Α

TREATISE ON JUSTIFICATION,

OR THE

DISPUTATIO DE JUSTITIA
HABITUALI ET ACTUALI,

OF

THE RIGHT REV. JOHN DAVENANT, D.D.,

BISHOP OF SALISBURY,

AND LADY MARGARET'S PROFESSOR, CAMBRIDGE;

DELIVERED TO THE DIVINITY STUDENTS IN THAT UNIVERSITY;

PUBLISHED FIRST IN THE YEAR 1631,

AND NOW TRANSLATED FROM THE ORIGINAL LATIN,

TOGETHER WITH

TRANSLATIONS OF THE "DETERMINATIONES"

OF THE SAME PRELATE:

BY THE

REV. JOSIAH ALLPORT,

P. C. OF ST. JAMES'S, BIRMINGHAM.

Our Righteousness (if we have any) is of little value; it is sincere, perhaps,
but not pure; unless we believe ourselves to be better than our fathers, who no
less truly than humbly said, All our righteousnesses are as filthy rags. For
how can that righteousness be pure, which cannot yet be free from imperfection?
BERNARD. Serm. 5 de Verbis Esaia Prophetæ, vi., 1, 2.

VOI. I.

LONDON:

HAMILTON, ADAMS, AND CO.;

CURRY AND CO., DUBLIN;

RAGG AND CO., BIRMINGHAM.

TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE.

THE doctrine of Justification is of prime importance in the Christian system; since the clear apprehension of it lies at the bottom of all proper conceptions of the God with whom we have to do, and is therefore essential to the peace and comfort of the soul of man. In a more expansive view still, the due maintenance of it with fidelity of adherence, has been pronounced by the voice of warning, of which history has abundantly developed the truth, as "the mark of a standing or a falling Church." Hence the full and explicit exposition of the doctrine and its disentanglement from all erroneous and mistaken exhibitions, by those who are appointed to minister in the word and doctrine, is of vital consequence.

Prepossessed on these grounds in favour of the writings of Bishop Davenant years ago, and that prepossession wrought into a conviction, in the Translator's mind, of their superiority to most others in the above respects, by occupation on the Expositio ad Colossenses; and receiving many subsequent testimonies to satisfy him that his conviction was well founded, his wish had long been to redeem a pledge given, after a short respite from his former work, and to proceed with the publication of Davenant's writings, in the vernacular tongue. Latterly his desires have often been revived, and even a degree of anxiety enkindled at times, to engage in the undertaking, by the revival and active dissemination of heterodox notions, on topics involving the character of his Church as a repository of the Truth, and by the extensive spread of dogmas subversive of the Christian faith, and the peace of the Christian Church. Who but

D32 v. I