Two Dissertations · §799 · John Davenant

Cap. X Ultimum Propos. 3: catholic doctrine — opposite always Pelagian/Semipelagian badge; they grant common offered mercy but make healing grace hang on prior merit

That this was catholic church doctrine is plain, first because the contrary was always the Pelagians’ and Semipelagians’ defense and as it were their badge. Though (as Arminians also now do) they granted a grace offered to all from mere mercy, yet the grace that heals, quickens, and justifies—and is not only offered by God but already possessed by man—they thought given only from prior merit of some good act or disposition that God saw in the receiver and not in others.

Latin

Hanc fuisse doctrinam Catholicae Ecclesiae patet, 1. Quia contraria semper a Pelagianis et Semipelagianis defensa fuit, et ejus ea quasi proprium insigne habita. Nam utcunque (quod etiam Arminiani jam faciunt) gratiam quandam agnoverint ex mera Dei misericordia omnibus oblatam, tamen illam quae sanat, vivificat, et justificat, quaeque non offertur tantum ex parte Dei, sed jam possidetur ex parte hominis, illam, inquam, cenrebant datam nisi ex antecedente merito bonae alicujus operationis aut dispositionis quam in accipiente vidit Deus, in aliis non vidit.

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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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