Articles. The English have alone been used as a preliminary test of orthodoxy on admission into holy orders1, so that long before enactments of the civil legislature at the opening of the present century, the two communions on the opposite sides of the Channel had been constituted by ecclesiastical usage the unitedChurch of England and Ireland'.' 1 Elrington's Ussher, p. 177. 2 e. g. in An Act for the Union of Great Britain and Ireland, it is provided (Stat. 40 Geo. III. c. 38, 'Ireland'): That it be the fifth Article of Union, that the Churches of England and Ireland, as now by law established, be united into one protestant episcopal Church, to be called "The United Church of England and Ireland;" and that the doctrine, worship, discipline, and government of the said United Church shall be, and shall remain in full force for ever, as the same are now by law established for the Church of England.' CHAPTER IX. THE SYNOD OF DORT AND THE ROYAL DECLARATION. ON Quinquar the reign of troversy, in James I. N the failure of the vehement effort which was made State of the at Cambridge, in the hope of riveting the Lambeth ticular conArticles upon the Church of England, the enthusiasm which had suggested their compilation appears to have been gradually subsiding. Calvinism was losing its ascendancy; it was confronted everywhere by an array of formidable opponents', while the ablest of its champions were, in many cases, falling off into positions of neutrality, or passing over to the opposite camp. A few, indeed, and in that remnant some of the more gifted writers of their age, continued to combine a partial acquiescence in Genevan doctrines with a pure and unreserved attachment to the Formularies of the Church; but, in the great majority, it was apparent that extreme or supra-lapsarian Calvinists were more and more identified with 'Puritans' 1 See Bp Young's remark at the time of Laud's ordination, in Le Bas, Life of Laud, p. 6. The following order of the King to the Universities in 1616, conduced to the same result: That young students in divinity be directed to study such books as be most agreeable in doctrine and discipline to the Church of England, and incited to bestow their time on the Fathers and Councils, schoolmen, histories and controversies, and not to insist so long upon compendiums and abbreviatures, making them the grounds of their divinity.' Wilkins, IV. 459. 2 e. g. Dr Thomas Jackson, of whom Prynne says that he 'disgraced his mother the University of Oxford, who grieved for his defection :' Works, Vol. I. p. xi. Oxf. 1844. Hales of Eton abandoned his former opinions with the observation that he 'bade John Calvin good night: Farindon's Letter, prefixed to Golden Remains, Lond. 1659. See also Bp Sanderson's remarkable statement respecting the change of his own mind on these subjects: Hammond's Works, 1. 669, fol. ed. and 'Precisians,' whose deep-rooted horror of 'the cap, the tippet, and the surplice,' had been driving them into the arms of men like Thomas Cartwright, and at length to a fresh platform1 of their own devising. Yet a cursory perusal of the Jacobean literature will satisfy us, that in spite of all defections, there was still a large and acrimonious party, both within and without the Church, who went on preaching the 'Divine decrees' as the distinguishing feature of the Gospel. Even where receding (as they now did) from the logical consequences of their system, or, in other words, adopting as their own the sub-lapsarian hypothesis, by which the harshness of the older teaching was considerably softened, they esteemed it an imperative duty to denounce all deviations from their ground as both Pelagian and Popish. To deny that the regenerating grace of God must issue in the saving of the soul to which it is imparted; to assert the universal applicability of Christ's atoning work; to claim for man the power of self-determination, or free choice, as one surviving element of his moral constitution; to suspend his full acquittal at the day of judgment on the energy of his faith, or on his faithful use of talents with which he is entrusted,— would be sure to implicate the preacher in a series of unseemly disputations: it was treason to the majesty of Calvin; it amounted to renunciation of the genuine Gospel. 1 The first conventicle' was organized in 1567. Mr Haweis' Sketches, p. 189: Zurich Letters, 1.201. 2 The Vice-Chancellor of Oxford (Dr Robert Abbott) in a Sermon before the University, 1614, made the following onslaught upon Laud, who was then rising into eminence: 'Might not Christ say, what art thou? Romish or English? Papist or Protestant? Or what art thou? A mongrel, or compound of both? A Protestant by ordination, a Papist in point of Free-will, inherent righteousness and the like?' Le Bas, Life of Laud, p. 25. Carleton, in like manner, denounces Montague ་ as 'running with the Arminians into the depth of Pelagius his poysoned doctrine,' and when the 'Appellant' declares that he has read nothing of the Arminians and utterly repudiates Pelagius, the only answer he obtains from his stern 'Examiner,' is this: It seemeth that you are an excellent scholler, that can learne your lesson so perfectly without instructors.' Examination of those things wherein the Author of the late Appeale holdeth the doctrines of the Pelagians and Arminians, to be the doctrines of the Church of England, pp. 19, 20: 2nd ed. 'Arminian Agitations of this kind arising out of our domestic The rise of quarrels, were still more exasperated at the opening of the ism, 1604. seventeenth century by the appearance of a kindred crop of controversies in the republic of the Low Countries. Our own Church, as Bishop Hall expressed it, began to sicken of the 'Belgic disease,' or the 'five busy Articles1;' and our preachers to indulge in most declamatory warnings against the 'poison' of Arminius. The chief leader of that new assault upon the fashionable metaphysics was professor in the university of Leyden, who is said to have abandoned all his Calvinistic tenets after reading a production of William Perkins, one of the most violent of the English supra-lapsarians2. Startled, it would seem, by principles enunciated in that work, without the slightest mitigation or reserve, Arminius had resorted to a milder theory of the Divine decrees which seems to have been first of all adopted by St Ambrose3. There he found a clue, facilitating his escape from the perplexities in which he was entangled, and supplying what he deemed the one intelligible method which enabled him to recognize the love of the Almighty, and to vindicate the freedom of His fallen creatures. This revulsion in the spirit of Arminius occurred in 1604, and as we might expect from the prevailing temper of the age, to which his theory was submitted, he became at once the object of unsparing castigation. Nor upon his own withdrawal from the theatre of strife (Oct. 1609) was the discussion he had raised in any way determined or exhausted. On the contrary, it spread with fresh rapidity in 1 Men, brethren, fathers, help. Who sees not a dangerous fire kindling in our Church, by these five fatal brands? which, if they be not speedily quenched, threatens a furious eruption, and shall too late die in our ashes.' Bp Hall, Via Media, Works, X. 479. Oxf. 1837. As early as 1597, these quarrels had begun in the Low Countries; many of the Dutch divines disputing the authority of the Confessio Belgica and the Heidelberg Catechism: see H.A. A short Relation of the Stirres in Hol- 2 William Perkins, Armilla Au- 3 See Mosheim, Ch. Hist. II. 93, and the Confessio sententiæ Pastorum, qui in fœderato Belgio Remonstrantes vocantur, p. 31. Herdewic. 1622. 13 The Remonstrance,' 1610. every quarter, and was fast absorbing into the Arminian school the very ablest men of Holland. Among others of this class who were contributing to its extension and defence were Episcopius and Uytenbogaert', the former by the agency of the press, the latter of the pulpit. They were also aided by the powerful countenance of Hugo Grotius and Olden-Barneveld: but the co-operation of these eminent statesmen led ere long to the association of the name and principles of Arminius with political combinations, entered into for the purpose of resisting the supreme authority, which by the revolution was conferred upon the leading House of Orange. For this reason, while particular states of the United Provinces' were ardent patrons of Arminianism, it was exposed to the hostility and hatred of Prince Maurice, and the whole of his adherents2. In order to avert the indignation of the party then ascendant, who not only wielded the civil sword, but threatened to unsheath it in behalf of Calvinistic dogmas, the Arminians now resolved to frame a solemn declaration of their tenets, and present it at a general meeting of the States, in 1610. This document was due to Episcopius and his colleague, and the title which it bore (the Remonstrance), has suggested the future appellation of the sect (the Remonstrants'). It consisted of Five Articles, (1) on predestination; (2) the extent of Christ's death; (3) free-will and human depravity; (4) the manner of our conversion to God, and (5) the perseverance of the saints; yet, far from smoothing down the opposition, which on civil and religious grounds had been aroused against Arminius, that apology resulted, after a tempestuous interval of eight years', in the convening of the Synod of Dort. 1 Guerike, Kircheng. II. 519. Miller, Philosophy of Hist. III. 192, 193. 3rd ed. 3 See Acta Synod. Dordrecht. Part III. ed. 1620, for the Articles and also for the Judgments of the Divines upon each thesis in succession. 4 During this interval (1611) a public disputation had taken place at the Hague between the Remonstrants and the Contra-remonstrants, but no concession having been made by either party and the toleration of the Prince of Orange being exhausted, he imprisoned Grotius and Olden-Barneveld: Collier, II. 716. The latter was afterwards beheaded, in 1619: Guerike, II. 521. |