Eliz. chap. xxviii. p. 293—296). The petition represents, that the grand point, wherein the petitioners differed from the other Proteftants, was, their holding "that God does fore know, and predeftinate all good and goodness, but doth only fore-know, and not predeftinate, any evil, wickednefs, or fin, in any behalf." For thus thinking, they complained, that they were "Efteemed and taken of their brethren the Proteftants, for fautors of falfe religion; and are constrained, hitherto, to fuftain at their hands, daily, the shameful reproach and infamy of Free-will-men, Pelagians, Papifts, Epicures, Anabaptists, and enemies to God's holy predeftination and providence; with other fuch-like opprobrious words; and threatenings of fuch-like, or as great, punishments and corrections, as upon any of the aforefaid errors and fects is meet and due to be executed." Then the petitioners intreat, that they may enjoy their opinion, of God's not being the predeftinator of evil, "Without any prejudice or fufpicion, to be had towards them, of the opprobrious infamy of fuch heretical names abovenamed:" And, that none of thofe corrections, punishments, and executions, which the clergy hath in their authority already, and hereafter, by the authority of this prefent parliament, from henceforth fhall have in their authority, to exercise upon any of the aforefaid errors and fects, or any other; fhall in no wife extend to be executed upon any manner of perfon, or perfons, as do hold of predeftination as is above declared: except it be duly proved, that the fame perfon or perfons, do, by their exprefs words or writings, affirm or maintain that man of his own natural power, is able to think, will, or work, of himfelf, any thing that fhould, in any cafe, help or ferve towards his own falvation, or any part thereof.

From all which, I conclude as follows: 1. That. on the acceffion of queen Elizabeth, the Church of England was re-established upon the old Calvinistic bottom, on which king Edward had left it. 2. That

our

our Proteftant bifhops and clergy were then more highly Calviniftic, than, perhaps, the Scriptures will warrant as holding, that God was the author both of man's fin and damnation. 3. That nevertheless, thofe perfons, who did not hold this, were looked upon as differing from the reft of our Proteftant Church-men. 4. That our English divines did, in general, carry their notions of God's decrees to this great length: parfon Talbot and his followers being exprefsly faid to have imbibed their qualified notions of predeftination from foreign divines. That part, therefore, of the prefent fashionable fyftem, which would exempt moral and penal evil from falling under God's decree, is not of English, but of foreign growth. 5. Thofe who held this opinion, of God's not being any cause of fin and damnation, were, at that time, mightily cried out againft, by the main body of our reformed Church, as fautors of falfe religion. 6. That Free-will-men, were ranked among Pelagians, Papifts, Epicures, Anabaptifts, and the enemies to God's holy predeftination and providence. 7. That to be called a Free-will-man, was looked upon as a fhameful reproach and opprobrious infamy: yea, that a perfon, fo termed, was deemed heretical, and that the doctrine and abettors of freewill, were numbered among thofe errors and fects, which called for the correction of the civil magiftrate. 8. That the oppofers of predeftination were then a good deal more modeft, than they are at prefent. The parfon of Milk-ftreet, who was agent for the reft, only requested an act of toleration, for himself and his brethren: which demonftrated a consciousness, of their differing from the Church established. 9. As thofe fort of people were then more modeft, fo they were much more orthodox, than the modern Arminians. The Semi-pelagians of queen Elizabeth's reign, were, as we have feen, very ready to confent, that any ecclefiaftical or civil penalty should be levied on thofe wha fhould, "By

E 2

their

their exprefs words, or writings, affirm, and maintain, that man, of his own natural power, is able to think, will, or work of himself, any thing that fhould in any cafe help or ferve towards his own falvation; or any part thereof." Where is the Arminian now, who would make fuch a conceffion as this? Nay, Where is now the Arminian, who does not ftifly maintain the very reverfe? From whence I infer, that our new Anti-Calvinifts are as much degenerated from their fore-fathers; as thofe fore-fathers degenerated from the purity of the Proteftant faith in general, and from that of our own national Church in particular.

Every man, who has eyes to read, muft fee, that, at the restoration of the Church of England, under queen Elizabeth, the Church was Calviniftic, as to doctrinals. Elfe, where had been either the neceffity, or the propriety, of prefenting fuch a petition as this, craving liberty and indulgence to thofe, who differed from the heads of the Church, only in not believing the abfolute predeftination of evil? Nothing can be more evident, than the bishops and clergy, to whom that petition was addreffed, believed the predestination of all actions and events whatever, evil as well as good; otherwife, the petitioners would never have thought themselves in danger for not believing it.

Page 79, you enter on an academical tranfaction, of a very different kind from that in which you have been recently concerned. I mean, the expulfion (for fuch it virtually was) of the reverend Mr. William Barrett, fellow of Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, from that university, in the year 1595. for not being a Calvinift. This gentleman, in a fermon, preached at St. Mary's, for his degree of batchelor in divinity, had the courage to deny the doctrines of affurance of falvation; the certainty of a true believer's final perfeverance; and the eternity and unconditionality of reprobation: interlarding

his harangue, with fierce invectives against Calvin, Beza, Zanchy, and other great lights of the Proteftant Church. This fermon was preached April 29*. On the 5th of May following, Barrett was fummoned before the confiftory of doctors, where a folemn recantation was enjoined him; which he read publicly, in the fame pulpit of St. Mary's, May 10.For this, you tell us, "We have the authority of that loyal and godly author, Mr. Prynne." Whether Mr. Prynne was really a godly man, or only fuch in pretence (which your irony feems to infinuate), must be left to the decifion of the Judge who cannot err. But, as to Mr. Prynne's loyalty, fuffer me to remind you, fir, that true loyalty extends to one's country, as well as to the prince: and that to oppofe tyranny, is no breach of loyalty, but an ef sential branch of it. Loyalty (as the very word imports) is fuch an attachment to the king and people, as is founded on the laws and an hair's breadth beyond law, true loyalty does not go. So allegiance is obedience, ad legem, according to law. Whenever, therefore (as was eminently the cafe in Mr. Prynne's time), a prince over-fteps law, loyalty itfelf obliges a loyal people to fay to fuch a prince, as the Almighty to the fea, "Hitherto fhalt thou come, and no further."-With regard to the authority of Mr. Prynne's Anti-Arminianifm, the treatife wherein Barrett's recantation of his Arminian errors is recorded, please to remember, that the treatise was published, little more than thirty years after the

* For the procefs against him, fee Strype's Life of Whitgift,

P. 436.

+ Befides, Prynne was a loyal man, even in Dr. Nowell's fenfe of the word. He was devotedly attached to the intereft of Charles II. and, for that reason, was excluded from the Houfe of Commons in the year 1661. Charles himself, ungrateful as he naturally and generally was, was yet fo fenfible of his obligations to Mr. Prynne, that on his restoration, he made him keeper of the records in the Tower, a place worth 500l. per ann. which he enjoyed till his death, which happened in the year 1669. See the Biographical Dictiona ry. See alfo Heylin's Life of Laud, p. 149. E 3

affair

affair happened: and, had a tittle of Mr. Prynne's account been untrue, there were enough living, who both remembered the fact, and could very easily have refuted our loyal and godly author *.-However, the matter is very far from depending entirely on Mr. Prynne's teftimony. He refers his reader [Anti-Arm. p. 66.] to bishop Carlton's "Examination of Montague's Appeal ;" and to Brown's Appendix to the "Life of Queen Elizabeth." He moreover gives us the recantation, in Latin, as it was delivered; tranfcribed from the original copy, in Barrett's own hand-writing; which Latin copy, he tells us, differs from his English tranflation of it, only in this one refpect; namely, that fo much of our 17th article, as relates immediately to predeftination, and is but mentioned in the English, was inferted in Barrett's own copy, and recited by him at full length, when he was forced to unravel his web at St. Mary's.-The industrious Mr. Fuller, in his Hiftory of Cambridge, gives the fame account, in all material points, with Mr. Prynne, of Barrett's recantation; which having fet down at large, he thus concludes: "This recantation was, by the doctors, peremptorily enjoined him; that on the Saturday following, immediately after the clerum, he should go up into the pulpit of St. Mary's (where he had publifhed thefe errors), and there openly, and in the face of the univerfity, read and make this recantation; which by him was done accordingly, but not with that remorfe and humility, as was expected: for, after the reading thereof, he concluded thus, bæc dixi; as if all had been oral, rather than cordial t. Yea, foon after, he departed the univerfity; got beyond fea; turned papist; returned into England; where he led a lay-man's life until the day of his death." [Hift. Cambr. p. 151.] But I have

*Strype himself appeals to Prynne's teftimony, as unexceptionable and valid. Life of Whitgift, p. 436.

+ See Strype, ibid, p. 436, 437, and 444.

yet