Calvinistic Controversy. Fisk Wilbur
much candor, I trust, not to acknowledge it frankly, and too much moral courage to be afraid of the name. If he is not, the cause of truth and his own consistency of character imperiously demand an explanation. Until this point, therefore, is decided, farther arguments on the merits of the question in which we are supposed to be at issue, are useless.
I am not, however, quite ready to dismiss the review. I stated at the commencement it was difficult to pursue this controversy without alluding to the manner in which it had been conducted on the part of our Calvinistic brethren; but that there was less ground for objection in this article in the Spectator than in most others. There are some things in this article, however, that I cannot justify. I will state them frankly, though I trust in Christian friendship. I cannot approve of the reviewer’s use of terms: though, to my understanding, he has evidently given the doctrine of predestination not merely a new dress, but a new character, yet he more than intimates that it is the old doctrine with only a new method of explanation; and seriously and repeatedly complains of the author of the sermon for “confounding the fact of God’s foreordaining the voluntary actions of men with this or any other solution of that fact or theory as to the mode in which it comes to pass.” And so confident is the reviewer that he still believes in the fact of predestination, in the old Calvinistic sense, that in stating his sentiments on this subject he uses the same forms of expression which Calvinists have used, when their meaning was as distant from his as the two poles from each other. He tells us, for instance, that “God determined that the events which take place should take place in the very manner in which they do, and for the very ends.” Now if the writer mean what the words naturally imply, then he believes that, in the case of a finally impenitent sinner, God predetermined that all his sins should take place in the manner they did, and for the very end that he might be damned! Again he tells us, “God, in his eternal purpose, has predetermined all events.” And, quoting from the Assembly’s Catechism, “God, from all eternity, did freely and unchangeably ordain whatsoever comes to pass,” he tells us that this expresses essentially the views entertained by the orthodox Congregationalists of New-England, among whom, I suppose of course, he would include himself. Now, after what I have said of the reviewer’s Arminianism, I doubt not but some of my readers will be startled at these quotations, and be ready to accuse me of great credulity in the judgment I have formed of the writer’s sentiments. I shall exculpate myself, however, by saying, in the first place, that if there is any contradiction in the writer’s sentiments or language, it is not my fault, but his; and if I should attempt to reconcile them, perhaps the reviewer would not thank me for my officiousness. Beside, after what has been said, I feel safer in understanding the reviewer in an Arminian sense, because he and some others take it very ill of me that I have represented them as Calvinists. But, in fairness to the reviewer, it is presumed that he will not consider himself justly chargeable with contradiction. He has used these old terms, it is true, and thus has subscribed to the Calvinistic creed as positively as the staunchest Calvinist; but then, let it be understood, he has explained that creed, and defined the terms, and protests against being held responsible for any other construction than his own. Hence by God’s predetermining that sin should take place, in the very manner, and for the very ends it does – by God’s foreordaining whatsoever comes to pass – he only means that God foresaw that sin would certainly take place, and predetermined that he would not hinder it, either by refraining from creating moral agents, or by throwing a restraint upon them that would destroy their free agency. In short, that he would submit to it as an evil unavoidably incident to the best possible system, after doing all that he wisely could to prevent it! This is foreordaining sin!! This is predetermining that it should be!!! I cannot but express my deepest regret that a gentleman of the reviewer’s standing and learning should lend his aid and give his sanction to such a perversion of language – to such a confusion of tongues. We do not complain of the doctrine contained in the explanation; but we protest, in the name of all that is pure in language, in the name of all that is important in the sentiments conveyed by language, against such an abuse of terms. Alas for us! When will the watchmen see eye to eye! when will the Church be at peace! while our spiritual guides, our doctors in divinity, pursue this course? By what authority will the reviewer support this definition? Do the words predestinate, or foreordain, or decree mean, in common language, or even in their radical and critical definition, nothing more than to permit – not absolutely to hinder – to submit to as an unavoidable but offensive evil? The reviewer certainly will not pretend this. Much less do they mean this when used in a magisterial or authoritative sense, to express the mind and will of a superior or governor toward an inferior or a subject. – What is the decree of a king? What is the ordinance of a senate? What is the official determination of a legislative body? Let common sense and common usage answer the question. Not a man probably can be found, from the philosopher to the peasant, who would say these words would bear the explanation of the reviewer. Yet it is in this official and authoritative sense that theologians, and our reviewer among them, use these terms. The Assembly’s Catechism, as quoted by himself, says, “God, from all eternity, did, by the most wise and holy counsel of his own will, freely and unchangeably ordain,” &c. Now it would be a gross insult to common sense to say of such language as this, in the mouth of an earthly potentate, that the sovereign meant by this nothing more than that he permitted the existence of certain unavoidable, and in themselves, highly offensive evils in his kingdom, because he could not remove them without embarrassing the essential operations of his government. There is not, probably, a clearer case in the whole range of philology.
But the use of these terms by those who believe as I understand the reviewer to believe, is the more unjustifiable, because they are used by most Calvinistic authors in a different sense. – Why, then, should the reviewer, believing as he does, continue to use them in the symbols of his faith? Different persons might give different answers to such a question. For one, I would prefer he should answer it himself.
I cannot approve of the reviewer’s censures upon my manner of treating the doctrine of predestination. He accuses me of confounding the doctrine itself, with modes of explanation. He says they are perfectly distinct; and though some may have been unfortunate in their modes of explanation, and though he acknowledges my arguments bear against such, yet the fact of the doctrine itself is not thereby affected. His mode of explanation, for example, he thinks untouched by the arguments of the sermon. But his mode of explanation, as we have seen, turns the doctrine into Arminianism. And it would, perhaps, be no difficult matter to show, that any explanation of the doctrine, short of doing it away, would be exposed to all the weight of the arguments urged in the sermon. But the sermon was never written to oppose those who hold to the decrees of God in an Arminian sense. Why then does the reviewer complain of the sermon? Why does he so “deeply regret” that the author of the sermon “should come before the public with an attack on the faith of a large part of the Christian community, conducted in a way so obviously erroneous and unjust?” The sermon was against Calvinism, not Arminianism. It is true, the reviewer may say, the sermon alludes, in some parts, to the Calvinism of New-England, and therefore he felt himself implicated. But he certainly was not unless he is a New-England Calvinist – unless he believes that “God foreordains whatsoever comes to pass,” in the proper sense of those terms. Indeed, it seems that Calvinism, in its proper character, is as obnoxious to the reviewer, as to the author of the sermon; and the former seems to have taken this opportunity to show the nakedness of the system, and bring into notice a better doctrine. If so, is it safe that the reviewer should still accord to them their old symbols of faith? And is it just, that the author of the sermon should be held the defendant on the record, when the execution is issued against Calvinism itself? In answer to the former question, I would say, it is utterly unsafe, and never will be approved of, I believe, by Arminians. With respect to the latter question, if it is safer to attack Calvinism in this indirect way, I will not object, though it may seem at present to my disadvantage. But I cannot see that it would be safer – an open bold front always ends best. What if it should subject the reviewer, and the theological doctors in New-Haven generally, to the charge of heresy? Still they ought not to shrink from their responsibilities – they occupy a commanding influence among the Churches and over the candidates of their theological school, and that influence should be openly and decidedly directed to discountenance