Two Dissertations · §615 · John Davenant

Cap. IX Arg. 6 Sol cont.: equivocation on 'cause' — true/direct vs abusive/indirect; sun illuminates truly, its setting is only abusively cause of darkness

Equivocation on the word cause has trapped our adversaries — or at least given them occasion to trap others. Something is called cause of an event or effect in two ways: truly, directly, and properly, as what flows in to produce the effect; abusively, indirectly, improperly, as what does not act to block the effect. So the sun at rising is truly and properly called cause why the air is lit; at setting it is only improperly and abusively called cause why it darkens — merely because its presence would have put darkness to flight.

Latin

Aequivocatio in hoc vocabulo causae imposuit adversariis nostris, aut saltem suppeditavit illis occasionem imponendi aliis. Nam dupliciter aliquid dici solet causa talis eventus aut effectus: Vere, directe, et proprie, per modum influentis ad producendum effectum; Abusive, indirecte, improprie, per modum non agentis ad prohibendum effectum: Sicuti sol ortu suo vere et proprie causa dicitur cur aer illuminetur; occasu improprie et abusive causa dicitur cur obtenebretur, hoc sensu solummodo, quia sua praesentia tenebras fugasset.

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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.

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