Cap. 7 open: universal death under faith and electing grace—two decrees do not collide
We have treated Christ’s death as it regards the whole human race—with the universal scope of his life-giving power, under the condition of Faith, as that power is to be brought into act for any person. For although, when that condition fails, Christ’s death does not put forth its saving force in the greater part of humankind, still it must neither be denied—what the Scriptures everywhere and clearly witness—nor doubted that God has within himself most just and wise reasons for his counsel when he ordained his Son’s death applicable to all under the condition of faith, and yet did not decree to effect or procure that the same death be applied to all by a faith given to each. So we must not set these divine decrees against each other as if they collided: “I will that my Son so offer himself on the cross for the sins of the human race that all and each who believe in him can be saved”; and “I will so dispense my efficacious grace that not all, but the elect alone, receive this saving faith by which they are saved.” If anyone thinks those two decrees fight, he ought rather to own the weakness of his understanding than to deny anything so plainly set down in Holy Scripture. Let this then stand fixed: by God’s own decree Christ was so offered on the altar of the cross for all human beings that his death is already established as it were a universal remedy for all and each, applicable by faith for obtaining remission of sins and eternal life.
Latin
Egimus de morte Christi, qua totum genus humanum spectat, universali ambitu vivificae potentiae, sub conditione Fidei, quoad quemvis hominem in actum deducendae. Quamvis enim, deficiente hac conditione, mors Christi non exserat in majore hominum parte vim suam salutiferam, tamen neque negandum est, quod Scripturae passim ac clare testantur; neque dubitandum est, quin Deus apud se habeat justissimas & sapientissimas sui consilii rationes, dum statuit mortem Filii sui omnibus sub fidei conditione applicabilem, & nihilominus non decrevit efficere aut procurare ut eadem per fidem singulis donatam omnibus applicetur. Non debemus itaque inter se committere & quasi collidere haec decreta Divina, Volo Filium meum ita semetipsum in cruce offerre pro peccatis humani generis, ut omnes & singuli in eum credentes possint servari; Volo gratiam meam efficacem ita dispensare, ut non omnes, sed electi solummodo, accipiant hanc fidem salutiferam qua serventur. Si cuiquam haec duo decreta pugnare videantur, debet ille intellectus sui infirmitatem potius agnoscere quam quicquam eorum, quae in sacris Scripturis tam diserte habentur, inficias ire. Sit igitur hoc fixum & stabilitum; Ex decreto ipsius Dei Christum ita fuisse in ara crucis oblatum pro omnibus hominibus, ut mors ejus sit jam constitutum quasi universale quoddam remedium omnibus & singulis, ad obtinendam remissionem peccatorum & vitam aeternam, per fidem applicabile.