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THE ARMINIAN CONTROVERSY.

CHAP. against any of them. But your strifes and quarrels are continual," &c.

III.

1612.

2

In these times, also, were the great troubles raised by the Arminians; who, as they greatly molested the whole State, so this city in particular, in which was the chief university; so as there were daily and hot disputes in the schools thereabouts. And as the students and other learned were divided in their opinions herein, so were the two professors or divinity readers themselves, the one daily teaching for it, and the other against it; which grew to that pass, that few of the disciples of the one would hear the other teach. But Mr. Robinson, although he taught thrice a week himself and wrote sundry books, besides, his manifold pains otherwise, yet he went constantly to hear their

The words any of are inserted from Hutchinson, ii. 454. Morton himself has it so in the Memorial, P. 21.

The fullest and best account of Arminianism, which Cotton Mather, (Magnalia, i. 46,) spitefully calls"that grand choke-weed of true Christianity," is contained in Brandt's History of the Reformation in the Low Countries. James Arminius, (Hermann), born at Oudewater in South Holland, in 1560, after having been fifteen years a minister at Amsterdam, was chosen professor of divinity at Leyden in 1603, and died Oct. 9, 1609, in his 49th year. The best Life of him is by Brandt. See also his Life by Nichols; Brandt's Hist. Ref. ii. 25-63; and Bayle, Dict. Hist. et Crit.

The following are the titles of the books which Robinson published after his arrival in Holland, and before the embarkation of the Pilgrims for America. 1. A Justification of Separation from the Church of England; against Mr.

Richard Bernard his invective, intituled the Separatists' Scheme. By John Robinson. 1610. 2. Of Religious Communion, private and public. With the silencing of the clamors raised by Mr. Thomas Helwisse against our retaining the baptism received in England, and administering of baptism unto infants. As also a survey of the confession of faith published in certain Conclusions by the remainders of Mr. Smith's company. By John Robinson. 1614. 3. Apologia Justa et Necessaria quorundam Christianorum, æque contumeliosè ac communiter dictorum Brownistarum sive Barrowistarum. Per Johannem Robinsonum, AngloLeidensem, suo et ecclesiæ nomine, cui præfigitur. 1619. This work was translated into English, and printed in 1644. The place where these books were printed is not mentioned on the title-page of either of them. It probably was Leyden, and Elder Brewster may have been the printer.

ROBINSON DISPUTES WITH EPISCOPIUS.

41

III.

readings, and heard as well one as the other. By CHAP. which means he was so well grounded in the controversy, and saw the force of all their arguments, and know the shifts of the adversary; and being himself very able, none was fitter to buckle with them than himself, as appeared by sundry disputes; so as he began to be terrible to the Arminians; which made Episcopius,' the Arminian professor, to put forth his best strength, and set out sundry theses, which by 1613. public dispute he would defend against all men. Now Polyander,' the other professor, and the chief preachers of the city, desired Mr. Robinson to dispute against him. But he was loth, being a stranger. Yet the other did importune him, and told him that such was the ability and nimbleness of wit of the adversary, that the truth would suffer if he did not help them; so as he condescended, and prepared himself against the time. And when the time came, the Lord did so help him to defend the truth and foil his adversary, as he put him to an apparent nonplus in this great and public audience. And the like he did two or three times upon such like occasions; the which, as it caused many to praise God that the truth had so famous a victory, so it procured him much honor and respect from those learned men and others which loved the truth.2

Simon Episcopius (Bisschop) and John Polyander were chosen professors of divinity in the university at Leyden in 1612. See Brandt, ii. 111; Limborch's Historia Vita Simonis Episcopii, p. 41; Calder's Memoirs of Episcopius, p. 128, and Bayle, Dict. Hist. et Crit.

Winslow, in his Brief Narra

tion, says, "Our pastor, Mr. Robin-
son, in the time when Arminianism
prevailed so much, at the request of
the most orthodox divines, as Poly-
ander, Festus Hommius, &c. dis-
puted daily against Episcopius (in
the Academy at Leyden) and others,
the grand champions of that error,
and had as good respect amongst

42

CHAP.
III.

to

THE DUTCH ESTEEM THE PILGRIMS.

Yea, so far were they from being weary of him and his people, or desiring their absence, as that it was 1608 said by some, of no mean note, that were it not for 1620. giving offence to the State of England,' they would have preferred him otherwise, if he would, and allowed them some public favor. Yea, when there was speech of their removal into these parts, sundry of note and eminency of that nation would have had them come under them; and for that end made them large offers.2

Now although I might allege many particulars and examples of the like kind to show the untruth and unlikelihood of this slander, yet these shall suffice,

them as any of their own divines."
I find, however, no account of this
disputation in Brandt or in any of
the biographers of Episcopius. Yet
John Hoornbeek, a professor at
Leyden, says in his Summa Contro-
versiarum Religionis, p. 741, (pub-
lished in 1658,)" Vir ille (Johannes
Robinsonus) gratus nostris, dum
vixit, fuit, et theologis Leidensibus
familiaris ac honoratus. Scripsit
præterea varia contra Arminianos :
frequens quippe et acer erat Epis-
copii in Academiâ adversarius et
opponens." Belknap judiciously
remarks concerning this disputa-
tion, "It is usual, on such occa-
sions, for the partisans on both
sides to claim the victory for their
respective champions. Whether it
were so at this time cannot be de-
termined, as we have no account
of the controversy from the Ar-
minian party." Amer. Biog. ii.

160.

'King James at this time exercised an unwarrantable influence in the Low Countries, both in civil and ecclesiastical affairs. He drove Vorstius from his professorship at

Leyden for his heresies, and labored to procure his banishinent; and prevented Ames from being elected to the same oflice. He seems to have kept an ambassador at the Hague chiefly to inform him of the progress of the theological disputes in that country. See Winwood's Memorials, iii. 293-6, 304, 310, 357. Sir Dudley Carleton's Letters, pp. 352, 373, 388, 435; Brandt, ii. 85, 97.

2

Henry Hudson, in the employment of the Dutch East India Company, discovered the river called by his name, in 1609. On this ground the Dutch claimed the adjoining territory; a few huts were erected at New York and Albany in 1613 and 1615; but no colony was settled in the New Netherlands till 1623. The Dutch West India Company was incorporated in 1621 for this object; but individuals had for some years before been meditating colonization on the Hudson; and the offers to the Pilgrims probably came from them. See Hazard's State Papers, i. 121.

THE PILGRIMS IN HOLLAND.

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seeing it was believed of few, being only raised by CHAP. the malice of some who labored their disgrace.1

Puritani d' Inghilterra, che per
occasion di commercio frequentan
l'Ollanda, e le altre Provincie Unite.

The English separatists in Holland attracted the notice of Cardinal Bentivoglio, who was the papal nuncio in that country from 1607 to I Puritani Inglesi sono in Am1616, though he misunderstood the sterdam quasi tutti per l'istesso cause of their leaving England, rispetto; e se ne trattengono alcuni supposing it to be commerce, and medesimamente per occasione di not religion. He says, " I Puritani mercantia nolla città di Midelburgo ancora vi son tolerati, cho sono i in Zelanda. Per ogni parte dunque, più puri e più rigidi Calvinisti, i e da tutti gli angoli, si può dire, quali non vogliono riconoscere au- delle Provincie Unite, s'odono i torità alcuna ne' magistrati politici latrati, e gli urli di tanti infetti loro sopra il governo de' loro ministri settarii." Relazione di Fiandra, heretici ; e sono quasi tutti de' parte ii. cap. ii.

III.

1608

to 1620.

CHAPTER IV.

SHOWING THE REASONS AND CAUSES OF THEIR REMOVAL.

CHAP.

AFTER they had lived in this city about eleven or IV. twelve years, (which is the more observable, being the

1609 whole time of that famous truce between that State 1620. and the Spaniards,) and sundry of them were taken

to

away by death, and many others began to be well stricken in years, the grave mistress experience having taught them many things, these prudent governors, with sundry of the sagest members, began both deeply 1617. to apprehend their present dangers and wisely to fore

see the future, and think of timely remedy. In the agitation of their thoughts and much discourse of particulars hereabout, they began to incline to this conclusion of removal to some other place; not out of any newfangledness, or other such like giddy humor, by which men are many times transported, to their great hurt and danger, but for sundry weighty and solid

1 After the war had been raging for more than thirty years between Spain and the United Provinces, by the mediation of Henry IV. of France and James I. of England, a truce of twelve years was concluded on the 9th of April, 1609.

See Bentivoglio, Della Guerra di Fiandra, parte iii. lib. viii., Opere Storiche, iv. 564; Grotius, p. 512, 569; Brandt, ii. 51; Watson's Philip III. p. 275; Grattan's Netherlands, p. 226.

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