Fathers

Two Dissertations · §61

Cap. 5 Mem. 2 Obj. 2: No injury when the gospel binds the fruit to faith

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Suppose that after accepting a sufficient ransom God still does not receive everyone into grace. Then, the objection says, he would wrong Christ, because he would not grant to human beings what Christ merited for them by dying. He would also deal unjustly with human beings, because he would still hold them bound by sins as by debts, even though Christ wiped out all those debts with his blood.

Neither side is injured. Not Christ: he himself did not will that the satisfaction he offered for the sins of the human race should avail for the actual reconciliation of particular persons unless their faith intervened, as we proved above. It would therefore be an insult to Christ if anyone were admitted into the actual fellowship and share of this grace while still not believing in Jesus Christ, the Author of salvation and our Redeemer. Nor are human beings injured when they are not received at once into God's favor simply on account of Christ's dying act, for that was neither owed to them nor promised. We cannot claim from Christ's death any benefit against or beyond the order and covenant established by God and by Christ and opened to us in the Gospel.

That order stands fixed, and the Gospel expressly sets this condition: the grace of reconciliation and the gift of eternal life overflow to sinners from Christ's death if they believe; if they do not, they remain bound by sins and perish in their unbelief. "Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; but whoever does not obey the Son will not see life, and the wrath of God remains on him" (John 3:36).

Latin

Si post acceptatum λυτρον sufficiens Deus non recipiat omnes in gratiam, Christo injurius esset, quia non gratificatur hominibus quod Christus moriendo pro illis meruit: cum hominibus etiam injuste ageret, quia eos peccatis, quasi debitis, constrictos adhuc tenet, quorum omnia debita Christus suo sanguine dispunxit. Neutri infertur injuria. Non Christo, quia ipse noluit satisfactionem a se praestitam pro peccatis humani generis valere ad actualem reconciliationem hominum singularium, nisi interveniente fide eorundem, ut supra probatum est. Esset igitur Christo contumeliosum, si in societatem & participationem actualem hujus gratiae quilibet admitteretur, nondum credens in Autorem salutis & Redemtorem nostrum Jesum Christum. Neque hominibus infertur injuria, eo quod non recipiantur illico in favorem Dei propter ipsum actum Christi morientis, quia hoc neque debitum fuit hominibus, neque promissum. Non possumus enim ex morte Christi vendicare nobis ullum beneficium contra, aut praeter ordinem ac pactum a Deo Christoque constitutum, nobisque in Evangelio patefactum. Est autem hic ordo stabilitus, haec conditio expresse posita in Evangelio, quod reconciliationis gratia & beneficium vitae aeternae ad peccatores ex morte Christi redundaret, si crederent; sin minus, manerent obstricti peccatis, & perirent in sua infidelitate: Qui credit in Filium, habet vitam aeternam; qui vero non obtemperat Filio, non videbit vitam, sed ira Dei manet super eum, Joh. iii. 36.

About this text

John Davenant — Dissertationes duae from the 1650 Cambridge Latin. Honest partial through De praedestinatione Cap. 1 subject tip; Cap. 1 mid-Thesis and remainder remain; De praedestinatione Cap. 1 Prolegomena IV distinguishing conditions tip; De praedestinatione Cap. II Variae (Pelagian opening) tip; De praedestinatione Cap. II Scholastici / Vasquez Arg. 1 tip; De praedestinatione Cap. II Arg. 2 praescientia tip; De praedestinatione Cap. II Arg. 3 (1 Cor. 2:9) tip; De praedestinatione Cap. II Arg. 4 (2 Tim. 2:21) tip; De praedestinatione Cap. II Arg. 5 (1 Tim. 2:4) tip; De praedestinatione Cap. II Arg. 6 (James 2:5) tip; De praedestinatione Cap. II Arg. 7 (Apoc. 3:11) tip; De praedestinatione Cap. III Rat. 1 (common inefficacious will) tip; De praedestinatione Cap. III Rat. 2 (Vasquez physical vs moral media) tip; De praedestinatione Cap. III Rat. 3 (king/prize / victory foresight) tip; De praedestinatione Cap. III Rat. 4 (optimum modus / crown of justice) tip; De praedestinatione Cap. III Rat. 5 (acceptor personarum) tip; De praedestinatione Cap. III Rat. 6 (misericordia/congruitas) tip; De praedestinatione Cap. III Rat. 7 (equal disposition) tip; De praedestinatione Cap. III Rat. 8 (few saved / major part) tip; De praedestinatione Cap. III Rat. 9 (Stephen / glory from others' sins) tip; De praedestinatione Cap. III Rat. 10 (mere beneplacitum / Predestinati) tip; De praedestinatione Cap. III reprobation ratio (foresight of sin) tip; De praedestinatione Cap. III Rat. 12 (efficacious election / free choice) tip; De praedestinatione Cap. III Rat. 13 (hortation/prayer) tip; De praedestinatione Cap. III Rat. 14 (decree/execution conformity) tip; De praedestinatione Cap. IV Arminianorum open tip; De praedestinatione Cap. IV Arg. 1 Sol tip; De praedestinatione Cap. IV Arg. 7 (τρόπος; Rom. 9:22) tip; De praedestinatione Cap. IV Arg. 8 (ordo exsecutionis) tip; De praedestinatione Cap. IV Arg. 9 (Christus fundamentum) tip; De praedestinatione Cap. V Obj. 1 (amor ad salutem) tip; De praedestinatione Cap. V Obj. 2 (actualis vitae datio) tip; De praedestinatione Cap. V Obj. 3 (qualis existens) tip; De praedestinatione Cap. V Obj. 4 (justitiae satisfactio) tip; De praedestinatione Cap. V Obj. 5 (natura vitae aeternae) tip; De praedestinatione Cap. V Obj. 6 (Christus a decreto) tip; De praedestinatione Cap. V Obj. 7 (Evangelium invertitur) tip; De praedestinatione Cap. V Obj. 8 (arcana/revelata) tip; De praedestinatione Cap. VI (Orthodoxa sententia) tip; De praedestinatione Cap. VI Arg. 2 (gratia specialis) tip; De praedestinatione Cap. VI Arg. 3 (Scripturae) tip; De praedestinatione Cap. VI Arg. 4 (vocatio) tip; De praedestinatione Cap. VI Arg. 5 (adjutorium) tip; De praedestinatione Cap. VI Arg. 7 (inconveniens) tip; De praedestinatione Cap. VI Arg. 8 (perseverantia) tip; De praedestinatione Cap. VI Arg. 9 (unica ratio) tip; De praedestinatione Cap. VI Arg. 10 (abyssus) tip; De praedestinatione Cap. VI Arg. 11 (efficacia) tip; De praedestinatione Cap. VI Arg. 12 (segregativum) tip; De praedestinatione Cap. VI Arg. 13 (pura gratia) tip; De praedestinatione Cap. VII open (reprobatio) tip; De praedestinatione Cap. VII Junius trifariam tip; De praedestinatione Cap. VIII open (adversariorum) tip; Cap. VIII peccata-causa tip; Cap. VIII fewer-reprobates tip; Cap. VIII Argentina tip; Cap. VIII dives-misericordia tip; Cap. VIII Corvinus tip into Cap. IX; Cap. IX Ab Adae tip; Cap. IX Ab Adae Christus omnibus+Minor tip; Cap. IX Arg. 3 Sol tip; Cap. IX vocatione Evangelica tip; Cap. IX vocatione Sol cont. tip; Cap. IX Arg. 6 Sol cont. tip.

English follows locked 1650 Cambridge Latin of De morte Christi Cap. 1-6 opening (origin + Thesis 1 + Cap. 2 Rat. 1-ultima + Cap. 3 Satisfit through Obj. 17 + Cap. 4 Thesis 2 tip through Mem. 1 close + Cap. 4 Mem. 2 through Mem. 3 tip + Cap. 4 Mem. 3 possible-faith through Thesis 2 close + Cap. 5 Thesis 3 tip through Mem. 2 Scripture close + Cap. 5 Mem. 2 Rat. 1-4 + Cap. 5 Mem. 2 Fathers tip + Cap. 5 Mem. 2 Huberiana objections tip through Obj. 3 Solut close + Cap. 5 Mem. 2 elect-from-eternity objections tip through Obj. 3 Solut close + Cap. 5 Mem. 2 Scripture elect objections tip through Cap. 5 thesis close + Cap. 6 opening tip through Arg. 1 close before Arg. 2), reconstructed from the Internet Archive PDF (pdftotext + tesseract) of the Roger Daniel folio with DjVu OCR check. The 1683 reprint was not used as copy-text. No modern English was copied.

Witnesses

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