Two Dissertations · §491 · John Davenant

Cap. VI Arg. 12: second — separation follows Peter's act, not God's segregating decree

Second: we grant that by that decree's tenor Peter is to be set apart to eternal life once he has persevered in faith — but that separation follows from Peter's own consequent contingent act, not from a segregating decree of God. By his act he was set apart to salvation after he was foreseen to have believed and persevered; by the decree itself he was not singularly segregated unto faith or salvation. Like case: if a king enacts Whoever scales the besieged city's walls shall be knighted; whoever turns his back shall die — those who climb and those who flee are singular persons; yet the king is not said to have elected certain singulars to knighthood and passed others by, but to have conferred it on singulars and destined that dignity equally to all — to be won if they behave well, lost if not. Arminian election is of that kind throughout, and so includes no true real separation of singular persons.

Latin

Secundo, agnoscimus juxta tenorem praedicti decreti Petrum ad vitam aeternam separandum, postquam in fide perseveraverit: sed haec separatio consequitur ex consequente et contingente actu ipsius Petri, non oritur ex segregativo decreto ipsius Dei. Suo enim actu fuit segregatus ad salutem postquam praevisus est credidisse et perseverasse, sed praedicto decreto non fuit singulariter segregatus, sive ad fidem sive ad salutem. Simili hoc illustretur. Si Rex tale decretum sanciat, Quisquis muros oppugnatae urbis ascenderit, eques fiet; quisquis terga verterit, capite plectetur, singulares personae sunt qui muros scandunt, singulares personae qui fugiunt: neque tamen tali decreto dicitur Rex elegisse singulares quasdam personas ad equestrem dignitatem, alias autem praeteriisse; sed contulisse in singulares personas; destinasse autem illam dignitatem ex aequo omnibus, sive obtinendam, si bene se gesserint, sive amittendam, si secus. Talis per omnia est illa electio Arminiana; ac proinde non habet inclusam veram et realem separationem singularium personarum.

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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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