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the time of Augustine, to have been that "of certain individuals "out of all nations into the pale of the visible church, with the "merciful purpose and intention on God's party, that through faith and holiness they should attain to everlasting life; but "(since the immediate notion of their election respected only an "admission into the church, not an admission into heaven,) with a possibility, through their own perverseness, of their not making "their calling and election sure, and of thus failing to obtain the "conditionally promised reward." Such, in point of IDEALITY, was the unvaried doctrine of the orthodox church to the time of Augustine; but in point of CAUSATION, an important difference may be observed. Before the days of Clemens Alexandrinus, who flourished about the latter end of the second century, the absolute will and sovereign pleasure of God was believed to be the impelling cause of election, after which, commonly, but not quite universally, it was deemed God's foreknowledge of man's future fitness. This change seems to have been introduced by Clemens. This system Mr. Faber would denominate Ecclesiastical Individualism, and the doctrine ecclesiastical individual election.

The IDEALITY of election according to the primitive church, will appear from the following writers. Clemens Romanus notices a sedition in the church at Corinth, which was foreign and alien to those who are the elect of God: he mentions also a contest in behalf of ALL the brotherhood, that the number of God's elect might be saved, and defines the elect of God to be the innocent and just; and introduces God as having elected THE LORD JESUS CHRIST AND US THROUGH HIM, to be a peculiar people. Hermas declares, that the Sovereign Ruler has sworn concerning his elect, that if any one shall sin, HE shall not have salvation; alludes to those who instruct the elect, and defines them exactly as Clemens has done. Justin Martyr speaks of Christians generally as the elect; and Irenæus calls the church the congregation of God, which God, that is, the Son, hath himself collected through himself; and elsewhere remarks," the wages of Jacob "were variegated sheep; and the wages of Christ are men, col"lected out of various and different nations into one cohort of the "faith;" equivalent to which is his phrase of the going forth of the church from the nations. So Clemens Alexandrinus defined the church not to be the place of assemblng (ròv TÓTOV) but the general assembly (rò apoioμa) of the elect; and Cyprian stating the Church to be elect, says, that one perfidiously forsaking her cannot flatter himself, as if he were elected to the reward of glory; for the Lord elected Judas, yet Judas betrayed him. In like manner, Jerome avers, that a person who is elected, may both be tempted and perish: thus, Saul was elected to be a king, and Judas to be an apostle; yet by their own fault they afterward fell away. Hence, we cannot but perceive, that ALL

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the members of the church are styled the elect of God, that "the church viewed collectively, as the election,... is spoken of as a society of people called and chosen out of the nations, which "had long remained ignorant of all true religion." Thus, with the primitive Christians, the immediate purpose of election was an entrance into the visible church, in order to a thus mediate "attainment of eternal life;" accordingly we find primitive writers naturally including themselves among the elect. Can stronger proofs exist, that the insulated and presumptuous doctrines of Calvinism are as little warranted by the voice of christian antiquity, as they are by the word of God itself?

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On the question of CAUSATION we must as much as possible condense our observations. Clemens Romanus intimates God's clemency and mercy, not his prescience of man's fitness, as the impelling CAUSE of election. Ignatius asserts predestination to be CAUSALLY founded on the sovereign will of the Father, and of Jesus Christ our God, and the church of the elect to be CAUSALLY founded by his own powerful or sovereign virtue. Five of the most ancient Fathers assign God's absolute and inscrutable will and sovereignty as the moving CAUSE, whilst others of the same antiquity do not notice the subject. But towards the end of second century, the prescientific solution of the problem, distinctly enounced, probably for the first time, by Clemens Alexandrinus, made its appearance. From which period, God's foreknowledge of human fitness became the prevalent solution with some exceptions; but on a careful review of both opinions, Mr. Faber refers the moving CAUSE of election to "the good pleasure of God's merciful though absolute sovereignty;" arguing, that if none were admitted into the pale of the church, but those whose fitness and holiness God foreknew, it would not contain a single individual, who at the time of his death would be found personally unfit or unholy.

These points of IDEALITY and CAUSATION he proceeds to establish from scriptural texts, from whence he draws the same results. The first series is selected from the Old Testament; and he rightly notices that in collating the two Testaments on this subject it should be borne in mind, that in the Old, our translators have generally employed the word chosen, whereas in the New they have adopted generally the term elect, which makes a less vivid impression on the mind of the merely cursory reader. From these passages it is shown, that the elect themselves, who were the whole chosen house of Israel, consisted of many wicked, as well as many good; and that God's chosen people, who had been brought into a special covenant with him, notwithstanding their election out of an unbelieving world, might even be so ecclesiastically rejected, as no more to be the people of the Lord.

With these he so admirably compares Rom. ix. 6, 26, 30,

31;

x. 19—21; xi. 1, 5, 7, that we must give a synoptical view of his remarks. From these and other passages he arrives at the same conclusion, to which his research of the early Fathers and examination of the Old Testament conducted him. In the Epistle to the Romans, he shows, that the election of Jacob in preference to the election of Esau relates to that of the posterity of Jacob, rather than to the election of the posterity of Esauthat that of the Israelites under the law was a type and exemplar of that of the Christians under the gospel, the apostle's avowed subject being the election of the collective Christian church into the place and privileges of the collective Levitical churchbut, that this typical election of the Israelites under the law, commencing with Abraham and the Patriarchs, and finally including the whole posterity of Jacob, was an election of certain individuals into the pale of the visible Hebrew Church, or an ecclesiastical individual election-therefore, that the antitypical or imitative election of Christians under the gospel, commencing with the apostles, and finally including ALL who profess the faith of Christ,-whether converted Jews, forming the remnant according to the election of grace, or Gentiles constituting collectively the society of the election,-must homogeneously be an election of certain individuals into the pale of the visible Christian church, or, an ecclesiastical individual election also. And as, in respect of personal holiness, all are not Israel which are of Israel, so, in respect of personal holiness, all are not faithful Christians who, in point of privileges and name, are of the Christian church of the election. Hence, wherever the terms predestination, election, elect, and chosen, occur in the New Testament, they must be understood according to this IDEALITY of election under the gospel; " for Scripture must not be interpreted so as to contradict Scripture;" which will more fully appear in our subsequent observations.

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The term "elect" is never applied to some in contradistinction from other members of the visible christian church; but it is applied to every member of it in contradistinction from those who are not members of it. Election, therefore, does not imply "irreversible predestination, directly and immediately, to eternal happiness." Thus, the whole church in Babylon (whether the literal or the mystical Babylon it imports not) was co-elect (OUVEKλEKT) with those whom St. Peter addressed (1 Ep. v. 13): thus, St. John in his Second Epistle addressed the elect lady and her children, by whom he doubtless meant the church of Jerusalem, as the mother of the other churches; and in his third epistle transmitted the salutation "thine elect sister," probably that of the church of Ephesus to that of Jerusalem. Of exactly the same force are the words in the parables of the labourers in the vineyard and the marriage of the king's son. Throughout the New Testament, indeed, are various texts of

equal cogency, which singly and collectively substantiate the preceding interpretation of the doctrine, and others, which show the possibility of lapsing from this calling and election.* St. Peter's particular exhortation to make them sure, proves that no individuals in this church had an assured election to eternal life, in the Calvinistic or Arminian sense; for we cannot conceive how we can make THAT sure, which God's irreversible decree had made sure already.

The strongest passage, however, which the Calvinists are wont to adduce in support of their system, is in Rom. viii. 28-30; but, which, if correctly interpreted, will be found as little available for such a purpose, as its predecessors already discussed. For "it is immediately followed by St. Paul's decision, that "the IDEALITY of election under the gospel is identical with the IDEALITY of election under the law." But the Calvinist argues, that the whole passage is progressive and cumulative; that it commences with God's foreknowledge and ends with man's

* Cf. 1 Cor. ix. 27. 2 Tim. ii. 10. 2 Pet. i. 10. Heb. vi. 4-6. Rev. xxii. 19.

†The American writer, Turner, by πрoćуvw, in this passage, understands particularly loved, arguing from the ramified use of y, and his proposed version is very well supported by reasons. But even if we accept it in the sense of foreknew, the Calvinist will not be benefited on two accounts; first, because he must either abandon these verses, as the bulwark of his system, or deny the universality of the Divine prescience; since, if it be universal, ovç #poéyvw, whom he foreknew, must irrestrictively include ALL mankind. Secondly, because the Predestination here mentioned is not that of a future eternal allotment, but of a conformity to the exemplar of the Son of God. 'Ekaλere too may better be rendered invited, as in the parable of the wedding-feast, according to the common use of the verb in the Classics. Cf. Plut. Brut. 34; Phil. Jud. de Mundi Opificio, i. 18. i. 19. Thus St. Luke calls the guests KƐκλημένοι analogously to κλήτορες—the name given to the slaves who invited them.

Пlpowρioɛ also does not include in itself the same idea which we are apt to attach to Predestination; it rather implies preappointed-predetermined. Hesychius interprets the simple verb, ἵστησιν—ὄρον δίδωσι -which yields a totally different signification. For its senses are merely modified by the prepositions with which it may be combined, whilst its radical force remains. Hence duopiw occurs in not absolutely a dissimilar sense in Manetho's Apotelesmata-where speaking of puois αιθερόπλαγκτος he says,

ὀρθὰ τεκμαιραμένοισι διώρισεν ἄνδρασιν ἄστρα.

In the rabbinical writers appears to have been the corresponding verb perhaps, it was that in the mind of the apostle; but with its cognates in Syriac, and in Arabic, it contains not the notion of destiny or necessity, simply implying to determine or appoint (a time).

زمن

glorification. Thus he easily passes to his restricted doctrine of election, and to his irreversible decree of predestination. The Arminian here rebuts him on his scheme of CAUSATION, which reasons already assigned show to be ineffectual. Mr. Faber, on the other hand, urges, that the Divine foreknowledge is not a CAUSAL one of men's future characters; that it is that GENERAL foreknowledge of futurity, without which predestination cannot exist. But as the climax of the passage is the stronghold of the Calvinistic argument, as it is also of the Arminian, Mr. Faber convicts both of error in referring ¿dóžave, glorified, to the future eternal glory of the elect, because in such a case the verb would have required the future tense. The tense, however, in which we find it, refers to something past; therefore it relates to them while yet alive upon the earth. Such were decidedly the opinions of Origen, Chrysostom, Ecumenius, Theodoret, Theophylact, the Pseudo-Ambrose, and Jerome, by whom this glorification was esteemed to be a right to participate in the high privileges of the christian church in this life, viz." The gifts and graces of "the Spirit-the adoption into Sonship to their heavenly Father "and the gradual transformation from glory to glory, in the course of their acquiring a spiritual similitude to the Son of "God."

If we place the doctrine of Predestination in the connexion in which the inspired writings place it, we must adjoin it to the półεois, or God's merciful purpose of admitting both Jew and Gentile within the pale of the Redeemer's church; and if we view it in this light, and argue from the context, not from detached passages, the mercy of the Divine Being will be seen shining in unclouded splendour through all his dispensations, and the way of salvation will manifestly be proved to be unreservedly thrown open to every individual of the human

race.

In fact, the Greek language was so fertile in terms fully adequate to express the apostle's meaning, that if his idea had been analogous to that of Augustine and Calvin, he could have found no difficulty in selecting a word which would convey it without the possibility of controversy. Had he intended any thing like predestination or necessity, or that which might suggest the notion of an irreversibly fated decree, we might have supposed ȧvaykáw, or one which in itself contained the idea, to have been employed, and some such conclusive terms as sipapμévn, πεπρωμένη, οι πεπρωμένον, which are of habitual occurrence in Justin Martyr and the Fathers, to have been applied to the doctrine. And as words are often found in the New Testament which have not exact classical parallels, the apostle would have probably had little difficulty, had he intended such a doctrine, in forming such a definite verb as προμοιρίζω: but what he intended by ὁρίζω is evident from Acts xvii. 26.

The fatalism of the ancients was a fertile source of impiety, like