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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A75582	The just mans defence, or, The royal conquest being the declaration of the judgement of James Arminius, Doctor of Divinity in the University of Leyden, concerning the principall points of religion, before the States of Holland and VVestfriezland / translated for the vindication of truth, by Tobias Conyers, sometimes of Peter-house in Cambridge.; Declaratio sententiae de predestinatione. English	Arminius, Jacobus, 1560-1609.; Conyers, Tobias, 1628-1687.	1657 (1657)	Wing A3700A; ESTC R208013	52,267	187

as to the four heads above-mentioned chiefly urged in this Doctrine not once touched upon by them no Confession of any Reformed church delivering the doctrine of predestination as before propounded by me The Bohemian Confession the confession of the Church of England that of Wittenberge the first Helv●tian confession of the foure Cities Argentorate Constantia Memminga and Lindavia make not the least mention of it The Basilian and that of Saxony do onely point at it in three words The Augustan confession is so darke that it stands in need of annotations to preadmonish us of it as they of Geneva have thought the last Helvetian confession which hath the consent and subscription of the greatest part of all reformed churches doth so speak of it that I would gladly see how it is consistent w th it as before represented though the Sabaudican and that at Geneva have approved it Sixthly Without all strife and 6. Arg. contention this doctrine may be justly cald into question touching its concordancy with the Belgick Confession and Heydelberg Catechism as I shall briefly demonstrate Artic. 14. Confes Belg. you have this passage Man knowingly and willingly subjected himself to The Author proves the disagreement of this doctrine with the Belgick Confession being that of his own County rather then any other sin and by consequence to Death and Malediction whilest he inclined his ear to the words and impostures of the Devil Whence I conclude Man sinned not by any necessity of the preceding Decree of Predestination which is diametrically opposite to the Doctrine thereof Again Artic. 16. speaking of the Eternal Election of God God shewed himself mercifull by saving and freeing them from damnation whom in his everlasting and unchangeable counsel for his gracious goodnesse without any respect of works he chose in his Son Christ Iesus our Lord and also just in relinquishing others in that their fall and perdition whereinto they had precipitated themselves How these words are consistent with the forementioned Doctrine I plainly see not In the Heydelberg Catechism Quest 20. Salvation is not given to all those by Christ who perished in Adam but to them onely who are ingrafted into him by faith and embrace his benefits Whence I conclude God to have fore-appointed none absolutely to Salvation but those beheld in his Decree as believers which is in open defiance with the first and third head of this Predestination So Quest 54. See pag. 26. I believe the Son of God out of all Mankinde doth from the beginning unto the end of the World gather a chosen company consenting in the true faith unto Eternal life Where Election to life and consent in Faith are mutually placed together and the latter not subordinate to the former which according to the nature of this Doctrine ought necessarily to have been and the words run thus The Son of God calls and gathers by his spirit and word a company chosen unto life everlasting that they might believe and agree in the faith Things being thus there is no cause why the maintainers and promoters of this Doctrine ought with that violence contend to obtrude the same on their Complices or the Church of Christ or take it in such ill part when any thing is taught either in Church or University not consenting or at variance therewith Seventhly This Doctrine 7. Arg. fights against the very Nature of God especially with those Attributes of his Divine Being by which he worketh and manageth all things viz. With his Wisdom Justice and Goodness It opposeth his Wisdom three waies 1. In that it asserteth God to decree something for that end which neither is good nor can be made so such is Gods creation of some persons to eternal Perdition to the praise of his Justice 2. In that it averreth God by this Predestination to have proposed to himself the demonstration of the praise of his Mercy and Justice which he could no way do but by an act contrary to both such is that decree whereby he determined that man should sin and become miserable 3. It changetk and invert's the order method of the twofold Wisdom of God manifest in Scripture in that it asserts God absolutely to have fore-appointed the salvation of men by the Mercy and Wisdom comprehended in the Doctrine of the Cross of Christ without foreseeing 't was impossible that man and that through his own default should be saved by Wisdom perfected in the Lavv and infused into him by Creation vvhen the Scripture avers the contrary 1 Cor. 12. 1. It pleased God by the foolishness of Preaching to save those that believe i. e. By the Word of the Cross after that in the Wisdom of God the world by wisdom knew not God 2 It wars against the Justice of God which represents him not only as a Lover of Righteousness and hater of sin but as having a perpetual and unshaken will of giving every one his right Against the first of these in that it makes God precisely to will the salvation of singular men and decree the same without any intuition or respect to righteousnesse or obedience and become a lover of those men more then his own Justice Against the later in that it stateth Gods vvillingness to entail misery upon the creature which is onely the punishment of sin not beholding it as peccant and so a culpable subject of Wrath and Punishment and so is made to impose upon the creature both that which belongs not unto it likewise that which is in conjuction with its greatest evil which is abhorrent from his Justice According therefore to this Doctrine God first detracts from himself that which is his right and attributes to the creature that which appertains not unto it to the making of it miserable 3. It is in open defiance with the goodnesse of God which is an affection in him of communicating good according to that fitnesse and congruity judged and permitted by his Justice But in this Doctrine of Predestination God is set forth unto us induced of his own accord without any external Motive to will and ordain the greatest evil to the Creature and that by an eternal preordination preceding any determination in him of indowing it with the least good this Doctrine being a declaration of Gods will to damn which that he might execute he purposed also to create now Creation is the first egresse of Divine goodnesse How discrepant are these things from that bounty of God whereby he doth good not only to the undeserving but also evil and guilty persons and which we are commanded to imitate in our heavenly Father Eightly It oppugneth the nature 8. Arg. of man consider'd in his being created after the Image of God in knowledge and righteousnesse in freedom of will with aptitude and affection to the enjoyment of Eternal life These three things may be concluded of him out of of that short sentence Do this and live in the day thou doest Rom. 10.

The Just Mans Defence OR The Royal Conquest BEING The Declaration of the Judgement of James Arminius Doctor and Professor of Divinity in the University of Leyden Concerning THE PRINCIPALL POINTS of Religion before the States of Holland and VVestfriezland Translated for the Vindication of Truth by Tobias Conyers sometimes of Peter-house in Cambridge Magna est veritas praevalebit LONDON Printed for the Author and are to be sold by Henry Eversden at the Greyhound in Pauls Church-yard 1657. TO HIS HIGHNESS Oliver Lord Protector of the Common-wealth of Great Britain and Ireland Great Sir I Presume the dedication of these papers without any Apologie to your Lordship having been already presented to States and Princes not that your Highness in whom so many princely vertues are constellated stood in need of a translation but that an obvious Dialect might supersede the pains of an Original Traverse and remit unto your Lordship all possible time to satisfie the importunity of those affairs which do publickly solicite you for a dispatch of them Had not the concernments of truth been of greater importance to me then any personal consideration though I am not stupidly insensible I should have been loth my Lord But in as much as the name of Arminians is violently obtruded upon us who beleeve that Christ died for all and tasted death for every man according to the Scriptures whereby our persons are indevoured to be rendered odious and the blessed word of the kingdom in our mouths scandalous and offensive I judged it reasonable to offer the authors judgment to English view not that I desire the Translation of his should be lookt upon as the interpretation of mine being never yet drawn by any inquisitory examinination to a full approbation or dislike of it but that I might put an opportunity into the hands of indifferent men of resolving themselves that Arminius was no such monster in religion as some men have attempted to represent him and that his name stands undeservedly blotted in the Ecclesiastick Rolls of continual obloquie It was a worthy essay of Your Highness upon occasion at Whitehall That it was not so much what a man held but how he held it A religous calenture hath alwaies been a dangerous maladie in the Eye of State-Physitians I am confident the Doctor in this draught of himself will abundantly please you in whom Learning and Ingenuity Piety and Moderation contend together for the mastery and this by the happy ducture of christian Principles which if the like tenderness candour and modesty had been used by the Reformed Churches in Scotland and Geneva they had not given that cause by their faction and disobedience to the Duke of Savoy and other persons of great and lesser quality to complain of them and indevour the extirpatation of their religion Witness those sad Massacres in France that lately in Piemont so fatal to the Hugonets barracado'd from the stroke of justice with their own engines It would not become me to unravell this bottom hoping by the timely interposure of Your Lordships wisdome and goodness with the care and prudence of those noble Patriots about you we may not have ground in things of less alloy to expostulate in our own Country It s well known my Lord what countenance the Scriptures carry with the doctrine of general atonement and how much it looks like the doctrine of the Church of England so we call it and that the major part of the Bishops and Doctors during the Episcopal Hierarchy were deeply babtized thereinto and the late King himself yet did they never discountenance piety and learning in men of the contrary judgment either in Country or University by rendering them uncapable of imployment either Civil or Ecclesiastick or draw them to recant their opinions before their institution and induction into any place witness the credit and promotion of Sibbs Preston Pridjeux Holdsworth Bromrig Love Hall c. Nay great Strafford president of the Court in the North did in the hearing of some persons who are still living testimonies thereof publickly rebuke some Ministers of the Arminian party so called though he himself a great promoter of that interest for bearing themselves high upon court favour and told them it was the will of his master and the Doctors of the Church that all moderation should be used herein The Scoene is altered these pluck't off the stage and your Lordship taken up I should be highly injurious to those many sacred vows and protestations your Highness hath so often made for Christian Liberty should I entertain a thought you would act your part with less tenderness and indulgency than any of those that have had their fatal Exit My Lord You have been a man of War Liberty was that Motto in your Ensign which encouraged the Soldiers of Christ to fight and pray under you for which I make no question victory came so often and lighed upon your banner I beseech you by the mercies of God and by what ever is dear or near unto you that you would not expose us by your authority to the wills of those who are so straitned in their principles as their affections in brotherly toleration are shut up against us likewise but that all your Acts of Grace like the Orders of Heaven issuing out from your great Master may impartially look to the good of all I cannot with the zeal of Arminius petition your Highness for a National Synod and to establish Ecclesiastick Sanctions by civill authority left in have the same event or somwhat An. 1618 1619. worse with the Dort-Conference but salving the honor and consciences of those Gentlemen the commissioners for Approbation of Ministers I must needs think the nature of Orthodox and Heterodox would be better prov'd by a subscription to a known Confession of Faith drawn up in Scripture terms phrases according to which the Preachers of the Gospel might ought to frame and level their judgments and doctrines then by the sudden and extempore resolves to a few unpredimeditated Questions till the present occasion lockt up in the breasts of some particular men And this I am bold to offer to your Lordship not as to one of Machiavells Princes who will not follow Religion too close at the heels or to a Roman Gallio who careth for none of these things but as to a good Josiah whose heart melted at the hearing of the Law and covenanted with his God to take away all the abominations out of all the Countreys that pertained 2 Chron. 34 35. to the Children of Israel That no Pharaoh Necho may come up against you and the people of this Land but that peace and prosperity may attend You and your Name be as apretious oyntment poured out upon the inhabitants of Zion is the unfeigned Prayer of My Lord Your Highness's most humble Servant Tobias Conyers June 5. 1655. To the CHRISTIAN READER IT s the chief intent of the Author as far as I can

a private person Lastly By this means I should have yeelded the Convention some right and prerogative over mee which it neither hath nor I could give considering my place without injuring those our common Magistrate would set over me Therefore Equitie did not more constrain me then Necessity to repudiate this conference yet might they have obtained their desire if they would have imbraced a private Debate of all the Articles of Christian Faith as ● offered them this being more accommodate to a mutual edification where every one as the manner is may speak with freedome and familiarity then the other where the Formalities of De●utations are observed Neither was there the least ground why they should shew themselves so hard to be intreated in this case when every one might have done it himself having further delivered my mind herein that whatever should be transacted by us should abide with us and not pass abroad to any which if they had consented to I doubt not but we had either satisfied one another or at last made appear that no damage could accrue upon this our mutual controversie to the Truth necessary to salvation godliness or christian peace To omit these things I cannot give an account to my self how these rumours are consistent one with another I am complain'd of for not declaring my judgement and yet in my own Countrey and forraign parts I am inveigh'd against as if I indeavoured the introduction of some impure Novel and false Tenents in Church and Christian Religion If I declare not my judgment whence is the unsoundness of it manifest If I explicate not my self how can I bring in any falsities If they be nothing but suspitions obtruded upon me it 's against the rule of Charity to attribute so much to them But I am reported to express my selfe in some things but not in all yet even in them it 's not darkly manifest whither I tend That 's to be here observed whether any thing delivered by me be judged contrary to the Word of God or the Confession of the Belgick Churches If the last * Not agreeing with the Belgick Confession be proved that I have taught any thing contrary to that I ingaged my self by my own subscription I am liable to punishment if the first * Contrary to the Word of God be made good I ought to be much more strictly dealt with and obliged either to recant or to lay aside my place especially if the heads of doctrine were notoriously injurious to the honour of God and salvation of men But if they were found neither to clash with the Word of God nor the Belgick Confession neither the inferences depending upon them according to the Rule of the Schoolmen The consequences of a doctrine being false the doctrine is false likewise and so on the contrary One of these ought to have been done either a charge brought in against me or a discrediting the reports of me The later I wished for the first I feared not notwithstanding the one and thirty Articles dispersed every where under my name to the great prejudice of me were noted by persons of great quality into whose hands they were given with what unsavouriness they were framed with what faith and conscience they were imposed upon me But I expect to hear Why did you not to avoyd these commotions and to satisfie so many Ministers fully open your selfe to your fellow-brethren in the whole matter of Religion either for your own timely instruction or their seasonable preparation to a mutuall conference Three inconveniences deterred me from this Least First my judgment professed should afford matter to them to frame an Action against me 2. Least the same should be disquieted and refuted in their Pulpits and Academical Disputes 3. Least it should be transmitted to Forraign Universities and Churches with hope of obtaining a condemnatory sentence against it and of bearing me down this way that I had weighty cause to fear all these things were not hard for me from the Tenents and Writings of some of them clearly to demonstrate That which respects my Infortion or instruction which I might hope from thence so it is there being besides my selfe many others who had drawn up their meditations in the matters of Religion instruction could not so profitably be administer'd any where as in the place of our joynt appearance where a Definitive Sentence as they call it might and ought to be pronounced as for my brethrens seasonable Preparation to the Conference certainly it would be Then most commodious When every one have produced their meditations together and so the reason of all things at once might be had And thus I have washed away the things chiefly cast upon me and come to discharge my promise and execute the commands which you my Lords the Noble and Potent Sates have laid upon me being confident hence no prejudice will arise either to my person or judgment in that obedience ariseth from it which next after God and according to God I owe to this honorable Assembly The first and chief b●anch in Religion upon which I have fixed my thoughts for these many years last past is the Predestination of God That is the election and reprobation of men to life and death making my entrance here I le first explain what some have delivered in our Churches and this University of Leyden both in words and writings concerning it then manifesting my thoughts upon that I wil lastly proceed to a Declaration of my own judgment in this point The Teachers in our Churches are not at oneness and simplicity in their judgments touching this doctrine but various and different amongst themselves The opinion of those who take the high and rigid way as 't is every where contained in their writings is this 1. That God by an eternal and immutable decree out of men not considered as made much less as fallen hath predestinated some to everlasting life others to eternal destruction without any intuition or respect to righteousness or sin obedience or disobedience of his pure good pleasure to demonstrate the glory of his justice and mercy or as others his saving grace wisdome and most free power 2. Besides this decree God to have fore-appointed some certain means belonging to the execution thereof and this by an everlasting and unchangeable Ordination these meanes are necessarily to follow by vertue of the preceding decree and unavoidably to lead him that is predestinated to his fore-appointed end Some of these Meanes lying in Common appertaining joyntly to the decree of Election and Reprobation others in special respecting each 3. Means common to both are three First the Creation of Man in the right state of Originall righteousnesse or according to the image and likeness of God in Righteousness and holiness Second the permission of the fall of Adam or the Ordination of God that man should sin and become vitious The Third the losing or the taking away of Originall Righteousness and the

is imprisoned because he differs from Zeno. O miserable times the doctrine of the Gospell obscured with strange and forraign disputes The dissent of the Danish Churches in general is evident from the writings of Nicholas Hemminge in his Treatife of Universal grace where he thus states the Controversie with his Adversaries Whether the Elect believe or Believers are elected Those who assert the first he judges them to agree with the doctrine of the Manichees and Stoicks those of the later perswasion with Moses and the Prophets Christ and his Apostles Further Many in our owne Countrey do so ill resent this doctrine as they have openly profess'd they neither can nor will have communion with our Church Some that have joyned themselves yet with this protestation that they could not close with this opinion and not a few upon the score of Predestination onely have fallen away from our Churches who have been of the same minde with us others threatning to leave us unless they were satisfied the Church was not of this judgement Certainly there is no doctrinal point the Papists Anabaptists and Lutherans do more sharply oppose and by whose means procure greater envy to our Church casting an Odium upon all the Doctrines thereof as if there were no blasphemy against God so dreadful either utterable or imaginable which according to this opinion of our Teachers might not upon good consequence bee deduced from this Predestination Lastly There was rarely ever any difficulty or controversie in these our Churches all along since the times of Reformation which hath not had its rise from this Doctrine or been in some conjunction with it For the truth of this wee may recollect the contests at Leyden in the matter of Coolhasius those at Gouda in the business of Herman Herberts those at Horn about Cornelius Wigyer and Medenblick in the cause of Taco Sibrand And this was not the least motive inducing me to a diligent animadvertency of this point endeavouring that no damage accrue thereby unto our Churches the Papacy hence geting ground whose ruin as of the Kingdome of Antichrist all pious Teachers ought to wish studiously seek and as much as in them lies pursue And this in brief is that I have meditated upon this Doctrine of Predestination as it hath in all faithfulness been propounded by mee from the Authours thereof not affixing the least syllable to them which I cannot clearly prove from their own writings Others of our Teachers do hold forth the Doctrine of Predestination with some diffrence from the former and that two several wayes which I will briefly run through The Judgement of some of them is this First That God hath purposed in himself by an Eternal and Immutable Decree out of the lump of mankinde to make the lesser part for his good pleasure partakers of grace and glory to the praise of his renowned Mercy but by his preterition to leave the greater part in the state of Nature impotent to supernatural things and not communicate to them that saving and spiritual grace by which their nature yet whole and integrate might be establish'd or corrupted and depraved restored to the demonstration of his Liberty but afterward being made peccant and culpable to punish them with eternal death for the illustration of his Justice Secondly Predestination which word with these men is taken in the strict sense for Election and opposed to Reprobation is considerable in respect of the end and the means leading thereunto In respect of the end which is salvation and a manifesto of his glorious grace Man 's consider'd absolutely and indifferently in his own nature in reference to the means he is looked upon as of himself and in himself perishing and as guilty in Adam Thirdly In the Decree touching the end these gradations are observable Gods prescience by which he foreknew the predestinate then his prefinition by which he preordain'd the salvation of those whom he foreknew First By electing them from eternity then by preparing grace for them in this life and glory in the life to come Fourthly Means appertaining to the execution of this Predestination are to be Christ himself then efficacious calling to faith in him whence ariseth Justification and then the gift of perseverance to the end Fifthly Reprobation as we are capable of understanding it consists of two acts Preterition and Predamnation the first antecedaneous to all things causes which are either in them or exist by them i. e. beholding man absolutely and indifferently under no consideration of sin Sixthly To execute this act of Preterition two means to be fore-appointed Dereliction in the state of Nature uncapable of supernatural performances and Non-communication of grace whereby their nature uncorrupted might be confirm'd or depraved might be restored Seventhly Predamnation likewise to precede all things yet not without the prescience of the causes of damnation God in his foreknowledge beholding man as an offender and guilty of death in Adam therefore liable to perish out of the necessity imposed upon him by Divine Justice Eighthly The means ordained to put into execution this Predamnation 1. Just desertion and that 's either of Exploration wherein God conferres not his grace or of Punishment when God deprives man of all his salutiferous gifts and delivers him up into the power of Satan 2. Means hardening and those things that accompany it to the real damnation of the Reprobate Others declare their Opinion thus The second Opinion concerning Predestination First That God willing to decree from eternity the Election of particular persons Reprobation of others looked upon mankind not onely as made but as fallen and corrupted and therefore guilty of Malediction from which he determined freely by his grace to save some for a declarative of his Mercy and leave others under the curse in just Judgement for a manifesto of his Justice and this without any consideration had of Repentance and Faith in the one or Infidelity and Impenitence in the other Secondly The special means See the stating of the first opinion particularly belonging to the execution of this Decree of Election and Reprobation are to be the same with those laid down in the stating of the first Opinion excepting those in common appertaining jointly to both for the judgement of these men we now represent makes not the fall of man as a means preordain'd to the accomplishment of the preceding Decree of Predestination but onely as a proaeresis or an occasion administred for the framing hereof Both of these Opinions according Arminius examines these Opinions to their outward shape do in this only differ from the first that they neither place Creation nor the fall as a middle cause fore-appointed of God to execute this preceding Decree of Predestination though the two later themselves agree not concerning the Fall The first of them propounds Election in respect of the end and preterition the first part of Reprobation as preceding the fall the second as both of them