sionsion. The rubric or marginal note is “Dr. Du Molyn, History Reader of the University, admitted by the Visitors, Oct. the 10th, 1648.”[1]
“Septemb : 14o 1648.
“At the Committee of Lords and Commons for the Reformation of the Universitie of Oxon:
“Whereas it appeared to this Committee that Mr. Robert Waringe, the pretended Historie Reader of the Universitie of Oxford, hath not submitted to the authority of Parliament in the Visitation, nor delivered upp the Insignia of his office according to a former order of this Committee being thereunto required when he was Proctor of the said Universitie, and being chosen into the place of History Reader by Doctor Fell, pretended Vice-Chancellor and Heades of Houses when the Universitie was under Visitation, and contrary to the Articles of the Surrender of Oxon : as by a Letter from the Generall is declared : And whereas it was this day resolved by this Committee that for an effectual remedy hereof the said Mr. Robt : Waring, the pretended History Reader, be removed from the said place, and that Dr. Lewis Du Molyn, recommended upon good testimony for a person of piety and learning, be History Reader : It is Ordered by this Committee, that the sayd Doctor Lewis Du Molyn be, and hereby he is constituted and established, History Reader of the said Universitie of Oxon in the place of the said Mr. Robert Waring, pretended Historie Reader, and shall enjoy and have all profitts, priviledges, advantages and benefitts by any statute, custome, or right, belonging to the said place.
Francis Rous.”
Oct. 10.
“Ordered : That Dr. Du Mullyns, upon his Petition, be dispensed with for his readinge the present Terme as History Reader; saveing his first Lecture.”
The Royalist Commissioners turned him out soon after 1660, and he retired to Westminster. He had adopted the Independent theory of church government, and he worshipped with the Nonconformists. He is described as of a hot and hasty temper, no doubt aggravated by the intolerance with which he was treated by the ruling powers in Church and State, and even (it is said) by his own brother, the Prebendary. Otherwise he was a sociable and agreeable member of society, especially of literary society. In 1678 Rou met him in London, and describes him as d’ un caractere tout singulier: he said that he had translated Rou’s Chronological Tables into English, and that a nobleman would be at the expense of engraving and publishing them, if Rou consented. That consent was refused (very unwisely, for afterwards they were pirated and appeared as the production of a Dr. Tallents). At a much earlier date Louis Du Moulin got into controversy with Richard Baxter, publishing under the pseudonym of Ludiomseus Colvinus, instead of his Latinised name, Ludovicus Molinaeus. Baxter concludes his account of these contests by declaring, “all these things were so far from alienating the esteem and affection of the Doctor, that he is now at this day one of those friends who are injurious to the honour of their own understandings by overvaluing me, and would fain have spent his time in translating some of my books into the French tongue.” Again, in 1671, Baxter writes, “Dr. Ludov : Molineus was so vehemently set upon the crying down of the Papal and Prelatical Government, that he thought it was that he was sent into the world, for to convince princes that all government was in themselves, and that no proper government (but only persuasion) belonged to the churches. To which end he wrote his Paraenesis contra cedificatores imperii in imperio, and his Papa Ultrajectinus, and other tractates, and thrust them on me to make me of his mind, and at last wrote his Jugulum Causea with no less than seventy epistles directed to princes and men of interest, among which he was pleased to put one to me. The good man meant rightly in the main, but had not a head sufficiently accurate for such a controversy, and so could not perceive that anything could be called properly Government, that was, in no way, co-active [co-ercive] by corporal penalties. To turn him from the Erastian extreme and to end that controversy by a reconciliation, I published An Hundred Propositions conciliatory, on the difference between the magistrate’s power and the pastor’s.”
It was as to the doctrines of personal salvation, that Louis Du Moulin seems to have agreed with Baxter, who, along with entire reliance on the merits of Christ, curiously insisted on somehow introducing our own good works into the purchase-money of our salvation. Dr. John Owen, the opponent of Baxter in this matter, consistently excluded all our good works from the purchase-money, and placed them among the things freely purchased for — graciously presented to — actually possessed by the saved sinner. Du Moulin had enjoyed Dr. Owen’s friendship at Oxford, and had dedicated to him his Introductory Lecture. On this and similar knotty points of Divinity the outed professor wrote to the quondam Dean of Christ
- ↑ He printed his Introductory Lecture, with the title, “Oratio auspicalis cui subjuncta est laudatio clarissimi viri Gul : Camdeni, dicente Lud. Molinaeo, Prof. Hist. Camd. et. M.D. Oxon: 1652.” 4to. (Dedicated to John Owen, Dean of Christ Church.)
