As I set my seal with fuller confidence to the doctrine of our Lord's Divine carriage upon the cross, when I hear the centurion who headed his executioners cry out, "Truly this was the Son of God:" so I embrace the doctrine of general redemption with a fuller persuasion of its truth, when I hear Calvin himself say, "Forasmuch as the upshot of a happy life consists in the knowledge of God, lest the door of hap piness should be shut against any man, God has not only implanted in the minds of men, that which we call THE SEED OF RELIGION; but he has likewise so manifested himself in all the fabric of the world, and presents himself daily to them in so plain a manner, that they cannot open their eyes, but they must needs discover him." His own words are: Quia ultimus heats vitæ finis in Dei cognitione positus est, ne cui præclusus esset ad felicitatem aditus, non solum hominum mentibus indidit illud, quod dicimus RELIGIONIS SEMEN; sed ita se patefecit in toto mundi opificio, ac se quotidie palam offert, ut aperire oculos nequeant quin eum aspicere cogantur. (Inst. lib. i, cap. 5, sec. 1.) Happy would it have been for us, if Calvin the Calvinist had been of one mind with Calvin the reformer. Had this been the case, he would never have encouraged those who are called by his name to despise "THE SEED OF RELIGION which God has implanted in the minds of men, lest the door of happiness should be shut against any one." Nor would he inconsistently have taught his admirers to do Christ, and desponding souls, that very "injury," against which he justly bears his testimony in one of the preceding quotations.

Although Zelotes has a peculiar veneration for Austin and Calvin, yet when they speak of redemption as the oracles of God, he begs leave to dissent from them both.

To maintain, therefore, even against them, his favourite doctrine of. absolute election and preterition, he advances some objections, three or four of which deserve our attention, not so much indeed on account of their weight, as on account of the great stress which he lays upon them.

OBJECTION FIRST. "You assert," says he, "that the doctrine of general redemption is Scriptural, and that no man is absolutely reprobated: but I can produce a text strong enough to convince you of your error. If the majority of mankind were not unconditionally reprobated, our Lord would at least have prayed for them: but this he expressly refused to do in these words, "I pray for them [my disciples :] I pray not for the world," John xvii, 9. Here the world is evidently excluded from all interest in our Lord's praying breath; and how much more from all interest in his atoning blood?” ·

ANSWER. I have already touched upon this objection, (Third Check, vol. first.) To what I have said there, I now add the following fuller reply:-Our Lord never excluded "the world" from all share in his intercession. When he said, "I pray for them, I pray not for the world;" it is just as if he had said, "The blessing which I now ask for my believing disciples, I do not ask for the world;' not because I have absolutely reprobated the world, but because the world is not in a capacity of receiving this peculiar blessing." Therefore, to take occasion from that expression to traduce Christ as a reprobating respecter of persons, is as ungenerous as to affirm that the master of a

grammar school is a partial, capricious man, who pays no attention to the greatest part of his scholars, because, when he made critical remarks upon Homer, he once said, "My lecture is for the Greek class, and not the Latin."

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That this is the easy, natural sense of our Lord's words, will appear by the following observations. (1.) Does he not just after (verse 11) mention the favour which he did not ask for the world? 'Holy Fa. ther, keep, through thy name, those whom thou hast given me, [by the decree of faith,] that they may be one as we are." (2.) Would it not have been absurd in Christ to pray the Father to keep "a world" of unbelievers, and to make them one? (3.) Though our Lord prayed at first for his disciples alone, did he not, before he concluded his prayer, (verse 2,) pray for future believers? And then giving the utmost latitude to his charitable wishes, did he not pray (verse 21) "that the world might believe”—and (verse 23) "that the world might know that God had sent him?" (4.) Was not this praying that the world might be made partakers of the very blessing which his disciples then enjoyed: witness these words, (ver. 24, 25,) "O righteous Father, the world has not known thee: but I have known thee, and these [believers] have known that thou hast sent me?" (5.) "The world hateth me," said our Lord. Now if he "never prayed for the world," how could he be said to have loved and prayed for his enemies? How badly will Zelotes be off, if he stands only in the imputed righteousness of a man, who would never pray for the bulk of his enemies or neighbours? But this is not all; for (6.) If our Lord "never prayed for the world,” he acted the part of those wicked Pharisees who "laid upon other people's. shoulders heavy burthens which they took care not to touch with one of their fingers;" for he said to his followers, "Pray for them who despitefully use you and persecute you," [that is, pray for the world,] Matt. v, 44. But if we believe Zelotes, "he said and did not :" like some implacable preachers who recommend a forgiving temper, he gave good precepts and set a bad example.

I ask Candidus' pardon for detaining him so long about so frivolous an argument: but as it is that which Zelotes most frequently produces in favour of particular redemption, and the absolute reprobation of the world, I thought it my duty to expose his well meant mistake, and to wipe off the blot which his opinion (not he) fixes upon our Lord's-character; an opinion this, which represents Christ's prayer, "Father, forgive them," to be all of a piece with Judas' kiss. For, if Christ prayed with his lips, that his worldly murderers might be forgiven, while in his heart he absolutely excluded them from all interest in his inter- · cession, and in the blood, by which alone they could be forgiven; might he not as well have said, My praying lips salute, but my reprobating heart betrays you: hail reprobates and be damned?

OBJECTION SECOND. "All your carnal reasonings and logical subtleties can never overthrow the plain word of God. The Scriptures cannot be broken, and they expressly mention particular redemption. Rev. v, 8, 9, we read that four-and-twenty elders having harps, sung a new song, saying, &c, Thou hast redeemed us to God by thy blood, out of every kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation.' Again, Rev. xiv, 1, &c, we read of one hundred and forty-four thousand harpers

that stood with the Lamb on Mount Sion, having his Father's name written in their foreheads, &c, singing as it were a new song which no man could learn but the one hundred and forty-four thousand who were redeemed from the earth, &c; these were redeemed from among men.' Now if all men were redeemed, would not St. John speak nonsense if he said that the elect were redeemed from among men? But as he positively says so, it follows that the generality of men are passed by, or left in a reprobate state absolutely unredeemed."

ANSWER. There is a redemption by power distinct from, though connected with our redemption by price. That redemption is in many things particular; consisting chiefly in the actual bestowing of the temporal, spiritual, or eternal deliverances and blessings which the atoning blood has peculiarly merited for believers; “Christ being the Saviour of all men, but especially of them that believe." Various degrees of that redemption are pointed out in the following scriptures, as well as in the passages which you quote out of the book of Revelation. "The angel who redeemed me from all evil, bless the lads. The Lord hath redeemed you from the hand of Pharaoh. When these things begin to come to pass, then look up, for your redemption draweth nigh. Ye are sealed, &c, until the redemption of the purchased possession. We ourselves groan, waiting for the redemption of our body." When therefore some eminent saints sing, "Thou hast redeemed us to God by thy blood [sprinkled upon our consciences through faith] out of every kindred," &c, it is not because Christ shed more blood upon the cross for them than for other people; but because, through the faithful improvement of the five talents, which sovereign, distinguishing grace had entrusted them with, they excelled in virtue, and “overcame the accuser of the brethren by the blood of the Lamb," more gloriously than the generality of their fellow believers do.

One or two arguments will, I hope, convince the reader that Zelotes has no right to press into the service of free wrath the texts produced in his objection; as he certainly does, when he applies them to a particular redemption by price. (1.) God promised to Abraham, that "all the nations, yea, all the kindreds of the earth should be blessed in his seed, that is, in Christ, the propitiation for the sins of the whole world.” And our Lord commands, accordingly, that his redeeming work be preached to "every creature among all nations:" but if there be no redemption but that of those elders and saints mentioned Rev. v, 8, 9, and said to be "redeemed to God, out of every kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation, it follows, that every kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation," is left unredeemed in flat contradiction to God's promise, as well as to the general tenor of the Scriptures. (2.) The number of the saved is greater than that of the redeemed. For St. John, Rev. vii, 9, describes the saved as "a great multitude which no man could number." But the persons "redeemed from the earth and redeemed from among men," are said to be just one hundred and fortyfour thousand: whence it follows, either that an "innumerable multitude" of men will sing "salvation to the Lamb," without having been redeemed; or that one hundred and forty-four thousand souls are "a multitude which no man can number;" and that as the number of these "redeemed from the earth and from among men," is already completed,

all the rest of mankind are consigned over to inevitable, finished damnation. Thus, according to the objection which I answer, Zelotes himself is passed by, as well as "every kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation." O ye kindreds and tongues, ye people and nations,-ye English and Welsh, ye Scotch and Irish, awake to your native good sense; nor dignify any longer with the name of "doctrines of grace," inconsistent tenets imported from Geneva,-barbarous tenets that rob you nationally of the inestimable jewel of redemption, and leave you nationally in the lurch with Cain and Judas-with wretches whose reprobation (if we believe Zelotes) was absolutely insured before your happy islands emerged out of the sea, and the sea out of the chaos.

OBJECTION THIRD. But we are pressed with rational, as well as Scriptural arguments. To show that Christ, who was lavish of his tears over justly reprobated Jerusalem, was so sparing of his blood, that he would not shed one drop of it for the world, and for the reprobated nations therein, much less for the arch reprobate, Judas: to show this, I say, Zelotes asks, “How could Christ redeem Judas? Was not Judas' soul actually in hell, beyond the reach of redemption, when Christ bled upon the cross?"

ANSWER. The fallacy of this argument will be sufficiently pointed out by retorting. it thus:-"How could Christ redeem David? Was not David's soul actually in heaven, beyond the need of redemption, when Christ bled upon the ignominious tree?" The truth is, from the foundation of the world Christ intentionally shed his blood, to procure a temporary salvation for all men, and an "eternal salvation for them that obey him, and work out their salvation with fear and trembling." With respect to David and Judas, "in the day of their visitation," through Christ's intended sacrifice, they had both an "accepted time;" and, while the one by penitential faith secured eternal salvation, the other by obstinate unbelief totally fell from initial salvation, and by his own sin "went to his own," and not to Adam's " place."

OBJECTION FOURTH. As to the difficulty which Zelotes raises from a supposed "defect in Divine wisdom, if Christ offered for all a sacrifice which he foresaw many would not be benefited by:" I once more observe that all men universally are benefited by the sacrifice of the Lamb of God. For all men enjoy a day of initial and temporary salvation, in consequence of Christ's mediation: and if many do not improve their redemption so as to be eternally benefited thereby, their madness is no more a reflection upon God's wisdom, than the folly of those angels who did not improve their creation. Again: this objection, taken from Divine wisdom, and levelled at our doctrine, is so much the more extraordinary, as, upon the plan of particular redemption, Divine wisdom (to say nothing of Divine veracity, impartiality, and mercy) receives an eternal blot. For how can "God judge the world in wisdom according to the Gospel?” Rom. ii, 16. How can he wisely upbraid men with their impenitency, and condemn them because "they have not believed in the name of his only begotten Son," John iii, 18, if there never was for them a Gospel to embrace, repentance to exercise, and an only begotten Son of God to believe in?

And now, reader, sum up the evidence arising from the scriptures balanced, the arguments proposed, and the objections answered in this

section; and say whether the doctrines of bound will and curtailed redemption, or, which is all one, the doctrines of necessary sin, and absolute, personal, yea, national reprobation, can, with any propriety, be called either sweet "doctrines of grace," or Scriptural doctrines of wisdom.

SECTION X.

The doctrine of free grace is farther maintained against Honestus; and that of free will and just wrath against Zelotes.