defines the term," but does not affirm the doctrine. By this new rule, all our pofitive articles are enly fo many definitions of terms: the firft, for inftance, defines the meaning of the word Trinity 5. the ninth defines original fin; the 27th is a definition of baptifm; and the 39th defines an oath. So the Church is founded, not upon doctrines, but on bare definitions; and is not a teacher, but a definer. Is there a Jew, a Turk, or a Papist, who would fcruple to fubfcribe our articles, confidered fimply as definitions of certain terms and phrases? or is there a Proteftant in the world, but might fafely fet his hand to pope Pius's Creed, upon a fimilar fuppofition? I leave to the confideration of Dr. Nowell, and of the public, who are to be deemed Methodifts and Sectarians? They, who believe the dotrines of the Church, as they ftand in her articles, without fophiftication and difguife? or, they who, with Mr. Wefley and fome others, fubfcribe the articles, not as articles of faith, but either as ecclefiaftical definitions of terms, or at moft as determinations which are not clear? By this loofe, fhaggling way of evading the force of Church decitions, and weakening the facred ties of folemn and repeated fubfcriptions, the fpiritual fence of our citablishment is broken down and trod under foot: and the Church, like a city without walls, or an houfe ftript of its doors, lies open to the entrance of every comer, whether friend or foc, who has opportunity of getting in. Such, I fear, is, in great meafure, the prefent condition of our once admirable Church. I can only, for my own part, be faithful to her myfelf; pour out my foul for her, in fecret, at the throne of grace; and, until God pours down a fpirit of reformation on many of her pretended fons, cry over her, faying, alas! my mother! Her gates are funk into the ground; he hath de. ftroyed and broken her bars; the law is no more; her prophets alfo find no vifion from the Lord. That thing fhall I liken to thee, O daughter of Je rufalem ? rufalem? what fhall I equal to thee, that I may comfort thee, O virgin daughter of Sion? for thy breach is great, like the fea; who can heal thee? Lam. iii. As to Dr. Waterland, on whofe attempts, to weed out Calvinism from our articles you lay fo great ftrefs; I grant, that, like the prelate last mentioned, he fought through thick and thin, and strained every nerve, in order if poflible, to Arminianize the Church. But his fuccefs was very far from being equal to his toil. This learned and excellent perfon never loft himself more vifibly, nor was never pinched more fenfibly, than when his own artillery was turned upon him by Sykes. The inference, urged by the latter, is too glaring to be denied: viz. That, if Arian fubfcription to Trinitarian articles is palpably dishoneft; then, by all the rules of argument in the world, Arminian fubfcription to articles, that are Calviniftic, muft and can be no lefs criminal. This was the Gordian knot, which Dr. Waterland, with all his ftraining, could never untie. Therefore this great man, finding himfelf wedged faft between the horns of this unavoidable dilemma; namely, either to give up the point, and own fubfcribing Arminians to be as inexcufable as fubfcribing Arians; or, that, if thofe might fubfcribe, falvá ronfcientia, fo might thefe, fince what is lawful for the raven is as lawful for the crow ;-the doctor, to free himself, as well as he could, from this embarraffment, refolved to cut the knot at once, by roundly denying that our articles are Calviniftical. But every ftruggle he made, and every argument he brought in fupport of his palpable falfhood (which he adopted only pro re nata, and to help himfelf out at a dead lift), only plunged him in deeper difficulties, by giving his Arian adverfaries this advantage against him, that, upon the doctor's own principles, and by virtue of his own example, they were as much at liberty, mutatis mutandis, to put their own fente upon the ift, 2d, 5th, and Sth articles; as WaterC 2 land land was to put his fenfe upon the 9th, 10th, 11th, and 17th: fince the very letter of thefe articles is no lefs determinate, in favour of original fin, the utter impotence of free-will in fpirituals, gratuitous juftification without works, and eternal, abfolute predestination; than those are, in favour of the Trinity, the godhead of Chrift, the godhead of the Holy Ghoft, and the orthodoxy of the three creeds. And, indeed, the cafe fpeaks for itself. For, if one fort of men may fairly claim the privilege of clipping, mincing, and wire-drawing fome articles, as a falvo for fubfcription; why may not another fort of men be allowed to take the fame liberty with the reft? Let not, then, the fubfcribing Arminian (though he may happen to be a Trinitarian) exclaim against the fubfcribing Arian, the fubfcribing Socinian, or even the fubfcribing Deist. Only grant it lawful to wrench the articles one way; and it is as lawful to wrench them any way, or every way. If an Arminian may ftretch the 17th article into conditional predeftination, and univerfal redemption; an Arian has juft as much right to lop fhort the 2d article, fo far as it ftands in his way. By the fame rule that our articles are drawn aside from any one part of their plain grammatical import; they may be frothed into no meaning whatever, and bandied about towards every point of the compafs. If a fubfcriber is really at liberty to pick and chufe which of them, and which part of them, he will believe, and which he shall reject; which to fubfcribe fincerely, and which with fecret provifos of his own; fubfcription is no longer a fence against error, but becomes a mere ftalking horfe, and the articles themselves a nofe of wax. St. Paul's words, with a flight variation, may be accommodated to the cafe in hand. Thou art inexcufable [O fubfcribing Arminian,] whoever thou art, that judgeft [the fubfcribing Arian]; for, wherein thou judgeft, [him,] thou condemneft thy felf: for thou, that judgeft, judgeft, doeft the fame thing [in another way.] Rom. ii. 1. Thus, the gap of prevaricating fubfcription being once opened, "we may," to ufe Dr. Waterland's own words, "bid adieu to principles;" and between one fubfcriber and another, the Church of England will have no fettled doctrines left: or, at moft, they will exift no where but in ink and paper, between the leaves of her liturgy and homilies, and in the forgotten writings of her old divines. Foreign comedians, a spruce band, arrive; And push her from the scene, or hifs her there. Should matters go on for half a century longer, as they have done for many years back, the most refpectable Church in the world will be reduced, by fome of those who call themselves her children, to the fame condition that the man in the fable was, by his two wives : Amba videri dum volunt illi pares, I pray God, that the Delilahs, who make it their bufinefs to fhear the Church of its locks, by robbing it gradually of its doctrines, may not, at the long run, deliver it quite up into the hands of the Philistines. Bishop Burnet went to work, in a much more plaufible manner, than either bishop Bull or Dr. Waterland. He contributed as much, in fact, towards opening a door to prevaricating fubfcription, as they; but did it with more decency, and with a better regard to appearances. He does not drive fo furiously as thofe Jehu writers, nor infult the common reafon of mankind, by fiercely infifting that our articles are not Calviniftic: but hit on a more trimming expedient, and would gently infinuate, that they are worded with, what he calls, fuch moderation and latitude, that Calvinifts and Arminians too may mutually teftify their affent by fubfcription. I mean not to depreciate that truly great and good prelate's Expofition of the Articles which is, in general, a very mafterly and valuable performance*. I am not entirely of Dr. South's mind, who, you know, fir, being afked, foon after its publication, what he thought of it? replied, in his fmart way, "Think of it?I think, that, in his Expofition of our 39 Articles, his lordship has given the Church forty ftripes fave one." That the bishop has given the Church three or four ftripes, I think, can hardly be denied and unhappy is the mother, who receives fuch ufage at the hands of the fons fhe has nourished and brought up. Thus much is certain: that Burnet plays faft and loofe, whenever Calvinifm and fubfcription fall in his way. Hence thofe 'two contradictory pofitions of his; "Subfcription does import an affent to the article: and-an article being conceived in fuch general words, that it can admit of different literal and grammatical fenfes; even when the fenfes given are plainly contrary one to another, yet both may fubfcribe the article with a good confcience, and without any equivocation." [Introd. to Exp. Art. p. 10.] As if there could be more literal fenfes of a propofition than one! and thofe numerous fenfes could be plainly contrary one to another, and yet be all literally and grammatically the fenfe of that propofition! An Arian, a Papift, or a Deift, may, with a good confcience, and, without any equivocation, fubfcribe thofe very articles, which, literally and grammatically, conclude point blank against Arianism, Popery, and Deifm! The lower Houfe of Convocation, in 1701, feyerely cenfured Burnet's Expofition of the Articles. See Tindal, 15. 319. That |