Cap. 3 Obj. 1: Many were already damned when Christ died — how then was his death ever applicable to them?
Obj. 1. First, then, it can be objected that at the time when Christ underwent death many had already been adjudged to Gehenna and were being tormented in hell; and from hell there is no redemption. How then can we maintain that Christ's death was ever in any way applicable to these damned human beings? Moved by this argument some have held that that innumerable multitude of the impious who lived from the beginning of the world until Christ's coming, and who for their impiety were cast into hell, before Christ's sacrifice offered on the cross had no more right to the benefit of redemption than the Devils themselves. So the Lyons Fathers speak in a certain writing which stands in Tom. 9 of the Bibliotheca Patrum: Just as the Lord Jesus Christ is in no way to be said to have suffered for the impious and damned angels, so far be it that he be believed to have suffered all things for those impious and damned human beings.
Sol. But I reply: when we affirm that Christ's death, by God's ordination and by the nature of the thing, is a remedy applicable to any human being, we are not looking only at the external passion of Christ endured at a fixed moment of time, but at the eternal virtue of Christ's death, salutary to human beings in every age. For Christ, as to God's acceptance, was the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world; and the efficacy of this propitiatory sacrifice could extend itself as much to those who lived before Christ suffered as to us who live after his passion. If therefore they mean only this — that by Christ's temporal death those could not be relieved who before his death had by an irrevocable decree been adjudged to infernal punishments — we confess the same; because they have already ceased to be wayfarers, that is, capable of repentance and faith. But if they wish to contend further that the eternal virtue of Christ's death was not applicable to such while they lived, because Christ's passion looked no more to them than to the impious and damned angels, that we utterly deny. For of Cain, of Esau, indeed of any human being who died before Christ suffered, it can truly be said that by the virtue of the sacrifice to be offered through the Messiah he could have been absolved from his sins and saved, if he had believed in the same — which cannot likewise be said of the damned angels; because the universal covenant of salvation under the condition of faith embraces the whole human race and does not embrace the fallen angels. It is therefore worthy of observation that God willed Christ's death, whether applied or under whatever condition applicable, for none of the fallen angels — toward these, therefore, God held himself equally and alike; but not equally toward human beings. For as to these, although he established and declared that the death of his Son under the condition of faith is applicable to any, yet he did not decree by the benefit of special mercy to render it equally applied to any. We do not therefore deny what is manifest — the difference between Demons and Human beings, namely that by God's ordination Christ's death is something ordained and applicable to human beings, but neither ordained nor applicable to demons — although after this life, for human beings constituted in hell, no further possibility of application remains. For this consequence is vicious: Christ's death was not applicable to the damned after their damnation; therefore it was never and in no way applicable to them.
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Obj. 1. Primum igitur objici potest, eo tempore quo Christus mortem oppetebat, multos fuisse gehennae adjudicatos et in inferno cruciatos: ab inferno autem nulla redemtio est. Quomodo igitur tueri possumus Christi mortem fuisse hisce damnatis hominibus unquam ullo modo applicabilem? Hoc argumento permoti nonnulli statuerunt, innumerabilem illam multitudinem impiorum qui fuerunt ab initio mundi usque ad adventum Christi, quique propter suam impietatem in infernum conjecti fuerunt, ante sacrificium Christi in cruce oblatum non plus juris habuisse in redemtionis beneficium quam ipsos Diabolos. Sic loquuntur Lugdunenses Patres in scripto quodam quod exstat Tom. 9. Biblioth. Patrum: Sicut pro impiis et damnatis angelis nullatenus Dominus Jesus Christus dicendus est passus; ita pro istis impiis et damnatis hominibus absit ut omnia passus esse credatur. Sol. Sed respondeo, Quando affirmamus Christi mortem ex ordinatione Dei et natura rei esse remedium cuivis homini applicabile, non spectare nos solummodo externam passionem Christi praestituto temporis momento toleratam, sed aeternam virtutem mortis Christi quovis saeculo hominibus salutiferam. Christus enim quoad acceptationem Dei fuit Agnus occisus ab origine mundi: et efficacia hujus sacrificii propitiatorii tam extendere se potuit ad illos qui vixerunt ante Christum passum, quam ad nos qui vivimus post ejus passionem. Si illud igitur tantum volunt, temporali morte Christi non potuisse eos sublevari, qui ante mortem ejus irrevocabili decreto fuerunt poenis infernalibus adjudicati, nos idem confitemur; quia jam desierunt esse viatores, id est, poenitentiae et fidei capaces: sed si ultra contendere velint, virtutem aeternam mortis Christi non fuisse talibus applicabilem dum viverent, quia Christi passio non magis ad eos spectavit, quam ad impios et damnatos angelos, id nos pernegamus. Nam de Caino, Esavo, imo de quovis homine ante Christum passum mortuo vere dici potest, illum virtute sacrificii per Messiam offerendi a peccatis suis absolvi et servari potuisse, si in eundem credidisset: quod de angelis damnatis itidem dici nequit; quia universale pactum salutis sub conditione fidei universum genus humanum complectitur, angelos lapsos non complectitur. Est itaque observatione dignum, Deum noluisse mortem Christi sive applicatam sive sub conditione quacunque applicabilem ulli lapsorum angelorum — ad hosce ergo universos pariter et ex aequo se habuit Deus: at non ex aequo ad homines; nam quoad hosce, licet statuerit et declaraverit mortem Filii sui sub conditione fidei esse cuivis applicabilem, tamen non decrevit specialis misericordiae beneficio illam ex aequo cuivis reddere applicatam. Non negamus itaque, quod manifestum est, discrimen scilicet inter Daemones et Homines in eo situm, quod ex ordinatione Dei mors Christi sit quiddam ordinatum et applicabile hominibus; sed neque ordinatum neque applicabile daemonibus; licet post hanc vitam hominibus in inferno constitutis nulla ulterius reliqua sit possibilitas applicationis. Vitiosa etenim est haec consequentia: Christi mors non fuit applicabilis damnatis post illorum damnationem; Ergo nunquam et nullatenus fuit illis applicabilis.