Jacobus Arminius · 80 of 81

AN EXAMINATION OF THE TREATISE OF WILLIAM PERKINS CONCERNING THE ORDER AND MODE OF PREDESTINATION · Part 3

Secondary grace, you say, is either imputed or inherent. The phrase imputed grace does not sound well in my ears. I have heretofore thought that grace is not imputed, but imputes, as in Romans iv. 4, "the reward is not reckoned of grace, but of debt." Righteousness is said, in the same chapter, to be imputed of grace, without works. But, passing by this, let us examine the subject. The question proposed was—"How far may believers lose grace and the Holy Spirit?" You answer—in respect to imputed grace, which consists in justification, a part of which is the remission of sins—"The remission of sins is not granted in vain." Be it so. But believers may, after remission of some sins has been obtained, commit sin and grievously backslide. If, then, they should not repent of that act, will they obtain remission? You answer in the negative. I conclude from this, that they can lose that grace of the remission of their sins. But you reply—"It can not be that they should not repent." I know that this is asserted, but I desire the proof—not that the elect indeed, can not depart hence without final repentance, but that they, who have once been believers, can not die in final impenitence. When you shall have proved this, it will not be necessary to recur to this distinction of grace, for then you would be permitted to say that the believer never finally loses his faith and dies in impenitence.

You make a distinction in inherent grace, as "faith" and "the consequent gift of faith." In faith you consider "the act and the habit of faith." From this distinction, you answer the proposed question, thus—"Faith, considered in respect to habit and ability, can not be lost, on account of confirming grace, (though it can per se be lost,) but faith, in respect to any particular act, can be lost." First, I ask proof of your assertion. "Faith, in respect to habit, can not be lost, on account of confirming grace." I also inquire—"Is that act of faith, in respect to which faith can be lost, necessary or not, that any one may apprehend Christ? If it is, then a man can fall from grace, if he loses, as you say, the act of apprehension of Christ, or, rather, if he does not apprehend Christ by that act. If it is not necessary, then, it was indeed, of no importance to have considered that act, when the loss of grace was under discussion.

You attempt to prove, both by the example of David and by the opinions of the fathers, that the habit of faith and love can not be lost. The example of David proves nothing. For, should it be conceded that David, when he was guilty of adultery and murder, had not lost the Holy Spirit, it does not follow from this that the Holy Spirit can not be lost. For another might sin even more grievously, and thus lose the Holy Spirit. If, however, I should say that David had lost the Holy Spirit when he committed that adultery and murder, what would you answer, You might reply that it is evident that it was not so from the 51st Psalm. That Psalm, I reply, was composed by David after he had repented of those crimes, having been admonished by Nathan. God, at that time, according to the declaration of Nathan, restored the Holy Spirit to David (2 Sam. xii. 13). In reference to the assertions of the fathers, I consider that the case of Peter is not to the prejudice of the opinion, which states that faith can be destroyed. For Peter sinned through infirmity, which weakens faith, but does not destroy it. I pass over Gratiaus. It would be proper to discuss, at some length, the sentiment of Augustine, if it had been proposed to present it fully. If, however, any one wishes to know what was the opinion of Augustine concerning this matter, let him look at the following passages: "De Predestinatione Sanctorum" (lib 1, cap. 14), and "De Bono Perseverantiae" (lib. 2, cap. 13, 16, 19, 22, 23). Let some passages be added from Prosper, who holds and every where defends the opinions of Augustine, e.g. Ad cap. Gall. respons. vii, Ad objectiones Vincentinas, respons. 16; De vocatione Gentium, lib. 2, cap. 8, 9, and 28. From these passages, it will, in my judgment, be apparent that Augustine thought that some believers, some justified and regenerate persons, some, on whom had been bestowed faith, hope and love, can fall away and be lost, and indeed will fall away and be lost, the predestinate alone being excepted.

You quote some objections to the foregoing explanation. The first objection is this: "Sin and the grace of the Holy Spirit can not subsist together." You reply, that "this is true of reigning sin, or sin with the full consent of the will." But you deny that the regenerate sin with the full or entire consent of the will. I answer, first, that "reigning sin" is not the same as that which has the full consent of the will. For the former belongs, generically to quality or habit, the latter pertains generically to action, and by the latter is prepared a way for the former. From this, it is clearly manifest that reigning sin can not subsist with the grace of the Holy Spirit. It is also true that sin does not reign in the regenerate. For, before this can take place, it is necessary that they should reject the grace of the Holy Spirit, which mortifies sin and restrains its power. We must, then, examine the other mode of sin, and see whether some of the regenerate may sin or not with the full consent of the will. You deny this, and deduce the reason for your denial from the beginning and successive steps of temptation. You consider the beginning of temptation to be concupiscence or native corruption, and you say that "it exists alone in the unregenerate man, who is entirely carnal. That, in the renewed man, there is, at the same time, flesh and Spirit, but in various degrees, so that he is partly carnal, partly spiritual;" from which you conclude that "concupiscence can subsist with the grace of the Holy Spirit, but not reign." I reply that though I have but little objection to that conclusion, yet I can not altogether approve those things which precede. For some of them are not true, and the statement is imperfect.

It is not true that "an unregenerate man is wholly carnal," that is, that there is in him only the flesh. For by what name shall that truth be called which the wicked are said to "hold in unrighteousness" (Rom. i. 18)? What is that conscience which accuses and excuses (Rom. ii. 15)? What is the knowledge of the law by which they are convinced of their sins (Rom. iii. 20)? All these things can not be comprehended under the term flesh. For they are blessings, and are adverse to the flesh. Yet I admit that the Holy Spirit does not dwell in the unrenewed man. The statement is imperfect, because it omits the explanation of the proportion, which exists between the flesh and the Spirit in the renewed man, as the Spirit predominates in the regenerate person, and because, from the predominating element, he receives the name of spiritual man, so that he can not come under the term carnal. But observe, moreover, that your conclusion has reference to concupiscence, which is a quality, while the question related to actual sin, namely—"Can actual sin consist with the grace of the Holy Spirit?" You refer to "five steps, of temptation." You concede that the first step may pertain to the regenerate, also the second, and it is, indeed, true. But it can never be proved that Paul, for such a reason, "complained of his own captivity, because he could delight in sorrowful meditation in reference to the commission of sin." For he is treating there, of sin already committed. "The evil which I would not, that I do."

The third step, which is "the consent of the will to the perpetration of sin," you attribute also to the regenerate, "but a more remiss consent, according to which they will, in such a sense, that they are even unwilling to commit sin," and you think that this can be proved from the example of Paul in Romans 7. I wish you to consider, here, how these things harmonize together, that, in reference to one and the same act, the will or volition may be two-fold, and, indeed, contrary to itself, even at the very moment when the act is performed. Before the act, while the mind is yet in doubt, and the flesh is lusting against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh, this might be affirmed: but, when the flesh carries out its concupiscence into action, that is, does that which it has lusted against the Spirit, then, indeed, the Spirit has ceased to lust. The position must then be assumed, that the renewed man commits sin from the concupiscence of the flesh, the Spirit in vain lusting against it, that is, the flesh is stronger than the Spirit, and the desire of the Spirit is overcome by the flesh, contrary to the declaration of Scripture—"greater is he that is in you, than he that is in the world" (1 John iv. 4), and contrary to the condition of the regenerate, in whom the Spirit predominates over the flesh, nor does it occur that the flesh should conquer, unless when the Spirit is quiet, and intermits the contest.

"But the Scripture affirms (Rom. 7) that the renewed man would do good, yet does it not, and would not do evil, yet does it." I answer. in that passage, reference is made not to a regenerate person, but to a man under the law. But, even, if this point be conceded, I affirm that it is not possible that there should be volition and nolition, at the same time, concerning the same act; hence, that volition, which is followed by an act, is a pure and efficacious volition; the other is not so much volition as velleity, which is produced, not by the Holy Spirit striving against the flesh, but by the conscience, or the law of the mind, existing in man, which ceases not to struggle against the flesh, until it is seared, and deprived of all feeling. That struggle of the conscience does not effect that the man should not sin with his full consent, but rather aggravates the sin, and declares how vehement is the consent of the will to a sin, presented by the concupiscence of the flesh, when not even the conscience, exclaiming against it, has not power to restrain the will from that consent.

It is, then, an injurious and most dangerous opinion, which holds that the renewed man does not sin with full consent, when he feels the sting of conscience, opposing the sin which the will is about to perpetrate. As this happens to all, who are affected by any sense of right and wrong, it will be very easy for them to persuade themselves that, as they do not sin with the full consent of the will, they have a certain indication of their own regeneration. Therefore, if the full consent of the will to sin can not consist with the grace of the Holy Spirit, it is certain that the regenerate sometimes lose the grace of the Holy Spirit, because they sin with the full consent of the will, when they sin against the conscience.

You consider the fourth step to be "the carrying out of an evil work into an act." This is correct, but the distinction which you make, can not be proved from the Scriptures. When the regenerate person commits sin, he commits it being overcome by the concupiscence of the flesh, while the Spirit of regeneration is quiescent, and not testifying against the sin, unless before the sin, when the consent of the will has not yet been gained by the suasion of concupiscence, and after the sin when the Spirit has begun to revive. But the "testifying," of which you speak is nothing else than the act of the conscience accusing the person both before and after the commission of sin. The whole man, then, sins, but "not according to that principle by which he is renewed." This was unnecessarily added; for who would ever call this in question? This, also, can be said of a man placed under the law, as he does not sin according to the law of his mind, that is, of his conscience approving the law, but only according to the flesh. Hence, you see that the distinction in this case, ought to have been of another character. Nor does it seem necessary to concede, "that an action, performed by a regenerate person, may be less sinful than if performed by him in whom sin reigns."

For the fault and sinfulness of an action is to be judged from the strong consent of the will to the sin. But he is borne more vehemently towards sin, who rejects the act of the Holy Spirit striving in the contrary direction, and follows the concupiscence of the flesh, than he, who, opposing the concupiscence of the flesh by his conscience alone, at length yields. Thus the sin of David, committing adultery and murder was far more heinous than that of a heathen man committing the same sins; the inhabitants of Bethsaida and Chorazin sinned more grievously than the citizens of Tyre and Sidon, because the former, committing their sins, resisted more influences, adapted to restrain from the commission of sin, than the latter. You say that the last step is "when a sin, confirmed by frequent repetition, becomes a habit." That step or degree was called, you remark, by the Greeks to< ajpotelei~n But you will allow me to deny that the Greeks used that word, in that sense. For your fourth step was equivalent to ajpotelei~v the same as to commit sin. But this last step is a degree, not so much in sin, as in sinners, of whom some advance further than others. You deny that this step can happen to the regenerate.

This needs proof. In all those distinctions, there is a continual assumption of the point to be proved. For they, who say that the regenerate can lose the grace of the Holy Spirit, say, also, that the regenerate may not only sin, but may persevere in sin, and contract the habit of sin.

The second objection, which you adduce, is this: "Adam, being yet pure, fell wholly, therefore, much more may they fall, who, having been born and renewed after the fall of Adam, have believed." The force of the argument depends on the parity or equality of the conditions of the parties; that of Adam, in respect to which he was created in righteousness and true holiness; and that, of his descendants, in respect to which they have been renewed in righteousness and true holiness. You attempt to solve the difficulty by showing the dissimilarity of the cases. But the dissimilarity, which exists between the two conditions, does not effect that the regenerate may not be able, altogether, to fall away. Nor, indeed, is this affirmed, in the passage, which you cite from Augustine. For, though the regenerate may have the will to do according to their ability, of which gift Adam was destitute, according to the sentiment of Augustine, yet it does not follow that they can not repudiate and willingly reject this gift. You were permitted to add other things, in which the condition of believers in Christ differs from the original state of Adam in righteousness. Among other things, this is peculiar, that the latter state had not the promise of the remission of sins, if it should happen that Adam should ever once commit sin; but that of believers is rendered more blessed by the promise—"their sins will I remember no more" (Heb. viii. 12). Hence it is that the faith of God is not made "without effect," even if those in covenant with him do sin (Rom. iii. 3). For the covenant is one of grace and faith, not of righteousness and works. Yet make whatever differences you please between the two states, it will be always necessary to admit that perseverance, voluntary, free, and liable to change, was necessary to salvation in both states. Man does not persevere, either in the former or the latter state, unless freely and willingly. This is so far true "that God does not take away even from those, who are about to persevere, that liability to change, by which they may possibly not choose to persevere," as is affirmed in the treatise "De vocatione Gentium, lib. 2, cap. 28." You refer to a third objection, "This member of a harlot is not a member of Christ—But the believer, who is a member of Christ, can become the member of a harlot; -- Therefore, the believer may cease to be a member of Christ." You reply to this objection by making distinctions in the term member. But those distinctions are unnecessary. First, the subject of discussion is a member not in appearance, but in truth. An apparent member is, in an equivocal sense, a member, and therefore, does not belong to the definition; and there would be four terms to the syllogism. Nor is the subject of discussion a member, which is such in its destination, for we know that all men, who are in destination members of Christ, are, universally, members of Satan, before they are in fact brought to Christ, and united to him. Since, therefore, members, which are really such, are referred to in the objection, to what purpose are these niceties of distinction sought? "In reference to those who are really members," you say, "some are living, others are half dead. But both are members, according to election." If this be so, you attain your object; for who is so foolish as to say that the elect may finally be lost? But they whom you consider your opponents, will deny that all true members of Christ are such by predestination. They will affirm that some are such according to their present state, their righteousness and present engraftment in Christ. Let us however, consider your answer, in the supposition of the truth of that distinction. You assert that "a true and actual member, and one that remains such cannot be a member of a harlot." That, indeed, is not strange. For it is an identical proposition, and, therefore, amounts to nothing. The member of Christ, that remains such, is not a member of a harlot, but this does not answer the question—Will a living member of Christ always remain alive? It was affirmed in the objection that a living member of Christ may become a member of a harlot, and may, therefore, not remain a member of Christ. The point, to be proved, is again assumed in your answer to that argument. But you say that "the half dead may, as far as they are concerned, at any time, lose the Holy Spirit." But, from what state do they become half dead? Is it not from being wholly alive? You would not indeed say that any one is half dead, at the time, when he is engrafted in Christ. You see that such an assertion is absurd. The state of the case, according to those who argue against you, is like this. At the beginning of faith in Christ and of conversion to God, the believer becomes a living member of Christ. If he perseveres in the faith of Christ and maintains a good conscience, he remains a living member. But if he becomes indolent, has no care for himself, gives place to sin, he becomes, by degrees half-dead: and proceeding in this way he at length wholly dies, and ceases to be a member of Christ. You ought to have refuted these statements, which, so far from refuting, you rather confirm by your distinctions. You have indeed treated this subject, with less care than its dignity, and your learning deserved. The ninth error; -- That, which is so styled by you, is erroneously charged on the sentiment adverse to you: for they do not say this, nor can it, in any way, be deduced from their sentiment. This is their opinion. "A man, by his own freewill, receives the grace, which is divinely offered to him, whatever it may be." For as grace preserves, so the free-will is preserved, and the free will of man is the subject of grace. Hence it is necessary that the free-will should concur with the grace, which is bestowed, to its preservation, yet assisted by subsequent grace, and it always remains in the power of the free-will to reject the grace bestowed, and to refuse subsequent grace; because grace is not the omnipotent action of God, which can not be resisted by the free-will of man. And since the state of the case is such, those same persons think that a man can reject grace and fall away. From which you see that you have undertaken a futile task, when you refute the error which you charge on that sentiment. Yet we may consider, also, those same things: perhaps an opportunity will be afforded to note something, which will not be unworthy of knowledge. "This sentiment," you affirm, "attributes a free will, flexible in every direction, of grace, to all men." Do you deny that the free will is "flexible in all directions"—I add, even without grace? It is flexible by its own nature: and as it is addicted to evil in its sinful state, so it is capable of good, which capability grace does not bestow upon it; for it is in it by nature. But it is, in fact, only turned to good by grace, which is like a mold, forming the ability and capacity of the material into an act, though it may be, of itself, sufficiently evil. Augustine (de predestin Sanctorum, cap. 5) says, "It belongs to the nature of man to be able to have faith and love, but it pertains to the grace of believers to actually have them." But you may be dissatisfied that this is said "to exist in all men," but that dissatisfaction is without cause. Their meaning is not that grace is bestowed on all men, by which their free will may be actually inclined to good; but that in all there exists a will which may be flexible in every direction by the aid of grace. But they teach, you say, that "it is in the will of man to apply itself to the grace which is bestowed by the aid of universal grace, or to reject the same by the inability of corrupt nature." What do you desire at this point? You will answer "that for the phrase ‘universal grace’ should be substituted ‘particular grace.’" But who has ever said that "a man can apply himself to particular grace by the force of universal grace"? I think that no one can be so foolish: for the man is led to the use of particular grace, offered to him, by the free-will, assisted by particular grace. The expression, "to reject the same by the inability," &c., is ineptly used; for inability does not reject; a passive non-reception pertains to it, while it is the province of depravity to reject. When, therefore, you have introduced, according to your own judgment, the phrase "universal grace," you fight against your own shadow. For it is evident that "the ability to believe is not carried out into action, unless by the aid of other subsequent grace, which we call particular or special, since it does not happen to all and to each of mankind.

The passages of Scripture, which you adduce, do not answer your purpose. For the former two are adapted to prove that the faithful do not fall away from Christ; and let it be remembered that, according to Augustine and the author of the book, "De vocatione Gentium," that perseverance pertains only to believers, who are predestinated to life. The passages from Augustine show that the grace, prepared for the predestinate, will certainly incline their hearts, and will not be rejected by them because God uses such persuasions with them, as He knows to be suitable to them, and adapted to persuade them. This he calls efficacious grace, and always distinguishes it from efficient grace. You, however, in quoting Augustine, with sufficient superciliousness, repudiate that distinction. But what arguments do you use? You say that no grace is sufficient for conversion, which is not efficacious. I deny it, and nature itself exclaims against your assertion, while she distinguishes sufficiency from efficacy. God is sufficient for the creation of many worlds, yet He does not efficaciously perform it. Christ is sufficient for the salvation of all men, yet he does not efficaciously accomplish it. But you perhaps understand by efficacious cause that which can effect any thing, and so make it identical with efficient cause. But they who distinguish between sufficient and efficacious define the latter as that, which really produces the effect.

You do not prove that which you intend, when you say that "man has not free-will in spiritual things." Granted. But if grace may restore the freedom of the will, is it not then in the exercise of free-will, that he either can do sufficiently, or really does efficaciously? Nor is it to the purpose to say that "we are dead" (Col. iii. 3), and that "our sufficiency is of God" (2 Cor. iii. 5). This is not denied by those, who speak of sufficient grace. Nor does that three-fold inability do away with sufficient grace. They, who make the distinction, say that sufficient grace is able to remove that three-fold inability, and to effect that a man should receive offered grace, should use it when received, and should preserve it.

You endeavour to prove, in the next place, as the necessary consequence of "the five-fold nature of grace, preeminent, preparative, operative, co-operative, and persevering," that no single grace can be sufficient, because "no one of those five kinds of grace is alone sufficient for salvation, since all joined together are necessary." It is not a sound conclusion, that there is no sufficient grace because no one of those five kinds of grace is sufficient alone. The reasoning here is from a particular case to a general conclusion, and therefore is not valid; there is here also the fallacy of Composition. But the first two kinds of grace, namely, prevenient and preparative, are either sufficient or efficacious. For God precedes (by His grace) sufficiently and efficaciously; He also prepares sufficiently and efficaciously. It may be questioned, also, whether the same can not be said of operative and co-operative grace. Yet let us concede that those terms properly pertain to efficacious grace. Nevertheless they who defend the use of the phrase "sufficient," will say that these latter kinds of grace are prepared for and offered to all those, who have suffered themselves to be moved by prevenient and preparative grace, which is sufficient in its character, in the direction intended by that grace; and afterwards the gift of perseverance is also bestowed. Hence you have not, by that argument, disproved sufficient grace so far as it is distinguished from efficacious grace. But we will not examine the definitions of that five-fold grace, because this does not pertain to the scope of this discussion. You also endeavour to refute the same distinction by a simile. But in it there is a great want of analogy. For an inert mass is moved, naturally and necessarily, by the application of forces, which exceed the force of its gravity; but we, as human beings, are moved according to the mode of freedom, which God has bestowed on the will, from which it is called free-will. At this point, the similitude, which Cardinal Contarenus uses in reference to predestination, and the opposite of your simile, may be not ineptly mentioned. He supposes a two-fold gravity in a stone, one natural, the other adscititious. The strength which is sufficient to raise a stone, tending downwards by natural gravity alone, will not be sufficient, if that adscititious gravity shall be added, and the efficiency of sufficient strength will be hindered by the adscititious gravity. We see this clearly in athletes, engaged in wrestling. One endeavours to raise the other from the earth, and to prostrate him, thus raised up. Either of them would be able in a moment to effect this in reference to his antagonist, if the latter should only offer the resistance of the native weight of his body, but because he does not wish to be raised, he depresses himself and his adversary as much as he can, by using the strength of his nerves and bones, which far exceeds the weight of his body alone. So there is, in man, by derivation from the first sin of the first man, a weight, which is, or may be called, native. There is, in addition to this, another produced in each person by his own wickedness, which does not so much exist in him, as is present with him, serving as a hindrance that the power of that grace, which is sufficient to overcome the natural tendency, may not effect that which, without the interposition of that impediment, it would effect. Nor is the flexibility of our will, nor our power of choice taken away by the concurrence of those five gifts, but, by that concurrence, it is effected that the will, which by its own nature is flexible in every direction, and the choice, which is able to elect freely between two different things, should incline certainly and infallibly in that direction, towards which the motion of the five-fold grace impels it. Hence, also, I wish that instead of "inflexible inclination," you had said "certain and infallible inclination." For, if we do not say that the mind of a man may possibly be inclined in another direction, even at the time when it is inclined in a given direction by efficacious grace, it follows that the will of man acts not according to the mode of liberty, but according to the mode of nature, and thus not the free-will, but the nature of man, will be saved. But the free-will, at least as to its exercise, will be, in that case, destroyed by grace, while it belongs to grace not to take away, but to correct nature itself, wherein it has become corrupt.