and mercy to our fellow-creatures which renders us partakers of the divine nature, and helpful to others in all their exigencies. When he gives signal demonstrations of his Almighty power, and of his great wisdom, he designs by this to teach us that he is able to foresee and to divert those evils which may at any time befal us, to rescue us from all our miseries, and to confer the greatest blessings on his servants, that so he may encourage us to place our trust in him at all times, to repair by humble supplications to the throne of grace, and to serve him faithfully, in expectation of his favour and protection. When he manifests himself to be a God of truth and faithfulness, one who will punctually perform his promises to, and execute his threats upon, us, he doth this chiefly to affright us from those sins which make it necessary for his justice to be severe upon us, and to provoke us to the performance of those duties to which he hath annexed the greatest blessings. When he informs us that his holiness and justice cannot permit the wicked to escape his vengeance, or any upright soul to want the tokens of his love or the reward of his sincere obedience; his great design in all this is, that sin, which is the rise of all our miseries, may be avoided; and holiness which is the true advancement and best accomplishment of human nature, may be more earnestly pursued by us. So that God's acting for his glory, is indeed his acting for the good of his most noble creatures, and only recommending of himself to their good-liking and affection, that so he may the more effectually promote their happiness.

It is indeed in our translation said God hath made all things for himself, even the wicked for the day of wrath.' (Prov. xvi. 4.) But in the Hebrew the word is (lamaanehu) from

(anah), and so the words may be thus rendered, 'the Lord hath made all things,' to answer to themselves, or aptly to refer to one another,' 'even the wicked for the day of wrath;' according to these words of Grotius, singula Deus ordinat ad id quod singulis competit, ordinat impium ad diem calamitosum.* The Bishop of Ely renders them thus, The Lord disposeth all things according to his will, even the wicked for the day of wrath, that is, to be then the executioners of it.

And whereas these men tell us, that God elected a certain number to be saved for the manifestation of the glory of his

grace,

*God appoints every thing to that which befits it,-he appoints the impious for the day of

calamity. ED.

(1.) according to this hypothesis, the glory of his grace must consist in electing so many to salvation and no more; for if the decree to save more would more have tended to the manifestation of his glory, the same motive must have induced him to save more. Now to affirm that "it is for the glory of his mercy to save the elect only, and no more," seems contrary to common sense; for the more are benefited, the greater is the glory of the benefactor. If it then tendeth to the glory of his mercy absolutely to decree to save some no more fitted to be the objects of his mercy than the rest, it must be more for the glory of his mercy to decree thus to save more, and most of all to decree to save all.

Again, (2.) if it be for the glory of his grace to prepare saving grace for any, and to give them that assistance which will unfrustrably procure their salvation, would it not be more for the glory' of the same grace to prepare it for, and afford it to, more, and to leave none under a necessity of perishing for want of grace sufficient to work out their salvation? Is grace the more magnified for being restrained to some few, when all do equally need and áll are equally capable of it? Nor is there any reason in the objects of it, why it should not equally be vouchsafed to them.

The other black part of this decree, which saith "God left the greatest part of mankind in a state in which they must infallibly fail of obtaining salvation, or the means of salvation,-faith and perseverance, they being the consequents and fruits of that election out of which they are excluded," is still more horrible in its immediate consequences: For, (i.) it makes God to create innumerable souls after the fall of Adam, to be inevitably damned without the least compassion for them, or will to afford them means sufficient to exempt them from that dreadful doom. For if "faith and perseverance be the consequents and fruits of God's election," then they who are not elected cannot have them; if "they must fail of obtaining salvation," they must inevitably incur damnation. (ii.) It makes him, in prosecution of this end, having created them pure and innocent as they came out of his hands, to put them into bodies, that so they may be made or deemed the offspring of Adam, and, by being so, may be fit objects of his eternal wrath; which they could never be by his creation of them, did he not thus unite them to the bodies generated by the posterity of Adam.

CHAP. V.

I SHOULD now, for a close, demonstrate the contradiction which this doctrine of absolute election and reprobation bears to the sentiments of the ancient fathers; but this is so evident, that Calvin, Beza," and many other patrons of the contrary doctrine, do partly confess it. I therefore shall content myself with three or four plain demonstrations of this truth, viz.

기

I. (1.) That they unanimously declare, that "God hath left in the power of man, in' dupóτepa тpéeσda, to turn to vice or virἀμφότερα τρέπεσθαι, ' tue'," saith Justin Martyf; b to chuse or to refuse faith and obedience, to believe or not," say Irenæus, Clemens Alexandrinus, Tertullian, and St. Cyprian: "That every one is himself the cause why he is made frumentum aut palea,"* saith Irenæus: Every one, ἑαυτὸν δικαιῦντος, ἤ ἔμπαλιν ἑαυτὸν ἀπειθῆ κατασκευάζε ●vros, ́rendering himself either righteous or disobedient'," saith Clemens of Alexandria: "That God hath left it in our own power, πρὸς τὰ καλὰ νεύειν, καὶ τὰ καλὰ ἀποτρέφεσθαι, to turn to or from good:' that he hath put it into our power, rès avalès nμãs εival ἤ κακές, πράττειν μεν τὰ δίκαια, ἤ τὰ ἄδικα, 'to be good or bad, to do what is righteous or unrighteous';" so Athanasius, Epiphanius, Macarius,' St. Chrysostom," Theodoret," and Cyril of Alexandria. "That our happiness or punishment, ex r Q' μÏ ρTTα, 'depends on our own choice;' that it is in our own choice, 1⁄2 ozɛgpa åycov ɛivai 1⁄2 tò vavríov, to be an holy seed, or the contrary,' to fall into hell, or enjoy the kingdom; ἐφ' ἡμῖν ἐσιν ἤ νύκτος ἤ ἡμέ pas vies viveobar, 'to be children of the night or of the day;'98 τέκνα δ ̓ ἀρετῆς, ἢ τῶ ἀντικειμένω διὰ κακίας, ‘by virtue to be God's, or by wickedness the devil's children';" so Cyril of Jerusalem," St. Basil, Chrysostom," and Gregory Nissen. (L. 2. contra Eunon. p. 95.)—“That unusquisque ex seipso causas et occasiones præstitit conditori, 'that every one gives occasion to his Maker to render

him' a vessel of honour or dishonour: et pro meritis suis unusquisque à Deo vel honoris vas efficitur vel contumelia, 'God having given man power to make himself a vessel of election or of wrath;' that we are vessels of wrath, or of mercy, ἀπὸ προαιρέσεως οικείας, "from our own choice,' every one naтaonEvwv kauтov onEvos gyñs, preparing himself to be a vessel of wrath, οἴκοθεν καὶ ἑξ ἑαυτῶ, from his own wicked inclination, καθάπερ καὶ σκεύος φιλανθρω 'or to be a vessel of divine love,' dia nisews, by faith,' dior ἀξίως ἑαυτὸς ἔλεος ἐποίησαν, ' because they have rendered themselves fit for mercy'." So Origen,' Macarius, Chrysostom,* Ecumenius, and Theophylact." And this," saith Origen, "is, justa sententia, et cum omni pietate concordans, ut ex præcedentibus causis unumquodque vas vel ad honorem vel ad contumeliam præparetur, 'a just sentence, and in all things agreeable to piety, that every one should from preceding causes be made a vessel of honour or dishonour'." (TIɛpt Apx. L. 3. F. 141.) And sure

πιας,

these things must be sufficient to convince us, that these Fathers believed nothing of the doctrine of absolute election or reprobation; which will be further evident,

II. From the exposition they all, before St. Austin, give of the eighth and ninth chapters to the Romans. First. Thus I have shewed that all the Fathers interpret these words of the apostle, those that are called according to his purpose, whom he foreknew,' of "those whom he foreknew to have good purposes, et quos præscivit sibi fore devotos, and whom he foreknew to be devoted to his service,' them he predestinated;" so Origen and all the ancient Fathers in their commentaries on this place; which exposition is as ancient as Clemens of Alexandria, who saith expressly that is προώρισεν ὁ θεὸς δικαιος ἐσομένως πρὸ καταβολῆς το ne yvwxas, "he fore-appointed them, knowing, before the foundation of the world, they would be righteous.'

Secondly. Upon those words, chap. ix. 13, Jacob have I loved, and Esau have I hated, they descant thus, "I have hated Esau because he was evil, and loved Jacob because he was good." "He made him,” saith Origen, "a vessel of mercy, pro puritate et simplicitate anima, for the purity and sincerity of his soul;'

* Περι Αρχῶν. 1. 3. C. 6.

t Ho. 15. p. 96. and in Rom. ix. 22, 23.

x Ch. 3, Arg. 3.

y Stro. 7. p. 765. B.

but seeing this wanting in the soul of Esau, him ex eâdem massa fecit vas contumelia, out of the same mass he made a vessel of dishonour'." "For God," saith Chrysostom, "doth not wait as a man doth, to the end, to see who will be good, or not; λλ καὶ πρὸ τέτων οἶδε τὶς μεν ὁ πονηρὸς, τὶς δὲ ὁ μὴ τοῦτος, but sees before, who will be bad, and who will not;' and seeing things future as God, προανεφώνησε καὶ τότε τὴν ἀρετὴν, κακείνη τῆς γνώμης Tǹv μoxƏngiav, ‘He foretold before his virtue, and the evil mind of the other".": And St. Jerom on the same words in Malachi, saith, dilectio et odium Dei ex præscientiâ nascitur futurorum, 'this love and hatred of God ariseth from his prescience of things future.' Hilary the deacon saith, "that, sciendo quid unusquisque illorum futurus esset, knowing what each of them would be," that he would be worthy who was the less, and the elder would be unworthy; unum elegit prescientiâ, et alterum sprevit, 'he chose one and rejected the other by his prescience'." "He did this," saith Theodoret, "foreseeing their purposes; yap adinos ǹ Exλoyn, & ἀλλὰ τῇ προθέσει τῶν ἀνθρώπων συμβαίνεσα, for God's election is not unjust, but accords with the purpose of man';" "election," saith Photius," being only rav diapegovтwv, of things that differ or excel.' And therefore to the question; why doth he say, He chose one before the other, when they had done neither good nor evil?” He answers, that θείᾳ προγνώσει τῶν μελλόντων zoλλà diaqége, in the divine fore-knowledge they differed very

much'."

Thirdly. On verse 15th, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy,' they all truly note, that this was said of the Jews, after they had all committed the capital sin of Idolatry, in worshipping the golden calf, and that some of them were punished for it, and some not; "This was done," saith Hilary, "quia Deus scit cujus debeat misereri, because God knew who were fit objects of his mercy';” “ because he knew, τίνες ἄξιοι σωτηρίας καί xa, who were worthy of preservation, and who were not';" so Chrysostom and Ecumenius.

Fourthly. On verse 6th they descant thus, "It is not of him that wills, or runs only, but of God that sheweth mercy, and crowns the work by his assistance; for otherwise," say they,

z Hom. 51. in Gen.