in general, signifies a decree of God, whereby, from all eternity, he ordained such a concatenation of causes as must produce every event by a kind of fatal necessity, and manage all opposition.

In this sense, the Turks are great predestinarians; and on this account are much more daring in battle, and willingly encounter greater dangers that they would otherwise do.

Predestination, among Christians, is used, in a more limited sense, for a judgment or decree of God, whereby he has resolved, from all eternity, to save a certain number of persons, from thence called elect; so that the rest of mankind, being left in a state of impenitence, are said to be reprobated.

Nothing has occasioned more disputes than this thorny subject of predestination; the Lutherans speak of it with horror, while the Calvinists contend for it with great zeal; the Molinists and Jesuits preach it down as a most dangerous doctrine, whilst the Janeside assert it as an article of faith; the Arminians, Remonstrants, and Pelagians, are all avowed enemies to predestination.