Chapter XII The Religious Sentiments of Grotius:-Some Other of His Works
1. Subsequent History of Arminianism. 2. Grotius’s Religious Sentiments. 3. His Projects of Religious Pacification.
XII. 1
Subsequent History of Arminianism.
We left the Arminians under the iron arm of Prince Maurice:-He died in 1625:-We have mentioned, that Prince Frederick-Henry his brother, and successor in the Stadtholderate, adopted more moderate councils in their regard; that he recalled the Remonstrants, with some exceptions, from banishment; that many settled at Amsterdam and Rotterdam; and that the Arminians founded a college in the former city:-Episcopius was its first professor of theology:-it has never been without teachers, of eminence for learning, as Courcelles, Pollemberg, Limborch, Le Clerc, Cottemburgh, and Wetstein.
CHAP. XII.
It should be added, that the authority of the Synod of Dort insensibly declined:-its authority was never formally acknowledged by the provinces of Friesland, Zealand, Utrecht, Gueldreland and Gröningen: In 1651, they were induced to intimate that they would see with pleasure, the reformed religion maintained upon the footing, upon which it had been maintained and confirmed by the Synod of Dort; but this intimation was never considered to have the force of a legislative enactment.043
XII.1. History of Arminianism.
The theological system of the Arminians, after their return to Holland, underwent, if we credit Dr. Mosheim,044 a remarkable change. They appear, by his account, to have almost coincided with those, who exclude the necessity of divine grace in the work of conversion and sanctification; and think that Christ demands from men, rather virtue than faith; and has confined that belief, which is essential for salvation, to very few articles. Thus the modern Arminians, according to Dr. Mosheim, admit into their communion,-1st. All, with an exception of Catholics, who receive the holy scriptures; and more especially the New Testament; allowing at the same time to every individual, his own interpretation of the sacred books:-2dly. All whose lives are regulated by the law of God:-3dly. And all, who neither persecute nor bear ill will towards those who differ from them in their religious sentiments. Their Confession of Faith was drawn up by Episcopius in 1622: four divines of the established church of Holland published a Refutation of it: the authors of the Confession replied to it in the following year, by their Apology.
CHAP. XII.
James I. of England directed his theological representatives in the Synod of Dort, to join the members in the condemnation of the doctrines of Arminius:-but, when the English divines returned from that assembly, and gave a full account of its proceedings, the King and the greatest part of the English clergy expressed their dissatisfaction with them, and declared that the sentiments of Arminius on the divine decrees, was preferable to those of Calvin and Gomarus. By the exertions of Archbishop Laud, and afterwards, in consequence of the general tendency of the public mind to doctrines of mildness and comprehension, an Arminian construction of the English articles on predestination and free-will was adopted:-it has since prevailed,-and the Arminian creed, by the number of its secret or open adherents, has insensibly found admittance into every Protestant church.
History of Arminianism.
If we believe the celebrated Jurieu045, Arminianism even in its Socinian form, abounded, in less than a century, after the death of Arminius, in the United Provinces, and among the Hugonots of the adjacent part of France. By his account, the dispersion of the French Hugonots, in consequence of the revocation of the Edict of Nantes, revealed to the terrified reformers of the original school, the alarming secret of the preponderance of Socinianism in the reformed church. Its members, according to Jurieu, being no longer under the controul of the civil power, spread their Socinian principles every where, with the utmost activity and success: even in England, Jurieu professed to discover the effect of their exertions. He mentions that in 1698, thirty-four French refugee ministers residing in London addressed a letter to the synod, then sitting at Amsterdam, in which they declared, that Socinianism had spread so rapidly, that, if the ecclesiastical assemblies supplied no means for checking their growth, or used palliatives only, the mischief would be incurable.
CHAP. XII.
This charge, however, the Arminians have indignantly rejected. A writer in the Bibliotheque Germanique046 relates, that
“the celebrated Anthony Collins called on M. Le Clerc of Amsterdam: He was accompanied by some Frenchmen, of the fraternity of those, who think freely. They expected to find the religious opinions of Le Clerc in unison with their own, but, they were surprised to find the strong stand which he made in favour of revelation. He proved to them, with great strength of argument, the truth of the Christian religion. Jesus Christ, he told them, was born among the Jews; still, it was not the Jewish religion which he taught; neither was it the religion of the Pagan neighbourhood; but, a religion infinitely superior to both. One sees in it the most striking marks of divinity. The Christians, who followed, were incapable of imagining any thing so beautiful. Add to this, that the Christian religion is so excellently calculated for the good of society, that, if we did not derive so great a present from heaven, the good and safety of men would absolutely demand from them an equivalent.”
Throughout the conversation, M. Le Clerc reproached the Deists strongly, for the hatred, which they shewed to Christianity. He proved, that, by banishing it from the world,
“they would overturn whatever was most holy and respectable among men; break asunder the surest bonds of humanity; teach men to shake off the yoke of law; deprive them of their strongest incitement to virtue, and bereave them of their best comfort. What,” (he asked them) “do you substitute in its place? Can you flatter yourself, that you will discover something better? You expect, no doubt, that men will erect statues to you, for your exertions to deprive them of their religion! Permit me to tell you, that the part you act makes you odious and despicable in the eyes of all honest men.”
He finished the conversation by requesting Mr. Collins to bring him no more such visitors.
XII. 1. History of Arminians.
From the close of the 17th century, till the present time, Arminianism has been continually on the increase. It is a just observation of Mr. Gibbon, that “the disciples of Arminius must not be computed by their separate congregations.”
Doctor Maclaine says, it is certain, that the most eminent philosophers have been found among the Arminians. “If both Arminians and Calvinists,” says Mr. Evans, in the excellent work we have cited,
“claim a King (James I.), it is certain that the latter alone can boast of a Newton, a Locke, a Clarke, or a Boyle. Archbishop Usher is said to have lived a Calvinist; and died an Arminian. The members of the episcopal church in Scotland; the Moravians, the general Baptists, the Wesleyan Methodists, the Quakers or Friends, are Arminians; and it is supposed that a great proportion of the Kirk of Scotland teach the doctrines of Arminius, though they have a Calvinistic confession of faith. What a pity it is that the opinions either of Calvinists or Arminians,”
-(we beg leave to add: or any other Catholic or Protestant opinions whatsoever)-
“cannot in the eyes of some persons be held without a diminution of Christian charity!”