[A golden chaine: or The description of theologie containing the order of the causes of saluation and damnation, according to Gods word; (Printed by Iohn Legat, printer to the Vniuersitie of Cambridge, 1600)]
William Perkins, born in the year of our Lord 1558 in Marston Jabbett, Warwickshire, did rise from modest origins to become a shining luminary in the reformed Church of England. Educated at Christ’s College, Cambridge, where he attained the degrees of Bachelor and Master of Arts, Perkins was elected Fellow of that College, a station in which he diligently exercised his gifts in the sacred discipline and did greatly profit the students in sound doctrine and holy conversation. Ordained within the ecclesiastical polity of the Church of England, Perkins served faithfully as lecturer at the renowned Church of Great St. Andrew’s, Cambridge. There, by the power of the Spirit, he did powerfully expound the Scriptures, laboring to reform men’s lives and to bring them into the obedience of Christ. His ministry was marked by an extraordinary zeal for experimental divinity, wherein he pressed upon men the necessity of true conversion, effectual calling, and a sanctified walk. Perkins excelled in the art of casuistry, providing godly counsel for tender consciences perplexed with the weight of sin, as demonstrated in his manifold treatises, among which The Golden Chaine and The Arte of Prophesying are eminent. He contended earnestly for the doctrines of grace, upholding predestination, the sufficiency of Christ’s atonement, and the authority of Scripture, all in the service of God’s glory and the edification of His elect. He departed this life in Cambridge in 1602, leaving a legacy both deep and wide, whereby his writings continue to guide souls in the straight and narrow path of godliness.
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Thus much shall suffice for the decree of Election, now followeth the decree of Reprobation.
The decree of Reprobation, is that part of predestination, whereby God, according to the most free and just purpose of his will, hath determined to reject certain men unto eternal destruction, and misery, and that to the praise of his justice.
Rom. 9.21. Hath not the potter power over the clay, to make of the same lump one vessel to honor, and another to dishonor? 1. Pet. 2.8. To them which stumble at the word, being disobedient, unto which thing they were even ordained. Jude v. 4. There are certain men crept in, which were before of old ordained to this condemnation. 1. Thess. 5.9. God hath not appointed us unto wrath but to salvation.
In the Scriptures Cain and Abel, Ishmael and Isaac, Esau and Jacob, are propounded unto us as types of mankind partly elected, and partly rejected.
Neither do we here set down any absolute decree of Damnation, as though we should think that any were condemned by the mere and alone will of God, without any causes inherent in such as are to be condemned. For unto the decree of God itself, there are certain means for the execution thereof annexed, and subordinate. And therefore, though we never do, or can separate God’s decree, and the means to execute the same, yet do we distinguish them, and do consider the purpose of God, sometimes by itself alone, and sometimes again not by itself, but with middle causes subordinate thereto. And in this second respect, Christ is said to be predestinate: but in the former, namely, as the decree is considered by itself, he is not predestinated, but together with God the Father, a Predestinator.
Again, the decree of God is secret:
I. Because it ariseth only from the good pleasure of God, unsearchable, & adored of the very angels themselves.
II. Because it is not known but by that which is after it, namely, by the effects thereof.