Two Dissertations · §322 · John Davenant

Cap. III Rat.: God rejects only from foresight of sin — so elects from foresight of works

God rejects only because of foresight of sin — for rejection or reprobation is a work of divine justice, which always presupposes a person stained with sin.h sin.h sin. Therefore he elects only from foresight of good works, since whoever is not rejected is by that very fact elected.

Latin

Deus non rejicit nisi ex praevisione peccati: Nam rejectio sive reprobatio est opus justitiae Divinae, quod semper supponit hominem peccato inquinatum. Non igitur eligit nisi ex praescientia bonorum operum; quoniam qui non est rejectus, hoc ipso est electus.

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John Davenant argues from Scripture that Christ's death is a remedy offered to every person, so that anyone who hears the Gospel may be called to believe, and then opens a second dissertation on predestination.

John Davenant (1572–1641) was Lady Margaret Professor of Divinity at Cambridge, bishop of Salisbury from 1621, and England's leading delegate to the Synod of Dort. A Reformed theologian of the moderate school, he defended universal atonement language within a Calvinist frame.

The Two Dissertations (1650) press two theses: that Christ died sufficiently for all, and that God sincerely calls all who hear the gospel — against the novel claim that Christ died only for the elect in every sense. They are Davenant's mature statement of the hypothetical-universalist position that divided English Calvinists.

This volume covers the opening of the first dissertation through the close of chapter 3, with the theses on the extent of Christ's death.

Date1572–1641 AD (Bishop of Salisbury; 1650 Cambridge imprint)

The 1683 reprint was not used as base text. No modern English was copied.

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