Animadversions on Doctor Heylins Quinquarticular History, Part 23 – Part 26
Dr. H. pag. 42, 43.
2. The Sublapsarian Opinion fighteth with God's holiness, and makes him the cause of sin in the greatest number of men, 1. In regard that of his own will and pleasure, he hath brought mem into an estate, in which they cannot avoid sin: that is to say, by imputing to them the transgression of their Father Adam. 2. In that he leaves them irrecoverably plunged and involved in it, without affording them power or ability to rise again to newness of life: In which case that of Tertullian seems to have been fitly alledged, In cujus manu est ne quid fiat, ei deputatur cum jam fit; In whose power it is that a thing be not done, to him it is imputed when it is done.
Answ. If absolute Reprobation do indeed rob God of his holiness, let it for ever be abandoned, and not so much as named with the least approbation among Divines. But what wretched ignorance is this! whilst a man is pleading for the holiness of his Maker, to lay down such a rule, which if it prove true, doth entitle him to all the wickednesses that ever were perpetrated by the sons of men! I ask the Doctor, Could not he who kept the Heathenish King from touching Abraham's Wife, Laban and Esau from doing mischief to Iacob, the Israelites Enemies from having so much as a mind to hurt them, so restrain the lust of all and every man, as that it should never conceive and bring forth sin and death? If he could not, he is not Omnipotent, nor fit to govern the World: If he could, sith he hath not, he is, by the Doctor's rule, become the Author of all the pollutions that have been in the World through lust. The best is, the rule is most apparently false even in reference to the creature; for a man is not guilty of all the sins which he had power to hinder, but only of those sins which by virtue of his calling and place he was bound to hinder. Let us see whether the Sublapsarians be more happy in their Principles than the Historian in his. Two Principles of theirs are taken notice of,
1. That God, of his own will and pleasure, hath brought men into an estate in which they cannot avoid sin; that is to say, by imputing to them the transgression of their Father Adam. Little did I expect to find this Principle charged with any opposition to the holiness of God: For though it be most unhandsomly expressed, yet that which is intended by it, is but this, that It was the free constitution of God, that if Adam stood, he should transmit holiness to all his Posterity, and if he did fall and rebel, then his Posterity should be born in a condition of sin and misery. If this be a truth, then it is not contrary to the holiness of God: If not a truth, what shall become of Rom. 5.12? Let foreign be rendred either in quo or eo quod, it must needs hold forth this, that, when Adam sinned we sinned: Which could not be, if Adam had not been made by God a common Person, a faederal as well as a natural head. If he was made a common Person, so as that his will was reputed our will, his fall our fall, he was made such by the meer will and pleasure of God; for who can think that there was any thing that necessitated God to make him such? It may be the second Principle is more hainous: That is thus laid down,
2. He leaves men irrecoverably plunged and involved in sin, without affording them power or ability to rise again to newness of life.
If this be understood of all men, it is a notorious calumny: For the Sublapsarians hold, that there are a great number of men, upon whom God hath eternally purposed to bestow that grace which shall infallibly bring them out of sin and misery. But there are some to whom he affords no such power: Well, What then? Is he not therefore holy? Absit. If he had let all the race of mankind perish, never sending his Son to take flesh, and so become a Mediator betwixt God and Man, he had notwithstanding been every way as holy as now he is. But it seems it is again come to that pass, that Deus non erit Deus nisi homini placuerit, God shall not be God (God he is not if he be not holy,) unless he have made such Decrees as please our Semipelagians.
Dr. H. page 43.
3. This Sublapsarian Doctrine is inconsistent with the mercy of God, so highly signified in the Scriptures; in making him to take so small and speedy occasion to punish the greater part of men for ever, and for one sin once committed, to shut them up under an invincible necessity of sin and damnation.
Answ. Who would have looked for such stuff from the Pen of a Divine? If God make man after his own image, allow him liberty to eat of all the trees but one, and tell him most expresly, that if he eat of that tree he shall die the death, Must he needs be thought, if he punish man for ever for eating of that tree, to take a small occasion to punish man? Had not this eating of the fruit of the forbidden tree, all the circumstances in it that may render it out of measure sinful? Had it not something in it contrary to all the Precepts of the natural Law? But besides, This charge of destroying God's mercy is grounded on a gross mistake: For Sublapsarians do not make Reprobution to be Gods punishing men for ever, or shutting them up under an invincible necessity of sin and damnation: It is, with them, only the denying or not giving of an undue favour, which yet he is pleased graciously to vouchsafe to others, who could as little deserve it as those to whom it is denied.
Dr. H. Ibid.
4. This is incompatible with the Iustice of God, who is said in Scripture to be righteous in all his wayes according unto weight and measure, that the far greatest part of mankind should be left remediless in a state of damnation, for the sin of their first Father only: that he should require faith in Christ of those, to whom he hath precisely in his absolute purpose denied, both a power to believe and a Christ to believe in: or, that he should punish men for the omission of an act, which is made impossible for them by his own decree, by which he purposed that they should partake with Adam in his sin, and be stript of all the supernatural power which they had in him before he fell.
Answ. All this is but a bundle of impertinencies, improprieties, calumnies. No opinion destroys the Justice of God, but that which ascribes injustice to him: Injustice is not ascribed to God, till he be affirmed to do something that is contrary to his goodness or his truth; Which he is not by those who maintain his Decree of Reprobation. Sublapsarians do not say, that the far greatest part of mankind is left remedilesly in a state of damnation, for the sin of their first Father only. They affirm, that the first transgression was as truly the transgression of every one descended naturally from the loins of Adam, as of Adam himself the common Progenitor. They maintain not, that any is left remediless in a state of damnation. They acknowledge, that a remedy is by God prepared, sufficient to deliver them from the wrath to come, and that it is through the fault of men, living in the Church, if the remedy become not effectual. They also make damnation to come upon the Reprobate, not because he is a Reprobate, nor meerly and solely for original sin; but for their habitual and actual sins. It is also most false, that by the Sublapsarians God is made to require faith in Christ of those, to whom he hath denied both a power to believe, and a Christ to believe in. Those who did never hear of Christ, are not required under pain of damnation to believe in him; faith to them is no duty, and therefore infidelity is no sin: Those to whom Christ is manifested, have a Christ given them to believe in; for he is propounded to them as able to save them to the uttermost, as willing and resolved and engaged to save them upon his own terms: which are no other, than their receiving of him, and submitting to him as their Lord, to rule and govern them, &c. Yea, the Sublapsarians affirm God to give the Reprobate a power of believing, as great a power as the Arminians make him to give to any whether Elect or Reprobate. God never purposed effectually to work in the Reprobate both to will and to do, say the Sublapsarians: He never purposed effectually to work to will and to do in any, say the Arminians.
I, but God punisheth the Reprobates for the omission of an act, which is by his own Decree made impossible to them, say Sublapsarians; ergo, he is unjust.
I deny the antecedent; Some Sublapsarians say, that faith is not impossible to any who is in statu viatoris; no Sublapsarian saith, that it was the decree of God which made the act of faith impossible to any man. It is the corruption and hardness of mens hearts that makes the act of faith impossible to men, (if absolutely it be impossible;) but this corruption and hardness of mens hearts is not an effect of God's decree.
Dr. H. pag. 43.
5. It is said to be destructive of God's sincerity, in calling them to repentance and to the knowledge of the faith in Iesus Christ that they may be saved, to whom he doth not really intend the salvation offered: Which is as if a Creditor should resolve upon no terms to forgive his Debtor, and yet make him offers to remit the whole upon Condition, and bind the same with many solemn oaths in a publick Auditory.
Answ. This is indeed said (the more some mens shame and impudence) too too often; but it is not proved. Sublapsarians do not feign God to have any purpose to remit the debt upon no terms: they plainly say, that he hath purposed to remit, on the conditions of faith and repentance; should any Reprobate perform and come up to these conditions, the whole sum, how great soever, should be forgiven, and he put into the actual possession and enjoyment of the salvation offered to him in the preaching of the Gospel. I, but these conditions are such as God knows the Reprobate will not, cannot come up to: therefore, to offer salvation on such terms, is but to delude. Why, but did not God foreknow, in the Arminian way, that the Reprobate would not repent and believe? Ay; but they do not say, that God ever decreed that he should not repent and believe. Well, however he decreed, not to cure his impenitence or unbelief. If this be granted, the Sublapsarian hath as much as he need contend for; Reprobation being with him, only a denial of that grace which makes men actually believers. Judge now what cause the Doctor had, so reproachfully to conclude this piece of his Charge,