ccount which shall
follow.

[Sidenote: Liberties of doctrine]

There had been, since the unhappy Covenant was brought and so
generally taken in England, a liberty given or taken by many
Preachers--those those of London especially--to preach and be too
positive in the points of Universal Redemption, Predestination, and
those other depending upon these. Some of which preached, "That
all men were, before they came into this world, so predestinated to
salvation or damnation, that it was not in their power to sin so, as
to lose the first, nor by their most diligent endeavour to avoid the
latter. Others, that it was not so: because then God could not be said
to grieve for the death of a sinner, when he himself had made him
so by an inevitable decree, before he had so much as a being in this
world;" affirming therefore, "that man had some power left him to do
the will of God, because he was advised to work out his salvation with
fear and trembling;" maintaining, "that it is most certain every man
can do what he can to be saved;" and that "he that does what he can
to be saved, shall never be damned." And yet many that affirmed this
would confess, "That that grace, which is but a persuasive offer, and
left to us to receive, or refuse, is not that grace which shall bring
men to Heaven." Which truths, or untruths, or both, be they which they
will, did upon these, or the like occasions, come to be searched into,
and charitably debated betwixt Dr. Sanderson, Dr. Hammond, and Dr.
Pierce,--the now Reverend Dean of Salisbury,--of which I shall proceed
to give some account, but briefly.

[Sidenote: A charitable disquisition]

In the year 1648, the fifty-two London Ministers--then a fraternity of
Sion College in that City--had in a printed Declaration aspersed Dr.
Hammond most heinously, for that he had in his Practical Catechism
affirmed, that our Saviour died for the sins of all mankind. To
justify which truth, he presently makes a charitable reply--as 'tis
now printed in his works.--After which there were many letters passed
betwixt the said Dr. Hammond, Dr. Sanderson and Dr. Pierce, concerning
God's grace and decrees. Dr. Sanderson was with much unwillingness
drawn into this debate; for he declared it would prove uneasy to him,
who in his judgment of God's decrees differed with Dr. Hammond,--whom
he reverenced and loved dearly,--and would not therefore engage him
into a controversy, of which he could never hope to see an end: bu