Thefe precepts, faith he, cut off mens excufe from ignorance, or Jaying I did not this because I did not know it was my duty; but then becaufe others, faith he, accufe God of being wanting in giving them power to do good, or inducing them to fin; against thefe men he cites that known paffage of the fon of Sirach, [God left man in the hands of his counfel, fi volueris, fervabis mandata, if he would to keep the commandments. He had fet before him fire and water, and to which of them he pleafed he might fretch forth his hand; he had placed life and death before him, and which he pleafed fhould be given him.] And then cries out, Ecce apertiffime videmus expreffum liberum humanæ voluntatis Arbitrium, behold here a very plain proof of the liberty of humane will, or an exprefs in what it confifts; and this, faith he, is alfo evident from all God's injunctions to do and keep his commandments; for quomodo jubet fi non eft liberum Arbitrium ? For how (or why) doth he command, if man hath not free will or power to obey? This therefore, if St. Auftin anfwers pertinently, must be the true import of thefe men's excufe, that they wanted free will, or power to obey God's precepts; and therefore he inquires (i) what do all God's commands fhew but the free will of man? Neque enim præciperentur nifi ho mo haberet propriam voluntatem qua divinis præceptis obedi ret; for they would not be commanded, if man had not that freedom of will by which he could obey them; and therefore in his book de fide against the Manichees, who denied that man had free will, or that it was, in poteftate hominis facere bene, aut male, in his power to do well or ill; he makes this an indication of their blindnefs, (k) quis enim non clamet ftultum effe præcepta dare ei cui liberum non eft quod præcipitur facere, et iniquum effe eum damnare cui non fuit poteftas juffa complere; et has injuftitias, et iniquitates miferi non intelligunt Deo fe adfcribere? For who, faith he, will not cry out that it is folly to command him who hath not liberty to do what is commanded, and that it is unjust to condemn him who hath it not in his power to do what is required; and yet thefe miferable men understand not that they afcribe this wickedness and injuflice to God? Whofoever, faith (1) Eufebius, doth industrioufly purfue, or command, or teach any thing, or exhort any man to obey, or not, to fin, or not; or reproves any for fin, or commends any for doing well, is he not thereby plainly convinced that he only retains the name of fate, to ev eprov naταλίπων τῷ παρ' ἡμῖν καὶ τῇ αὐτεξεσία, but leaves the allions to our liberty and our own power? (m) Clemens of Alexandria declares, that neither praifes nor reprehenfions, rewards or (i) ibid. Cap. 4.(k) Cap. 15.-(1) Præp. Evang. 1. 6. c. 6. p. 244.(m) Strom. 1. p. 311. A, funifliments are juft, μὴ τῆς ψυχῆς ἐχέσης τὴν ἐξεσίαν τῆς ὁρμῆς; καὶ ἀφορμῆς, ἀλλ ̓ ἀκεσία τῆς κακίας ἔσης, if the foul hath not the power of choofing, or abftaining, but evil is involuntary; yea, he makes this the very (n) foundation of falvation, without which there could be neither any reafonable baptifm, nor divine ordering of our natures, becaufe faith would not be in our own power. Sui Arbitrii eft anima, et in quam voluerit partem eft ei Fiberum declinare, the foul, faith (0) Origen, acts by her own choice, and it is free for her to incline to whatever part fhe will; and therefore God's judgment of her is just, because of her own accord the complies with good or bad monitors. Upon this fuppofition, faith he, it is that (p) good men are praised, and that God faith reafonably, well done good and faithful fervant; and again, O thou wicked and flothful fervant; that he faith to them of the right hand, come ye bleffed, &c. and to them of the left hand, depart from me ye curfed, &c. One of these two things are neceffary, faith (q) Epiphanius, yevéoews inapxxons, either that a neceffity arifing from our being born, there should be no judgment, διὰ τὸ τὸν πράττοντα ἐκ ἀφ' ἑαυτό πράττειν, because men act not freely; or if laws be justly made by God, and punishments threatened to, and inflicted on the wicked, and God's judgments be according to truth, there is no fate; for διὰ τὸν δύνασθαι ἁμαρτάνειν, καὶ μὴ ἁμαρτεῖν, τὸν μὲν διὰ τὰ ἁμαρ τήματα δικην ἀπ' αἰτεῖσθαι, τὸν δὲ ἔπαινον ἀπεκδέχεσθαι διὰ τὸ ἔν Epayέval, therefore is one punifhed for his fins, and another praised for his good works, because he hath it in his power to fin, or not. For how, faith (r) Theodoret, can he justly punifh a nature, ἀγαθὸν τὸ δράσαι μὴ δυναμένην, ἀλλὰ τοῖς τῆς και κίας πεπεδημένην δεσμοῖς, which had no power to do good, but was bound in the bonds of wickedness. And again, () God having made the rational nature aureon, with power over its own actions, averts men from evil things, and provokes thers to do what is good by laws and exhortations, εκ αναγκάζει δὲ μὴ βελομένην τῶν ἀμεινόνων μεταλαχεῖν, ἵνα μὴ παρακινήση τις opus Tñs news, but he doth not neceffitate the unwilling to embrace what is better, that he may not overturn the bounds of nature. Innumerable are the paffages of this nature which might be cited from the fathers; but thefe at present fhall fuffice, becaufe fome of them may be mentioned hereafter. (η) Ὥσε ἐδὲ βάπτισμα ἔτὶ ἔύλογον ἀλλ ̓ ἄθες, είμαι ἡ τῶν φύσεων αὐτοῖς ἐυρίσκεται διανομὴ τὸν θεμέλιον τῆς σωτηρίας τὴν ἑκάσιον πίςιν ἐκ ἔχεσα. Strom. 2. p. 363. D. (0) In Num. Hom. 20. Fol. 135. H.- -(P). In Ep. ad Rom. Edit. Huet. Tom. 2. p. 425, 426.—(9) Hær. 16. p 35.——(v) Tòm. 4. 269.—(ƒ) Adv. Gent. Serm. 5. p. 542. CHAPTER III. Propounding Arguments from Reafon to evince this Freedom of the Will from Neceffity. To proceed, fecondly, to the rational inducements to e vince this freedom of the will from neceffity, or a determination to one, i. e. either to good or evil only. I argue, SECTION 1.-ft. From what I have infifted on more largely in the preface to the third difcourfe, to fhew that God acts fuitably to our faculties; to wit, by the illumination of our understanding, and by perfuading of the will; for if God work only on the will by moral caufes, then lays he no neceffity upon it, fince moral caufes have no neceffarv influence on the effect, but move only by fuch perfuafions as the will may refift; as when St. Paul perfuaded the Corinthians to give alms. And whereas too many divines take this for granted, that though God hath laid no neceffity on man to do evil by his own decrees, yet fallen man lies under a neceffity of doing evil fince the fall, by reafon of that difability he hath contracted by it to do any thing which is truly good: I have demonftrated the falfhood of that fuppofition, in the fecond part of that difcourfe, Sec. 6 and thewed in Sec. 3. of the fate of the question in this discourse, that though the evil habits added to our natural corruption do render it exceeding difficult, they do not render it impoffible for them to do what is good and acceptable in the fight of God. SECTION II-Argument 2.-2dly. I argue from the received notion of the word; for as (a) Le Blanc obferves, according to the common fenfe of mankind, and the received ufe of fpeaking, that only is faid to be free for us to do; 1. Which it is in our power to do; 2. Which may be done otherwife than it is done; and 3. About which there is ground wife that for confultation and deliberation. Seeing then, neceffarium eft quod non poteft aliter fe habere, that only is necessary to be done one way which cannot be done otherwife; and that which is thus neceffary cannot be free, because that only is fo which may be done otherwife. 2dly. Seeing that is not in our * Sup. 188. 2.32. (a) De Lib. Arbit. part. 2. Sec, 20, power to omit which we are determined to do, nor is it in our power to do that which we are determined to omit; if that be only free which it is in our power to do, or not to do; that evil which through the fall we are determined to do, or that omiffion of good we are neceffitated to; and that good which by the divine influx we are neceffitated or determined to perform, cannot be free; and fo can neither be blameworthy, or rewardable. And 3dly. Seeing there can be no rational confultation or deliberation about those things, which antecedently are either neceffary or impoffible; and fo when perfons are infruftrably determined to one, that one thing becomes neceffary and any other thing is thereby made to them impoffible; they who are only free in matters about which they can reafonably confult and deliberate, cannot act. freely in thofe things which they are thus determined to do, or not do. Moreover, all confultation and deliberation is in order to choice and election; now choice, or election, in the very. nature of it, is of more than one; but there can be no choice of more than one in him who is determined to one, and fo a confequent election cannot confift with an antecedent deter mination to one. If therefore the divine grace in man's converfion unfruftrably determines him to one; or if the disability contracted by the fall determines men to choofe that which is evil only, and to omit that which is truly good; both these determinations must take away the freedom of mens actions, at least as far as they are worthy of praise or dispraife, of reward or punishment. For,. ift. Either the divine influx leaves men room to choose to turn to God, or it doth not; if it doth not, they do not choose to turn to God when they are thus converted; if it doth, it cannot unfruftrably determine them to turn to him, because it leaves it to their choice whether they will turn or not. Again, either this difability determines lapfed man to what is evil only and fo to the omiffion of what is truly good; orit doth not fo; if it doth not fo, it leaves him an ability to do good; if it doth he cannot properly be faid to choose not to do good. In a word, when God calls, invites and exhorts him to choose the thing that is good, and to learn to do well; when he attempts by threatenings to affright him from continu-. ance in his evil ways, and by his promifes to allure and to incite him to return unto him; are not these things defigned to engage him to confider of, and attend to God's exhortations; to confult and deliberate how he may avoid the evils threatened, and obtain the bleffings promifed? But if they lie under an utter difability of doing what is fpiritually good, and so of obtaining the bleffings promifed, to what purpofe fhould they deliberate about it ? To what purpofe fhould they con fider how they may avoid the evil that they do? I conclude therefore this argument with that which (a) Gennadius delivers as the doctrine of the church of God, that though man by the fall hath loft, vigorem arbitrii, the vigor of his free will, non tamen electionem, ne non effet fuum quod evitaret peccatum, nec merito indulgeretur quod non arbitrio diluiffet yet hath he not loft his choice, left it should not be of his choice that he avoided fin, nor should that he accounted to him for reward which he did not freely put away; manet ergo ad quærendam falutem Arbitrii libertas, fed admonente prius Deo, et invitante; there remains therefore yet to fallen man a freedom of will to feek after his falvation, though God must first admonth and invite him fo to do. SECTION III-Argument 3-Ibid. Le Blanc adds, that all the actions which proceed freely from us may be subject to a command, and by the Law of God or man may be enjoined or forbidden; but this cannot agree to thofe acts, circa quos voluntas immutabiliter fe habet, in which the will is fa immutably determined that it never can or could do otherwife. So that if this be the cafe of lapfed man, his fin cannot proceed freely from him, and fo cannot be reasonably forbidden; for as (b) St. Auftin faith, peccati teneri reum quempiam quia non fecit id quod facere non potuit, fumma iniquitatis et infaniæ eft; it is the hight of madness and injustice to hold any perfon guilty because he did not that which he could not do as will be farther evident even from the ef fential condition of a law, viz. that it be juft: Those laws being certainly unjuft which prohibit that under a penalty which a man cannot poffibly fhun, or require that which cannot poffibly be done by him of whom it is required: And the greater is the penalty, the greater ftill is the injuftice.For, ft. Juft laws are the ordinances of wifdom and right reafon. Whereas that which commands impoffibilities can never be required reafonably or wifely, (c) quis enim non clamet ftultum effe præcepta ei dare cui liberum non eft quod præcipitur facere? for who, faith St. Austin,ll not pronounce it folly to command him who is not free to do what is commanded? 2dly. Juft laws are inftituted for the public good, and God hath made this declaration concerning his own precepts, that he commands them for our good; but that law which prefcribes impoffibilities under a penalty upon nonperformance, cannot be inftituted for the public good, but rather for the greatest evil to the generality of mankind; who are faid to be left to the defect and disability of their own wills. 3dly. (a) De Dogm. Eccl. cap. 21.- (b) L. De Duabus anim. c. 11.——— (L. de. Fide contr. Man. c. 10 |