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OF

SIMON EPISCOPIUS,

THE CELEBRATED PUPIL OF ARMINIUS,

AND SUBSEQUENTLY

DOCTOR OF DIVINITY, AND PROFESSOR OF THEOLOGY IN THE
UNIVERSITY OF LEYDEN;

WHO WAS

CONDEMNED BY THE SYNOD OF DORT AS A DANGEROUS HERETIC, AND,
WITH SEVERAL OTHER MINISTERS, WAS SENTENCED TO PERPETUAL
BANISHMENT BY THE CIVIL AUTHORITIES OF HOLLAND, FOR
HOLDING THE DOCTRINE OF GENERAL REDEMPTION;

TO WHICH IS ADDED,

A BRIEF ACCOUNT OF THE SYNOD OF DORT;

AND OF

THE SUFFERINGS TO WHICH THE FOLLOWERS OF ARMINIUS WERE EXPOSED, IN
CONSEQUENCE OF THEIR ATTACHMENT TO HIS OPINIONS.

BY FREDERICK CALDER.

"Simon Episcopius, the disciple of Arminius, was admired even by his enemies, on account
of the depth of his judgment, the extent of his learning, and the force of his eloquence."
MOSHEIM.

"The Calvinists now punished with death those dissenters who had only followed the
examples of the most renowned of Protestant Reformers, by a rebellion against authority, for
the sake of maintaining the paramount sovereignty of reason."-SIR J. MACKINTOSH.

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THE subject of these memoirs lived in an age marked by fierce theological strife, as carried on between the followers of Calvin and Arminius. The prominent part he took in this conflict, with the extraordinary talents he displayed in defence of Arminianism, and the sufferings to which he was exposed, in consequence of his attachment to it, have given his name distinction in the religious history of the seventeenth century. Nevertheless, as an extended account of him is only to be found in foreign publications, it is hoped that the following Memoirs, chiefly selected from such works, will not be unacceptable.

The design of the writer in publishing this work is, to present an impartial portrait of the character of Episcopius, which has been greatly misrepresented by bigoted and prejudiced authors. The Synod of Dort, by which he was condemned as a heretic, divested of his honours as a scholar, deprived of his office as a professor, and excluded from the ministry, for defending the doctrines of Arminius, is particularly noticed in the following pages; whilst his banishment from Holland, the imprisonment of his brother ministers, the prohibition of the religious assemblies of the Remon

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