Two Dissertations · §521 · John Davenant

Cap. VIII Arg. 2 Resp.: Paul removes good and evil acts; Augustine Contra 2 Epist. Pelag.

First reply: their argument strikes straight against Paul's mind and plain words. In this place he teaches that election and rejection of particular persons do not hang on diverse or contrary human acts, but on God's diverse good pleasure — willing to have mercy on one, not on another. For that cause he removes not only their good acts but their evil ones: when they were not yet born, nor had done anything good or evil. As for those who claim God regarded not works done but works he foresaw they would do — and so loved Jacob and hated Esau — since they are sharper than the Apostle himself, who could not invent that answer, I will not refute them; let them enjoy their dream. Only this: hear Augustine patiently. Irritated by that inept escape he broke out: You are truly misguided who, when truth says NOT OF WORKS BUT OF HIM THAT CALLS, say Jacob was loved from future works God foresaw he would do (Against two Letters of the Pelagians 2.7).

Latin

Respondeo primo, illos directe impingere in mentem et clara verba Apostoli hac sua argutatione. Nam Paulus id agit hoc in loco, ut doceat electionem et rejectionem personarum singularium non pendere ex diversis aut contrariis actibus hominum, sed ex diverso Dei beneplacito volentis hujus misereri, illius non misereri. Atque hanc ob causam non modo removet bonas eorum actiones, sed etiam malas; Cum nondum nati fuissent, aut aliquid boni aut mali egissent. Quod autem ad eos attinet qui obtendunt Deum non spectasse quidem opera quae fecerunt, sed quae praevidit eos facturos, atque inde dilexisse Jacobum, et odisse Esavum, cum sint ipso Apostolo perspicaciores, qui hanc responsionem excogitare non potuit, ego eos non refellam, sed suo insomnia frui permittam. Id tantum monebo, Augustinum patienter audiant, qui hoc inepto effugio irritatus in haec verba prorupit: Profecto desipitis, qui dicente veritate, NON EX OPERIBUS, SED EX VOCANTE DICTUM EST, vos dicitis, ex futuris operibus quae Deus illum facturum esse praesciebat, Jacob fuisse dilectum, etc. Contr. 2. Epist. Pelag. lib. 2, cap. 7.

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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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