There is little ground of fear, as I suppose, that a “novel Dutch synod,” as it is called, though consisting of persons delegated from all the principal reformed churches of Europe (that of France only excepted), “should prescribe doctrines to the church of England,” seeing in that synod the church of England did rather prescribe doctrines to the Dutch than receive any from them; for the divines. which had the pre-eminence of suffrage and authority in that as- sembly were those of the church of England, sent thither by public authority to testify the doctrine of this church, and to lead the Dutch into the same confession with themselves,
But to return; it is to be feared that as Pelagianism, in its first edition, did secretly and gradually insinuate itself into the ani-
APOSTASY FROM THE TRUTH OF THE GOSPEL. oe
mal and vital spirits of the body of the church in those days, proving a poison unto it, so under its new varnish and gilding it will be
received, until it diffase itself into the veins and vitals of the present reformed church-state in the world. This I know, that some pre- tending a zeal for holiness and reformation of life do yet, with a shameful partiality, charge those doctrines as a principal means of the decay of piety, which they cannot but know were generally be- lieved and.avowed then when piety most flourished in this nation. But this is part of that entertainment which the church of England meets with at this day from her degenerate offspring. The doctrine of all the ancient bishops must be traduced, as the means of the decay of piety; and, which increaseth the wonder, it had not this effect till it began to be publicly deserted and renounced! for whether they are the one the cause of the other or no, yet there is a demon- strative coincidence between the originals of our visible apostasy from piety and the admission of these novel opinions, contrary to the faith of the first reformed churches, and that they both bear the same date among us.
But there is yet a greater abomination effectually taking place among us, to the utter overthrow of the faith of some, and the cor- rupting of the minds of others from the truth of the gospel. This is the leprosy of Socinianism, which secretly enters into the walls and timber of the house, whence it will not be scraped out. It com- menced in the world some time before the other spring of a partial apostasy before mentioned; but for a good space it lay fermenting in some obscure places of Poland and the countries adjacent. When the books and writings of the authors and promoters of the opinions
- called by that name came once to be known and read in other places, they were continually all of them abundantly answered and confuted by learned men of all sorts, so as it was justly hoped it would obtain no great success or progress in the world. But,—
« Latius excise serpit contagio gentis Victoresque suos natio victa premit.’’
The vanity of the minds of men, their weariness of sound doctrine, which they will endure no longer, whatever they embrace, have given it admission, either in part or in whole, among multitudes who once professed the faith of the gospel: for whereas the whole system of the opinions of those men is but a collection of such errors as for- merly perplexed the church and overthrew the faith of many, the prin- cipal and most material of them may be referred unto two heads,—
1. Photinianism; and, 2. Pelagianism. Unto the first are referred their denial of the Trinity, and consequently of the divine person ~ and incarnation of the Son of God. Under the latter, their opposi-
78 THE NATURE AND CAUSES OF APOSTASY. —
tion unto the satisfaction of Christ, the true nature of his priesthood and sacrifice, justification by faith in his blood and the imputation of his righteousness, the efficacy of his grace, and the corruption of our nature by the fall, may be comprised. The denial of the re- surrection of the same bodies, the eternity of the punishment of the damned in hell, with other of their imaginations, were also traduced from some of old. The first part of their heresy as yet takes no great place but only among themselves, the doctrine opposite unto it being. secured by law, and the interest of men therein who have advantage by the public profession. But yet it is to be feared that the cold- ness of many in asserting and defending those fundamental doctrines of the gospel which they oppose, yea, their indifferency about them, and the horrid notions, with strange expositions, that some have embraced and do use concerning the person of Christ, do proceed from some secret influence on the minds of men, which the venom of their opinions and sophistical disputes have had upon them. And from a just improvement of their sentiments have proceeded those bold efforts of atheistical imaginations and oppositions unto the Scripture, both the letter and sense of it, which have of late been divulged in public writings; which, being brought from the neigh- bour nation, do find no slack entertainment by many among us. But as to the latter branch of their profession, or their Pelagianism, it hath diffused itself among multitudes of persons who were some time of another persuasion, and have yet engagements on them so to be. All that unreasonable advancement of reason in matters of reli- gion which we have amongst us; the new notions men have of the satisfaction of Christ, pretending to the acknowledgment of it, indeed destructive unto it; the noisome conception of the little use of the person of Christ in religion beyond the revelation and confirmation of the gospel; doctrines of the possibility, yea, facility of yielding acceptable obedience unto all evangelical commands without the aids of effectual grace, of the powers and incorruption of our nature, of justification by and upon our own obedience, of the suitableness of all gospel mysteries to unrenewed reason or an unsanctified mind, of regeneration as consisting only in the reformation of our lives; with a rejection of all internal real efficacy in converting grace, and the substitution of morality in the room of grace; with the denial of any influences of grace from Jesus Christ unto the holiness of truth; and many other opinions wherewith men even pride themselves, to the contempt of the doctrine received and established in the reformed churches of old,—are borrowed out of the storehouses of their imagi- nations, shall I say, or raked out of their dunghill. And whither the infection may diffuse itself I know not. The resurrection of the same bodies substantially, the subsistence and acting of the soul in