Cap. 4 Mem. 3: Faith-condition not impossible for any viator — passive potency
We have taught that Christ died for all human beings, in this sense: that through Christ’s death an Evangelical covenant has been stabilized with the whole human race, according to which remission of sins and eternal life is exposed to all human beings under a possible condition of faith. Certain persons, fixing the eyes of their mind only on the secret of predestination and reprobation, cannot grasp how Christ, faith, remission of sins, eternal life, or any spiritual and saving good can pertain in any way, or under any possible condition, to those who were not included in the number of the predestinate before the foundations of the world were laid — even though Christ may be offered to them in Evangelical preaching, faith may be required of them, and remission and eternal life to be obtained through Christ may be promised to them under that very condition of faith. Briefly, then, we will show that this condition of faith, which is required for this, that Christ’s death endured for all be singularly applied to this or that person, neither is, nor ought to be conceived by us as, utterly impossible for any wayfarer. Here it must be recalled to memory what we warned from the beginning: that this possibility is founded in a supernatural help possibly to be received by anyone while we are here on the way; according to that celebrated saying of Prosper of Aquitaine: This is the difference between bad human beings and demons, that for human beings, even very bad ones, reconciliation still remains, if God has mercy; but for demons no conversion is reserved forever (Objection of Vincent, reply 6).
First, then, when we say that faith, or believing, is something possible for any wayfarer, we look not to an active and formal power, as if any wayfarer could by the liberty of his own choice elicit this act of believing; but to a passive power, as they call it, and a material one, because in any wayfarer this can be effected by God, that he be converted and believe the Gospel. For we are said to be able to do something in two ways, as Aquinas well observed: namely either by a power that is in us, as we say that a stone can be moved downward; or by a power considered on another’s part, as we say that a stone can be moved upward, not by an innate power, but by the power of the one throwing it. In this manner we affirm that any wayfarer can believe; or that the condition of faith is possible for any wayfarer, not by a proximate power residing in himself, but by a supernatural help which can be supplied by God at any moment to any wayfarer; according to that of John the Baptist (Luke 3:8): I say to you that God is able even from these stones to raise up children of Abraham. Therefore no heart is so hardened and stony that it cannot be softened by God and bent to faith and penitence. This is what Augustine signified in other words when he wrote that being able to have faith is of the nature of human beings, but having it is of the grace of the faithful (On the Predestination of the Saints, chapter 5). To this the same Augustine also alluded in the Soliloquies, book 1, chapter 1, where when he had said, Let us believe, if this is in our power, he at once adds, Our power is God himself.
Latin
Docuimus Christum pro omnibus hominibus mortuum, eo sensu quod per mortem Christi sit stabilitum foedus Evangelicum cum toto humano genere, juxta quod remissio peccatorum et vita aeterna omnibus hominibus sub possibili fidei conditione sit exposita. Quidam in solum praedestinationis et reprobationis arcanum animi sui oculos defigentes, capere non possunt, quomodo Christus, fides, remissio peccatorum, vita aeterna, aut quicquam boni spiritualis et salutiferi ullatenus aut sub ulla conditione possibili ad eos pertineat, qui in praedestinatorum numero haud inclusi fuerunt ante jacta mundi fundamenta, licet Christus in Evangelica praedicatione eis offerri, licet fides ab eis exigi, licet sub ipsa fidei conditione remissio et vita aeterna per Christum obtinenda illis promitti possit. Breviter itaque ostendemus, Hanc fidei conditionem, quae requiritur ad hoc ut Christi mors pro omnibus tolerata sit huic aut illi singulariter applicata, neque esse, neque a nobis concipi oportere, ut cuivis Viatori omnino impossibilem. Hic autem in memoriam revocandum est, quod ab initio monuimus, hanc possibilitatem fundari in auxilio supernaturali possibiliter, dum hic in via sumus, a quolibet recipiendo; juxta celebre illud dictum Prosperi Aquitanici, Hoc inter malos homines distat et daemones, quod hominibus etiam valde malis superest, si Deus misereatur, reconciliatio, Daemonibus autem nulla est in aeternum servata conversio, Object. Vincent. resp. 6. Primo igitur, quando dicimus fidem sive credere, esse quid possibile cuivis viatori, respicimus non activam et formalem potentiam, quasi quivis viator posset pro libertate arbitrii sui hunc actum credendi elicere; sed passivam, quam vocant, et materialem, quia in quolibet viatore potest hoc a Deo effici ut convertatur et credat Evangelio. Nam posse aliquid dupliciter dicimur, ut bene observavit Aquinas, scilicet vel per potentiam quae in nobis est, sicut dicimus quod lapis potest moveri deorsum; vel per potentiam ex parte alterius consideratam, sicut dicimus lapidem posse moveri sursum, non per potentiam innatam, sed per potentiam projicientis. Ad hunc modum nos affirmamus quemlibet viatorem posse credere; vel fidei conditionem esse cuivis viatori possibilem, non per potentiam proximam in seipso residentem, sed per auxilium supernaturale, quod a Deo potest pro quolibet momento cuivis viatori suppeditari; juxta illud Johannis Baptistae, Luc. iii. 8, Dico vobis, Posse Deum etiam ex lapidibus istis excitare filios Abrahae. Ergo nullum cor tam obduratum et lapideum est, quod non possit a Deo emolliri, et ad fidem ac poenitentiam inflecti. Hoc illud est quod aliis verbis significavit Augustinus, quando scripsit, Posse habere fidem, naturae est hominum, habere autem, gratiae est fidelium, De Praedestinat. Sanctor. cap. 5. Huc etiam allusit idem Augustinus in Soliloquiis, lib. 1. cap. 1, ubi cum dixisset, Credamus, si hoc in nostra potestate est, mox subjicit, Potestas nostra ipse Deus est.