Cap. 3 Obj. 8: Applicable-to-all death would erase elect/non-elect and overturn predestination
Obj. 8. If Christ's death is set as applicable to all and each by God's ordination, then every distinction of elect and those not chosen is removed, and the doctrine of predestination is utterly overturned: have died for all in any sense, what prevents our pronouncing all and each human beings elect by God in the same sense?
Sol. These things proceed from ignorance of the true reason of election or predestination. For it is not any ordination to salvation through any means whatever places a person in the number of the elect or predestined, but an ordination through such media as God both knows and has decreed will infallibly produce the effect of salvation in the elect person. Hence that definition of predestination in Augustine, On the Gift of Perseverance, chapter 14: It is the foreknowledge and preparation of God's benefits, by which whoever are liberated are most certainly liberated. Hence also that Apostolic chain in (Romans 8:29–30), in which predestination is coupled by an inseparable bond with final glorification: Whom he predestined, them he also glorified. Although therefore we confess that Christ's death under some respect has been ordained by God as a common remedy of the human race, and will profit all under this Gospel condition if they have believed; yet it does not follow from this that all and each are promiscuously elect, because God has not decreed to give to all and each that grace that they may believe, and by believing draw life infallibly from this death of Christ. Indeed this also can be added: even if we grant not only that Christ died for all, but also that on account of this death of Christ sufficient grace has been prepared and given by God to all and each (which nevertheless we do not hold), still no one would rightly infer from these concessions that all human beings are promiscuously elect, or that there is no distinction between the elect and the passed-by. The reason is ready at hand: because no however sufficient ordination of media to procure a human being's salvation argues that he is predestined, unless there has also accrued this — that there be indeed an infallible order of special providence establishing and directing the ordained media to the most certain and unfrustrable attainment of the end. This can be illustrated by the example of Angels and of Human beings considered in the state of intact nature. All and each angels were created instructed with sufficient grace, and thence sufficiently ordained to obtaining beatitude: yet it is not thereby proved either that there was no election among the angels, or that all were indiscriminately elect. So Adam himself in his creation, and in him all his posterity, are understood to have been given sufficient grace and duly instructed for obtaining eternal life: yet it will not follow from this that all human beings were elect, or that no predestination is given. For it is not any ordination whatever to the attainment of eternal life that immediately posits a human being elect or denies a those not chosen, but (as has been said) an infallible ordination. To return and: from Christ's death ordained for all and each human being as a propitiatory sacrifice, and applicable by faith to obtaining remission and salvation, it does not follow that election and preterition are removed, because, this common ordination being posited and revealed in the Gospel, there is besides a certain secret ordination according to which the aforesaid death of Christ is decreed to be applied infallibly to some, of whom God wills specially to have mercy, and not so to be applied to others, of whom he does not will to have mercy in that way. And this abundantly suffices to defend the doctrine of predestination and reprobation, though we extend Christ's death to all in the aforesaid sense.
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Obj. 8. Si Christi mors ex ordinatione Dei omnibus et singulis applicabilis statuatur, tum tollitur omne discrimen electorum et non-electorum, atque doctrina praedestinationis prorsus evertitur: Si enim Christus quocunque sensu pro omnibus mortuus dicatur, quid impedit quin eodem sensu omnes et singulos homines a Deo electos pronunciemus? Sol. Haec proficiscuntur ab ignorata electionis sive praedestinationis vera ratione. Non enim quaevis ordinatio ad salutem per qualiacunque media ponit hominem in numero electorum aut praedestinatorum, sed ordinatio per talia media quae Deus et novit et decrevit effectum salutis in homine electo infallibiliter productura. Hinc illa definitio praedestinationis apud Augustinum, De bono persever. cap. 14. Est praescientia et praeparatio beneficiorum Dei, quibus certissime liberantur quicunque liberantur. Hinc etiam illa catena Apostolica, Rom. viii. 29, 30. in qua praedestinatio inseparabili nexu cum glorificatione finali copulatur; Quos praedestinavit, hos et glorificavit. Utcunque ergo fateamur Christi mortem sub aliqua ratione ordinatam a Deo in commune remedium humani generis, et profituram omnibus sub hac conditione Evangelica, si crediderint; tamen non hinc sequitur omnes et singulos esse promiscue electos, quia Deus non decrevit omnibus et singulis illam gratiam donare ut credant, et credendo ex hac morte Christi vitam infallibiliter hauriant. Imo et illud addi potest, Licet demus non modo Christum pro omnibus fuisse mortuum, sed etiam propter hanc mortem Christi sufficientem gratiam omnibus et singulis a Deo esse praeparatam et donatam (quod tamen non tenemus) adhuc nemo ex hisce concessis recte inferret omnes homines esse promiscue electos, vel nullum esse discrimen inter electos et praeteritos. Ratio in promptu est; Quia nulla quantumvis sufficiens ordinatio mediorum ad salutem hominis procurandam arguit illum esse praedestinatum, nisi illud accesserit, ut sit infallibilis quidem ordo specialis providentiae statuens et dirigens media ordinata ad certissimam et infrustrabilem finis consecutionem. Potest hoc illustrari exemplo Angelorum et Hominum in statu naturae integrae consideratorum. Angeli omnes et singuli conditi fuerunt sufficiente gratia instructi, atque inde sufficienter ordinati ad beatitudinem obtinendam: non tamen hinc evincitur aut nullam fuisse electionem inter angelos, aut omnes fuisse indiscriminatim electos. Sic ipse Adamus in sua creatione, atque in illo posteri ejus omnes, intelliguntur sufficiente gratia donati, atque ad vitam aeternam consequendam debite instructi: neque tamen inde sequetur omnes homines fuisse electos, aut nullam dari praedestinationem. Non enim ordinatio quaelibet ad vitae aeternae consecutionem aut ponit illico hominem electum, aut negat non-electum, sed (uti dictum est) ordinatio infallibilis. Ut itaque redeamus ad id quod in manibus est; Ex Christi morte omnibus et singulis hominibus in propitiatorium sacrificium ordinata, et per fidem ad remissionem et salutem obtinendam applicabili, non consequitur tolli electionem et praeteritionem, quia posita hac communi ordinatione, et in Evangelio revelata, est insuper arcana quaedam ordinatio juxta quam praedicta Christi mors quibusdam, quorum Deus vult specialiter misereri, infallibiliter applicanda decernitur; aliis, quorum non vult illo modo misereri, non ita applicanda decernitur. Et hoc abunde sufficit ad praedestinationis et reprobationis doctrinam tuendam; quamvis Christi mortem ad omnes sensu praedicto extendamus.