The nature of the _redemption_ it preached was likewise everywhere the same. It was not a redemption from the dominion of sin, but by denying that there was any such thing as sin. Whether it taught that the simple practical knowledge of this fact was all the redemption necessary, or that some initiatory rite was requisite to give that knowledge, or that a full knowledge of the Gnostic theory was to be superadded to qualify for _eternal_ redemption,—whether it led its votaries to defy the God of the Old Testament, or taught them mystic forms by which to elude him when sitting in judgment, it all amounted to the same thing. Lewdness of the grossest kind was denied to be any sin. There were, indeed, some who embraced the general theory, and with it believed that the flesh, as being the work of the Creator, was to be denied and mortified in every way, and who therefore decried marriage(730) itself, and forbad to eat flesh; but they were the few. The opposite use of the undervaluing of the flesh was the more popular and the more prevalent. Hitherto, perhaps, there has appeared but little in common with our own times; but there were other features of Gnosticism, in which it will appear to have been the parent of Antinomianism, even that of the most recent days. If any one is at all familiar with the high Calvinism of Toplady and his school, he will have found that it strongly resembled the Gnosticism of the age of Irenæus. It is of the essence of strict Calvinism to teach that _individuals_ are _inevitably_ destined to salvation; and so it was in Gnosticism. The spiritual seed must all be brought back again from earthly degradation; none can fail of being so, first or last. It may be destined to numerous transmigrations; but the spirit must finally be wafted upward to the eternal Fulness(731). Again, the spiritual pride and presumption of the genuine Antinomian is a very observable trait: his speaking of all as carnal who do not adopt his scheme; his placing religion not in holiness, but in _knowing_ the truth; his assumption of superior illumination; his declarations that none but those specially favoured _are capable_ of knowing the truth; all this is merely a repetition of Gnosticism. The Gnostic called himself spiritual, and the Churchman carnal(732); he was the elect and perfect, and the orthodox the ignorant and simple(733); he derived his very name from his making _knowledge_ paramount to all other things(734); he declared that none were capable of receiving his scheme but the spiritual seed(735); that to others good works were necessary and useful(736), but that their lot, however praiseworthy, could never be the same as that of the elect(737). So, again, the abuse of the doctrine of justification by faith is as early as those times. They declared that faith and love was the sum of their religion(738); that the law might be a restraint suited to inferior natures, but that to them it would be a degradation to submit their minds