The Protestant Religion Truly State and Justified, Part 17
The Nineteenth accuſed Point.
That by the fall of Adam, we have all leſt our Free-will, and that it is not in our power to chooſe good, but only Evil.
Anſ. Reader, I muſt deſire thee not to judge of all the Learned Papiſts, by this Deceiver: For if thou haſt read the loads of Voluminous Controverſies about Grace and Free-will among themſelves, it will remain doubtful to thee, whether this mans ſtating the Proteſtants Doctrine, prove him ignorant of it, or a willing Cheater. He tells you not, that this is as much a Controverſie among themſelves, as with the Proreſtants. He tells you not, how Auguſtine and Palagius managed it, and that their Pope Celeſtine took Auguſtines part: He tells you not, that the Thomiſts, Dominicans, Oratorians, and moſt Nominals, and Scotiſts, ſay as much againſt Free-will as we do, and we as much for it as they. He ſuppoſeth that you never read what Lombaerd, Aquinas, Bradwardine, Cajetane, Ferrarienſis, Zumel, Bannez, Alvarez, Aegedius Romi, Capreolus, and a Multitude more, ſay as much, and many more, againſt Free-will, than the Proteſtants: He tells you, not that even the Learned Jeſuits, Suarez, Vaſquez, Bellarmine, with Penottus, and many ſuch, are as much againſt Free-will, as moſt Learned Proteſtants. The man takes you for a Herd of ſilly Animals, that know not but that he ſaith true, what falſhood ſoever he ſhall tell you: But the truth of the Controverſie is this:
1. The Proteſtants loath ſo ſilly a ſtating of Controverſies, as this chat of Free-will without diſtinction: And ſo of Power.
2. They know that Phyſical, Moral, and Political Freedom of will, are not all one thing. Phyſical Freedom or Power, is that by which the natural faculty of the will, can determine it ſelf to act, (not without a ſuperiour Cauſe, but) without any extrinſick or intrinſick Coactor, or neceſſitating cauſe of Evil.
Moral Freedom and Power, is that by which the will is from under the overſtrong Byas of a vicious Diſpoſition, or deceitful Argument.
3. Political Freedom is, when no Law of God or Man obligeth him to any Evil, but all to good.
Protheſtants hold, 1. That Phyſical Liberty and Power, is common to man, as man. That is, that he wants not natural faculties to chooſe aright, but a right Inclination: And that he ſinneth not for want of ſuch faculties, but for want of their right diſpoſition and action.
2. That all men have juſt ſo much, and no more Moral Liberty and power, as they have of Gods Grace, to Relieve their vitiated wills and diſpoſitions, and to help them in the act. No man is freed from vitious Inclinations, further than Gods Grace freeth him, which is much more where there is ſpecial Grace and ſtrong, than where there is but common Grace or weak. And that the Thraldom or Impotency of the Vitious, is but the diſeaſe of their wills, and aggravation of their Sin: e. g. Where the Drunkard or Fornicator ſaith, I cannot forbear my Sin: He is ſo much the worſe and more unexcuſeable.
3. Every man hath not only Political Liberty to avoid Sin, but much more, even Gods urgent Precepts, Promiſes, and Threats: God doth not only give us Leave, but commandeth us not to Sin.
1. It is the very Eſſence of the will to be a natural power of faculty of willing good and nilling evil, as ſuch, as ſo apprehended by the intellect, and commanding the inferior faculties, ſome politically, and ſome deſpotically, ſome difficultly, ſome eaſily, ſome perfectly, ſome imperfectly, according to it's reſolution and their receptivity.
2. Libertas hominis, when a man may have what he chooſeth, is more than Libertas Voluntatis, which is but the Mode of it's ſelf determination; as without conſtraint it is a ſelf determining principle, of its own elicite acts, conſidered comparitively.
Which is, 1. Liberty of contradiction, or Exerciſe, viz, to will or not will, nill or not nill. 2. Liberty of Contrariety, or Specification of the Act, viz. To will this or nill it. 3. Liberty of Competition, to will This object or That: To nill This or That, (of which ſee Robert Baronius his Metaphyſicks.)
The will hath ſuch various ſorts of Liberty, and the word [Free-will] is ſo ambiguous, that it is a ſhame, and irkſome to read a pretended Teacher, ſtate a caſe thus indiſtinctly, Whether we have Free-will or power to chooſe good and refuſe evil: He is no man that hath no ſuch Free-will and power. And no man hath all ſorts of Free-will and power. Nay, as Liberty is oppoſed to Neceſſity▪ every man is neceſſitated to will Good as Good, and nill Evil as Evil, and can do no otherwiſe: And whenever he willeth Evil, it is ſub ratione bon…, miſtaking it for good: And who-ever nillleth good, doth it falſely, ſub ratione malt. The will is free from Conſtraint to Sin: God will not ſo conſtrain it: Men, Devils, Objects, cannot. He that had read but their Pennattus and Gibi…uf only, would ſee what a ſhame it is thus confuſedly to talk for or againſt Free-will.
But that which Proteſtants deny, is this.
1. They deny that mans will in his unregenerate State, is free from a Vitious Inclination, or from the Conduct of an Erring Intellect, or from the Byaſs and Temptation of Senſuality, or vitiated Senſes and Imagination; or from the Temptations of Satan and the World.
2. They deny that the will thus Vitiated and Tempted, will ever deliver it ſelf without Gods Spirit and Grace; being rather inclined to grow worſe.
3. They deny that this Grace is perfect in any in this Life, as without all defect in degree, or totally freeth any man from all Sin: and therefore they deny that any mans will is perfectly and inculpably free from every degree of vice and danger.
4. And as that degree of common Grace which is in the unregenerate, is but ſuch as conſiſteth with the predominance or Reign of Sin, ſo that will of every unregenerate man in that pravity, is as a ſlave to it's own, vitious diſpoſition, and to Errour, Objects, and Temptations; being not delivered as to the predominance.
5. Yet we believe that common Grace is ſuch, that theſe men are not utterly void of all good Inclination, and knowledge; and therefore that in Moral Sence, every man can do more good, and leſs Evil than he doth: And that men periſh, becauſe not only they will not (by pravity) do what they have natural ſtrength to do, but alſo becauſe they will not chooſe and do what morally they might have choſen and done, as to the wills own power.
6. And we ſtill ſay, that whenever a man ſinneth, it was not becauſe it was naturally impoſſible to do otherwiſe, (as to touch the Moon, to ſee without Eyes, or through the Earth, &c.) nor for want of natural faculties, nor doth God by Grace, give man other natural faculties, making him an Animal of another Species: But men ſin becauſe they will ſin, and they will becauſe they are tempted and now vitiouſly inclined; from which their wills are made free only in that meaſure, that Gods Grace doth ſanctifie them.
If our Prieſt would have told us, what there is in all this Doctrine of Free-will, that he dare accuſe, (and what dare he not cccuſe,) we ſhould have ſeen cauſe to conſider of his Arguments: But now he citeth Scripture as in a Dream.