Cap. IX Arg. 13 Sol close: negligence harms elect too; no one absolutely damned whether they repent or not; unknown whom God hardens — soft teaching (2 Tim. ii. 25); jailer analogy; absolute decrees do not cut means from end
Thus far of the elect. Now their objection about the reprobate — that on our view ministers' negligence can harm only those God absolutely wills to destroy, who cannot be saved — is first false. It can also harm, and often does harm, the elect, while it lets them sleep for a time in their sins, and by that security provoke God's wrath and various scourges against themselves. Next: there is no reprobate whom God absolutely wills to destroy — that is (as the adversaries seem to take it) whether they repent or not, believe or not, die in their sins or not. There are many of whom God does not so have mercy as to have prepared for them special efficacious grace that will also work belief, repentance, and an end to hardening their hearts. But because ministers do not know of whom God wills to have mercy, and whom he wills to harden, they ought with all gentleness to instruct those of a contrary mind, if at any time God give them repentance (2 Tim. Ii. 25). Moreover, even if it were true that ministers' negligence can harm only those God absolutely wills to destroy, that does not exempt negligent ministers from guilt or capital punishment — as a jailer would not be exempt from guilt if he ran a thief through with a sword, or extinguished the means, whom the judge in his mind had absolutely decreed to damn and put to death. Finally: what they pretend — that once God has precisely decreed things thus or otherwise, care and solicitude for those same things is afterward taken up by men in vain — is most plainly that idle argument, or lazy reasoning; if we assent to it, there is nothing at all we do unwillingly (Cicero, De fato). For absolute or precise decrees of God do not cut means from the destined end, but bring both means and end under the order of a certain infallible providence. That infallibility of the thing decreed does not take away natural possibility of a contrary event — only the contrary event itself. Nor does it imply that the effect is produced without second causes, or that second causes' proper operation is broken. So the eternal secret decree of predestination and reprobation gives no one a cause of sloth — though the impious and the slothful may falsely pretext it for their idleness.
Latin
Hactenus de electis. Jam quod de reprobatis objiciunt, negligentiam ministrorum non posse, ex sententia nostra, nocere nisi iis quos Deus absolute vult perdere, quique non possunt servari, id primo falsum est: Nam potest etiam nocere, et saepe nocet, electis, dum patitur eos suis peccatis ad tempus indormire, et hac sua securitate iram Dei ac varia flagella contra se provocare. Dein, nemo est reprobatorum quem Deus absolute vult perdere, hoc est (ut adversarii videntur intelligere) sive poeniteant sive non poeniteant, sive credant sive non credant, sive peccatis immoriantur sive non. Sunt multi quorum Deus non sic miseretur ut praeparaverit illis gratiam specialem et efficacem atque operaturam ut credant, ut poeniteant, ut indurare sua corda desinant. Sed quia ministris ignotum est, quorum Deus vult misereri, et quos vult indurare, debent cum omni lenitate erudire eos qui contrario animo sunt affecti, si quando det illis Deus poenitentiam, etc. 2 Tim. ii. 25. Adhaec, si verum esset, negligentiam ministrorum non posse nocere nisi iis, quos Deus absolute vult perdere, tamen hoc non eximit negligentes ministros vel a culpa vel a poena capitali; sicuti custos carceris a culpa non eximeretur, si latronem gladio transfoderet, aut media extingueret, quem judex apud animum suum absolute decrevisset damnare, et morte afficere. Denique, quod obtendunt, rebus praecise sic vel aliter a Deo semel decretis, curam et solicitudinem earundem rerum frustra postmodum ab hominibus suscipi, est planissime ignava illa ratio, sive ἀργολογία, cui si assentiamur, nihil est omnino quod agamus invita, ut inquit Cicero De fato. Absoluta enim sive praecisa Dei decreta non praescindunt media a fine destinato, sed et media et finem ad infallibilis cujusdam providentiae ordinem reducunt. Neque haec infallibilitas rei decretae tollit naturalem possibilitatem ad eventum contrarium, sed ipsum eventum contrarium: neque etiam innuit aut effectum sine causis secundis producendum, aut propriam operationem secundarum causarum infringendam. Aeternum et arcanum igitur praedestinationis et reprobationis decretum nemini praebet causam socordiae, quamvis impii et socordes possint hoc suae ignaviae falso praetexere.