Two Dissertations · §439 · John Davenant

Cap. VI Arg. 1: Augustine — praedestinatio is foresight and preparation of God's benefits

First argument: from various definitions of Predestination. Augustine: Predestination is the foresight and preparation of God's benefits, by which whoever are liberated are most certainly liberated. Observe: God foreknows those benefits or grace-gifts by which, applied, he will liberate certain singular elect persons; then prepares them all for them; and at length, as he foresaw and prepared, confers them at the right time. What here does not flow from God's mere good pleasure, preceding every act of the human will? He foresaw in the elect those grace-gifts he himself predestinated and prepared by free benevolence when he elected them in Christ — as Eph. 1:3–4 also openly shows. To cast darkness on pure divine mercy by putting foresight faith as cause or antecedent condition is trifling — faith is one of the chief benefits prepared for the elect in the predestination decree.

Latin

Primum argumentum petetur a definitionibus Praedestinationis variis, definiente Augustino; Praedestinatio est praescientia et praeparatio beneficiorum Dei, quibus certissime liberantur quicunque liberantur. Ubi observandum, Deum praescire ea beneficia sive gratiae dona, quibus adhibitis ipse liberabit singulares quasdam personas electas; dein, haec omnia illis praeparare, ac tandem, sicut praescivit et praeparavit, opportuno tempore conferre. Quid hic cogitari potest, quod non dimanet a mero Dei beneplacito, omnem humanae voluntatis actum praecedente? Praescivit enim Deus in electis illa dona gratiae quae ipse illis praedestinavit et praeparavit secundum gratuitam suam benevolentiam, quando illos elegit in Christo. Ut aperte etiam ex Apostolo colligitur Ephes. i. 3–4. &c. Si quis hic, ut purae Dei misericordiae tenebras offundat, praevisam fidem obtendat fuisse causam, aut conditionem antecedaneam, nugas egerit; cum fides sit unum ex praecipuis hisce beneficiis quae in praedestinationis decreto praeparantur hominibus electis.

Report a mistake in this passage

About this text

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.

Printed text used

Also checked PDF of the 1650 (Latin · print facsimile)
Also checked DjVu machine-read text of the 1650 (Latin)

We have not yet re-checked this work against its source. We made this study translation with AI help. No scholar has yet certified it as faithful and complete. Open Latin on any section, or the Latin source link, to see the source text. It is not a critical edition.

Report a mistake