CAMERON, JOHN (15791623)

This article appears in Volume V05, Page 108 of the Encyclopedia Britannica.

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CAMERON, JOHN (15791623) , Scottish theologian, was born at Glasgow about 1579, and received his early education in his native city. After having taught Greek in the university for twelve months, he removed to Bordeaux, where he was soon appointed a regent in the college of Bergerac. He did not remain long at Bordeaux, but accepted the offer of a chair of philosophy at

Sedan

SEDAN

, where he passed two years. He then returned to Bordeaux, and in the beginning of 1604 he was nominated one of the students of divinity who were maintained at the expense of the church, and who for the period of four years were at liberty to prosecute their studies in any

Protestant

PROTESTANT

seminary. During this period he acted as tutor to the two sons of Calignon, chancellor of Navarre. They spent one year at Paris, and two at Geneva, whence they removed to Heidelberg. In this university, on the 4th of April 16o8, he gave a public proof of his ability by maintaining a

series

SERIES (a Latin word from serere, to join)

of theses, De triplici Dei cum Homine Foedere, which were printed among his works. The same year he was recalled to Bordeaux, where he was appointed the colleague of Dr Primrose; and when Francis Gomarus was removed to Leiden, Cameron, in 1618, was appointed professor of divinity at Saumur, the principal seminary of the French Protestants.
In 162o the progress of the civil troubles in France obliged Cameron to seek

refuge

REFUGE

for himself and family in England. For a short time he read private lectures on divinity in London; and in 1622 the king appointed him principal of the university of Glasgow in the room of Robert Boyd, who had been removed from his office in consequence of his adherence to Presbyterian-ism. Cameron was prepared to accept Episcopacy, and wascordially disliked for his adherence to the doctrine of passive obedience. He resigned his office in less than a year.
He returned to France, and lived at Saumur. After an interval of a year he was appointed professor of divinity at

Montauban

MONTAUBAN
MONTAUBAN, ARTHUR DE (d. 1479)

. The country was still torn by civil and religious dissensions; and Cameron excited the indignation of the more strenuous adherents of his own party. He withdrew to the neighbouring town of

Moissac

MOISSAC

; but he soon returned to

Montauban

MONTAUBAN
MONTAUBAN, ARTHUR DE (d. 1479)

, and a few days afterwards he died at the age of about

forty

FORTY

-six. Cameron left by his first wife several children, whose maintenance was undertaken by the

Protestant

PROTESTANT

churches in France. All his works were published after his death.
His name has a distinct place in the development of Calvinistic theology in Europe. He and his followers maintained that the will of man is determined by the

practical

PRACTICAL

judgment of the mind; that the cause of men's doing good or evil proceeds from the knowledge which God infuses into them; and that God does not move the will physically, but only morally, by virtue of its dependence on the judgment of the mind. This peculiar doctrine of grace and free-will was adopted by

Amyraut

AMYRAUT, MOSES (1506-1664)

, Cappel, Bochart, Daille and others of the more learned among the Reformed ministers, who dissented from Calvin's. The Cameronites (not to be confused with the Scottish sect called Cameronians) are moderate Calvinists, and approach to the

opinion

OPINION (Lat. opinio, from opinari, to think)

of the Arminians. They are also called Universalists, as holding the universal reference of Christ's death, and sometimes Amyrald= ists. The rigid adherents to the synod of Dort accused them of Pelagianism, and even of Manichaeism, and the controversy between the parties was carried on with great zeal; yet the whole question between them was only, whether the will of man is determined by the immediate action of God upon it, or by the intervention of a knowledge which God impresses on the mind.

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