we either have done, shall do, or can do, as things that be far too weak and insufficient and imperfect to deserve remission of our sins, and our justification. And therefore we must trust only in God's mercy, and that sacrifice which our High Priest and Saviour, Christ Jesus, the Son of God, once offered for us upon the cross, to obtain thereby God's grace and remission as well of our original sin in baptism, as of all actual sin committed by us after our baptism, if we truly repent and turn unfeignedly unto him again."

Thus firmly do our admirable reformers assert, and thus clearly do they explain, this most important doctrine of justification only for the merit of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, by faith, and not for our own works and deservings. But let it never be forgotten, (which they who wish extravagantly to extol the importance of faith, appear sometimes too prone to forget) that, as Scripture teaches, so our church maintains, that "faith without works is dead before God."†

It teaches that " Albeit that good works, which are the fruits of faith, and follow after justification, cannot put away our sins, nor endure the severity of God's judgment, yet are they pleasing and acceptable to God in Christ, and do spring out necessarily of a true and lively faith, insomuch that by them a lively faith may be as evidently known, as a tree discerned by the fruit:" and our excellent reformers exclude every vain confidence in any faith which produces not good works, where an opportunity of producing them is found.

Our reformers freely adopt the distinction, laid down in the divine word, between "that faith which in Scripture is called a dead faith, which bringeth forth no good works, but is idle, barren, and unfruitful; a faith," say they," which by the holy apostle St. James, is compared to the faith of devils, which believe God to be true and just, and tremble for fear, yet they do nothing well, but all evil. And such a manner of faith have the wicked and naughty Christian people, which confess God, as St. Paul saith, in their mouths, but deny Him in their deeds, being abominable and without the right faith, and to all good

Second part of the Sermon of Salvation, (by Cranmer,) Homilies, p. 18. Dublin edition by Johnston, 1813.

† James, ii. 17, 20, 26.

VOL. III.

+ Article 12.

M

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works reprovable. And this faith is a persuasion and belief in man's heart, whereby he knoweth that there is a God, and agreeth unto all truths of God's most holy word contained in holy Scripture, so that it consisteth only in believing the word of God, that it is true. And this is not properly called faith; for as he that readeth Cesar's Commentary, believing the same to be true, hath thereby a knowledge of Cesar's life and notable acts, because he believeth the history of Cesar, yet it is not properly said that he believeth in Cesar, of whom he looketh not for help or benefit; even so, he that believeth that all that is spoken of God in the Bible is true, and yet liveth so ungodly that he cannot look to enjoy the promises and benefits of God; though it may be said, such a man hath a faith and belief in the words of God, yet it is not properly said that he believeth in God, or hath such faith and trust in God, whereby he may surely look for grace, mercy, and everlasting life at God's hand, but rather for indignation and punishment, according to the merits of his wicked life." * Thus" as faith without works is dead, it is not now faith, as a dead man is not a man; this dead faith therefore is not that sure and substantial faith which saveth sinners. Another faith there is in Scripture, which is not as the aforesaid faith, idle, unfruitful, and dead, but worketh by charity, as St. Paul declareth, Gal. v. 6, which as the other vain faith is called a dead faith, so may this be called a quick or lively faith." Of this faith our reformers afterwards give the following just and beautiful description:-" When men hear in the Scripture, so high commendations of faith that it maketh us to please God, to live with God, and to be the children of God; if then they fancy that they be set at liberty from doing all good works, and may live as they list, they trifle with God, and deceive themselves; and it is a manifest token that they be far from having the true and lively faith, and also far from knowledge what true faith meaneth. For the very sure and lively Christian faith is, not only to believe all things of God which are contained in holy Scripture, but also is an earnest trust and confidence in God that he doth regard us, and is careful over

* Vide Homilies, p. 23-" A short declaration of a true, lively, and Christian faith."

us, as the father is over the child he doth love; and that He will be merciful to us for his only Son's sake, and that we have our Saviour Christ, our perpetual Advocate and Priest, in whose only merits, oblation, and suffering we do trust that our offences be continually washed and purged, whensoever we, repenting truly, do return to him with our whole heart, steadfastly determining with ourselves, through His grace, to obey and serve Him in keeping His commandments, and never to turn back again to sin. Such is the true faith that the Scripture doth so much commend, the which, when it seeth and considereth what God hath done for us, is also moved through continual assistance of the Spirit of God, to serve and please him, to keep his favour, to fear his displeasure, to continue his obedient children, showing thankfulness again by observing or keeping his commandments, and that freely for true love chiefly, and not for dread of punishment, or love of temporal reward, considering how clearly without our deservings, we have received his mercy and pardon freely."*

I have chosen to quote thus fully from the Homilies, the descriptions they give of the doctrines of justification by faith, and the connexion of faith with good works, not only because they exactly express the opinions I have always entertained on these subjects, but because it thus appears, that the sentiments of our venerable reformers are perfectly free from those irrational extremes, into which sectarians have been so often betrayed, by their excessive zeal to exalt the necessity of faith, and shew the insufficiency of all human works to merit salvation -truths undoubtedly of the most signal importance, but which have been too frequently debased and degraded, by an extravagance and fanaticism utterly abhorrent from the tenets of our truly moderate and apostolic church.

I shall now proceed to state distinctly the doctrines which, in the following pages, I shall endeavour to show are repugnant to the general tenor of Scripture, fairly interpreted, and which appear calculated to give us mistaken and revolting ideas of the moral attributes and government of God: I shall exhibit these doctrines in the very formularies which have been brought forward

* Homilies, p. 25-first part of the Sermon of Faith.

by their advocates, as clear and authentic expositions of their opinions, or in the very words of their most celebrated patrons and defenders.

All suspicion of mis-statement and exaggeration will thus be removed; and the religious inquirer will be enabled to compare distinctly these disputed opinions with the Scripture, and to form a clear decision as to their agreement with, or their repugnance to that sure criterion of divine truth, the word of God carefully examined and rightly understood. This method also will not merely exhibit distinctly the doctrines hereafter to be considered, but prove that they have been defended by writers so highly respected by their followers in the religious world, as to evince the necessity of bestowing on them the most serious consideration, and, if they are found repugnant to scriptural truth, exposing their error and resisting their progress.

These doctrines are perhaps exhibited most clearly and compendiously in the articles known by the name of the Lambeth Articles, drawn up in 1595, in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, and in those of the Synod of Dort, in the year 1618. These will enable the religious inquirer to see what were considered as the peculiar doctrines of those who maintained absolute predestination, at the end of the sixteenth, and beginning of the seventeenth century, and he may judge whether any thing equivalent to these doctrines be contained in the Scriptures.

The Lambeth Articles are translated in the following words, by Mr. Toplady, whose strong devotion to Calvinism ensures his exhibiting them in the true meaning, as acknowledged by Calvinists themselves.*

"I. God hath, from eternity, predestinated certain persons to life, and hath reprobated certain persons unto death.

"II. The moving or efficient cause of predestination unto life is, not the foresight of faith, or of perseverance, or of good works, or of any thing that is in the persons predestinated, but the alone will of God's good pleasure.

"III. The predestinate are, a predestinated and certain number which can neither be lessened or increased.

* Vide his Historic Proof of the Calvinism of the Church of England. London, 1793, vol. II. p. 173.

"IV. Such as are not predestinated to salvation, shall inevitably be condemned on account of their sins.

"V. The true lively and justifying faith, and the Spirit of God justifying, is not extinguished, doth not utterly fail, doth not vanish away in the elect, either finally or totally.

"VI. A true believer, that is one who is endued with a justifying faith, is certified by the full assurance of faith, that his sins are forgiven, and that he shall be everlastingly saved by Christ. “VII. Saving grace is not allowed, is not imparted, is not granted, to all men, by which they may be saved if they will.

"VIII. No man is able to come to Christ, unless it be given him, and unless the Father draw him; and all men are not drawn by the Father, that they may come to his Son.

"IX. It is not in the will or power of any man to be saved."

Of these, as Mr. Toplady terms them, famous Articles, the then archbishop of York affirmed, that they are gatherable from the holy Scriptures, either expressly, or by necessary consequence; and also from the writings of St. Austin.-Whether they are affirmed by St. Austin, I shall not particularly inquire; whether they are conformable to Scripture, rightly understood, is the question I mean to discuss.

The Articles of the Synod of Dort, translated by Heylin, from Tilenus, in his History of the Quinquarticular Controversy, are as follows:

"That God, by an absolute decree, hath elected to salvation a very small number of men, without any regard to their faith

* I had transcribed these Articles from Bishop Tomline's Confutation of Calvinism, (p. 567) who adopted Heylin's translation of Tilenus. Some circumstances have since led me to suspect the accuracy of Heylin's translation; and on consulting the Sylloge Confessionum, printed at Oxford in 1804, (which I found it very difficult to procure,) the original words stand thus in Caput primum, Art. 7: "Deus secundum liberrimum voluntatis suæ beneplacitum ex mera gratia certam quorundam hominum multitudinem eligit." The words very small number, certainly do not express the idea of multitudinem, which marks a great number. But the expressions certam and quorundam are, on the contrary, of a restrictive nature, very far from suggesting such an idea of the extent of divine mercy as is impressed by the prophetic apostle, who after marking the thousands sealed by God amongst the tribes of Israel, adds, "After this I beheld, and lo, a great multitude which no