Cap. 7 Quartum Rat. 9: without merited application elect have no privilege—Bannes / Rom 8:32
Ratio 9. Suppose Christ’s death, by God’s ordination and Christ’s intention, did not merit for the predestinate an efficacious application and the infallible obtaining of salvation that flows from it. Then this follows: the Mediator’s merit, under the Father’s accepting will and the Son’s exhibiting will, regards the elect no more than the passed-by, but reaches both alike. The consequence is clear, since it is granted that by God’s will the dying Christ’s merit extends to all under the condition that they apply it to themselves by faith. Unless Christ by his death also meant to merit for the elect that, through faith given, this fruitful application be made in them, no singular privilege in his merit is assigned to them. By God’s ordination Christ’s death merited for Judas that he could, under the condition of faith, reach eternal life; for Peter it obtained besides that, because of Christ’s merit, he receive persevering faith and all other spiritual benefits required to obtain eternal life infallibly. Paul’s reasoning in Romans 8:32 looks here, treating the predestinate’s privileges: “He who did not spare his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how will he not also with him give us all things?” Just as he had hinted a special calling of the predestinate—“according to purpose”—so he marks a special offering of Christ for those same predestinate, an offering according to purpose: with a sure purpose to confer efficacious grace on the elect and lead them infallibly to life by this death’s merit. Those who erase that discrimination of divine intention in Christ’s death toward elect and passed-by, as Báñez truly says (On 1, q. 23, art. 5, pp. 296–297), make Christ’s merit no more perfect a cause of the predestinate’s salvation than of the reprobate’s. As to sufficiency the merit regards all equally; the difference is that it is applied to some and not to others. So if application itself for the elect does not fall under Christ’s merit, that merit regards predestinate and reprobate alike. So Báñez.
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Rat. 9. Si ponamus Christi mortem ex ordinatione Dei & intentione Christi non meruisse praedestinatis efficacem applicationem, & infallibilem salutis consecutionem inde emanantem, illud incommodi sequetur, hoc meritum Mediatoris, juxta voluntatem & intentionem Patris illud acceptantis Filiiique illud exhibentis, non magis spectare ad electos quam praeteritos, sed ex aequo ad utrosque pertingere. Patet consequentia, quia concessum est, Ex voluntate Dei meritum Christi morientis ad omnes homines se extendere sub hac conditione, Si per fidem illud sibi applicaverint. Nisi ergo Christus morte sua intenderit electis hoc insuper mereri, ut per Fidem donatam fiat in illis haec fructuosa applicatio, nullum singulare privilegium in merito Christi illis assignatur. Nam Christi mors ex ordinatione Dei Iudae hoc meruit, ut potuerit sub conditione Fidei ad vitam aeternam pervenire: Petro igitur & illud insuper obtinuit, ut propter meritum Christi fidem perseverantem acciperet, caeteraque omnia spiritualia beneficia quae ad vitam aeternam infallibiliter consequendam requiruntur. Atque huc spectat illa Apostoli ratiocinatio, Rom. viii. 32. Ubi de praedestinatorum privilegiis disserit, Qui proprio Filio non pepercit, sed pro nobis omnibus tradidit eum, quomodo non etiam cum eo omnia nobis donabit? Quo in loco sicut specialem quandam vocationem praedestinatorum antea innuuerat, quam appellavit vocationem secundum propositum, ita & specialem quandam oblationem Christi pro eisdem praedestinatis designat, quam licet appellare oblationem secundum propositum, id est, cum proposito certo gratiam efficacem conferendi electis, eosdemque merito hujus mortis ad vitam infallibiliter perducendi. Qui tollunt hoc discrimen intentionis Divinae, quoad mortem Christi, in relatione ad electos & praeteritos consideratam, illi, (ut vere Bannesius In 1. quaest. 23. art. 5. pag. 296. 297.) faciunt meritum Christi nihilo perfectius esse causam salutis praedestinatorum quam reproborum. Quia quod attinet ad sufficientiam meriti, aeque respicit omnes; sed differentia est in hoc, quod quibusdam applicatur illud meritum, quibusdam vero non. Ergo (si applicatio ipsa quoad electos non cadat sub merito Christi) meritum Christi aequaliter respiciet praedestinatos & reprobes. Haec ille.