings which way they goe in those controversies all men well know that have read them CHAP. 3. The Third Opinion THe third Opinion seemes to be defended by the reverend and learned late Bishop of Norwich Doctor Overald and Richard Thompson his diligent Audiditor and familiar as may be gathered out of the Bishops judgement de quinque Articulis in Belgia controversis and out of the Conference at Hampton Court and out of Thompsons Diatribe de intercisione justitiae c. 4. And it is 1. That God decreed to create mankinde good c. as the second Opinion said 2. That he foresaw the fall of man c. as in the same second Opinion was said 3. That he decreed to send his Sonne to dye for the World and his Word to call and to offer salvation unto all men with a common and sufficient grace in the meanes to worke faith in Men if they bee not wanting to themselves 4. That out of Gods fore knowledge of mans infirmity and that none would believe by this common grace he decreed to adde a speciall grace more effectuall and abundant to whomsoever he pleased chosen according to his own Purpose and Grace by which they shall not onely bee able to believe but also actually believe This Opinion if I understand it aright I have not found expresly or strictly examined by any Divine Doctor Abbot in his animadversion upon Thompsons Diatribe suspecteth * c. 4. Insuavis quidam gravis halitus Arminiani dogmatis Arminianisme in it and rejected it But Doctor Overald doth clearely sever it from the Remonstrants Tenet as you shall see by and by I object it thus 1. That common Grace by which no man is sav'd which is inferiour to the infirmity of man is not the Grace of the Gospell nay deserves not the name of Grace which never brought forth the effect Salvation 2. That superabundant speciall effectuall Grace seemes not to be the Grace of the Gospell being rejected of none to whom it is offered for the Grace of the Gospell is such as is receiv'd by some and the selfe same rejected by other some to some 't is in vaine to others not in vaine 3. This Opinion with the two former seemes to bring in a certaine desperation into the mindes of men as was of old objected to St. Augustine seeing none can be saved but by that speciall and abundant Grace which is given but to a few out of the secret purpose of God which whether God doth intend to give or no the generall promises in the Gospell do not assure seeing they sound no more than a common grace which is ineffectuall by this Opinion But before I censure it farther bee it presented unto you in the words of one of the most illuminate Doctors of our Age. There were five Articles controverted in Holland 1. Of Gods Predestination 2. Of
humane capacity as de ordine modo praedestination is in mente divina concordia gratiae liberi arbitrii cum praedestinatione But these Papers I hope shall make it manifest first that I leave things unsearchable unsearchd and stand with the Apostle in the selfe same place that he did admiring and adoring 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Rom. 11. 33. I say in the selfesame place or the like not to cloak iniquity or absurdity imputed to the divine Majesty by O the depth c. Secondly that I search not at all into any thing by meere naturall light and humane reason which to do in these things were a presumption deserving precipitation but by the light of divine revelation in Gods holy word and therefore I have set for my title Appello Evangelium which is the opening of Gods Counsell so far as he is pleased to communicate to us And thirdly this I doe not onely by appealing to those Texts that directly and immediately speak of our Predestination and Election which may seeme hard and obscure but also to the openest and commonest places that are fundamentall principles of Christianity and the grounds of Catechisme which ordinary capacities and not great wits alone are able to understand and by which the fewer and harder Texts are to be enlightned and interpreted and not contrarily Irenaeus hath a right saying Multa male interpretari coguntur Lib. 5. qui Unum recte intelligere non volunt which hath hapned to many in our Age. That unum which they will not rightly understand is promissum Evangelicum universale in Christo redemptore vniversali which our Church professeth in her Articles and in her Catechisme which unum is the ground of all the Conclusions here maintained So that my studies have not been about some curious and superfluous questions separable from the body of Divinity and which might well have been spared but about the most essentiall parts and articles of that body and of their mutuall coherence and connexion the industrious search and examination whereof is so necessary and worthy a thing as I can hardly hold him worthy the name of a Divine that hath not laboured therein And as to my Opinions which unexamined may be presumed to be nothing else but either ancient or late condemn'd Heresies which imputation or very supposition no good man ought to beare with silence these leaves do undertake to shew that the apprehensions expressed in them are none of those old condemned Heresies nor of those late rejected Heterodoxes but the very Doctrine of the ancient Fathers of the Church builded upon the sense and letter of the holy Scriptures and consonant to the publike establish'd Doctrine of the Church of England contained in the bookes of Articles Common Prayer and Homilies which if I shall make good by cleare and undeniable evidence then I hope my good friends will hold me excused and cleared of any such crime as Heresie or semi-heresie or novelty and will take me for a true and sound member of the Church of England both in Doctrine and in Discipline from both which I feare there hath been made by many in this Church too great a defection and departure since the dayes of King Edw. the 6. when they were first established and since the primitive years of the happy reigne of Queen Elizabeth wherein they were ratifyed and strengthened with a second and oft-renewed judgement But the examination and tryall of all this I commit and submit to my ingenuous and loving friends and them and their studies to the goodnesse and grace of God our Father CHAP. I. The first Opinion THe first Opinion concerning the order of Divine Predestination and having these defenders Beza Piscator Whitaker Perkins and other holy and learned men is this 1. That God from all eternity decreed to create a certain number of Men. 2. That of this number he Predestinated some to everlasting life and other some he Reprobated to eternall death 3. That in this act he respected nothing more than his own dominion and the pleasure of his own will 4. That to bring men to these ends he decreed to permit Sin to enter in upon all men that the Reprobate might be condemned for sinne and that he decreed to send his Sonne to recover out of sin his Elect fallen together with the Reprobate This Opinion is rejected by many protestant Divines as by the reverend Divines of our Church that were at the Synod at Dort by Peter Moulin by Robert Bishop of Salisbury and others It is detested by the Papists and Lutherans it was it tha◠Arminius and his followers chiefly opposed in the low Countries It is charg'd To make God the Author of Sin To Reprobate men before they were evill To Elect men not in Christ who is sent after this Opinion to recover out of sinne those that were elected before they were considered as sinners This is that irrespective decree which Mr. Mountague disliketh because in it there is no respect had to any thing fore-known not so much as the fall of man much lesse Christ or Faith giving to God no fore-knowledge or no use of it at all in this act of his which the Scripture calls predestination Yet this Opinion doth well admonish us to remember the Dominion and Soveraigne power and will of God which must be seen and acknowledged in his predestinating of men according to that of the Apostle Rom. 9. 21. Hath not the Potter power over the clay and vers 15. Hee hath mercy on whom he will which we will be mindfull of in the fifth Opinion Under this Opinion are to be placed the nine Assertions concluded at Lambeth Nov. 20. 1595. which have been often required to be put into our Booke of Articles but yet could it never be obtained It is requisite therefore to set them down because they are not vulgarly knowne and to examine them what they meane and see how farre they are Orthodoxall or agreeing to our Articles And for their sakes that understand not the Latine tongue I will render them in English * Consule Articulos Lambethanos ab F. G. Ecclesiae Ministro nuper editos Articles approv'd by the right Reverend Lords John Lord Archbishop of Canterbury and Richard Lord Bishop of London and other Divines at Lambeth the 20. of Novemb. in the year 1595. 1. God from Eternity Predestinated some Men to life and some he Reprobated unto Death 2. The Moving or Efficient cause of Predestination to life is not the foresight of Faith or of perseverance or of good workes or of any thing which may be in the persons predestinated but onely the Will of Gods good pleasure 3. Of the predestinate there is a predefined and certaine number which can neither be increased nor diminished 4. They which are not predestinated to salvation shal necessarily be condem'd for their sinnes 5. True lively justifying Faith and the sanctifying Spirit of God is not extinguished doth not fall out doth
and practice but of curious and carnall men and such as lack the Spirit of Christ to whom also these evills doe betide of despaire and security and therefore this would be shunn'd and avoyded as he that loves his safety would shun to walk upon or gaze from some high and deep downfall One point in this comparison needeth some more full Explication for it may be questioned whether the Article meanes that these different Effects of comfort or downfall doe proceed onely from the difference of the persons that doe consider being either pious or curious carnall or spirituall having the Spirit of Christ or lacking the Spirit of Christ or doe flow also from the difference of the things considered viz. either of Predestination or Election in Christ or the sentence of Gods Predestination There are that make no difference betweene these two and so to them the difference that the Article moteth must arise onely from the difference of the persons considering one and the same Doctrine of Predestination But I may bee bold to put a difference betweene the things considered aswell as betweene the persons considering because the Article doth so so for curious and carnall persons c. The Article doth not say it is a dangerous downefall namely the consideration of Predestination and Election in Christ as keeping the same subject whereof hee had spoken before as comfortable but it substituteth another subject to have continually before their Eyes the Doctrine of Gods Predestination that is a dangerous downefall and not the other And to mee it should seeme incredible that either the Article should say or that Doctor Bancroft should say That the sound full and whole Doctrine of Predestination and our Election in Christ such as is here delivered in the former paragraph should be a dangerous downfall even to carnall men and even them that lack the Spirit of Christ For although it be true that the fruit and comfort of this and many other Divine truths bee reaped onely by godly persons when they are come to have the Spirit of Christ c. And it be true also that our curiosity and carnall affections bee great impediments to the right conceiving and judging of Divine truths yet it is as true that every necessary Doctrine is in sacred Scripture so fully perfectly and coherently delivered and ought to be therefore fitly deduced by the Church that of it selfe it have no aptnesse to become a praecipitium even to carnall men and such as have not the Spirit of Christ since the Scripture was not written to be reade onely of them that doe already in humility beleeve it and are filled with the Spirit of Christ but even by naturall men having onely ordinary humane judgements and to taste of the things of God What then is it that the Article saith hath so much as a likelyhood of a downfall to the curious and carnall To have continually before their eyes the sentence of Gods Predestination what is this Sentence The bare and naked Sentence that very decree it selfe in generality That God hath Predestinated some men to life and hath reprobated some to death such is the first of the 9. Assertions at Lambeth without any mention or consideration of Christ of faith of Gods Prescience or any other of his Attributes This naked Sentence without any thing of the order or manner how this decree is concluded or come unto is that praecipitium that exceeding height from whence the Devill doth or may thrust men curious carnall into despaire or security laying all their religion upon Predestination If I shall be sav'd I shall be sav'd This is that which Bancroft calleth a desperate Doctrine pag. 29. of the Conference The selfe-same for substance methinks I find expressed by Hemingius in his Syntagm loco de praedest whom I beseech you heare with a little patience 1. De aeternâ praedestinatione rectè erudir◠ecclesiam summoperè necessarium est nam ut nulla doctrina uberiorem consolationem piis conscientiis afferre solet quam doctrina praedestinationis rectè explicita ita nihil periculosius est quam rectâ praedestinationis ratione aberrare 2. Nam qui à verâ deflectit in praecipitium fertur unde se recipere non potest 3. Sunt quidam qui cum audiunt nostram salutem in Dei electione proposito sitam esse modum verum haud observant somnia Stoica fabulas Parcarum fingunt quibus seipsos miserè implicant alios perniciosè seducunt vide Thes 4 5 6 7. 4. Modus autem praedestinationis verissimus est quem Paulus nobis commonstrat cum ad Ephes scribit Elegit nos in Christo 1. 9 10 11. in hoc modo conditio fidei includitur Nam cum fide inserimur Christo ejus membra efficimur ideo electi quia Christi membra sumus The Sentence therefore of Predestination without the Modus is Praecipitium but the Modus in Christo is the fountain of all comfort and hope and godliness which maketh this matter of so much worth to contend for The true Modus Praedestinationis divinae Now I come to the period of the second Paragraph and the whole Article Furthermore we must receive Gods promises in such wise as they be generally set forth unto us in holy Scripture and in our doings that Will of God is to be followed which we have expresly declared unto us in the word of God This part of the Article Bishop Bancroft shewed King James at Hampton Court pag. 29. line 19 20. as the Doctrine of the Church of England touching Predestination and it was there very well approved Moreover the Kings most excellent Majesty that now is in his Declaration commanding that all farther curious search be layd aside willeth that these disputes be shut up in Gods promises as they be generally set forth unto us in the holy Scripture as if the generall promises of God were the surest principles to determine all these doubts and differences by and they rest safely that rest in them The Authority of this Article together with other like passages in our Catechisme and Homilies constrained our divines that were at Dort to deliver in secundo Articulo these Theses for the third and fourth 3. Deus lapsi generis humani miseratus misit filium qui seipsum dedit precium redemptionis pro peccatis totius mundi 4. And for the fourth Thesis In hoc merito mortis Christi fundatur universale promissum Evangelicum juxta quod omnes in Christo credentes remissionem peccatorum vitam aeternam reipsâ consequantur which they confirme by Mark 16. 15. so that this part of the Article though it be the last yet it is not the last in worth and use For whereas it saith Furthermore we must receive c. It intendeth to give farther remedy against the harme which may be taken by curious and carnall persons from the Sentence of Predestination had continually before their Eyes Which
nothing without the Sonne being the chiefest peece in the Frame Secondly this word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 may signifie the Purpose Decree Determination and Resolution of the Will of God to execute and to put into being the things whereof the plot which is in his minde is the patterne thus S. Paul taketh it 2 Tim. 1. 9. when hee joynes purpose and grace together Who hath saved us and called us with an holy calling not according to our workes but according to his purpose and grace given unto us in Christ Jesus before the World was or of both these together is the purpose of God consisting the Counsell and the Decree of God intending those things the order and course and forme wherof he hath in his Mind and his Power and lastly in his Will So that I may say with Vrsinus on Esai 14. Eventus rerum accuratissimè respondent consilio praevisioni Dei tanquam Archetypo So S. Paul would say all things come to passe 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 all things doe and fulfill the purpose of God This purpose is about Ends and Meanes to those ends and all circumstances accompanying them both in things of the order of nature and of the order of grace and about those things God will doe himselfe and those things hee will permit the Creature and all secondary Causes to doe And although in the whole frame or plot there be two parts or two wayes one that leadeth some to happinesse and another wherein some goe to their owne destruction and although the purpose of God runs upon them both as being not without his Counsell or his will yet in S. Paul that onely which is the way to happinesse to some as the more worthy and desirable part is called the purpose of God just as in the foreknowledge where although the wicked are not unknowne to God as ignorant of the men and of their workes yet the faithfull onely and the Elect are named and called those whom God foreknew because in them hee is pleased and delighted So it is in purpose that part onely of Divine disposition that bringeth unto happinesse is called Gods purpose because hee delighteth in the good of his Creatures and hath no pleasure in their death and destruction which is of themselves and not of him yet adjudged by him and decreed upon their rebellion And this may suffice for the opening of this Terme The Purpose of God As for the Adjuncts added by our Article to purpose as the everlasting purpose they are so cleer as they neede no further Explication than was made in the Analysis before Onely to the last we may adde a word By his Counsell secret to us Consilio nobis quidem occulto This Clause I would have reserved and kept in minde to prove that Doctrine which I delivered in the 18. Chapter of the third part of this worke That although there be revealed to us some hopefull signes of our Election and Predestination as it is witnessed in the next branch of this paragraph yet the very certainty of our Election or Predestination is a secret hidden in God and in this life unknown to us Come wee now to the outward Act or End purposed by God to his chosen viz. to bring them to everlasting Salvation This is terminus ad quem the end which Predestination intendeth as that which decreeth a perfect worke and leaveth not the issue uncertaine or contingent as unto God To this is added in the Article the terminus à quo from whence men are brought to Salvation from curse and damnation from which they are delivered And there is added the meanes by which they are both delivered from curse and brought to Salvation and that is Christ and lastly there is an Illustration As Vessels made to Honour Out of these words To deliver from curse is rightly collected by Robert late Bishop of Salisbury that the Church of England doth acknowlege them quos Deus in Christo elegit to be maledicto exitio liberatos nam privatum est non publicum Ecclesiae judicium quicquid aliter à quibusdam inconsideratè scriptum est So he in praefatione ad Lectorem In these quibusdam are no meaner men than Doctor Whitakers and Master Perkins who tooke this Article to speak for them Whom yet this learned Bishop saith have written aliter and inconsideratè the Article then hath not beene understood and so it may yet be not fully apprehended by great Praelates for likewise out of this that our Article saith with the Apostle that our Election is in Christ Doctor Carleton late Bishop of Chichester well collecteth that this Counsell of God had respect unto the corrupt masse of Mankinde for saith he the benefit we have by Christ appeareth not in the state of Innocency pag. 10. against the Appealer where the said reverend Bishop disputeth earnestly against them that teach Predestination to be a separation between men and men as they were found in the Masse of Mankinde uncorrupt which is the Doctrine the Appealer so much inveighed against as contrary to our Church in the 17 Article So that to mee it is strange the Bishop should bee so severe against the Appealer whith whom himselfe concurreth in the condemning of the same Novelty But more strange it seemes to mee that out of those words Chosen in Christ hee could collect the fall of Mankinde to be presupposed by God before the Counsell proceeded to Election and could not aswell collect now that Christ himselfe was presupposed to be sent into the World to be preached to be beleeved on or refused before God proceeded to Elect or to Reprobate man Seeing the first is collected more remotely that the Gift of Christ supposeth sinne and a curse from whence men had neede to be delivered by a Saviour But the second is expresly affirmed by the Apostle Hee hath chosen in Christ and so it may immediately be collected that wee were chosen not to Christ as to be sent but in Christ supposed as sent and we found Beleevers in him seeing the foreknowledge of God did aswell understand the issue and successe of Christ preached in the World that hee would be the occasion of the rising of many and of the sorer fall of many others as it understood the issue of the Creation of man of the Commandement given of the Tempter permitted that it would bee to the fall and corruption of all Mankinde It is very true that the Bishop of Salisbury saith Sect. 1. P. 2. That God looking upon the Masse of Mankinde defiled with sinne and guilty of eternall Death and Damnation did there see subesse ibi commoditatem evolvendi explicandi opes illas abyssos sapientiae suae justitiae misericordiae potentiae patientiae summa ut in illum gloria istustrium virtutum praedicatio redundaret but how to shew all this The Scripture saith by sending his Sonne to die for the World for therein are all these riches opened But that