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time had very few, that either did or dared openly to espouse his notions. And as for Austin, he was so far from being alone in his sentiments, that it was well known that not only the Roman and African churches, but all the sons of promise in all parts of the world, agreed with his doctrine, as in the whole of faith, so in the confession of grace;" as Prosper observes *.

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I have only further to observe, that the testimonies produced in the following work, are taken from the writers before Austin. I have made no use of him, nor of Prosper and Fulgentius, his two boatswains, as Dr. Whitby + very wittily, no doubt, as he thought, calls them: nor have I taken any citations upon trust from others; but what is here presented to the reader, is the fruit of my own reading, care, and diligence.. I say not this in an ostentatious way, but that the reader may more safely depend upon them. To all which I only add, that I have not attempted an elegant translation of these testimonies, but have as much as possible pursued a literal one, lest I should be thought to impose my own sense upon an author. Great allowance must be made those writers, on account of the age in which they lived, and the style in which they wrote: nor can it be expected they should write with exactness and accuracy, or express themselves as moderns do, upon points which had never been the subject of controversy. I do not pretend to reconcile all their different expressions, which may seem contradictions to themselves and to truth: what I propose, and have in view, is to make it appear that the Arminians have no great reason to boast of antiquity on their side; and I hope, on the perusal of the following sheets, it will be allowed that this point is gained.

CHAPTER I.

OF PREDESTINATION.

THAT the doctrine of absolute election and reprobation bears a contradiction to the sentiments of the ancient fathers, Dr. Whitby says ‡, is so evident, that Calvin, Beza, and many other patrons of it do partly confess it; and therefore he shall content himself with three or four demonstrations of this truth. As to the confessions of Calvin and Beza, the former only observes §, that the doctrine of election and reprobation, according to God's foreknowledge, has had magnos authores, "great authors," or abettors, in all ages; and the latter ||, that Origen led most of the Greek and Latin writers into that gross error, that the foresight of works is the cause of election. But these confessions, as they are called, are so far from granting that the doctrine of absolute election and reprobation contradicts the sentiments of all the ancient fathers, that they plainly suppose that some were for it. As for his three or + Preface, p. 6; ed. 2. p. 3. Postscript, p. 557; ed. 2. 534. § Instit. 1. 3, c. 22, s. 1. In Rom. xi, 35.

*Epist. ad. Ruffin. P. 304. Discourse, &c., p. 96; ed. 2. 95.

four demonstrations, they are taken from several passages of the ancients, respecting the power of man's free will; from their exposition of the 8th and 9th chapters of the Epistle to the Romans, which will be considered hereafter, and from the testimonies of Vossius and Prosper. The words of Vossius, but not as the Doctor has rendered them, are these: "The Greek fathers always, and those of the Latin fathers who lived before Austin, are wont to say, that they were predestinated unto life, whom God foresaw would live piously and rightly; or as others say, whom he foresaw would believe and persevere. The Doctor ought to have transcribed what Vossius adds, which serves to explain their sense: "which," says he, "they so interpret, that predestination to glory may be said to be made according to prescience of faith and perseverance;" but they did not mean the prescience of those things which man would do from the strength of nature, but what he would do from the strength of grace, both preventing and subsequent. So that the consent of antiquity nothing helps the Pelagians, or Semipelagians, for they both believed that the cause of predestination is given on the part of man, according to all effects. But the Catholics owned that the first grace is bestowed freely, and not of merit. Wherefore neither did they think, that on the part of man is given "any cause of predestination unto preventing grace: yea, it is very probable that all, or most of them, when they make faith prior to election, yet do not consider faith as the cause of election properly so called; as if God, moved with the worthiness of faith, chose some to holiness and life.' From whence it appears, that though they held predestination to glory, according to God's prescience of faith and perseverance, which prescience of faith and perseverance proceeds from God's absolute decree to give them both, in which sense none deny it; yet they make predestination to grace to be absolute, without any cause or condition on man's part; for otherwise grace must be given according to man's merits, which was the doctrine of Pelagius, condemned by the ancients, and something in man must be the cause of the divine will; whereas, as Aquinas observes, "no man was ever of so unsound a judgment, as to say that merits are the cause of divine predestination with respect to the act of God predestinating." What is alleged from Prosper, is out of an epistle of his to Austin, in which he observes to him, "that many of the servants of Christ, at Marseilles, thought that what Austin had wrote against the Pelagians, concerning the calling of the elect according to God's purpose, was contrary to the opinion of the fathers, and sense of the church; and that they defend their obstinacy by antiquity, affirming that what are brought out of the epistle of the apostle Paul to the Romans, to prove divine grace preventing the merits of "the elect, were never so understood as they are now, by any ecclesiastical men. This objection, how it may be removed," says he, "we pray that you would show, patiently bearing with our folly; namely, that they (the Massilians, and not Prosper, as the Doctor translates it, which spoils the ingenuous confession of Prosper the Doctor boasts of) Hist. Pelag. 1. 6, thes. 8, p. 538, 539. Sum. pur. 1, in. 23, art. 5, concl. p. 77.

Pages 879, 881, 886.

having again perused the opinions of almost all those that went before, concerning this matter, their judgment is found to be one and the same, by which they embraced the purpose and predestination of God according to prescience." The sum of which is, that some Frenchmen of Marseilles cavilled at Austin's doctrine, and pleaded antiquity on their side; having, as they said, perused almost all, not all, that went before them, and which they own did not please them. Austin's answer to this is cited already. And certain it is, that as his doctrines were then generally esteemed, except by these few Frenchmen, so he verily thought that the writers before him were of the same mind with him; for which purpose he cites* particularly Cyprian, Nazianzen, and Ambrose. But what was the sense of these, and other writers before him concerning this point, will be seen in the following Sections.

SECTION I.

CLEMENS ROMANUS. A. D. 69.

CLEMENT of Rome, lived in the times of the apostles, and is, by Clement of Alexandria†, called an apostle. He is thought by some‡ to be the same Clement the apostle Paul speaks of, in Phil. iv. 3, as one of his fellow-labourers. He wrote an epistle in the name of the church at Rome to the church at Corinth, about § the year 69, which is the earliest piece of antiquity next to the writings of the apostles extant, being written when some of them were living, even before the apostle John wrote his Epistles, and the book of the Revelation, and while the temple at Jerusalem was yet standing. In this epistle are several things relating to the doctrine of election, and which greatly serve to confirm it. For,

1. Agreeable to the apostolic doctrine, that God worketh all things after the counsel of his own will ||, that his purposes shall stand, and that whatsoever he has determined shall come to pass, Clement affirms, that "when he wills, and as he wills, he does all things;" kaι ovdev un παρελθη των δεδογματωμένων υπ' αυτου, and that “ none of those things which are decreed by him, shall pass away," or be unaccomplished: which shows his sense of the dependency of all things upon the will of God, and of the immutability of his decrees in general.

2. He not only frequently makes mention of persons under the character of the elect of God, but also intimates, that there is a certain, special, and peculiar number of them fixed by him. Speaking of the schism and sedition in the church at Corinth, he represents it ** as what was (6 very unbecoming, and should be far from τοις εκλεκτοίς του cov, the elect of God." And elsewhere ††, having cited Psalm xviii. 26, he says, "Let us therefore join ourselves to the innocent and righteous, for εισιν ουτοι εκλεκτοι του Θεου, they are the elect of God;”

* De Perseverantia, c. 19.

Stromat. 1. 4, p. 516.

Euseb. Eccl. Hist. 1. 3, c. 15; Hieron. Catalog. Script. Eccl. s. 25.

§ Fabricii Bibl. Græc. 1. 4, c.
. 5, P. 175. | Eph. i. 11.

** Epist. ad Corinth. i. P. 2.

Epist. ad Corinth. i. P. 64. + Ibid. p. 104.

that is, they appear to be so, these are characters descriptive of them. And in another place*, enlarging in commendation of the grace of love, he says, "Love knows no schism, is not seditious; love does all things in harmony ; παντες οι εκλεκτοι του Θεου, all the elect of God are made perfect in love:" which agrees with what the apostle says of them, that they are chosen to be holy and without blame before him in lovet. Moreover, Clement observes, to the praise of the members of the church of Corinth, to whom he writes, that formerly their “contention was night and day for the whole brotherhood, that тov apiμov των εκλεκτων αυτου, the number of his elect might be saved, with mercy and a good conscience." And elsewhere § he says, that "God chose the Lord Jesus Christ, and us by him, els Xaov Teplovσiov, for a peculiar people."

3. Whereas the apostle Paul, writing to the Ephesians, says; Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings, in heavenly places, in Christ ; according as he hath chosen us in him before the foundation of the world ||, we conclude from hence, that from all eternity there was a preparation of spiritual blessings made; and agreeably, Clement, our apostolical writer, has these words; "Let us therefore consider T, brethren, out of what matter we are made; who and what we were when we came into the world, as out of the grave and darkness itself; who, having made and formed us, brought us into his world рOETOLμασας τας ευεργεσίας αυτού πριν ημας γεννηθηναι, having first prepared his good things for us, before we were born."

4. This very ancient writer plainly intimates, that the special and spiritual blessings of grace are peculiar to the elect of God; and that it is the stable and unalterable will of God, that his chosen ones should partake of them: particularly repentance, and remission of sins for having mentioned those words in Psalm xxxii. 1, 2, Blessed is he whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered; Blessed is the man unto whom the Lord imputeth not iniquity, and in whose spirit there is no guile; he observes **, that this blessedness comes upon, or belongs unto, τους εκλελεγμένους υπο του Θεου, those that are chosen of God by Jesus Christ our Lord." And in another place++, having taken notice of some general instances, declarations and exhortations, encouraging men to repentance, suggests, that God's design herein, was to bring to repentance such as were interested in his love; his words are these;" Therefore He (that is, God), being desirous that παντας τους αγαπητας αυτού, all his beloved ones should partake of repentance, confirmed it by his almighty will." That is, God, not willing, as the apostle Peter says, that any of his beloved ones should perish, but that all of them should come to repentance, fixed it by an unchangeable decree, that they should come to repentance; and therefore makes use of the above declarations and exhortations as means to bring them to it.

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5. As the Scriptures always ascribe the act of election to God, and not men, and represent it as made in Christ, and by or through him *; that he was first chosen as a head, and the elect as members in him; so Clement speaks + of God as he δεκλεξαμενος τον Κυριον Ιεσουν Χριστον και ημας δι αυτου, who hath chosen the Lord Jesus Christ, and us by him;” and of the elect as chosen υπο του Θεου δια Ιεσου Χριστου Tov Kupio nov, of God through Jesus Christ our Lord;" and exhorts men to come to God in holiness of soul, lifting up pure and undefiled hands unto him, loving our mild and merciful Father, ος ημας εκλογής "who hath made us a part of the election for

μέρος εποιησεν εαυτώ, himself."

SECTION II.

IGNATIUS. A. D. 110.

IGNATIUS was made bishop of Antioch, A. D. 71, according to Alsted §, and suffered martyrdom according to some ||, in the eleventh year of Trajan, and according to others, in the nineteenth year of that Emperor, A.D. 116. There are several epistles written by him still extant; among which is an epistle to the Ephesians, and is thus inscribed**: "Ignatius, who is also Theophorus, To the blessed in the greatness of God the Father and fulness; τη προωρισμένη προ αιώνων to the predestinated before ages, that is, before the world began; always to be a glory, abiding, immoveable, united and chosen in the true passion by the will of God the Father, and Jesus Christ our God; to the church, worthily blessed, which is in Ephesus of Asia, much joy in Christ Jesus, and in the unblemished grace." In which, besides the doctrines of Christ's Deity, and the saints' perseverance, may be observed that of eternal predestination to grace and glory. In his epistle to the Magnesians++, he speaks of two sorts of persons, signified by "two pieces of money; the one belongs to God, and the other to the world; which have each their own characters upon them, and

every one shall go Eis tov idiov Tomov, to his own place;" which Barnabas, the companion of the apostle Paul, calls, in his epistle‡‡, opioμevov TOTTOV, "the appointed place;" for as wicked men, such as Judas, go to their own place, which is no other than hell-fire, prepared for the devil and his angels; so good men go to their own place, appointed by God for them, which is the kingdom prepared for them from the foundation of the world, and which Polycarp, bishop of Smyrna, and disciple of the apostle John, calls§§ τον οφειλόμενον αυτοίς τόπον, " the place that is due unto them, not by works, but of grace." And it here may be proper to insert a passage out of an epistle || || which the church of Smyrna, of which Polycarp was bishop, and to whom Ignatius wrote

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