Two Dissertations · §784 · John Davenant

Cap. X Ultimum Propos. 1: Hilary and Faustus; then Arminius/Arnoldus reject the grace that makes the good will — only sweet persuasion, event to free will

So Hilary to Augustine: texts like As he has dealt to each the measure of faith they take to mean the one who has begun to will is helped—not that willing itself is given. A little later: they explain elect and rejected by the merit of each one’s own will joined on. Faustus of Riez, the Semipelagians’ chief, says: It is of divine pity that you are called, but left to your will that you follow; and (p. 1506): God waits for the will of the one to be purged. From countless such lines we gather Pelagians and Semipelagians agreed never to grant God’s special munificence by which faith and charity are poured into some and a good will is thereby created in them. For a makeweight add this: Arminius, Arnoldus, and the rest from that school do not acknowledge the grace Pelagians and Semipelagians rejected—the grace that by its efficacy makes the good will—but only the grace that by persuasion moves the will to want to be good, and leaves the event to free will.

Latin

Sic Hilarius in Epist. ad August. Illud testimonium, Sicut unicuique partitus est mensuram fidei, et similia, ad id volunt valere, ut adjuvetur qui coeperit velle, non ut etiam donetur ut velit. Paulo post, Rationem reddunt electorum vel rejectorum ex eo, quod unicuique meritum propriae voluntatis adjungitur. Denique Faustus Rhegiensis Semipelagianorum coryphaeus, Divinae, inquit, miserationis est ut voceris, sed tuae voluntati commissum ut sequaris, Pag. 1493. Voluntatem ejus qui est purgandus exspectat Deus, Pag. 1506. Hujusmodi innumera apud hunc auctorem occurrunt, ex quibus colligimus Pelagianos et Semipelagianos in hoc conspirasse, quod numquam concedere voluerunt specialem Dei munificentiam et misericordiam, qua infundatur fides et charitas aliquibus, bonaque voluntas eo pacto in iisdem creetur. Jam superpondii loco et illud apponemus: Arminium ac Arnoldum, caeterosque qui ex eadem Schola prodierunt, non agnoscere illam quam Pelagiani et Semipelagiani exploserunt, nempe illam quae sua efficacitate bonam voluntatem facit; sed illam solam quae suasione movet ut bona esse velit, eventum autem ipsi libero arbitrio commitit.

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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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