trines, either entirely abandoned them, or modified them in súch a manner as to deprive them of all their scriptural effici ency.*

A fine passage from the judicious Hooker, on the abuse of the doctrine of Divine Authority, has been quoted, (page 207,) and an equally pertinent and nervous passage on the abuse of Spiritual Influence occurs in the Humble Address to the Lord Fairfax and the Council of War, in 1648, by Dr. HENRY HAMMOND, one of the mildest and most loyal of Divines, when those self-constituted arbiters of fallen Majesty had made the death of his ROYAL MASTER the subject of their deliberations. This pathetic appeal, after the manner of Luther and Melancthon when contending against the principles of the German Anabaptists, grounds its strong arguments on that doctrine of Divine Influence which connects itself with God's written word, and refuses to acknowledge any of those pretended inspirations which could not produce such a scriptural voucher. In one part the Doctor says: "My Lord, and Gentlemen, having among you some of the nearest of my blood, whose eternal weal must needs be very dear and precious to me, I am, in the fear of God, and in the prosecution and discharge of my duty and conscience, desirous to make this short address to you, to desire you, in the name and in the bowels of Jesus Christ and by all the obligations of christian duty and charity, to review some of the principles by which you seem to be acted, and whereon to ground the high enterprises which you have now in hand.

"And 1. Whereas you seem to believe, that God by his Spirit hath put it into your hearts to do what hitherto you have done, and whal now you profess to deliberate to do further against his Majesty, and all others, who are now fallen into your hands; I beseech you to consider, in the presence of that God to whose directions and Spirit you pretend, what safe ground you have for so doing. For, I shall suppose that the plain words of scripture are not that voice of THE SPIRIT which is your only guide in this matter; or if it be, I desire that charity from you, for myself and others, that you will point us out those scriptures. And I must profess to believe you bound in duty to God and man, and to yourselves, to satisfy this desire, to produce that voice of the Spirit in the received scriptures of God, which may say that to other christians also which it appears to do to you. But if God's Spirit be by you conceived to have spoken to you any other way than in or by some part of the written word, then my second request is, that you will declare to others the ground of this your persuasion, that you have received any such revelation from God; that so that pretended Spirit may, according to the rules prescribed by God in his acknowledged word, be tried and ex

See a preceding note on their abandonment of the doctrine of the Assurance of Salvation, page 141.

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amined regularly, whether it be of God or no, before the subjectmatter of such revelation be believed infallible, or accordingly built upon by you as your warrant or principle of acting any thing. For, there are evil spirits that come into the world, and which many times are by God permitted to seduce men, and, that they may do so the better, they constantly pretend to come from God, and assume Divine authority to recommend and authorize their delusions: a thing so ordinary in all ages, that the poet that would express the embroiling of a kingdom, thinks he cannot do it better than by bringing in Alecto, a Fury, with a message from heaven, to avenge such or such an injury. And of these our Saviour forewarns us, and tells us, that we shall know them by their fruits; and so directs us to judge of the truth of their pretensions by the goodness and commendableness, at least, justifiableness of their actions, and not to judge of their actions by their pretences. And beside these evil spirits from without, there is also an evil spirit within, a great deal of disguised wickedness in the heart of man, which, when it remains unmortified in those who believe themselves to be God's chosen saints and taught by him, is very apt to be mistaken for an inclination of God's Spirit, and a flame of zeal, when it is really the most contrary to it. And because there is so much danger, that what is not fetched from the acknowledged word of God may thus flow from one of these contrary principles, my next request is, that it be considered, whether when an angel from heaven, in case he should teach any other doctrine than what had been by Saint PAUL preached to his Galatians, were to be anathematized, and when the judgments are so fearful, which are pronounced against them which shall add to the words of that Prophecy which we now retain under the title of the Apocalypse or Revelation,-which being the last writing which is known to be dictated by the Spirit, may very probably contain a severe denunciation against all those who pretend to any revelation or prophecy after that concerning the christian church,-whether I say, it be not a matter of

In that fine sermon, The Christian's Obligations to Peace and Charity, which was preached in 1647 by Dr. Hammond, before his Majesty, then a prisoner in Carisbrooke Castle, this subject is treated with great ability. Take this extract as a specimen: "The Gospel spirit is that which, after the out-dating of prophecies, pretends to no other direction or incitation or impulsion of the Spirit, than that which lies visible in the New Testament,— the Spirit that incites us to perform those duties that the Word hath prescribed us,-the Spirit which, when it comes to be tried whether it be of God or no, pretends not, like Mahomet, to be a-talking with God whilst he lies foaming in an epileptic fit; but is content to be judged and discerned by the old plain doctrines of the gospel,-a regulated, authorized, ordinary, sober spirit. "Our Saviour hath contributed toward this great work by the exemplariness of his own practice in this kind :-not only in refusing to have the fire from heaven, that the Boanerges would have helped him to, against the Samaritans,-in reprehending of St. Peter's zeal, when it drew the sword in his Master's defence against the high priest's servants,—iu refusing the aid of angels from heaven against the heathens that attacked him ;-but, above all, by that answer of his to Pilate, If my kingdom were of this world, then should my servants fight,' &c. (John xviii, 36.); which was certainly part of that good confession before Pilate mentioned with such honour, 1 Tim.vi,13."

fear and just apprehension, to all those who shall affix or impose upon THE SPIRIT OF GOD (or pretend to be revealed to them from that,) any matter of doctrine or practice which acknowledges not the SPIRIT OF GOD speaking in the scripture for its only warrant or foundation? Or lastly, if from the scriptures you conceive it may be proved, that any part of the unction mentioned there so far belongs to you that it shall surely lead you into all truth; then, first, I beseech you to consider, whether you do not oblige yourselves, by the same or some other scripture, to prove to others, (and not only yourselves to be persuaded,) that you are those special saints of God to whom that privilege peculiarly belongs, and as clearly to demonstrate that all others, who conceive that that unction teaches them directly the contrary to that which you profess to be taught by it, are impious persons possest with that deluding spirit of which I now desire you to beware. And secondly, to examine whether this differencing of yourselves from others, this bearing witness to yourselves, and judging others,*beside that it will look like an act of most pharisaical presumption, and the very thing which, from Simon Magus downward, hath been observed in all hereticks, calling themselves

The following is a fair sample of the way in which the Calvinists were accustomed to esteem themselves the most orthodox and godly of professing christians, while others were regarded as heathen men and publicans! It is in reference to Mr. Barlee that Dr. Pierce thus writes: "I said, It is not so good a task to make men ORTHODOX CHRISTIANS, as to make them HONEST AND SINCERE ONES. Upon which Mr. B. is very angry. If he thinks it is better to know much, than to do well, and prefers a clear head before a sound and upright heart, what a case is he in! and how ill bath he done to commend his preaching! He adds a little after, that I and the pious men of my way, are great admirers and followers of a practical catechism [Dr. Hammond's] the sixth time published.' What greater commendation could he have given us, than that we follow the good which we admire? Would he have us know our lesson, but not observe and keep it? orthodox christians, but not practically honest and sincere ones too? If be, and the godly men of his way, (as he and they are wont to word it,) do neither admire nor follow that practical catechism, I wish they did, and beseech God they may. If they neither do nor will, I will rather be a pious than godly man. that is, (as he hath distinguished,) I will rather be of them whom he calls the pious, than of them whom he calls the godly.

"He calls his opinions in these matters, the very fundamentals of the covenant of grace;' but in which of the three Creeds shall we find either of them? What Popery is this, to obtrude upon us new articles of faith? I see King James was a wise, as well as a learned and orthodox man: And so was he of the lower House, who told Mr. Speaker in his speech, (An. Dom. 1640.) That if they were listened to who would extirpate episcopacy, (speaking of the Presbyterians,) they would, instead of every Bishop put down in a diocess, set up a Pope in every Parish: And if the Presbyterian assemblies should succeed, they would assume a power to excommunicate Kings, as well as other men: And if Kings were once excommunicated, men would not care what became of them." And Mr. Hooker (as I take it) doth say of such men, that they might do well enough to live in a Wilderness, but not in a Kingdom, or Common-wealth.' For all who differ from their opinions (that is, their mistakes,) shall be said to err in the very fundamentals of the covenant of grace,' and so be looked upon as Heathens, and so be used as vessels of wrath."

the spiritual, and all others animal carnal men,-whether it will not be also a great injustice at this time toward them who pretend not to learn any thing from this unction but what they receive from the doctrine of the gospel, in those books, which have, in effect and in the last result, the testimony of God from heaven that they are his true infallible word and dictate of his Spirit, and who desire to make no other use of this to their own advantage, but only to preserve them in a quiet possession of what by law belongs to them, and a capacity of making good their allegiance to him to whom they have often by law been required to swear it.*

This clause contains a brief but noble plea for the maintenance of the just rights and the loyal principles of the Arminian clergy. Instead of being vexed with sequestrations, they wished only for protection in the "quiet possession of what by law belonged to them," and for " a capacity of making good their allegiance to him," their king, "to whom they had often by law been required to swear it :" And, for both these lawful requests, they could plead express scriptural authority, in opposition to the unch ristian purposes to which the Calvínists applied that Divine sanction.

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Dr. Thomas Pierce, in 1657, adopted the following method of shewing, that the Episcopal Church of England, though then in a state of captivity, was established by the common law of the land. His litigious opponent had expressed his delight that the British divines at the Synod of Dort were the visible lawful representers of our mother, the Church of England there." This circumstance, though false in fact, was one on which the Calvinistic Dissenters from our church delighted to expatiate. Dr. Pierce thus turus the inference which the author intended to deduce : Besides, if those very few of our men at the Synod of Dort were the visible LAWFUL representers of our mother the Church of England,' how much more were all those who composed the Catechism, the Communion Book, the thirty-nine Articles of our English Church, to some of which some Articles of the Synod at Dort have a most evident repugnance? If so few men at Dort, who were purposely called out by the same King James, are to denominate the judgment of the whole Church of England, how much more may be said for the Commonprayer, which was not only subscribed to by all our English Divines at Dort, but was established by law and Canon, since the times of our reformation, by no less than five acts of Parliament in the days of Edward the sixth, and Queen Elizabeth ?-compiled by those reformers who were not persecutors, but Martyrs ?-and held in practice during the time of no less than four Princes? How much more [may be said] for EPISCOPACY, which is not only as ancient as CHRISTIANITY itself in this very land, but was particularly confirmed by Magna Charta, and by no less than 32 acts of Parliament? And in the Forty-second of King Edward the third, the first chapter enacteth, that if any statute be made to the contrary, it shall be holden for none. And in the Twenty-fifth of Edward the First (Chap. 1.2.) Magna Charta is declared to be the common law of the land. And I hope an ecclesiastical constitution, whether divine or human, is not the less valid for being corroborated by the whole civil power."

Such iutrepid conduct as this, in the arbitrary days of Cromwell, was in every respect worthy of a true sou of the Church of England. He was molested in various ways by the common disturbers of the peace of the Church; but he was too courageous to be intimidated by threats of sequestration, when peaceably engaged in the performance of a lawful duty. In his Divine Philanthropy Defended, he says: "I am told Mr. Barlee is angry that I am not thought worthy of sequestration, and that (for my sake only) he would be revenged upon the memory of one that is dead. And to fill up the measure of his comparison, he will have me to deserve as cutting a reproof, as that which Elymas received from Paul! (Acts xiii, 10.) After a wailing with floods of tears that my Triobulary Pamphlets' (as he was pleased

"A second principle which I must desire you to review, is that upon which you conclude, that God hath borne testimony to your cause by the many victories which he hath given you. This concluding of yours, first, proceeds upon a premise directly false in matter of fact: For, you say, that the KING, by taking up arms, made his appeal to heaven; which it is most certain that he never did. Nay, secondly, this concluding of yours will, by the same reason, infer that Christianity IS NOT, and that Mahumetism is the true religion; because when the Turks asserted one and the Greek church the other, and that difference begat a war betwixt them, it is clear that the Turks were successful, and the Greek church was most sadly wasted and subdued by them, and so remaineth to this hour in that unreturned captivity. Which will therefore be a fit opportunity to make you revert to the trying of that spirit (which inclines you thus to argue) by this touchstone: (1.) By considering and examining whether in the written word any thing be more frequent and visible than the sufferings of God's people, the shedding the blood of the saints, the fastening all kind of contumelies on such, particularly that reproach of Thou bloody man!, upon David who was a king after God's heart, the sending or permitting an host against the daily sacrifice to cast down the truth to the ground, and to practise and prosper. (2.) Whether it were not Rabshakeh's argument against the people's adhering to their lawful king Hezekiah, that his master's arms had been invincible? (3) Whether that saddest fate of Nebuchadnezzar, (who, for conquering of God's people and others, was by God stiled his hammer and battle-axe of the whole earth,) may not be expected the final lot of others also;-first, to destroy men, and then to be cast out into the field, to inhabit among beasts? (4) Whether it were not a crime complained of by the

to call them) had received the applause of no mean persons, and drawn disciples from their school;' he presently stirs up his brethren to finish the plot which they had begun of an Ecclesiastical association;' that, by their Presbyterian censures, such a sorcerer as I may be delivered up to the devil. When I compare these things with many like passages in his book, (especially page 232,) I cannot choose but conceive that he would threaten me into a silence; and hopes I may think it my safest way, to make as if I were nonplussed by him and his seniors. Much indeed might be done, if I were able to be afraid of such as fear not the Lord of Hosts: But I seriously profess I do not know which way to do it. For I have learned to distinguish betwixt things necessary, and things convenient. I hold it necessary to keep a GOOD CONSCIENCE; whereas it is but convenient to keep a GOOD LIVING. I know a man may be persecuted, and yet be saved."

Dr. Hammond here shews himself to be a better prophet than those whom he reprehends. Not only the soldiers whom the Doctor here addresses, but their Calvinistic Chaplains, and those who so expounded the Scriptures as to convert them into a sanction for rebellion, were by a wise retribution of Divine Providence severally punished for their reprehensible participation in these bloody transactions. Let it be granted, that many of those who in the reign of Charles the Second eagerly engaged in this punitive process, were not men distinguished for piety: This concession, however, is only another illustration of the same rule in the Divine Economy,-for God does not