Fathers

Two Dissertations · §84

Cap. 6 Arg. 3 Obj. 1–2: Preacher neglect and ancestral contempt do not bind God

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Some meet this argument by saying the gospel is not preached everywhere less because God fails to send preachers than because those who are sent refuse to go. So Corvinus against Tilenus, page 105. But if God, by his goodness and justice, as if by a kind of congruence, and with Christ’s death supposed, were bound to communicate sufficient means of application to everyone, he would not let anyone be cheated of an owed benefit by another’s carelessness—least of all a benefit without which no salvation can be hoped for. It is even a contradiction to say that by ordinary law God provides and administers to all these means that look to applying Christ, and yet withholds them from some because of the preachers’ neglect—when the very care of the preachers would have to be counted among those means, without which knowledge and application of the Christ who is preached cannot be had.

Further, if God’s goodness or justice required that these means of applying Christ be administered to all, he would without doubt have kindled in at least some preachers the will and care to preach and carry the gospel to every nation. He himself knows how to thrust laborers into the harvest according to his good pleasure. Finally, what preacher-neglect explains that two hundred years ago the gospel was preached by no one among the Americans, when no one had even dreamed those nations existed? We must therefore rise to a higher cause: God’s free good pleasure in granting or denying these means. By a special providence he sees to it that they are administered to peoples, or not administered, through his ministers—as Acts 16:6 and following shows: “They were forbidden to speak the word of God in Asia, and they were intending to go into Bithynia, and the Spirit did not permit them,” and so on.

Second, they answer that those long without evangelical grace had already repudiated it in their ancestors, and so the descendants are rightly stripped of the gospel proclamation their ancestors despised; therefore the fact that some are not lit by the gospel’s saving light should not be referred to God’s absolute will. But this does not hang with their own views. If God, with an eye to Christ’s death, is bound to administer sufficient means of salvation to all people, it is hardly fair that, because ancestors despised the preached word in Noah’s day, the gospel should be denied to their posterity after many thousands of years. If—Adam’s sin notwithstanding—Christ’s death has (on their showing) secured that sufficient means of salvation be administered to all, it is alien to reason and equity to break that quasi-ordinary law on the pretext of sins committed by any other ancestors of ours.

Just as God could justly deny any spiritual benefit to Adam’s posterity because of Adam’s own sin, so we grant that from other ancestors’ sins God may also take occasion to deny us any free benefit. But if by Christ’s death, with God’s goodness concurring, a law has been set about administering the means of grace, then just as God will not abrogate that quasi-statute because of Adam’s sin—who bore in himself the person of all his posterity—so it is far less fitting that posterity be robbed of this benefit because of the sins of others who do not sustain that common person of the human race. They flee in vain to ancestral sins to explain the denial of a thing which, by the virtue of Christ’s death and of divine goodness, they themselves claim was prepared for all and each by divine decree and as if owed by fixed law.

Latin

Sed huic argumento occurrunt nonnulli respondendo, Quod Evangelium ubique non praedicetur, causa non tam haec est, quod a Deo non mittantur qui praedicent, quam quod qui mittuntur ire recusent. Sic Corvinus, contra Tilenum, pag. 105. Verum si Deus ratione bonitatis suae & justitiae, quasi ex congruitate quadam, Christi morte supposita, teneretur media applicationis sufficientia omnibus communicare, non sineret quenquam ob incuriam alterius debito beneficio fraudari, praesertim tali, absque quo nulla salus est sperabilis. Imo contradictionem implicat, Deum ex lege ordinaria providere & administrare omnibus haec media ad Christi applicationem spectantia, & quibusdam eadem non administrare, obstante scilicet praedicatorum incuria: Cum ipsa cura praedicatorum non esset annumeranda hisce mediis, sine quibus cognitio & applicatio Christi praedicati haberi nequit. Porro, Si Dei bonitas aut justitia hoc requireret, ut haec media Christi applicandi omnibus administrarentur, proculdubio in aliquibus saltem praedicatoribus hunc animum & hanc curam praedicandi & proferendi Evangelii ad singulas nationes accendisset. Ipse enim est qui operarios pro beneplacito suo novit in messem protrudere. Denique quae incuria praedicatorum in causa fuit, quod ducentis ab hinc annis Evangelium Americanis a nemine fuit praedicatum, quando de hisce nationibus nemo per somnium cogitaverat? Redeundum itaque est ad causam altiorem, nempe liberum Dei beneplacitum in hisce mediis gratificandis, aut negandis, qui per specialem quandam providentiam ea procurat administranda populis, vel non administranda per ministros suos, ut videre licet Actor. xvi. 6 &c. Vetiti sunt loqui verbum Dei in Asia, & tendebant ire in Bithyniam, & non permisit Spiritus, &c. Secundo respondent, eos qui longo tempore gratia Evangelica caruerunt, eam a majoribus suis repudiavisse: & sic posteros merito privari praeconio Evangelii, quod majores illorum contempserunt: Non itaque ad absolutam Dei voluntatem referendum esse, quod quidam salutari luce Evangelii non illustrentur. Sed neque haec bene cohaerent cum istorum placitis. Nam si Deus, ad mortem Christi habito respectu, omnibus hominibus tenetur media salutis sufficienter administrare, parum aequum videtur ut, propter praedicationem verbi temporibus Noachi a majoribus contemptam, Evangelium post multa annorum millia eorundem posteris denegatur. Si enim, non obstante Adami peccato, Christi morte impetratum sit (ex istorum sententia) ut media salutis sufficientia omnibus administrentur, a ratione & aequitate alienum est, hanc legem quasi ordinariam infringere, praetextu peccatorum ab aliis quibuscunque majoribus nostris commissorum. Sicut igitur propter ipsum Adami peccatum Deus juste possit posteris ejus quodvis beneficium spirituale denegare, ita fatemur, ex peccatis aliorum majorum posse quoque Deum occasionem sumere negandi nobis quodvis beneficium gratuitum. Verum si Christi morte, Dei bonitate concurrente, lex stabilita sit de administrandis gratiae mediis; jam sicut propter Adami peccatum, qui gessit in se personam omnium suorum posterorum, Deus non vult hoc suum quasi statutum abrogare, ita propter peccata aliorum, qui minime sustinent hanc communem humani generis personam, multo minus consentaneum est ut posteri hoc beneficio priventur. Frustra igitur ad peccata majorum confugiunt, ut ejus rei negatae rationem reddant, quam virtute mortis Christi ac bonitatis Divinae omnibus & singulis, ex decreto Divino praeparatam atque statuta lege quasi debitam, praefitentur.

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.

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