The decrees of the Synod of Dort were accepted with unparalleled unanimity by all the Reformed Churches. They were adopted again and again by the National Synod of the Reformed Church of France; at Alez, in 1620; at Charenton, in 1623; and at every subsequent session until they ceased to meet. Again and again the French Synod examined this very question, and decided, as I showed above from the minutes of the Synod of Alencgon (A.D. 1637), that Christ died with the inten- tion of saving only the elect, while his work is freely offered to all) The theological faculty of Geneva, the successors of Calvin, only eighty years after his death, unite with the theological faculties of Leyden, Sedan, Franeker and Groningen, in writing earnestly to the Synod, protesting against the doctrines of Amyraldus, calling them ‘“ novelties, upstarted opinions, new doctrines,” &¢., and recommending the work written to refute them by that “famous divine Andrew Rivet,” pastor and professor at Leyden.
The Savoy Confession (A.D. 1658) adopted by the English Independents agrees with the Westminster as to the design of redemption. The Boston Confession (A.D. 1680) explicitly teaches the same doctrine. The Cam- bridge Synod (4.D. 1648), when they formed the Cam- bridge Platform, solemnly adopted the Westminster Confession as their doctrinal symbol. The Synod of the Connecticut Churches, which formed the Saybrook Plat- form in 1703, adopted the Boston Confession of 1680 for their doctrinal symbol. The Westminster Confession
2) en 99 6k
* Formula Consensus Helvetica, canon 13.
STANDARD OF CALVINISM. 367
has been subsequently adopted as the doctrinal Confes- cuarrer sion of all the Presbyterians and Independents of British —— descent in the world. This much, at least, in common honesty, ought to be held as settled, that whatever may
be the case as to the teachings of Scripture, 2¢ is not an open question what is the doctrine of the Reformed Churches as to the design of the Atonement. There is no question whether the International Synod of Dort; the National Synods of France and Westminster; the For- mula Consensus Helvetica; the theological schools of Geneva, Sedan, Leyden, Franeker and Groningen; the theologians Beza, Voetius, Diodati, Gomarus, Rivet, Du Moulin, Spanheim, Heidegger, Turretin, Cocceius, Witsius, Vitringa, Van Maestricht, Marckius, De Moor, Pictet and Owen,—there is no question whether these represent truly and fully the theology of the Reformed Churches.
The consensus of these is the standard of Caluinism.
CHAPTER VI.
THE ARGUMENTS STATED UPON WHICH THE REFORMED DOCTRINE AS TO THE DESIGN OF THE ATONEMENT RESTS.
ouarter Rve’em'a i are, under this fifth head, to consider the , WA}; evidence relied upon by Calvinists as estab- Arcu- via WA BY = lishing the truth of their view of the Atone- ments on |Kasiataaen 4 which Re- ment as personal and definite. I believe that eae Lane general principles of Calvinism, and the Satisfaction ae ae Theory of the Atonement in particular, being assumed as the At- true, the only question as to the design of Christ’s work yareyien that remains possible is fully disposed of by a discrimi- nating and exhaustive statement of the points at issue. Having spent so much time in rendering such a state- ment, I propose now to present the positive arguments establishing our view of the question in a very cursory
manner. Christ 1. That the design of the Atonement was the salva-
a None tion of the elect personally and definitely, we think, cer-
Senate tainly follows from the very nature of the Atonement
people-- itself, which has been fully demonstrated in the former wage. part of this volume. .
isfaction 1.) We then proved that Christ wrought our salva- with the tion aS our SUBSTITUTE in the strict sense of that term, ee *f and that his suffering and obedience were strictly vica- these for rious. He occupied our law-place, and the sentence due died. to the principals was executed on him. Now this fact
we do not believe involves any calculation as to the kind or amount of suffering. Whether a Substitute for
TRUTH OF THE REFORMED DOCTRINE. 369
few or for many, a divine person might surely, by the cyart=s same actions and in the same time, discharge all the — obligations of all indifferently. But a strict substitution
of person for persons, and the infliction on the one part,
and the voluntary suffering on the other, of vicarious punishment, surely implies a definite recognition, on the part of the Sovereign and of the Substitute, of the per- sons for whom the Substitute acts, whose sins he bears,
and whose penal obligation he discharges. The very conception of substitution necessarily involves definite, personal relations.