CENT. different system with respect to the divine decrees. SECT. III. He maintained, that the everlasting condition of PART II. mankind in a future world, was determined from

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all eternity by the unchangeable order of the Deity, and that this absolute determination of his will and good pleasure was the only source of happiness or misery to every individual. This opinion was, in a very short time, propagated through all the Reformed churches, by the writings of Calvin, and by the ministry of his disciples, and in some places was inserted in the national creeds and confessions; and thus made a public article of faith. The unhappy controversy, which took its rise from this doctrine, was opened at Strasburg, in the year 1560, by Jerome Zanchius, an Italian ecclesiastic, who was particularly attached to the sentiments of Calvin; and was afterwards carried on by others with such zeal and assiduity, that it drew, in an extraordinary manner, the attention of the public, and tended as much to exasperate the passions, and foment the discord of the contending parties, as the dispute about the eucharist had already done [1].

The discord is carried to

VIII. The Helvetic doctors had no prospect the greatest left of calming the troubled spirits and tempering, at least, the vehemence of these deplorable feuds, but the moderation of the Saxon divines, who were the disciples of Melancthon, and who,

height.

breathing

tom. iii. ch. xxviii. p. 292, 298, and also the author of a book, entitled, Observationes Gallica in Formul. Consensus Helveticum, p. 52. The very learned Dr Gerdes, instead of being persuaded by these testimonies, maintains, on the contrary, in his Miscellan. Groningens. tom. ii. p. 476, 477, that the sentiments of Calvin were the same with those of the ancient Swiss doctors. But this excellent author may be refuted, even from his own account of the tumults that were occasioned in Switzerland, by the opinion that Calvin had propagated in relation to the divine decrees.

[/] Loscheri Historia Motuum, part III. lib. v. cap. ii. p. 27, S. c. x. p. 227.—Salig, Historia August. Confession, tom. i. lib. ii. cap. xiii. p. 44.

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breathing the pacific spirit of their master, seemed, CENT. after his death, to have nothing so much at heart sec Sect III as the restoration of concord and union in the pro- PART II. testant church. Their designs, however, were not carried on with that caution and circumspection, with that prudent foresight, or that wise attention to the nature of the times, which distinguished always the transactions of Melancthon, and which the critical nature of the cause they were engaged in, indispensably required. And hence they had already taken a step, which was adapted to render ineffectual all the remedies they could apply to the healing of the present disorders. For, by dispersing every where artful and insidious writings, with a design to seduce the ministers of the church, and the studious youth, into the sentiments of the Swiss divines, or, at least, to engage them to treat these sentiments with toleration and forbearance, they drew upon themselves the indignation of their adversaries, and ruined the pacific cause in which they had embarked. It was this conduct of theirs that gave occasion to the composition of that famous Form of Concord, which condemned the sentiments of the Reformed churches in relation to the person of Christ, and the sacrament of the Lord's supper. And as this Form is received by the greatest part of the Lutherans, as one of the articles of their religion; hence arises an insuperable obstacle to all schemes of reconciliation and concord.

that are

servation in

IX. So much did it seem necessary to premise what those concerning the cause, rise, and progress of the things are, controversy, which formed that separation that most wor still subsists between the Lutheran and Reformed thy of o churches. From thence it will be proper to pro- the rend ceed to an account of the internal state of the progress of latter, and to the history of its progress and revo- formed lutions. The history of the Reformed church, church. during this century, comprehends too distinct

Bb 2

periods.

the e

CEN T. periods. The first commences with the year 1519, SECT. III. When Zuingle withdrew from the communion of PART I Rome, and began to form a Christian church be

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yond the bounds of the pope's jurisdiction; and it extends to the time of Calvin's settlement at Geneva, where he acquired the greatest reputation and authority. The second period takes in the rest of this century.

During the first of these perods, the Helvetic church, which assumed the title of Reformed after the example of the French protestants in their neighbourhood, who had chosen this denomination in order to distinguish themselves from the Roman catholics, was very inconsiderable in its extent, and was confined to the cantons of Switzerland. It was indeed augmented by the accession of some small states in Suabia and Alsace, such as the city of Strasbourg, and some little republics. But, in the year 1536, these petty states changed sides, through the suggestions and influence of Bucer, returned to the communion of the Saxon church, and thus made their peace with Luther. The other religious communities, which abandoned the church of Rome, either openly embraced the doctrine of Luther, or consisted of persons, who were not agreed in their theological opinions, and who really seemed to stand in a kind of neutrality between the contending parties. All things being duly considered, it appears probable enough that the church, founded by Zuingle, would have remained still confined to the narrow limits which bounded it at first, had not Calvin arisen, to augment its extent, authority, and lustre. For the natural and political character of the Swiss, which is neither bent towards the lust of conquest, nor the grasping views of ambition, discovered itself in their religious transactions. And, as a spirit of contentment with what they had, prevented their

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aiming at an augmentation of their territory, so C E N T. did a similar spirit hinder them from being ex-scr. III. tremely solicitous about enlarging the borders of PART II. their church,

that first

tween the

ans.

X. In this infant state of the Reformed church, The religi the only point that prevented its union with ous points the followers of Luther, was the doct ine they excited divitaught with respect to the sacrament of the Lord' sions be supper. This first controversy, indeed, soon pio-Swiss and duced a second, relating to the person of Jesus the LutherChrist, which, nevertheless, concerned only a part of the Lutheran church [m]. The Lutheran divines of Suabia, in the course of their debates with those of Switzerland, drew an argument in favour of the real presence of Christ's body and blood in the eucharist, from the following proposition; that all the properties of the divine nature, and consequently its omnipresence, were communicated to the human nature of Christ by the hypostatic union. The Swiss doctors, in order to destroy the force of this argument, denied this communication of the divine attributes to Christ's human nature, and denied, more especially, the ubiquity or omnipresence of the man Jesus. And hence arose that most intricate and abstruse controversy concerning ubiquity and the communication of properties, that produced so many learned and unintelligible treatises, so many subtile disputes, and occasioned that multitude of invectives and accusations, that the contending parties threw out against each other with such liberality and profusion.

Bb3

It

[m] It was only a certain number of those Lutherans, that were much more rigid in their doctrine than Luther himself, that believed the ubiquity or omnipresence of Christ's person, considered as a man. By this we may see that the Lutherans have their divisions, as well as the Reformed, of which several instances may be yet given in the course of this history.

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CENT. It is proper to observe, that, at this time, the Heivetic church universally embraced the docPART II trine of Zuingle concerning the eucharist. This doctrine, which differed considerably from that of Calvin, amounted to the following propositions: "That the bread and wine were no more than a representation of the body and blood of Christ; "or, in other words, the signs appointed to de"note the benefits that were conferred upon mán"kind in consequence of the death of Christ; "that, therefore, Christians derived no other fruit "from the participation of the Lord's supper, than "a mere commemoration and remembrance of "the merits of Christ, which, according to an "expression common in the mouths of the abet"tors of this doctrine, was the only thing that was "properly meant by the Lord's supper [n]." Bucer, whose leading principle was the desire of peace and concord, endeavoured to correct and modify this doctrine in such a manner, as to give it a certain degree of conformity to the hypothesis of Luther; but the memory of Zuingle was too fresh in the minds of the Swiss to permit their accepting of these corrections and modifications, or to suffer them to depart, in any respect, from the doctrine of that eminent man, who had founded their church, and been the instrument of their deliverance from the tyranny and superstition of Rome.

John Calvin

XI. In the year 1541, John Calvin, who surthe princi- passed almost all the doctors of this age in la

pai founder

of the Re

formed church.

borious

[n] Nil esse in Cena, quam memoriam Christi. That this was the real opinion of Zuingle, appears evidently from va rious testimonies. which may be seen in the Museum Helveticum, tom. i. p. 485, 490, tom. iii. p. 631.-This is also confirmed by the following sentence in Zuingle's book concerning baptism: (tom. ii. opp. p. 85.) "Cana Dominica non aliud, quam Commemorationis nomen meretur." Compare with all this Fueslini Centur 1. Epistolar. Theologor. Refor mator. p. 255, 262, &c.