Two Dissertations · §550 · John Davenant

Cap. VIII Arg. 9 (Thomas of Argentina): adult reprobation from foresight of final bad use of free will

Among the older Scholastics, Thomas of Argentina admits he deserts the common opinion of the theologians, and tries against them to prove this: that the cause of reprobation as to adults is the evil use of free will lasting in them to life's end, foresighted by God from eternity. That opinion differs in words, not in sense, from the Jesuit and Arminian. Let us hear Argentina's reasons.

Latin

Ex antiquis Scholasticis Thomas de Argentina fatetur se communem opinionem Theologorum deserere, ac conatur contra eos hanc conclusionem probare, Causam reprobationis quoad adultos esse malum usum liberi arbitrii, usque ad finem vitae in ipsis duraturum, ab aeterno a Deo praescitum. Quae opinio verbis, non sensu, differt a Jesuitica et Arminiana. Audiamus igitur Argentinae rationes.

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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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