IV. That all whom God hath predestinated unto eternal life, he is pleased, in his appointed time, effectually to call by his word and Spirit out of that state of sin and death in which they were by nature, to grace and salvation by Jesus Christ.

V. "That those whom God has effectually called and sanctified by his Spirit, shall never finally fall from a state of grace. That true believers may fall partially, and would fall totally and finally, but for the mercy and faithfulness of God, who helpeth the feet of the saints; also, that he who bestoweth the grace of perseverance, bestoweth it by means of reading and hearing the word, meditation, exhortations, threatenings and promises; but that none of these things imply the possibility of a believer's falling from a state of justification."

Calvin also taught the doctrine of three co-ordinate persons in the Godhead, in one nature, and of two natures in Jesus Christ, forming one person, of justification by faith, and of the eternal happiness of the righteous, and endless misery of the finally impenitent.

These principles were fully embodied in the catechism of Heidelberg, drawn up by Ursinus for the use of the church of the palatinate in Germany, which, first under the elector Frederick III. in 1560, and afterwards under John, in 1583, embraced the discipline of Geneva. The protestants in Holland, Poland and Hungary, received Calvin's views of the sacrament, but not readily, of predestination. The church of England became, under Edward VI. Calvinistic in doctrine, but would not renounce episcopacy. The Bohemian and Moravian brethren, also received the creed of the Calvinists, while they retained their ancient government. The French and Scotch churches, came entirely into Calvin's views. To the consistory of Geneva, the Scotch added a general assembly of the whole church-a tribunal, to which should be referred matters of highest moment.

Of the reformed churches, Calvin was the life and the soul. From his academy at Geneva, proceeded for many years, a great number of distinguished students, who filled England, Scotland, France, Italy and Germany, with his doctrine. He was succeeded by his colleague Theodore Beza, who published a Latin version of the New Testament enriched with critical observations, and maintained for many years, the high reputation of the academy.

In their early stages, these churches were engaged in violent controversies with the Lutherans. The chief point of difference regarded the Lord's supper. They differed also, com

cerning the decrees of God; the Lutherans, affirming that hese decrees proceeded from a previous knowledge of men's sentiments and characters, and the Reformed, that they are free and unconditional, founded on the will of God;—and concerning some Catholic rites and institutions-the use of images in the churches, of wafers in the supper, exorcism in baptism, private confession of sin and clerical vestments, which the Lutherans thought proper and useful, but which the Reformed condemned, on the principle that the worship of the Christian church ought to be restored to its primitive simplicity. In these controversies, the Calvinists were generally triumphant, and brought over to their communion many Lutheran churches. With divisions and disputes among themselves, they were much less afflicted than the Lutherans; but they were not wholly unmolested. A sect called the spiritual brethren and sisters, spread in Flanders, affirming that God was the sole operating cause in the mind of man and the immediate author of all human actions; that religion consisted in an union of the spirit with God, and that those who had formed this union could not sin, do what they would; and, being favoured by Margaret queen of Navarre, gave Calvin no small trouble. At Geneva, Calvin's doctrine of decrees was openly contemned by Castalio, master of the public school and Jerome Bolsec, a French monk. Both were banished from the city. Michael Servetus, a Spanish physician, who had written against the doctrine of the Trinity, came to Geneva in 1553. Calvin caused him to be apprehended and brought before the Senate. Being condemned as a heretic, Servetus appealed to the four Swiss churches. They approved of the sentence and he was burnt Oct. 27. Calvin wished to have the mode of his execution changed, but he thought the sentence should be capital. It was the opinion of the age that erroneous religious principles should be capitally punished by the civil magistrate. A miserable way of opposing and subduing error. The severity of Calvin's doctrine and discipline (for he not only excommunicated all the flagitious from the church, but even had them punished by the magistrate and banished from the city) roused the resentment and malignity of the libertines of Geneva who gave him perpetual trouble.

Calvin and Beza differed some on the divine decrees relating to the fall of man. The former held that God permitted the first man to fall into transgression without absolutely predeter mining his fall; the latter, that God decreed that Adam should fall, in order that God should glorify his justice and mercy in the

destruction of some and salvation of others. Two parties were formed called Sublapsarians and Supralapsarians.

Wherever the Catholics could reach them, they caused the Reformed to drink to the dregs the cup of bitterness. The awful sufferings of the Huguenots in France have passed before us. Near 800,000 were destroyed in about 30 years in that kingdom. By the revocation of the edict of Nantez about 50,000 were driven into exile. Some fled to Holland, where they erected churches and enjoyed religious liberty. Among these were Dumont, Dubosc, and the eloquent Saurin.*

The most horrid scenes of violence and bloodshed were exhibited from 1660 to 1690 among the Waldenses, whom the Papists persecuted with relentless fury.

The churches in Great Britain, as we shall see in subsequent chapters, suffered both from internal commotion and the fire of Papal persecution.

The church of the Palatinate passed under a Roman Catholic prince and was almost extinguished.

At the opening of the 17th century the Reformed churches were distracted by the Arminian schism. This originated with James Arminius, professor of divinity at Leyden, who rejected the whole of Calvin's system relating to predestination and grace. He was warmly upheld and applauded in his views by many men of learning and power in Holland. He met however with warm opposition, especially from Gomer his colleague. After his death in 1609, the controversy became general, and so violent were the debates, such the tumults and broils, that the magistrates interfered, and the states general convened a general synod at Dort in 1618, to consider and decide the whole controversy.

This was one of the most learned and important councils ever assembled. It was composed of the most able divines of Holland, England, Scotland, Switzerland, Bremen, Hessia and the Palatinate. At the opening of the Synod, the Arminians demanded the liberty of disproving the sentiments of Calvin, especially upon reprobation, but the synod forbade them and required them first to prove their own sentiments. This they refused to do; and, for their refusal, were banished from the Assembly. Their system was then examined and condemned. The Armi; nians were driven from their churches and country.

*Saurin was born at Nismes, 1677. He left France on the revocation of the edict of Nantez and went to Geneva. There he studied with great assiduity and then pursued for a little time a military life. Relinquishing this, he entered the ministry, and in 1705 settled at the Hague. There he preached his eloquent sermons to crowded and brilliant audiences with astonishing effect. He died Dec. 30, 1730.

But the decisions of the Synod were not popular, and operated to the detriment of Calvinism. Many of the Arminians were men of learning and eloquence, and correct lives, whose sufferings excited the sympathy of the public. The authority of the synod was not universally acknowledged among the Dutch. The provinces of Friesland, Zealand, Utrecht, Guelderland, and Groningen, rejected its decisions. England threw off the doctrines of Calvin, and embraced the doctrines of Arminius. French Protestants finding the decisions of the Synod extremely offensive to the Catholics, from whom they were suffering the greatest indignities, were afraid publicly to approve of them, lest they should bring upon themselves new sufferings, and gradually relaxed from the Gomarists.

The

The doctors of Saumur and Sedan advanced sentiments conformable to the Lutherans. John Cameron and Moses Amyraut preached the doctrine of universal redemption. De LaPlace came forward with a denial of the imputation of Adam's sin. Claude, Pajon, and Papin exalted the powers of human nature, rendering unnecessary the operations of the Spirit of God. By these and other bold spirits, they were led in the course of this century to depart far from the sentiments of Calvin, and before the revocation of the edict of Nantez the body of French Protestants had become Arminians.

The Swiss churches were seriously affected by the relaxed doctrines of the French. The academy at Geneva retained its high character for near half a century, and was the resort of students from all parts of Europe; and the churches long remained firm in the faith of the distinguished man who had so highly elevated them. But some of the pastors imbibed the principles of Amyraut and De La Place, and Geneva was numbered among the Arminians. Alarmed at the progress of the new opinions, an assembly of divines appointed John Henry Heidegger, professor of divinity at Zurich in 1675, to construct a system of doctrine, and to add to it the other confessions of the Helvetic church. The whole was called the FORM OF CONCORD. But it occasioned great tumult, for in the next century it was imposed by the magistrates of Berne upon all professors and pastors as a rule of faith, and violently resisted, until it was abrogated. Since 1705, candidates for the ministry have been admitted upon a general declaration of faith in the Scriptures.

The Dutch Calvinists flattered themselves that they should have much peace and prosperity after the expulsion of the Arminians, but they found themselves involved in new troubles, not only with them upon their restoration, but from intestine disputes

upon various points of doctrine and practice, which, for a whole century, continued to distract the United Provinces. The most important factions were the Cocceians and the Voetians. John Cocceius, professor of divinity in the university of Leyden, neglecting the natural and simple interpretation of Calvin, was disposed to understand the words and phrases of Scripture in every sense of which they are susceptible, and viewed the whole of the Old Testament as a mirror, in which may clearly be seen the New Testament dispensation; and every thing relating to Christ and his apostles as types or images of future events. He considered the ten commandments not as a rule of obedience, but as a representation of the covenant of grace. With him united Des Cartes, the most famous philosopher of that period; whose leading principles were, that the man who would be a philosopher must begin his inquiries by doubting all things, even the existence of God; that the nature or essence of spirit, and even of God himself, consists in thought; that space has no real existence, is no more than the creature of fancy, and that consequently matter is without bounds. The Cocceians and Cartesians united for the purpose of delivering the theology of the day from the endless divisions and subdivisions of the peripatetical philosophy.

Their attempts met with opposition in 1639 from Voet, a theological instructor at Utrecht. He was supported by Rivet, Des Marets, Maestricht, and the greatest part of the Dutch clergy, who resolved in a public assembly to admit no one into the ministry who favoured the Cartesian philosophy. The states of Holland also issued an edict, forbidding the professors to teach it in the public schools. But opposition rather aided than retarded the Cocceians and Cartesians. The contests between the contending parties were very violent for many years.

Other controversies arose out of attempts to simplify religion by the Cartesian philosophy, which for years agitated the United Provinces and Germany. At one time the churches were rent by a dispute on the authority of reason in matters of religion. At another on the proper generation of the Son of God, on divine decrees, original sin, and the satisfaction of Christ. Bewitched by the Cartesian philosophy, Balthazar Becher, minister of Amsterdam, got persuaded that mind could not act upon matter, unless united with it as was the soul to the body, and denied the scriptural account of the influence of the devil over mankind, and published in 1691 a work of immense labour, entitled The World Bewitched, which for a time encountered much opposition. There arose also about the same time the Verschorists