A DIVINE REVELATION, as such, is ABSOLUTENESS AND PERFECTION. Nothing can be added to it, beyond what it originally declared: nothing can be detracted from it, of what it originally propounded. It sets forth certain well-defined doctrines, which jointly constitute a System: and, beyond that, it is silent. Whatever doctrine, therefore, at a subsequent period, is started for the first time : the doctrine, thus circumstanced, being, by the very terms of the statement, uncommunicated and unknown from the beginning, must inevitably, by the mere fact of its newness, be a confessedly unrevealed, and thence an indisputably unauthoritative, doctrine. It may claim, indeed, to be deduced from Scripture: but, if it was never heard of till a period subsequent to the original divine revelation, and if it cannot be traced up to the original divine revelation itself as its universally received sense from the beginning, it is nothing more respectable than a mere human invention or speculation*.

* Such was the rationalè of the excellent prescriptive canon of Tertullian, the sound good sense of which may well recommend it to every doctrinal inquirer who wishes rationally to satisfy either himself or others.

Adversus universas hæreses jam hinc præjudicatum sit: id esse verum, quodcunque primum; id esse adulterum, quodcunque posterius. Tertull. adv. Prax. § 2. Oper. p. 405.

Ita, ex ipso ordine, manifestatur: id esse dominicum et verum, quod sit prius traditum ; id autem extraneum et falsum, quod sit posterius immissum. Tertull. de præscript. adv. hær. § 11. Oper. p. 107.

On this obvious principle, I would bring the three Schemes of Arminianism and Nationalism and Calvinism to the test of Primitive Antiquity.

If the disciples of the Apostles, and from them the disciples of what were called Apostolic Men in regular succession downward, universally received one of the three Schemes, rejecting the two others: then, as reasonable inquirers, on the sure ground of historical testimony, we stand bound to adopt the Scheme thus sanctioned by the hermeneutic voice of Primeval Christianity.

But, if the disciples of the Apostles, and after them the disciples of Apostolic men in regular succession downward, were equally ignorant of them all; and, still more, if they should be found to have universally received and communicated a Scheme totally different from every one of them: then, plainly, as reasonable inquirers, on the sure ground of historical testimony, we stand bound impartially to reject alike all the three Schemes in question.

IV. The principle, for which I contend, is so thoroughly rational and so perfectly intelligible, that, to every honestly investigating mind, it cannot fail most amply to approve itself. Yet a member of the Anglican Church may be additionally satisfied, when he learns, that the principle before us is the very principle adopted by that truly Apostolic Community.

Renouncing the self-sufficient licentiousness of that miscalled and misapprehended right of Private

Judgment, which dogmatically pronounces upon the meaning of Scripture from a mere insulated inspection of Scripture, and which rapidly decides that such must be the sense of Scripture because an individual thinks that such is the sense of Scripture: renouncing this self-sufficient and strangely unsatisfactory licentiousness, the Church of England, with her usual sober and modest judiciousness, has always professed to build her code of doctrine, authoritatively indeed upon SCRIPTURE ALONE, but hermeneutically upon SCRIPTURE AS UNDERSTOOD AND EXPLAINED BY PRIMITIVE ANTIQUITY *.

Herein, she has judged well and wisely.

SCRIPTURE and ANTIQUITY are the two pillars, upon which all rationally established Faith must ultimately repose.

* Holy Scripture containeth all things necessary to salvation : so that, whatsoever is not read therein, nor may be proved thereby, is not to be required of any man, that it should be believed as an Article of the Faith, or be thought requisite or necessary to salvation. Art. vi.

Ista nos didicimus a Christo, ab Apostolis, et sanctis Patribus : et eadem bona fide docemus populum Dei. Juell. Apol. Eccles. Anglican. apud Enchirid. Theolog. vol. i. p. 228.

A primitiva Ecclesia, ab Apostolis, a Christo, non discessimus. Ibid. p. 295.

Nos, et ex Sacris Libris, quos scimus non posse fallere, certam quandam Religionis formam quæsivisse; et ad veterum Patrum atque Apostolorum primitivam Ecclesiam, hoc est, ad primordia atque initia, tanquam ad fontes, rediisse. Ibid. p. 340.

Opto, cum Melancthone et Ecclesia Anglicana, per canalem

If we reject SCRIPTURE, we reject the very basis of theological belief: if we reject ANTIQUITY, we reject all historical evidence to soundness of interpretation.

When, in our inquiries after revealed truth, the two are combined, we attain to MORAL CERTAINTY: and, in matters which by their very nature admit not of mathematical proof, MORAL CERTAINTY is the highest point to which we can possibly attain.

Antiquitatis deduci ad nos dogmata Fidei e fonte Sacræ Scripturæ derivata. Alioquin, quis futurus est novandi finis? Casaub. Epist. 744.

Quod si me conjectura non fallit, totius Reformationis pars integerrima est in Anglia: ubi, cum studio Veritatis, viget studium Antiquitatis. Casaub. Epist. 837.

Rex cum Ecclesia Anglicana pronunciat, eam demum se doctrinam pro vera simul et necessaria ad salutem agnoscere, quæ, e fonte Sacræ Scripturæ manans, per consensum veteris Ecclesiæ, ceu per canalem, ad hæc tempora fuerit derivata. Casaub. Epist. 838.

CHAPTER II.

ARMINIANISM.

By the Arminians or Remonstrants, as we have recently seen, the IDEA of Scriptural Election is pronounced to be The Election of certain individuals, out of the great mass of mankind, directly and immediately, to eternal life: and the MOVING CAUSE of that Election is asserted to be God's eternal Prevision of the future persevering holiness and consequent moral fitness of the individuals themselves, who thence have been thus elected.

I. Respecting Predestination and Grace, the sentiments of the Remonstrants, as they propounded them anterior to the Synod of Dort in the year 1618, were summed up in the five following Articles.

1. God, from all eternity, determined, to bestow salvation on those whom he foresaw to be about to persevere unto the end in their faith in Christ Jesus, and to inflict everlasting punishments on those who should continue in their unbelief and should resist unto the end his divine succours.