2. Jesus Christ, by his death and sufferings, made an atonement for the sins of all mankind in general and of every individual in particular. None, however, but those who believe in him, can be partakers of their divine benefit.

3. True faith cannot proceed, from the exercise of our natural faculties and powers, nor from the force and operation of Free Will; since man, in consequence of his natural corruption, is incapable either of thinking or doing any good thing. Therefore it is necessary to his conversion and salvation, that he be regenerated and renewed by the operation of the Holy Ghost, which is the gift of God through Jesus Christ.

4. This divine Grace or Energy of the Holy Ghost, which heals the disorder of a corrupt nature, begins and advances and brings to perfection every thing that can be called good in man: and, consequently, all good works, without exception, are to be attributed to God alone and to the operation of his Grace. Nevertheless, this Grace does not force the man to act against his inclination, but may be resisted and rendered ineffectual by the perverse will of the impenitent sinner.

5. They, who are united to Christ by faith, are thereby furnished with abundant strength and with succours sufficient to enable them to triumph over the seduction of Satan and the allurements of sin and temptation. But the question, Whether such MAY fall from their faith and forfeit finally this

state of grace, has not been yet resolved with sufficient perspicuity: and, therefore, it must be yet more carefully examined by an attentive study of what the Holy Scriptures have declared in relation to this important point *.

II. Such, with the exception, that the last of these five Articles, which, in its original construction, hesitated (we see) in respect to the point of Final Perseverance, had its hesitation subsequently removed by the introduction of a positive affirmation that The Saints might fall away finally from a State of Gracet: such was the exposition given by Arminius and the Remonstrants; and, though at first it encountered a somewhat fierce opposition, it has, to a very wide extent, I believe, been received and adopted with much approbation.

1. Doubtless, it is abundantly plausible: because, through the CAUSATION of God's indisputable prevision of future actions whether good or bad, it undertakes to reconcile God's decrees of Election and Reprobation with Man's notions of God's attribute of justice. How it disposes of various texts which seem hard of agreement with its avowed theory of CAUSATION, I stop not now to inquire ‡.

* Mosheim's Eccles. Hist. cent. XVII. sect. ii. part 2. chap. 3. § iv. vol. v. p. 444, 445.

+ Mosheim's Eccles. Hist. Ibid. p. 445.

Arminianism makes The divinely foreseen holiness of particular individuals to be the CAUSE of Their Election.

My present business is purely with the question of Historical Testimony to Primeval Antiquity.

If, then, the System, which usually bears the name of ARMINIANISM, do indeed set forth the sincere doctrine of Divine Revelation in that case, we may expect to find it universally held and familiarly inculcated by the early Church.

:

But, if no such System can be detected as universally held and familiarly inculcated by the early Church; and, a fortiori, still more, if, in hereafter prosecuting the investigation, the early Church should be found to have held, as being apostolically received, a widely different System: in that case, agreeably to our proposed test, the Scheme of Arminianism must be rejected, as a mere human invention, which, having been introduced subsequent to the original delivery of the Gospel, can only be deemed an unauthoritative adulteration.

2. With a view to the solution of this question, I have examined the documents of the early Church

But the texts, to which I refer, exactly invert this process: for they make The Election of particular individuals to be the CAUSE of Their holiness. See Rom. viii. 29. Ephes. i. 4, 5. 1 Peter i. 2.

That Augustine should insist upon the order so plainly marked out in these texts, might naturally be expected: but Jerome, who, in modern nomenclature, was certainly no Calvinist, does the very same. See August. cont. Julian. lib. v. c. 4. Oper. vol. vii. p. 374. and Hieron. Comment. in Epist. ad Ephes. i. Oper. vol. vi. p. 162. Hieron. Apol. adv. Ruffin. lib. i. c. 6. Oper. vol. ii. p. 199.

C

as extensively and as attentively as I have been able: and I certainly must say, that, as a System, I have altogether failed to discover the Scheme proposed by Arminius and the Remonstrants.

(1.) Its theory of CAUSATION, namely God's Prescience of an individual's future perseverance in holiness, may indeed boast of a very considerable degree of antiquity: for, though it cannot be traced higher than Clement of Alexandria who flourished at the latter end of the second century, and though his predecessors maintained a very different and (I think) a much more scriptural theory; yet, if an Arminian can be satisfied with relative instead of positive antiquity, from the time of Clement downward to the time of Augustine, it appears, with some exceptions, to have been generally adopted *.

(2.) But its theory of IDEALITY, namely God's Election of certain individuals, directly and immediately, to eternal life, I find not in the expositions of the early ecclesiastical writers. Nor, on this point, is it mere silence which we encounter. The IDEA of Election, which they set forth as the sense universally received by the Primitive Church,

* Clement of Alexandria is full and express, as to what he maintained to be the MOVING CAUSE of Election.

Τοὺς ἤδη κατατεταγμένους, οὓς προώρισεν ὁ Θεὸς, δικαίους ἐσομένους πρò kaтaßoλĥs kóσμov ¿yvæкs. Clem. Alex. Strom. lib. vii. Oper. p. 765.

As an exception to the general subsequent adoption of this theory, I have noticed Jerome, who flourished in the fourth and fifth centuries. See below, book ii. chap. 3. § 11. 2.

is, as we shall hereafter learn, essentially different from the IDEA of Election entertained by the Arminians *.

III. Hence, if the mode of reasoning, which I have adopted, be valid: historical testimony forbids us to receive Arminianism as the genuine mind of the Gospel; because that System was not acknowledged, as scriptural truth, by the early Christians, who, either immediately or almost immediately, derived their theology from the Apostles themselves.

* See below, book ii. chap. 2.