Latest / Bondage of the Will / 006 - Sections 41-58 Discussion Part I-a

Transcript

006 - Sections 41-58 Discussion Part I-a · Bondage of the Will

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Sections forty one through fifty eight of The Bondage of
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: the Will by Martin Luther, translated by Henry Cole. This
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Discussion first part,
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: section forty one. And First of all, let us begin
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: regularly with your definition according to which you define free will. Thus, moreover,
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: I consider free will in this light, that it is
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: a power in the human will, by which a man
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: may apply himself to those things which lead unto eternal salvation,
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: or turn away from the same, the great deal of policy. Indeed,
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: you have here stated a mere naked definition, without declaring
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: any part of it, as all others do, because perhaps
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: you feared more shipwrecked than one. I therefore am compelled
• 0:48
  Speaker 1: to state the several parts myself. The thing defined itself,
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: if it be closely examined, has a much wider extent
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: than the definition of it, And such a definition the
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: sophists would call fall, that is, when the definition does
• 1:02
  Speaker 1: not fully embrace the thing defined. For I have shown
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: before that free will cannot be applied to any one
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: but to God only. You may perhaps rightly assign to
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: man some kind of will, but to assign unto him
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: free will in divine things is going too far. For
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: the term free will, in the judgment of the ears
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: of all, means that which can and does do God
• 1:25
  Speaker 1: word whatever it pleases, restrainable by no law and no command.
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: But you cannot call him free, who is a servant
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: acting under the power of the Lord. How much less
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: then can we rightly call men or angels free, who
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: so live under the all over ruling command of God,
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: to say nothing of sin and death, that they cannot
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: consist one moment by their own power. Here, then, at
• 1:50
  Speaker 1: the outset, the definition of the term and the definition
• 1:54
  Speaker 1: of the thing termed militate against each other, because the
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: term signifies one thing, and the being termed is by
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: experience found to be another. It would indeed be more
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: properly termed vertible will or mutable will. For in this
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: way Augustine and after him the Sophists diminished the glory
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: and force of the term free, adding thereby this detriment
• 2:17
  Speaker 1: that they assign vertibility to free will. And it becomes
• 2:22
  Speaker 1: us thus to speak, lest by inflated and lofty terms
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: of empty sound, we should deceive the hearts of men. And,
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: as Augustine also thinks, we ought to speak according to
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: a certain rule in sober and proper words, For in teaching,
• 2:37
  Speaker 1: simplicity and propriety of argumentation is required, and not high
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: flown figures of rhetorical persuasion Section forty two. But that
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: we might not seem to delight in a mere war
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: of words, we sede to that abuse, although great and dangerous.
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: That free will means vertible will, we will seede also
• 2:58
  Speaker 1: that to Erasmus, where he makes free will a power
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: of the human will, as though angels had not a
• 3:04
  Speaker 1: free will, too merely because he designed in this book
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: to treat only on the free will of men, we
• 3:10
  Speaker 1: make this remark. Otherwise, even in this part the definition
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: would be too narrow to embrace the thing defined. We
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: come then to those parts of the definition which are
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: the hinge upon which the matter turns. Of these things,
• 3:23
  Speaker 1: some are manifest enough. The rest shun the light, as
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: if conscious to themselves that they had everything to fear,
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: because nothing ought to be expressed more clearly and more
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: decisively than a definition. For to define obscurely is the
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: same thing as defining nothing at all. The clear parts
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: of the definition are these power of human will, and
• 3:45
  Speaker 1: by which a man can also unto eternal salvation. But
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: these things are UNDEBATAI to apply, and to those things
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: which lead also to turn away? What shall we do, vine,
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: that this to apply means, and this to turn away also?
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: And also what these words mean which pertain unto eternal salvation?
• 4:10
  Speaker 1: Into what dark corner? Have these withdrawn their meaning? I
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: seem as if I were engaged in dispute with a
• 4:17
  Speaker 1: very Scotinian, or with Heraclitus himself, so as to be
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: in the way of being worn out by a twofold labor.
• 4:25
  Speaker 1: First that I shall have to find out my adversary
• 4:28
  Speaker 1: by groping and feeling about for him in pits and darkness,
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: which is an enterprise both venturius and perilous. And if
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: I do not find him, to fight to no purpose
• 4:37
  Speaker 1: with ghosts and beat the air in the dark. And secondly,
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: if I should bring him out into the light, that
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: then I shall have to fight with him upon equal ground,
• 4:47
  Speaker 1: when I am already worn out with hunting after him.
• 4:50
  Speaker 1: I suppose then, what you mean by the power of
• 4:53
  Speaker 1: the human will? Is this a power or faculty or
• 4:57
  Speaker 1: disposition or aptitude to will or not to will, to
• 5:02
  Speaker 1: choose or refuse to approve or disapprove, And what other
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: actions soever belong to the will? Now, then, what it
• 5:11
  Speaker 1: is for this same power to apply itself or to
• 5:14
  Speaker 1: turn away? I do not see, unless it be the
• 5:17
  Speaker 1: very willing or not willing, choosing or refusing, approving or disapproving,
• 5:23
  Speaker 1: that is, the very action itself of the will. But
• 5:26
  Speaker 1: may we suppose that this power is a kind of
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: medium between the will itself and the action itself, such
• 5:33
  Speaker 1: as that by which the will itself allures forth the
• 5:36
  Speaker 1: action itself of willing or not willing, or by which
• 5:40
  Speaker 1: the action itself of willing or not willing is allured forth.
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: Anything else beside this it is impossible for one to
• 5:47
  Speaker 1: imagine or think of. And if I am deceived, let
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: the fault be my authors, who has given the definition,
• 5:54
  Speaker 1: not mine who examine it. For it is justly said
• 5:57
  Speaker 1: among lawyers his words who speaks obscure, surely when he
• 6:00
  Speaker 1: can speak more plainly, are to be interpreted against himself.
• 6:05
  Speaker 1: And here I wish to know nothing of our moderns
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: and their subtleties, For we must come plainly to close
• 6:10
  Speaker 1: quarters in what we say for the sake of understanding
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: and teaching. And as to those words, which lead unto
• 6:17
  Speaker 1: eternal salvation. I suppose by them are meant the words
• 6:21
  Speaker 1: and works of God, which are offered to the human will,
• 6:24
  Speaker 1: that it might either apply itself to them or turn
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: away from them. But I call both the Law and
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: the Gospel the words of God. By the Law works
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: are required, and by the Gospel faith. For there are
• 6:36
  Speaker 1: no other things which lead either unto the grace of
• 6:39
  Speaker 1: God or unto eternal salvation, but the Word and the
• 6:42
  Speaker 1: work of God. Because grace or the spirit is the
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: life itself to which we are led by the Word
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: and work of God Section forty three. But this life
• 6:53
  Speaker 1: or salvation is an eternal matter, incomprehensible to the human capacity,
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: as Paul shows out of Isaiah first Corinthians two nine,
• 7:02
  Speaker 1: I hath not seen nor ear heard, neither hath it
• 7:06
  Speaker 1: entered into the heart of man to conceive the things
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: which God hath prepared for them that love Him. For
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: when we speak of eternal life, we speak of that
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: which is numbered among the chiefest articles of our faith,
• 7:17
  Speaker 1: and what free will avails in this article, Paul testifies
• 7:21
  Speaker 1: First Corinthians two ten. Also God saith, he hath revealed
• 7:26
  Speaker 1: them unto us by his spirit, as though he had said,
• 7:30
  Speaker 1: the heart of no man will ever understand or think
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: of any of those things unless the Spirit shall reveal them.
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: So far is it from possibility that he should ever
• 7:40
  Speaker 1: apply himself unto them or seek after them? Look at experience?
• 7:45
  Speaker 1: What have the most exalted minds among the nations thought
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: of a future life and of the resurrection? Has it
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: not been that the more exalted they were in mind,
• 7:54
  Speaker 1: the more ridiculous the resurrection and eternal life have appeared
• 7:57
  Speaker 1: to them? Unless you mean to say that those philosophers
• 8:01
  Speaker 1: and Greeks at Athens, who Acts seventeen eighteen called Paul
• 8:05
  Speaker 1: as he taught these things, a babbler and a setter
• 8:08
  Speaker 1: forth of strange gods, were not of exalted minds. Portius
• 8:12
  Speaker 1: Festus Acts twenty six twenty four calls out that Paul
• 8:16
  Speaker 1: is mad on account of his preaching eternal life. What
• 8:20
  Speaker 1: does Pliny bark forth Book seven? What does Lucian also
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: that mighty genius were not they? Men wondered at? Moreover,
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: to this day there are many who the more renowned
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: they are for talent and erudition, the more they laugh
• 8:36
  Speaker 1: at this article, and that openly considering it a mere fable.
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: And certainly no man upon earth, unless imbued with the
• 8:44
  Speaker 1: Holy Spirit, ever secretly knows, or believes in, or wishes
• 8:48
  Speaker 1: for eternal salvation, how much soever he may boast of
• 8:51
  Speaker 1: it by his voice and by his pen. And may
• 8:55
  Speaker 1: you and I, friend Erasmus, be free from this boasting leaven.
• 8:59
  Speaker 1: So rare is a believing soul in this article have
• 9:02
  Speaker 1: I got the sense of this definition section forty four
• 9:06
  Speaker 1: Upon the authority of Erasmus, Then free will is a
• 9:09
  Speaker 1: power of the human will, which can of itself will
• 9:12
  Speaker 1: and not will to embrace the word and work of God,
• 9:15
  Speaker 1: by which it is to be led to those things
• 9:18
  Speaker 1: which are beyond its capacity and comprehension. If then it
• 9:22
  Speaker 1: can will and not will, it can also love and hate.
• 9:25
  Speaker 1: And if it can love and hate, it can to
• 9:28
  Speaker 1: a certain degree do the law and believe the Gospel.
• 9:32
  Speaker 1: For it is impossible if you can will and not will,
• 9:35
  Speaker 1: that you should not be able by that will to
• 9:37
  Speaker 1: begin some kind of work, even though from the hindering
• 9:40
  Speaker 1: of another you should not be able to perfect it.
• 9:43
  Speaker 1: And therefore, as among the works of God which lead
• 9:47
  Speaker 1: to salvation, death, the cross, and all the evils of
• 9:50
  Speaker 1: the world are numbered. Human will can will its own
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: death and perdition. Nay, it can will all things, while
• 9:57
  Speaker 1: it can will the embracing of the Word and work
• 9:59
  Speaker 1: of God. For what is there that can be anywhere beneath, above, within,
• 10:04
  Speaker 1: or without the Word and work of God, but God himself.
• 10:08
  Speaker 1: And what is there here left to grace and the
• 10:10
  Speaker 1: Holy Spirit. This is plainly to ascribe divinity to free will.
• 10:15
  Speaker 1: For to will to embrace the Law and the Gospel,
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: not to will sin, and to will death belongs to
• 10:22
  Speaker 1: the power of God alone, as Paul testifies in more
• 10:25
  Speaker 1: places than one. Wherefore, no one since the Pelagians has
• 10:29
  Speaker 1: written more rightly concerning free will than Erasmus. For I
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: have said above that free will is a divine term
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: and signifies a divine power. But no one hitherto except
• 10:41
  Speaker 1: the Pelagians, have ever assigned to it that power. Hence
• 10:45
  Speaker 1: Erasmus by far outstrips the Pelagians themselves, for they assign
• 10:50
  Speaker 1: that divinity to the whole of free will, but Erasmus
• 10:53
  Speaker 1: to the half of it. Only. They divide free will
• 10:56
  Speaker 1: into two parts, the power of discerning and the power
• 10:59
  Speaker 1: of chrue using, assigning the one to reason and the
• 11:02
  Speaker 1: other to will, and the Sophists do the same. But Erasmus,
• 11:07
  Speaker 1: setting aside the power of discerning, exalts the power of
• 11:10
  Speaker 1: choosing alone, and thus makes a lame, half membered free
• 11:14
  Speaker 1: will God himself. What must be supposed that he would
• 11:18
  Speaker 1: have done had he set about describing the whole of
• 11:20
  Speaker 1: free will. But not contented with this, he outstrips even
• 11:25
  Speaker 1: the philosophers, for it has never yet been settled among
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: them whether or not anything can give motion to itself.
• 11:32
  Speaker 1: And upon this point the Platonics and Peripatetics are divided
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: in the whole body of philosophy. But according to Erasmus,
• 11:39
  Speaker 1: free will, not only of its own power, gives motion
• 11:43
  Speaker 1: to itself, but applies itself to those things which are eternal,
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: that is, which are incomprehensible to itself. A new and
• 11:52
  Speaker 1: unheard of definer of free will truly, who leaves the philosophers,
• 11:56
  Speaker 1: the Pelagians, the Selphists, and all the rest of them
• 11:59
  Speaker 1: far behind him. Nor is this all. He does not
• 12:03
  Speaker 1: even spare himself, but descends from and militates against himself
• 12:08
  Speaker 1: more than against all the rest together. For he had
• 12:11
  Speaker 1: said before that the human will is utterly ineffective without grace,
• 12:15
  Speaker 1: unless perhaps this was said only in joke. But here
• 12:19
  Speaker 1: where he gives a serious definition, he says that the
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: human will has that power by which it can effectively
• 12:25
  Speaker 1: apply itself to those things which pertain unto eternal salvation,
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: that is, which are incomparably beyond that power, so that
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: in this part Erasmus outstrips even himself. Section forty five.
• 12:39
  Speaker 1: Do you see, friend, Erasmus, that by this definition you,
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: though unwittingly I presume, betray yourself and make it manifest
• 12:46
  Speaker 1: that you either know nothing of these things whatever, or
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: that without any consideration, and in a mere air of contempt,
• 12:53
  Speaker 1: you write upon the subject, not knowing what you say,
• 12:56
  Speaker 1: nor whereof you affirm. And as I said before, you
• 13:00
  Speaker 1: say less about and attribute more to free will than
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: all others put together. For you do not describe the
• 13:07
  Speaker 1: whole of free will, and yet you assign unto it
• 13:09
  Speaker 1: all things. The opinion of the Sophists, or at least
• 13:13
  Speaker 1: of the father of them, Peter Lombard, is far more tolerable.
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: He says, free will is the faculty of discerning and
• 13:22
  Speaker 1: then choosing also good if with grace, but evil, if
• 13:26
  Speaker 1: grace be wanting. He plainly agrees in sentiment with Augustine,
• 13:31
  Speaker 1: that free will, of its own power, cannot do anything
• 13:34
  Speaker 1: but fall, nor avail unto anything but to sin. Wherefore Augustine,
• 13:39
  Speaker 1: also book two against Julian, calls free will under bondage
• 13:44
  Speaker 1: rather than free. But you make the power of free
• 13:47
  Speaker 1: will equal in both respects, that it can, by its
• 13:51
  Speaker 1: own power, without grace, both apply itself unto good and
• 13:55
  Speaker 1: turn itself from evil. For you do not imagine how
• 13:58
  Speaker 1: much you assign unto it by this pronoun itself and
• 14:03
  Speaker 1: by itself when you say can apply itself, For you
• 14:07
  Speaker 1: utterly exclude the Holy Spirit with all his power, as
• 14:11
  Speaker 1: a thing superfluous and unnecessary. Your definition therefore is condemnable
• 14:16
  Speaker 1: even by the Sophists, who, were they not so blinded
• 14:20
  Speaker 1: by hatred and fury against me, would be enraged at
• 14:23
  Speaker 1: your book rather than at mine. But now, as your
• 14:27
  Speaker 1: intent is to oppose Luther, all that you say is
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: holy and Catholic, even though you speak against both yourself
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: and them. So great is the patience of holy men.
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: Not that I say this as approving the sentiments of
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: the Sophists concerning free will, but because I consider them
• 14:45
  Speaker 1: more tolerable, for they approach nearer to the truth. For
• 14:49
  Speaker 1: though they do not say, as I do, that free
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: will is nothing at all, yet since they say that
• 14:54
  Speaker 1: it can of itself do nothing without grace, they militate
• 14:58
  Speaker 1: against Erasmus. Nay, they see to militate against themselves, and
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: to be tossed to and fro in a mere quarrel
• 15:04
  Speaker 1: of words, being more earnest for contention than for the truth,
• 15:08
  Speaker 1: which is just the sophist should be. But now let
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: us suppose that a sophist of no mean rank were
• 15:15
  Speaker 1: brought before me, with whom I could speak upon these
• 15:17
  Speaker 1: things apart in familiar conversation, and should ask him for
• 15:22
  Speaker 1: his liberal and candid judgment. In this way, if any
• 15:26
  Speaker 1: one should tell you that that was free, which of
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: its own power could only go one way, that is
• 15:32
  Speaker 1: the bad way, and which could go the other way,
• 15:35
  Speaker 1: indeed that is the right way, but not by its
• 15:37
  Speaker 1: own power, nay, only by the help of another, could
• 15:41
  Speaker 1: you refrain from laughing in his face, my friend, For
• 15:45
  Speaker 1: in this way I will make it appear that a
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: stone or a log of wood has free will, because
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: it can go upwards and downwards, although by its own
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: power it can go only downwards. But can go upwards
• 15:58
  Speaker 1: only by the help of another. And, as I said before,
• 16:02
  Speaker 1: by meaning at the same time the thing itself and
• 16:04
  Speaker 1: also something else which may be joined with it or
• 16:07
  Speaker 1: added to it, I will say consistently, with the use
• 16:10
  Speaker 1: of all words and languages, all men are no man,
• 16:14
  Speaker 1: and all things are nothing. Thus, by multiplicity of argumentation
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: they at last make free will free by accident, as
• 16:23
  Speaker 1: being that which may at some time be set free
• 16:26
  Speaker 1: by another. But our point in dispute is concerning the
• 16:29
  Speaker 1: thing itself, concerning the reality of free will. If this
• 16:34
  Speaker 1: be what is to be solved, there now remains nothing.
• 16:37
  Speaker 1: Let them say what they will but the empty name
• 16:40
  Speaker 1: of free will. The Sophists are deficient. Also in this
• 16:45
  Speaker 1: they assign to free will the power of discerning good
• 16:48
  Speaker 1: from evil. Moreover, they set light by regeneration and the
• 16:52
  Speaker 1: renewing of the spirit, and give that other external aid,
• 16:56
  Speaker 1: as it were, to free will. But of this hereafter,
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: let this be sufficient concerning the definition. Now let us
• 17:05
  Speaker 1: look into the arguments that are to exalt this empty
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: thing of a term Section forty six. First of all
• 17:12
  Speaker 1: we have that of Ecclesiasticus fifteen fifteen through eighteen. God
• 17:17
  Speaker 1: from the beginning made man, and left him in the
• 17:20
  Speaker 1: hand of his own counsel. He gave him also his
• 17:23
  Speaker 1: commandments and his precepts, saying, if thou wilt keep my commandments,
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: and wilt keep continually the faith that pleaseth me, they
• 17:32
  Speaker 1: shall preserve thee He has set before thee fire and water,
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: and upon which thou wilt stretch forth thine hand before
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: man is life and death, good and evil, And whichsoever
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: pleaseth him shall be given unto him. Although I might
• 17:49
  Speaker 1: justly refuse this book, yet nevertheless I receive it, lest
• 17:54
  Speaker 1: I should, with loss of time, involve myself in a
• 17:56
  Speaker 1: dispute concerning the books that are received into the cannon
• 18:00
  Speaker 1: of the Hebrews. Which canon you do not a little
• 18:03
  Speaker 1: reproach and deride when you compare the Proverbs of Solomon
• 18:07
  Speaker 1: and the Love's Song, as with a double meaning sneer
• 18:10
  Speaker 1: you call it with the two books Esdras and Judith,
• 18:14
  Speaker 1: the History of Susannah of the Dragon, and the Book
• 18:18
  Speaker 1: of Esther. Though they have this last in their canon,
• 18:22
  Speaker 1: and according to my judgment, it is much more worthy
• 18:24
  Speaker 1: of being there than any one of those that are
• 18:26
  Speaker 1: considered not to be in the canon. But I would
• 18:29
  Speaker 1: briefly answer you here in your own words. The scripture
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: in this place is obscure and ambiguous. Therefore it proves
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: nothing to a certainty. But however, since I stand in
• 18:41
  Speaker 1: the negative, I call upon you to produce that place
• 18:44
  Speaker 1: which declares in plain words what free will is and
• 18:48
  Speaker 1: what it can do. And this perhaps you will do
• 18:51
  Speaker 1: by about the time of the Greek Callans. In order
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: to avoid this necessity, you spend many fine sayings upon nothing,
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: and moving along on the tip of prudence, cite numberless
• 19:02
  Speaker 1: opinions concerning free will, and make of Pelagius almost an evangelist. Moreover,
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: you vamp us a fourfold grace, so as to assign
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: a sort of faith and charity even to the philosophers,
• 19:15
  Speaker 1: and also that new fable a threefold law of nature,
• 19:19
  Speaker 1: of works and of faith, so as to assert with
• 19:22
  Speaker 1: all boldness that the precepts of the philosophers agree with
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: the precepts of the Gospel. Again, you apply that of
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: Psalm four to six. The light of Thy countenance is
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: settled upon us, which speaks of the knowledge of the
• 19:36
  Speaker 1: very countenance of the Lord, that is, of faith to
• 19:39
  Speaker 1: blinded reason, All which things together, if taken into consideration
• 19:44
  Speaker 1: by any Christian, must compel him to suspect that you
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: are mocking and deriding the doctrines and religion of Christians.
• 19:52
  Speaker 1: For to attribute these things as so much ignorance to
• 19:55
  Speaker 1: him who has illustrated all our doctrines with so much diligence,
• 19:59
  Speaker 1: and STI er them up in memory, appears to me
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: very difficult. Indeed, But however, I will hear abstain from
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: open exposure, contented to wait until a more favorable opportunity
• 20:12
  Speaker 1: shall offer itself. Although I entreat you, friend, Erasmus, not
• 20:17
  Speaker 1: to tempt me in this way like one of those
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: who say who sees us, for it is by no
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: means safe in so great a matter to be continually
• 20:26
  Speaker 1: mocking every one with vertumnities of words. But to the
• 20:30
  Speaker 1: subject section forty seven, out of the one opinion concerning
• 20:35
  Speaker 1: free will, you make three you say that the first
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: opinion of those who deny that man can will good
• 20:42
  Speaker 1: without special grace, who deny that it can begin, who
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: deny that it can make progress perfect, and so forth,
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: seems to you severe, though it may be very probable.
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: And this you prove as leaving to man the desire
• 20:57
  Speaker 1: and the effort but not leaving what is to be
• 21:00
  Speaker 1: ascribed to his own power. That the second opinion of
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: those who contend that free will avails unto nothing but
• 21:07
  Speaker 1: to sin, and that grace alone works good in us
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: and so forth, is more severe still. And thirdly, that
• 21:15
  Speaker 1: the opinion of those who say that free will is
• 21:18
  Speaker 1: an empty term, for that God works in us both
• 21:21
  Speaker 1: good and evil, is most severe. And that it is
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: against these last that you profess to write. Do you
• 21:29
  Speaker 1: know what you are saying, friend Erasmus, You are here
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: making three different opinions, as if belonging to three different sects,
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: because you do not know that it is the same
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: subject handled by us, same professors of the same sect,
• 21:42
  Speaker 1: only by different persons in a different way and in
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: other words. But let me just put you in remembrance
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: and set before you the yawning in considerateness or stupidity
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: of your judgment. How does that definition of free will?
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: Let me ask you, which you gave us above, square
• 22:00
  Speaker 1: with this first opinion, which you profess to be very probable.
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: For you said that free will is a power of
• 22:08
  Speaker 1: the human will by which a man can apply himself
• 22:11
  Speaker 1: unto good. Whereas here you say and approve the saying
• 22:15
  Speaker 1: that man without grace cannot will good. The definition therefore
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: affirms what its example denies. And hence there are found
• 22:25
  Speaker 1: in your free will both a YA and an A,
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: so that in one in the same doctrine and article,
• 22:30
  Speaker 1: you approve and condemn us, and approve and condemn yourself.
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: For do you think that to apply itself to those
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: things which pertain unto eternal salvation, which power your definition
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: assigns the free will is not to do good? When
• 22:46
  Speaker 1: if there were so much good in free will that
• 22:49
  Speaker 1: it could apply itself unto good, it would have no
• 22:51
  Speaker 1: need of grace. Therefore, the free will which you define
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: is one, and the free will you defend is another. Hence,
• 23:01
  Speaker 1: then Erasmus, outstripping all others, has two free wills, and
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: they militating against each other. Section forty eight. But setting
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: aside that free will which the definition defines, let us
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: consider that which the opinion proposes is contrary to it.
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: You grant that man without special grace cannot will good.
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: For we are not now discussing what the grace of
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: God can do, but what man can do without grace.
• 23:30
  Speaker 1: You grant then that free will cannot will good. This
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: is nothing else, but granting that it cannot apply itself
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: to those things which pertain unto eternal salvation. According to
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: the tune of your definition. Nay, you say a little
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: before that the human will after sin is so depraved that,
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: having lost its liberty, it is compelled to serve sin,
• 23:52
  Speaker 1: and cannot recall itself into a better state. And if
• 23:56
  Speaker 1: I am not mistaken, you make the Pelagians to be
• 23:59
  Speaker 1: of this opinion. Now, then I believe my proteus has
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: here no way of escape. He is caught and held fast.
• 24:06
  Speaker 1: In plain words, that the will, having lost its liberty,
• 24:11
  Speaker 1: is tied and bound a slave to sin. O noble
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: free will, which, having lost its liberty, is declared by
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: Erasmus himself to be the slave of sin. When Luther
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: asserted this, nothing was ever heard of so absurd. Nothing
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: was more useless than that this paradox should be proclaimed abroad,
• 24:30
  Speaker 1: so much so that even a diatribe must be written
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: against him. But perhaps no one will believe me that
• 24:36
  Speaker 1: these things are said by Erasmus. If the diatribe be
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: read in this part, it will be admired. But I
• 24:43
  Speaker 1: do not so much admire it. For he who does
• 24:45
  Speaker 1: not treat this as a serious subject, and is not
• 24:48
  Speaker 1: interested in the cause, but is in mind alienated from it,
• 24:52
  Speaker 1: and grows weary of it, cold in it, and disgusted
• 24:56
  Speaker 1: with it. How shall not such an one everywhere speak absurdities, follies,
• 25:01
  Speaker 1: and contrarieties, while as one drunk or slumbering over the
• 25:05
  Speaker 1: cause he belches out in the midst of his snoring.
• 25:08
  Speaker 1: It is so, It is not so, just as the
• 25:11
  Speaker 1: different words sound against his ears. And therefore it is
• 25:16
  Speaker 1: that rhetoricians require a feeling of the subject in the
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: person discussing it. Much more then does theology require such
• 25:23
  Speaker 1: a feeling that it may make the person vigilant, sharp, intent, prudent,
• 25:29
  Speaker 1: and determined. If therefore, free will without grace, when it
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: has lost its liberty, is compelled to serve sin and
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: cannot will good, I should be glad to know what
• 25:41
  Speaker 1: that desire is, what that endeavor is, which that first
• 25:45
  Speaker 1: probable opinion leaves it. It cannot be a good desire
• 25:49
  Speaker 1: or a good endeavor, because it cannot will good, as
• 25:52
  Speaker 1: the opinion affirms, and as you grant. Therefore, it is
• 25:56
  Speaker 1: an evil desire and an evil endeavor that is left, which,
• 26:00
  Speaker 1: when the liberty is lost, is compelled to serve sin.
• 26:05
  Speaker 1: But above all, what I pray is the meaning of
• 26:07
  Speaker 1: this saying this opinion leaves the desire and the endeavor,
• 26:12
  Speaker 1: but does not leave what is to be ascribed to
• 26:14
  Speaker 1: its own power. Who can possibly conceive in his mind
• 26:18
  Speaker 1: what this means? If the desire and the endeavor be
• 26:21
  Speaker 1: left to the power of free will? How are they
• 26:24
  Speaker 1: not ascribed to the same. If they be not ascribed
• 26:27
  Speaker 1: to it, how can they be left to it? Are then,
• 26:31
  Speaker 1: that desire and that endeavor before grace left to grace
• 26:36
  Speaker 1: itself that comes after, and not to free will, so
• 26:39
  Speaker 1: as to be at the same time left and not
• 26:42
  Speaker 1: left to the same free will. If these things be
• 26:46
  Speaker 1: not paradoxes, or rather enormities, then pray what are enormities?
• 26:52
  Speaker 1: Section forty nine. But perhaps the diatribe is dreaming this,
• 26:56
  Speaker 1: that between these two can will good and can not
• 27:00
  Speaker 1: will good? There may be a medium, seeing that to
• 27:04
  Speaker 1: will is absolute both in respect of good and evil,
• 27:08
  Speaker 1: so that thus by a certain logical subtlety, we may
• 27:11
  Speaker 1: steer clear of the rocks and say, in the will
• 27:14
  Speaker 1: of man there is a certain willing which cannot indeed
• 27:18
  Speaker 1: will good without grace, but which nevertheless being without grace,
• 27:21
  Speaker 1: does not immediately will nothing but evil, but is a
• 27:25
  Speaker 1: sort of mere, abstracted willing, vertible upward unto good by grace,
• 27:30
  Speaker 1: and downward unto evil by sin. But then, what will
• 27:34
  Speaker 1: become of that which you have said, that, when it
• 27:38
  Speaker 1: has lost its liberty it is compelled to serve sin?
• 27:42
  Speaker 1: What will become of that desire and endeavor which are left.
• 27:46
  Speaker 1: Where will be that power of applying itself to those
• 27:49
  Speaker 1: things which pertain unto eternal salvation? For that power of
• 27:52
  Speaker 1: applying itself into salvation cannot be a mere willing unless
• 27:56
  Speaker 1: the salvation itself be said to be nothing. Nor again
• 28:00
  Speaker 1: can that desire and endeavor be a mere willing. For
• 28:04
  Speaker 1: desire must strive and attempt something as good perhaps, and
• 28:08
  Speaker 1: cannot go forth into nothing, nor be absolutely inactive. In
• 28:12
  Speaker 1: a word, which way, soever the diatribe turns itself, it
• 28:16
  Speaker 1: cannot keep clear of inconsistencies and contradictory assertions, nor avoid
• 28:20
  Speaker 1: making that very free will which it defends, as much
• 28:24
  Speaker 1: a bond captive as it is a bond captive itself,
• 28:28
  Speaker 1: For in attempting to liberate free will, it is so
• 28:31
  Speaker 1: entangled that it is bound together with free will in
• 28:35
  Speaker 1: bonds indissoluble. Moreover, it is a mere logical figment that
• 28:41
  Speaker 1: in man there is a medium, a mere willing. Nor
• 28:45
  Speaker 1: can they who assert this prove it. It arose from
• 28:48
  Speaker 1: an ignorance of things and an observance of terms, as
• 28:52
  Speaker 1: though the thing were always in reality, as it is
• 28:55
  Speaker 1: set forth in terms. And there are with the softest
• 28:58
  Speaker 1: many such misconceptions, whereas the matter rather stands. As Christ saith,
• 29:04
  Speaker 1: he that is not with me is against me Matthew
• 29:07
  Speaker 1: twelve thirty. He does not say, he that is not
• 29:10
  Speaker 1: with me is yet not against me, but in the medium.
• 29:14
  Speaker 1: For if God be in us, Satan is from us,
• 29:18
  Speaker 1: and it is present with us to will nothing but good.
• 29:22
  Speaker 1: But if God be not in us, Satan is in us,
• 29:25
  Speaker 1: and it is present with us to will evil. Only.
• 29:29
  Speaker 1: Neither God nor Satan admit of a mere, abstracted willing
• 29:32
  Speaker 1: in us. But as you yourself rightly say, when our
• 29:36
  Speaker 1: liberty is lost, we are compelled to serve sin. That is,
• 29:40
  Speaker 1: we will sin and evil. We speak sin and evil,
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: we do sin and evil. Behold, then, invincible and all
• 29:49
  Speaker 1: powerful truth has driven the witless diatribe to that dilemma,
• 29:53
  Speaker 1: and so turned its wisdom into foolishness, that whereas its
• 29:57
  Speaker 1: design was to speak against me, it is impelled to
• 30:00
  Speaker 1: speak for me against itself, just in the same way
• 30:04
  Speaker 1: as free will does anything good. For when it attempts
• 30:07
  Speaker 1: so to do, the more it acts against evil, the
• 30:10
  Speaker 1: more it acts against good, so that the diatribe is
• 30:14
  Speaker 1: insane exactly what free will is in doing, though the
• 30:18
  Speaker 1: whole diatribe itself is nothing else but a notable effort
• 30:22
  Speaker 1: of free will, condemning by defending, and defending by condemning,
• 30:27
  Speaker 1: that is, being a twofold fool while it would appear
• 30:31
  Speaker 1: to be wise. This, then, is the state of the
• 30:34
  Speaker 1: first opinion compared with itself. It denies that a man
• 30:38
  Speaker 1: can will anything good, but yet that a desire remains.
• 30:42
  Speaker 1: Which desire, however, is not his own. Section fifty. Now
• 30:48
  Speaker 1: let us compare this opinion with the remaining two. The
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: next of these is that opinion, more severe still, which
• 30:55
  Speaker 1: holds that free will avails unto nothing but to sin. Indeed,
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: is Augustine's opinion expressed as well in many other places,
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: as more especially in his book concerning the Spirit and
• 31:08
  Speaker 1: the Letter. In if I mistake not the fourth or
• 31:11
  Speaker 1: fifth chapter, where he uses those very words. The third
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: is that most severe opinion, that free will is a
• 31:19
  Speaker 1: mere empty term, and that every thing which we do
• 31:23
  Speaker 1: is done from necessity under the bondage of sin. It
• 31:26
  Speaker 1: is with these too that the diatribe conflicts. I here
• 31:30
  Speaker 1: observe that perhaps it may be that I am not
• 31:32
  Speaker 1: able to discuss this point intelligibly, from not being sufficiently
• 31:37
  Speaker 1: acquainted with the Latin or with the German. But I
• 31:40
  Speaker 1: call God to witness that I wish nothing else to
• 31:43
  Speaker 1: be said or to be understood by the words of
• 31:46
  Speaker 1: the last two opinions than what is said in the
• 31:48
  Speaker 1: first opinion. Nor does Augustine wish anything else to be understood,
• 31:53
  Speaker 1: nor do I understand anything else from his words than
• 31:57
  Speaker 1: that which the first opinion asserts. So that the three
• 32:01
  Speaker 1: opinions brought forward by the diatribe are with me nothing
• 32:05
  Speaker 1: else than my one sentiment. For when it is granted
• 32:09
  Speaker 1: and established that free will, having once lost its liberty,
• 32:13
  Speaker 1: is compulsively bound to the service of sin, and cannot
• 32:16
  Speaker 1: will anything good, I from these words can understand nothing
• 32:20
  Speaker 1: else than that free will is a mere empty term
• 32:24
  Speaker 1: whose reality is lost, and a lost liberty, according to
• 32:28
  Speaker 1: my grammar, is no liberty at all, And to give
• 32:31
  Speaker 1: the name of liberty to that which has no liberty
• 32:34
  Speaker 1: is to give it an empty term. If I am
• 32:38
  Speaker 1: wrong here, let him set me right who can. If
• 32:41
  Speaker 1: these observations be obscure or ambiguous, let him who can
• 32:45
  Speaker 1: illustrate and make them plain. I, for my part, cannot
• 32:49
  Speaker 1: call that health which is lost health, And if I
• 32:52
  Speaker 1: were to ascribe it to one who was sick, I
• 32:55
  Speaker 1: should think I was giving him nothing else than an
• 32:57
  Speaker 1: empty name. But away with these enormities of words. For
• 33:02
  Speaker 1: who would bear such an abuse of the manner of speaking?
• 33:05
  Speaker 1: As that we should say a man has free will,
• 33:08
  Speaker 1: and yet at the same time assert that when that
• 33:10
  Speaker 1: liberty is once lost, he is compulsively bound to the
• 33:13
  Speaker 1: service of sin and cannot will anything good. These things
• 33:18
  Speaker 1: are contrary to common sense and utterly destroy the common
• 33:22
  Speaker 1: manner of speaking. The diatribe is rather to be condemned, which,
• 33:27
  Speaker 1: in a drowsy way foists forth its own words without
• 33:30
  Speaker 1: any regard to the words of others. It does not,
• 33:34
  Speaker 1: I say, consider what it is, nor how much it
• 33:38
  Speaker 1: is to assert that man, when his liberty is lost,
• 33:41
  Speaker 1: is compelled to serve sin and cannot will anything good,
• 33:45
  Speaker 1: For if it were at all vigilant or observant, it
• 33:48
  Speaker 1: would plainly see that the sentiment contained in the three
• 33:52
  Speaker 1: opinions is one and the same, which it makes to
• 33:55
  Speaker 1: be diverse and contrary. For if a man, when he
• 33:58
  Speaker 1: has lost his liberty, is compelled to serve sin and
• 34:02
  Speaker 1: cannot will good, what conclusion concerning him can there be
• 34:06
  Speaker 1: more justly drawn than that he can do nothing but
• 34:09
  Speaker 1: sin and will evil. And such a conclusion the Sophists
• 34:14
  Speaker 1: themselves would draw, even by their syllogisms. Wherefore the diatribe
• 34:19
  Speaker 1: unhappily contends against the last two opinions and approves the first,
• 34:24
  Speaker 1: whereas that is precisely the same as the other two.
• 34:28
  Speaker 1: And thus again, as usual, it condemns itself and approves
• 34:32
  Speaker 1: my sentiments in one and the same article, Section fifty one.
• 34:38
  Speaker 1: Let us now come to that passage in Ecclesiasticus, and
• 34:41
  Speaker 1: also with it compare that first probable opinion, the opinion
• 34:45
  Speaker 1: saith free will cannot will good. The passage in Ecclesiasticus
• 34:50
  Speaker 1: is adduced to prove that free will is something and
• 34:53
  Speaker 1: can do something. Therefore, the opinion which is to be
• 34:56
  Speaker 1: proved by Ecclesiasticus asserts one thing, and eccle Siasticus, which
• 35:01
  Speaker 1: is adduced to prove it, asserts another. This is just
• 35:04
  Speaker 1: as if any one setting about to prove the Christ
• 35:07
  Speaker 1: was the Messiah, would adduce a passage which proves that
• 35:10
  Speaker 1: Pilot was governor of Syria, or anything else equally discordant.
• 35:15
  Speaker 1: It is in the same way that free will is
• 35:17
  Speaker 1: here proved, But not to mention. My having above made
• 35:21
  Speaker 1: it manifest that nothing clear or certain can be said
• 35:24
  Speaker 1: or proved concerning free will, as to what it is
• 35:27
  Speaker 1: or what it can do. It is worth while to
• 35:30
  Speaker 1: examine the whole passage thoroughly. First, he saith God made
• 35:35
  Speaker 1: man in the beginning. Here he speaks of the creation
• 35:39
  Speaker 1: of man. Nor does he say anything as yet concerning
• 35:42
  Speaker 1: either free will or the commandments. Then he goes on
• 35:47
  Speaker 1: and left him in the hand of his own counsel.
• 35:50
  Speaker 1: And what is here is free will built upon this.
• 35:54
  Speaker 1: But there is not here any mention of commandments for
• 35:57
  Speaker 1: the doing of which free will is required. Nor do
• 36:01
  Speaker 1: we read anything of this kind in the creation of man.
• 36:04
  Speaker 1: If anything be understood by the hand of his own counsel,
• 36:08
  Speaker 1: that should rather be understood which is in Genesis one
• 36:11
  Speaker 1: and two, that man was made lord of all things,
• 36:14
  Speaker 1: that he might freely exercise dominion over them. And as
• 36:18
  Speaker 1: Moses saith, let us make man and let him have
• 36:21
  Speaker 1: dominion over the fishes of the sea. Nor can anything
• 36:25
  Speaker 1: else be proved from these words. For it is in
• 36:29
  Speaker 1: these things only that man may act of his own will,
• 36:32
  Speaker 1: as being subject unto him. And moreover he calls this
• 36:37
  Speaker 1: man's counsel in contradiction, as it were, to the counsel
• 36:40
  Speaker 1: of God. But after this, when he has said that
• 36:44
  Speaker 1: man was made and left thus in the hand of
• 36:46
  Speaker 1: his own council, he adds he added moreover his commandments
• 36:51
  Speaker 1: and his precepts. Unto what did he add them, certainly
• 36:56
  Speaker 1: unto that council and will of man, and over and
• 37:00
  Speaker 1: above unto that constituting of his dominion over other things,
• 37:04
  Speaker 1: by which commandments he took from man the dominion over
• 37:08
  Speaker 1: one part of his creatures, that is, over the tree
• 37:10
  Speaker 1: of knowledge of good and evil, and willed rather that
• 37:14
  Speaker 1: he should not be free. Having added the commandments, he
• 37:17
  Speaker 1: then comes to the will of man towards God and
• 37:19
  Speaker 1: towards the things of God. If thou wilt keep the commandments,
• 37:24
  Speaker 1: they shall preserve thee and so forth from this part. Therefore,
• 37:29
  Speaker 1: if thou wilt begins the question concerning free will, so
• 37:34
  Speaker 1: that from Ecclesiasticus we learn that man is constituted as
• 37:38
  Speaker 1: divided into two kingdoms. The one is that in which
• 37:42
  Speaker 1: he is led according to his own will and counsel,
• 37:45
  Speaker 1: without the precepts and the commandments of God. That is,
• 37:48
  Speaker 1: in those things which are beneath him. Here he has
• 37:52
  Speaker 1: dominion and is lord, as left in the hand of
• 37:55
  Speaker 1: his own counsel. Not that God so leaves him to himself,
• 37:59
  Speaker 1: as that he does not co operate with him, but
• 38:02
  Speaker 1: he commits unto him the free use of things according
• 38:05
  Speaker 1: to his own will, without prohibiting him by any laws
• 38:08
  Speaker 1: or injunctions. As we may say by way of similitude,
• 38:12
  Speaker 1: the Gospel has left us in the hands of our
• 38:14
  Speaker 1: own council, that we may use and have dominion over
• 38:17
  Speaker 1: all things as we will. But Moses and the Pope
• 38:21
  Speaker 1: left us not in that council, but restrained us by
• 38:24
  Speaker 1: laws and subjected us rather to their own will. But
• 38:28
  Speaker 1: in the other kingdom he is not left in the
• 38:31
  Speaker 1: hand of his own counsel, but is directed and led
• 38:33
  Speaker 1: according to the will and counsel of God. And as
• 38:37
  Speaker 1: in his own kingdom he is led according to his
• 38:39
  Speaker 1: own will, without the precepts of another, so in the
• 38:43
  Speaker 1: Kingdom of God he is led according to the precepts
• 38:45
  Speaker 1: of another, without his own will. And this is what
• 38:49
  Speaker 1: Ecclesiasticus means when he says he added moreover his commandments
• 38:53
  Speaker 1: and his precepts, saying if thou wilt, and so forth.
• 38:58
  Speaker 1: If therefore these things be satisfact really clear, I have
• 39:01
  Speaker 1: made it fully evident that this passage of Ecclesiasticus does
• 39:05
  Speaker 1: not make for free will, but directly against it, seeing
• 39:09
  Speaker 1: that it subjects man to the precepts and will of
• 39:12
  Speaker 1: God and takes from him his free will. But if
• 39:16
  Speaker 1: they be not satisfactorily clear, I have at least made
• 39:18
  Speaker 1: it manifest that this passage cannot make for free will,
• 39:23
  Speaker 1: seeing that it may be understood in a sense different
• 39:25
  Speaker 1: from that which they put upon it. That is, in
• 39:29
  Speaker 1: my sense already stated, which is not absurd, but most holy,
• 39:33
  Speaker 1: and in harmony with a whole scripture, whereas their sense
• 39:37
  Speaker 1: militates against the whole scriptures and is fetched from this
• 39:40
  Speaker 1: one passage only contrary to the tenor of the whole scripture.
• 39:44
  Speaker 1: I stand therefore secure in the good sense the negative
• 39:48
  Speaker 1: of free will, until they shall have confirmed their strained
• 39:52
  Speaker 1: and forced affirmative. When therefore Ecclesiasticus says, if thou wilt
• 39:58
  Speaker 1: keep the commandments and keep the faith that pleaseth me,
• 40:01
  Speaker 1: they shall preserve thee I do not see that free
• 40:05
  Speaker 1: will can be proven from those words. For if thou
• 40:09
  Speaker 1: wilt is a verb of the subjunctive mood, which asserts nothing.
• 40:14
  Speaker 1: As the logicians say, a conditional asserts nothing indicatively, such
• 40:19
  Speaker 1: as if the devil be God, he is deservedly worshiped.
• 40:23
  Speaker 1: If an ass fly, an ass has wings. So also,
• 40:27
  Speaker 1: if there be free will, grace is nothing at all. Therefore,
• 40:31
  Speaker 1: if Ecclesiasticus had wished to assert free will, he ought
• 40:35
  Speaker 1: to have spoken thus man is able to keep the
• 40:38
  Speaker 1: commandments of God, or man has the power to keep
• 40:41
  Speaker 1: the commandments Section fifty two. But here the diatribe will
• 40:46
  Speaker 1: simply retort Ecclesiasticus by saying, if thou wilt keep, signifies
• 40:52
  Speaker 1: that there is a will in man to keep and
• 40:55
  Speaker 1: not to keep. Otherwise, what is the use of saying
• 40:58
  Speaker 1: unto him who has no will? If thou wilt. Would
• 41:02
  Speaker 1: it not be ridiculous if any were to say to
• 41:05
  Speaker 1: a blind man, if thou wilt see, thou mayst find
• 41:08
  Speaker 1: a treasure, Or to a deaf man, if thou wilt hear,
• 41:12
  Speaker 1: I will relate to thee an excellent story. This would
• 41:15
  Speaker 1: be to laugh at their misery. I answer, these are
• 41:20
  Speaker 1: the arguments of human reason, which is wont to shoot
• 41:23
  Speaker 1: forth many such sprigs of wisdom. Wherefore I must dispute now,
• 41:28
  Speaker 1: not with Ecclesiasticus, but with human reason concerning a conclusion.
• 41:32
  Speaker 1: For she, by her conclusions in syllogisms, interpets and twists
• 41:37
  Speaker 1: the scriptures of God, just which way she pleases. But
• 41:41
  Speaker 1: I will enter upon this willingly and with confidence, knowing
• 41:45
  Speaker 1: that she can prate nothing but follies and absurdities, and
• 41:49
  Speaker 1: that more especially when she attempts to make a show
• 41:51
  Speaker 1: of her wisdom in these divine matters. First, then if
• 41:56
  Speaker 1: I should demand of her, how it can be proved
• 41:59
  Speaker 1: that the freedom of the will in man is signified
• 42:01
  Speaker 1: and inferred wherever these expressions are used. If thou wilt,
• 42:06
  Speaker 1: if thou wilt do, if thou wilt hear, she would say,
• 42:10
  Speaker 1: because the nature of words and the common use of
• 42:13
  Speaker 1: speech among men seem to require it. Therefore she judges
• 42:17
  Speaker 1: of divine things and words according to the customs and
• 42:20
  Speaker 1: things of men, than which what can be more perverse,
• 42:25
  Speaker 1: Seeing that the former things are heavenly, the latter earthly
• 42:29
  Speaker 1: like a fool. Therefore she exposes herself, making it manifest
• 42:33
  Speaker 1: that she has not a thought concerning God? But what
• 42:36
  Speaker 1: is human? But what if I prove that the nature
• 42:39
  Speaker 1: of words and the use of speech, even among men,
• 42:42
  Speaker 1: are not always of that tendency as to make a
• 42:45
  Speaker 1: laughing stock of those to whom it is said, if
• 42:47
  Speaker 1: thou wilt, if thou shalt do it, if thou shalt hear.
• 42:52
  Speaker 1: How often do parents thus play with their children, when
• 42:55
  Speaker 1: they bid them come to them, or do this or that,
• 42:58
  Speaker 1: for this purpose only that it may plainly appear to
• 43:01
  Speaker 1: them how unable they are to do it, and that
• 43:04
  Speaker 1: they may call for the aid of the parent's hand.
• 43:07
  Speaker 1: How often does a faithful physician bid his obstinate patient
• 43:11
  Speaker 1: do or omit those things which are either injurious to
• 43:14
  Speaker 1: him or impossible, to the intent that he may bring him,
• 43:18
  Speaker 1: by an experience, to the knowledge of his disease or
• 43:22
  Speaker 1: his weakness. And what is more general and common than
• 43:25
  Speaker 1: to use words of insult or provocation when he would
• 43:29
  Speaker 1: show either enemies or friends what they can do and
• 43:32
  Speaker 1: what they cannot do. I merely go over these things
• 43:35
  Speaker 1: to show reason her own conclusions, and how absurdly she
• 43:39
  Speaker 1: tax them to the scriptures. Moreover, how blind she must
• 43:43
  Speaker 1: be not to see that they do not always stand good,
• 43:47
  Speaker 1: even in human words and things. But the case is,
• 43:51
  Speaker 1: if she sees it to be done once, she rushes
• 43:53
  Speaker 1: on headlong, taking it for granted that it is done
• 43:56
  Speaker 1: generally in all things of God and men. Thus, according
• 44:01
  Speaker 1: to the way of her wisdom, of a particularity and universality.
• 44:06
  Speaker 1: If then God, as a father deal with us as
• 44:10
  Speaker 1: with sons, that he might show us, who are in ignorance,
• 44:14
  Speaker 1: our impotency, or as a faithful physician, that he might
• 44:18
  Speaker 1: make our disease known none to us, or that he
• 44:21
  Speaker 1: might insult his enemies who proudly resist his counsel. And
• 44:25
  Speaker 1: for this end say to us by proposed laws as
• 44:29
  Speaker 1: being those means by which he accomplishes his design the
• 44:32
  Speaker 1: most effectively, do here keep or if thou wilt, if
• 44:38
  Speaker 1: thou wilt do, if thou wilt here, can this be
• 44:42
  Speaker 1: drawn therefrom as a just conclusion. Therefore, either we have
• 44:46
  Speaker 1: free power to act, or God laughs at us. Why
• 44:51
  Speaker 1: is this not rather drawn as a conclusion. Therefore God
• 44:54
  Speaker 1: tries us that by his law he might bring us
• 44:58
  Speaker 1: to a knowledge of our impotency if we be his friends,
• 45:02
  Speaker 1: or he thereby righteously and deservedly insults and derides us
• 45:06
  Speaker 1: if we be his proud enemies. For this, as Paul teaches,
• 45:10
  Speaker 1: is the intent of the divine legislation Romans three twenty
• 45:14
  Speaker 1: five twenty the Latians three nineteen twenty four. Because human
• 45:19
  Speaker 1: nature is blind, so that it knows not its own powers,
• 45:23
  Speaker 1: or rather its own diseases. Moreover, being proud it self,
• 45:28
  Speaker 1: conceitedly imagines that it knows and can do all things
• 45:32
  Speaker 1: to remedy which pride and ignorance. God can use no
• 45:35
  Speaker 1: means more effectual than his proposed law, of which we
• 45:39
  Speaker 1: shall say more in its place. Let it suffice to
• 45:43
  Speaker 1: have thus touched upon it here to refute this conclusion
• 45:46
  Speaker 1: of carnal and absurd wisdom. If thou wilt, therefore thou
• 45:50
  Speaker 1: art able to will freely, the diatribe dreams that man
• 45:55
  Speaker 1: is whole and sound as to human appearance, he is
• 45:58
  Speaker 1: in his own affairs. And therefore, from these words, if
• 46:02
  Speaker 1: thou wilt, if thou wilt do, if thou wilt hear,
• 46:06
  Speaker 1: it pertly argues that man, if his will be not free,
• 46:10
  Speaker 1: is laughed at. Whereas the scripture describes man as corrupt
• 46:14
  Speaker 1: and a captive, and added to that as proudly contemning
• 46:19
  Speaker 1: and ignorant of his corruption and captivity. And therefore by
• 46:23
  Speaker 1: those words it goads him and rouses him up, that
• 46:26
  Speaker 1: he might know by a real experience how unable he
• 46:29
  Speaker 1: is to do any one of those things Section fifty three.
• 46:35
  Speaker 1: But I will attack the diatribe itself. If thou really think, o, Madame, reason,
• 46:40
  Speaker 1: that these conclusions stand good, If thou wilt, therefore thou
• 46:45
  Speaker 1: hast a free power, why dost thou not follow the
• 46:48
  Speaker 1: same thyself? For thou sayest, according to that probable opinion,
• 46:53
  Speaker 1: that free will cannot will anything good? By what conclusion? Then,
• 46:57
  Speaker 1: can such a sentiment flow from this passage? Also so
• 47:00
  Speaker 1: if thou wilt keep when thou sayest that the conclusion
• 47:04
  Speaker 1: flowing from this is that man can will and not
• 47:07
  Speaker 1: will freely, what can bitter and sweet flow from the
• 47:12
  Speaker 1: same fountain, dost thou not hear much more deride man
• 47:16
  Speaker 1: thyself when thou sayest that he can keep that which
• 47:20
  Speaker 1: he can neither will nor choose. Therefore, neither dost thou
• 47:24
  Speaker 1: from thy heart believe that this is a just conclusion.
• 47:28
  Speaker 1: If thou wilt, therefore thou hast a free power, although
• 47:31
  Speaker 1: thou contendest for it with so much zeal, Or if
• 47:35
  Speaker 1: thou dost believe it, then thou dost not from thy
• 47:38
  Speaker 1: heart say that that opinion is probable, which holds that
• 47:41
  Speaker 1: man cannot will good. Thus reason is so caught in
• 47:45
  Speaker 1: the conclusions and words of her own wisdom that she
• 47:48
  Speaker 1: knows not what she says, nor concerning what she speaks. Nay,
• 47:53
  Speaker 1: knows nothing but that which it is most right. She
• 47:55
  Speaker 1: should know that free will is defended with such arguments
• 47:59
  Speaker 1: as mutually devour and put an end to each other,
• 48:03
  Speaker 1: just as the Midianites destroyed each other by mutual slaughter
• 48:06
  Speaker 1: when they fought against Gideon, and the people of God
• 48:09
  Speaker 1: Judges seven. Nay, I will expostulate more fully with this
• 48:14
  Speaker 1: wisdom of the diatribe. Ecclesiasticus does not say, if thou
• 48:18
  Speaker 1: shalt have the desire and the endeavor of keeping. For
• 48:22
  Speaker 1: this is not to be ascribed to that power of yours,
• 48:25
  Speaker 1: as you have concluded. But he says, if thou wilt
• 48:29
  Speaker 1: keep the commandments, they shall preserve thee Now, then, if we,
• 48:33
  Speaker 1: after the manner of your wisdom, wish to draw conclusions,
• 48:37
  Speaker 1: we should infer. Thus therefore man is able to keep
• 48:41
  Speaker 1: the commandments. And thus we shall not here make a
• 48:45
  Speaker 1: certain small degree of desire, or a certain little effort
• 48:48
  Speaker 1: of endeavor to be left in man, but we shall
• 48:51
  Speaker 1: ascribe unto him the whole, full and abundant power of
• 48:55
  Speaker 1: keeping the commandments. Otherwise Ecclesiasticus will be made to laugh
• 49:00
  Speaker 1: at the misery of man as commanding him to keep
• 49:03
  Speaker 1: who he knows is not able to keep. Nor would
• 49:06
  Speaker 1: it have been sufficient if he had supposed the desire
• 49:09
  Speaker 1: and the endeavor to be in the man, For he
• 49:12
  Speaker 1: would not then have escaped the suspicion of deriding him
• 49:16
  Speaker 1: unless he had signified his having the full power of keeping.
• 49:20
  Speaker 1: But however, let us suppose that that desire and endeavor
• 49:24
  Speaker 1: of free will are a real something. What shall we
• 49:28
  Speaker 1: say to those the Palagians, I mean, who from this
• 49:32
  Speaker 1: passage have denied grace in Toto and described all to
• 49:36
  Speaker 1: free will. If the conclusion of the diatribe stands good,
• 49:40
  Speaker 1: the Pelagians have evidently established their point. For the words
• 49:44
  Speaker 1: of Ecclesiasticus speak of keeping, not of desiring or endeavoring.
• 49:49
  Speaker 1: If therefore you deny the Palagians their conclusions concerning keeping,
• 49:53
  Speaker 1: they in reply will much more rightly deny you your
• 49:56
  Speaker 1: conclusions concerning endeavoring. And if you take from them the
• 50:00
  Speaker 1: whole of free will, they will take from you your
• 50:03
  Speaker 1: remnant particle of it. For you cannot assert a remnant
• 50:08
  Speaker 1: particle of that which you deny in Toto. In what
• 50:11
  Speaker 1: degree soever, therefore you speak against the Pallagians, who from
• 50:15
  Speaker 1: this passage ascribe the whole to free will? In the
• 50:18
  Speaker 1: same degree, and with much more determination, shall we speak
• 50:22
  Speaker 1: against that certain small remnant desire of your free will?
• 50:27
  Speaker 1: And in this the Pallagians themselves will agree with us,
• 50:30
  Speaker 1: that if their opinion cannot be proved from this passage,
• 50:33
  Speaker 1: much less will any other of the same kind be
• 50:36
  Speaker 1: proved from it. Seeing that if the subject be to
• 50:40
  Speaker 1: be conducted by conclusions, Ecclesiasticus above all makes the most
• 50:45
  Speaker 1: forcibly for the Pallagians, For he speaks in plain words
• 50:48
  Speaker 1: concerning keeping only if thou wilt keep the commandments. Nay,
• 50:53
  Speaker 1: he speaks also concerning faith, if thou wilt keep the faith,
• 50:58
  Speaker 1: so that by the same conclusion keeping them faith ought
• 51:01
  Speaker 1: also to be in our power, which, however, is the
• 51:04
  Speaker 1: peculiar and precious gift of God. In a word, since
• 51:09
  Speaker 1: so many opinions are brought forward in support of free will,
• 51:12
  Speaker 1: and there is no one that does not catch at
• 51:15
  Speaker 1: this passage of Ecclesiasticus in defense of itself, and since
• 51:19
  Speaker 1: they are diverse from and contrary to each other, it
• 51:23
  Speaker 1: is impossible but that they must make Ecclesiasticus contradictory to
• 51:28
  Speaker 1: and diverse from themselves in the self same words. And
• 51:31
  Speaker 1: therefore they can from him prove nothing. Although if that
• 51:36
  Speaker 1: conclusion of yours be admitted, it will make for the
• 51:39
  Speaker 1: Pallagians against all the others. And consequently it makes against
• 51:43
  Speaker 1: the diatribe, which in this passage is stabbed by its
• 51:47
  Speaker 1: own sword Section fifty four. But as I said it first,
• 51:52
  Speaker 1: so I say here this passage of Ecclesiasticus is in
• 51:57
  Speaker 1: favor of no one of those who assert free will,
• 52:00
  Speaker 1: but makes against them all for that conclusion is not
• 52:04
  Speaker 1: to be admitted, if thou wilt, therefore thou art able.
• 52:08
  Speaker 1: But those words and all like unto them are to
• 52:11
  Speaker 1: be understood, thus that by them man is admonished of
• 52:15
  Speaker 1: his impotency, which without such admonitions, being proud and ignorant,
• 52:21
  Speaker 1: he would neither know nor feel. For He here speaks
• 52:24
  Speaker 1: not concerning the first man only, but concerning any man.
• 52:28
  Speaker 1: Though it is of little consequence whether you understand it
• 52:31
  Speaker 1: concerning the first man or any others. For although the
• 52:34
  Speaker 1: first man was not impotent from the assistance of grace,
• 52:37
  Speaker 1: yet by this commandment God plainly shows him how impotent
• 52:41
  Speaker 1: he would be without grace. For if that man who
• 52:44
  Speaker 1: had the spirit could not by his new will will
• 52:47
  Speaker 1: good newly proposed, that is obedience, because the Spirit did
• 52:52
  Speaker 1: not add it unto him. What can we do without
• 52:55
  Speaker 1: the spirit towards that good that is lost in this man? Therefore,
• 53:00
  Speaker 1: it is shown by a terrible example for the breaking
• 53:03
  Speaker 1: down of our pride, what our free will can do
• 53:06
  Speaker 1: when it is left to itself and not continually moved
• 53:09
  Speaker 1: and increased by the Spirit of God. He could do
• 53:12
  Speaker 1: nothing to increase the spirit, who had its first fruits,
• 53:16
  Speaker 1: but fell from the first fruits of the spirit. What then,
• 53:19
  Speaker 1: can we who are fallen do towards the first fruits
• 53:22
  Speaker 1: of the spirit which are taken away? Especially since Satan
• 53:26
  Speaker 1: now reigns in us with full power, who cast him down,
• 53:31
  Speaker 1: not then reigning in him but by temptation alone, nothing
• 53:36
  Speaker 1: can be more forcibly brought against free will than this
• 53:39
  Speaker 1: passage of Ecclesiasticus, considered together with the fall of Adam.
• 53:45
  Speaker 1: But we have no room for these observations here. An
• 53:47
  Speaker 1: opportunity may perhaps offer itself elsewhere. Meanwhile, it is sufficient
• 53:52
  Speaker 1: to have shown that Ecclesiasticus in this place says nothing
• 53:56
  Speaker 1: whatever in favor of free will, which nevertheless they consider
• 54:00
  Speaker 1: as their principal authority, And that these expressions and the like,
• 54:04
  Speaker 1: if thou wilt, if thou hear, if thou do, show
• 54:09
  Speaker 1: not what men can do, but what they ought to
• 54:11
  Speaker 1: do Section fifty five. Another passage is adduced by our
• 54:17
  Speaker 1: diatribe out of Genesis four seven, where the Lord said,
• 54:21
  Speaker 1: unto Cain under thee shall be the desire of sin,
• 54:25
  Speaker 1: and thou shalt rule over it. Here it is shown
• 54:28
  Speaker 1: Saith the diatribe that the motions of the mind to
• 54:31
  Speaker 1: evil can be overcome, and that they do not carry
• 54:34
  Speaker 1: with them the necessity of sinning. These words, the motions
• 54:39
  Speaker 1: of the mind to evil can be overcome, though spoken
• 54:42
  Speaker 1: with ambiguity, Yet from the scope of the sentiment, the
• 54:46
  Speaker 1: consequence and the circumstances must mean thus that free will
• 54:50
  Speaker 1: has the power of overcoming its motions to evil, and
• 54:54
  Speaker 1: that those motions do not bring upon it the necessity
• 54:57
  Speaker 1: of sinning. Here again, what is there accepted which is
• 55:01
  Speaker 1: not ascribed unto free will? What need is there of
• 55:05
  Speaker 1: the Spirit? What need of Christ? What need of God?
• 55:09
  Speaker 1: If free will can overcome the motions of the mind
• 55:12
  Speaker 1: to evil? And where again is that probable opinion which
• 55:17
  Speaker 1: affirms that free will cannot so much as will good?
• 55:21
  Speaker 1: For Here the victory over evil is ascribed unto that
• 55:24
  Speaker 1: which neither wills nor wishes for good. The inconsiderateness of
• 55:28
  Speaker 1: our diatribe is really too too bad. Take the truth
• 55:33
  Speaker 1: of the matter in a few words. As I have
• 55:36
  Speaker 1: before observed, by such passages as these, it is shown
• 55:40
  Speaker 1: to man what he ought to do, not what he
• 55:42
  Speaker 1: can do. It is said, therefore, unto Cain, that he
• 55:46
  Speaker 1: ought to rule over his sin and to hold its
• 55:49
  Speaker 1: desires in subjection under him, but this he neither did
• 55:53
  Speaker 1: nor could do, because he was already pressed down under
• 55:57
  Speaker 1: the contrary dominion of Satan. It is well known that
• 56:00
  Speaker 1: the Hebrews frequently use the future indicative for the imperative,
• 56:05
  Speaker 1: as in Exodus twenty one through seventeen, Thou shalt have
• 56:09
  Speaker 1: none other gods but me, thou shalt not kill, Thou
• 56:12
  Speaker 1: shalt not commit adultery, and in numberless other instances of
• 56:16
  Speaker 1: the same kind. Otherwise, if these sentences were taken indicatively
• 56:21
  Speaker 1: as they really stand, they would be promises of God.
• 56:25
  Speaker 1: And as he cannot lie, it would come to pass
• 56:28
  Speaker 1: that no man could sin, and then as commands they
• 56:31
  Speaker 1: would be unnecessary. And if this were the case, then
• 56:34
  Speaker 1: our interpreter would have translated this passage more correctly. Thus,
• 56:38
  Speaker 1: let its desire be under thee, and rule thou over
• 56:42
  Speaker 1: it Genesis four seven, even as it then ought also
• 56:46
  Speaker 1: to be said concerning the woman, be thou under thy husband,
• 56:50
  Speaker 1: and let him rule over thee Genesis three sixteen. But
• 56:54
  Speaker 1: that it was not spoken indicatively, unto Caine, is manifest
• 56:58
  Speaker 1: from this. It would then have been a promise, whereas
• 57:01
  Speaker 1: it was not a promise because from the conduct of
• 57:05
  Speaker 1: kin the event proved the contrary Section fifty six. The
• 57:10
  Speaker 1: third passage is from Moses Deuteronomy thirty nineteen. I have
• 57:15
  Speaker 1: set before thy face life and death. Choose what is good?
• 57:19
  Speaker 1: And so forth what words say the diatribe can be
• 57:22
  Speaker 1: more plain? It leaves to man the liberty of choosing?
• 57:27
  Speaker 1: I answer, what is more plain than that you are blind?
• 57:31
  Speaker 1: How I pray? Does it leave the liberty of choosing?
• 57:35
  Speaker 1: Is it by the expression choose? Therefore, as Moses Saith choose,
• 57:40
  Speaker 1: does it immediately come to pass that they do choose?
• 57:44
  Speaker 1: Then there is no need of the spirit. And as
• 57:46
  Speaker 1: you so often repeat and inculcate the same things, I
• 57:49
  Speaker 1: shall be justified in repeating the same things. Also, if
• 57:53
  Speaker 1: there be a liberty of choosing, why has the probable
• 57:56
  Speaker 1: opinion said that free will cannot will good? Can it
• 58:00
  Speaker 1: choose not willing or against its will? But let us
• 58:04
  Speaker 1: listen to the similitude. It would be ridiculous to say
• 58:08
  Speaker 1: to a man standing in a place where two ways met,
• 58:11
  Speaker 1: thou seest two roads go by which thou wilt when
• 58:15
  Speaker 1: one only was open. This, as I have before observed,
• 58:20
  Speaker 1: is from the arguments of human reason, which thinks that
• 58:23
  Speaker 1: a man is mocked by a command impossible, whereas I
• 58:27
  Speaker 1: say that the man, by this means, is admonished and
• 58:30
  Speaker 1: roused to see his own impotency. True, it is that
• 58:34
  Speaker 1: we are in a place where two ways meet, and
• 58:37
  Speaker 1: that one of them only is open. Yea, rather neither
• 58:40
  Speaker 1: of them is open. But by the law it is
• 58:44
  Speaker 1: shown how impossible the one is, that is to good
• 58:47
  Speaker 1: unless God freely give his spirit, and how wide and
• 58:51
  Speaker 1: easy the other is, if God leave us to ourselves. Therefore,
• 58:55
  Speaker 1: it would not be said ridiculously, but with a necessary
• 58:58
  Speaker 1: seriousness to the man, thus standing in a place where
• 59:01
  Speaker 1: two ways meet, go by which thou wilt if he,
• 59:06
  Speaker 1: being in reality impotent, wished to seem to himself strong,
• 59:10
  Speaker 1: or contended that neither way was hedged up. Wherefore the
• 59:15
  Speaker 1: words of the law are spoken, not that they might
• 59:17
  Speaker 1: assert the power of the will, but that they might
• 59:20
  Speaker 1: illuminate the blindness of reason, that it might see that
• 59:24
  Speaker 1: its own light is nothing, and that the power of
• 59:26
  Speaker 1: the will is nothing. By the law, Saith Paul is
• 59:30
  Speaker 1: the knowledge of sin Romans three twenty. He does not say,
• 59:35
  Speaker 1: is the evolution of or the escape from sin? The
• 59:39
  Speaker 1: whole nature and design of the law is to give
• 59:42
  Speaker 1: knowledge only, and that of nothing else save of sin,
• 59:46
  Speaker 1: but not to discover or communicate any power whatever. For
• 59:50
  Speaker 1: knowledge is not power, nor does it communicate power. But
• 59:54
  Speaker 1: it teaches and shows how great the impotency must there
• 59:57
  Speaker 1: be where there is no power. And what else can
• 1:00:01
  Speaker 1: the knowledge of sin be but the knowledge of our
• 1:00:03
  Speaker 1: evil and infirmity. For he does not say by the
• 1:00:06
  Speaker 1: law comes the knowledge of strength or of good. The
• 1:00:10
  Speaker 1: whole that the Law does, according to the testimony of Paul,
• 1:00:13
  Speaker 1: is to make known sin. And this is the place
• 1:00:16
  Speaker 1: where I take occasion to enforce this My general reply,
• 1:00:20
  Speaker 1: that man, by the words of the law is admonished
• 1:00:23
  Speaker 1: and taught what he ought to do, not what he
• 1:00:26
  Speaker 1: can do. That is that he is brought to know
• 1:00:29
  Speaker 1: his sin, but not to believe that he has any
• 1:00:31
  Speaker 1: strength in himself. Wherefore, friend Erasmus, as often as you
• 1:00:36
  Speaker 1: throw in my teeth the words of the law, so
• 1:00:39
  Speaker 1: often I throw in yours that of Paul by the
• 1:00:43
  Speaker 1: Law is the knowledge of sin, not of the power
• 1:00:46
  Speaker 1: of the will. Heap together. Therefore, out of the large
• 1:00:49
  Speaker 1: concordances all the imperative words into one chaos, provided that
• 1:00:54
  Speaker 1: they be not words of the promise, but of the
• 1:00:56
  Speaker 1: requirement of the law only, And I will immediate declare
• 1:01:01
  Speaker 1: that by them is always shown what men ought to do,
• 1:01:04
  Speaker 1: not what they can do or do do. And even
• 1:01:08
  Speaker 1: common grammarians and every little schoolboy in the street knows
• 1:01:12
  Speaker 1: that by verbs of the imperative mood, nothing else is
• 1:01:15
  Speaker 1: signified than that which ought to be done, and that
• 1:01:19
  Speaker 1: what is done or can be done is expressed by
• 1:01:21
  Speaker 1: verbs of the indicative mood. Thus, therefore it comes to
• 1:01:25
  Speaker 1: pass that you, theologians are so senseless, and so many
• 1:01:29
  Speaker 1: degrees below even schoolboys, that when you have caught hold
• 1:01:32
  Speaker 1: of one imperative verb, you infer an indicative sense, as
• 1:01:36
  Speaker 1: though what was commanded were immediately and even necessarily done,
• 1:01:40
  Speaker 1: or possible to be done. But how many slips are
• 1:01:44
  Speaker 1: there between the cup and the lip, so that what
• 1:01:47
  Speaker 1: you command to be done, and is therefore quite possible
• 1:01:50
  Speaker 1: to be done, is yet never done at all. Such
• 1:01:54
  Speaker 1: difference is there between verbs imperative and verbs indicative, even
• 1:01:58
  Speaker 1: in the most common and easy things. Whereas you, in
• 1:02:02
  Speaker 1: these things, which are as far above those as the
• 1:02:05
  Speaker 1: heavens are above the earth, so quickly make indicatives out
• 1:02:08
  Speaker 1: of imperatives, that the moment you hear the voice of
• 1:02:11
  Speaker 1: Him commanding saying, do keep, choose, you will have that
• 1:02:16
  Speaker 1: it is immediately kept, done, chosen, or fulfilled, or that
• 1:02:21
  Speaker 1: our powers are able so to do Section fifty seven.
• 1:02:26
  Speaker 1: In the fourth place, you adduce from Deuteronomy thirty many
• 1:02:30
  Speaker 1: passages of the same kind which speak of choosing, of
• 1:02:33
  Speaker 1: turning away from, of keeping, as if thou shalt keep,
• 1:02:39
  Speaker 1: if thou shalt turn away from, if thou shalt choose.
• 1:02:43
  Speaker 1: All these expressions you say, are made use of preposterously.
• 1:02:46
  Speaker 1: If there be not a free will in man unto
• 1:02:49
  Speaker 1: good I answer, And you, friend, diatribe preposterously enough, also
• 1:02:55
  Speaker 1: conclude from these expressions the freedom of the will. You
• 1:02:59
  Speaker 1: set out to prove the endeavor and desire of free
• 1:03:02
  Speaker 1: will only, and you have adduced no passage which proves
• 1:03:05
  Speaker 1: such an endeavor. But now you adduce those passages which,
• 1:03:09
  Speaker 1: if your conclusion holds good will, ascribe all to free will.
• 1:03:14
  Speaker 1: Let me hear, then again, make a distinction between the
• 1:03:17
  Speaker 1: words of the scripture adduced and the conclusion of the
• 1:03:19
  Speaker 1: diatribe tacked to them. The words adduced are imperative, and
• 1:03:24
  Speaker 1: they say nothing but what ought to be done. For
• 1:03:27
  Speaker 1: Moses does not say, thou hast the power and strength
• 1:03:31
  Speaker 1: to choose the words choose keep, do convey the precept
• 1:03:37
  Speaker 1: to keep. But they do not describe the ability of man,
• 1:03:40
  Speaker 1: but the conclusion tacked to them by that wisdom aping
• 1:03:44
  Speaker 1: Diatribe infers. Thus therefore man can do those things. Otherwise
• 1:03:49
  Speaker 1: the precepts are given in vain, to whom this reply
• 1:03:52
  Speaker 1: must be made. Madam Diatribe, you make a bad inference,
• 1:03:57
  Speaker 1: and do not prove your conclusion. But the conclusion and
• 1:04:00
  Speaker 1: the proof merely seem to be right in your blind
• 1:04:03
  Speaker 1: and inadvertent self. But know that these precepts are not
• 1:04:07
  Speaker 1: given preposterously nor in vain, but that proud and blind
• 1:04:12
  Speaker 1: man might by them learn the disease of his own
• 1:04:15
  Speaker 1: impotency if he should attempt to do what is commanded.
• 1:04:19
  Speaker 1: And hence your similitude amounts to nothing. Where you say otherwise,
• 1:04:24
  Speaker 1: it would be precisely the same as if any one
• 1:04:26
  Speaker 1: should say to a man who was so bound that
• 1:04:29
  Speaker 1: he could only stretch forth his left arm, behold thou
• 1:04:32
  Speaker 1: hast on thy right hand excellent wine, thou hast on
• 1:04:36
  Speaker 1: thy left poison, on which thou wilt stretch forth thy hand.
• 1:04:41
  Speaker 1: These your similitudes, I presume are particular favorites of yours.
• 1:04:45
  Speaker 1: But you do not all the while see that if
• 1:04:48
  Speaker 1: the similitudes stand good, they prove much more than you
• 1:04:51
  Speaker 1: ever purposed to prove. Nay, that they prove what you
• 1:04:55
  Speaker 1: deny and would have to be disproved that free will
• 1:04:59
  Speaker 1: can do all things. For by the whole scope of
• 1:05:02
  Speaker 1: your argument forgetting what you said that free will can
• 1:05:05
  Speaker 1: do nothing without grace, you actually prove that free will
• 1:05:08
  Speaker 1: can do all things without grace. For your conclusions and
• 1:05:12
  Speaker 1: similitudes go to prove this that neither free will can
• 1:05:16
  Speaker 1: of itself do those things which are said and commanded,
• 1:05:19
  Speaker 1: or they are commanded in vain, ridiculously and preposterously. But
• 1:05:24
  Speaker 1: these are nothing more than the old songs of the Pallagians,
• 1:05:27
  Speaker 1: sung over again, which even the Sophists have exploded, and
• 1:05:31
  Speaker 1: which you have yourself condemned. And by all this your
• 1:05:35
  Speaker 1: forgetfulness and disorder of memory, you do nothing but evince
• 1:05:39
  Speaker 1: how little you know the subject and how little you
• 1:05:41
  Speaker 1: are affected by it. And what can be worse in
• 1:05:45
  Speaker 1: a rhetorician than to be continually bringing forward things wide
• 1:05:49
  Speaker 1: of the nature of the subject, and not only so,
• 1:05:52
  Speaker 1: but to be always declaiming against his subject and against
• 1:05:55
  Speaker 1: himself Section fifty eight. Wherefore I observe finally, the passages
• 1:06:01
  Speaker 1: of Scripture adduced by you are imperative, and neither prove
• 1:06:05
  Speaker 1: anything nor determine anything concerning the ability of man, but
• 1:06:09
  Speaker 1: enjoying only what things are to be done and what
• 1:06:12
  Speaker 1: are not to be done. And as to your conclusions
• 1:06:16
  Speaker 1: or appendages and similitudes, if they prove anything, they prove this,
• 1:06:20
  Speaker 1: that free will can do all things without grace. Whereas
• 1:06:24
  Speaker 1: this you did not undertake to prove. Nay, it is
• 1:06:27
  Speaker 1: by you denied. Wherefore these your proofs are nothing else
• 1:06:31
  Speaker 1: but the most direct confutations. For that I may, if
• 1:06:35
  Speaker 1: I can rouse the diatribe from its lethargy. Suppose I argue, thus,
• 1:06:40
  Speaker 1: if Moses say, choose life and keep the commandment, unless
• 1:06:45
  Speaker 1: man be able to choose life and keep the commandment,
• 1:06:48
  Speaker 1: Moses gives that precept to man ridiculously. Have I by
• 1:06:52
  Speaker 1: this argument proved my side of the subject that free
• 1:06:55
  Speaker 1: will can do nothing good, and that it has no
• 1:06:59
  Speaker 1: external endeavor separate from its own power. Nay, On the contrary,
• 1:07:03
  Speaker 1: I have proved by an assertion sufficiently forcible that either
• 1:07:08
  Speaker 1: man can choose life and keep the commandment as it
• 1:07:11
  Speaker 1: is commanded, or Moses is a ridiculous lawgiver. But who
• 1:07:16
  Speaker 1: would dare to assert that Moses was a ridiculous lawgiver?
• 1:07:19
  Speaker 1: It follows therefore, that man can do the things that
• 1:07:23
  Speaker 1: are commanded. This is the way in which the diatribe
• 1:07:27
  Speaker 1: argues throughout contrary to its own purposed design, wherein it
• 1:07:31
  Speaker 1: promised that it would not argue thus, but would prove
• 1:07:34
  Speaker 1: a certain endeavor of free will, of which, however, so
• 1:07:38
  Speaker 1: far from proving it, it scarcely makes mention in the
• 1:07:41
  Speaker 1: whole string of its arguments. Nay, it proves the contrary,
• 1:07:45
  Speaker 1: rather so that it may itself be more properly said
• 1:07:48
  Speaker 1: to affirm and argue all things ridiculously, And as to
• 1:07:52
  Speaker 1: its making, it, according to its own adduced similitude, to
• 1:07:56
  Speaker 1: be ridiculous that a man, having his right arm bound,
• 1:07:59
  Speaker 1: should be ordered to stretch forth his right hand, when
• 1:08:02
  Speaker 1: he could only stretch forth his left. Would it, I pray,
• 1:08:05
  Speaker 1: be ridiculous if a man having both his arms bound,
• 1:08:09
  Speaker 1: and proudly contending or ignorantly presuming that he could do
• 1:08:13
  Speaker 1: anything right or left should be commanded to stretch forth
• 1:08:16
  Speaker 1: his hand right and left, not that his captivity might
• 1:08:20
  Speaker 1: be derided, but that he might be convinced that his
• 1:08:23
  Speaker 1: false presumption of liberty and power, and might be brought
• 1:08:26
  Speaker 1: to know his ignorance of his captivity and misery. The
• 1:08:30
  Speaker 1: Diatribe is perpetually setting before us such a man who
• 1:08:35
  Speaker 1: either can do what is commanded, or at least knows
• 1:08:38
  Speaker 1: that he cannot do it, whereas no such man is
• 1:08:41
  Speaker 1: to be found. If there were such an one, then indeed,
• 1:08:45
  Speaker 1: either impossibilities would be ridiculously commanded, or the spirit of
• 1:08:49
  Speaker 1: Christ would be in vain. The Scripture, however, sets forth
• 1:08:54
  Speaker 1: such a man who is not only bound, miserable, captive,
• 1:08:58
  Speaker 1: sick and dead, but who, by the operation of his
• 1:09:02
  Speaker 1: Lord Satan, to his other miseries, adds that of blindness,
• 1:09:07
  Speaker 1: so that he believes he is free, happy at liberty, powerful, whole,
• 1:09:12
  Speaker 1: and alive. For Satan well knows that if men knew
• 1:09:16
  Speaker 1: their own misery, he could retain no one of them
• 1:09:19
  Speaker 1: in his kingdom, because it could not be but that
• 1:09:23
  Speaker 1: God would immediately pity and succor their own misery and calamity.
• 1:09:27
  Speaker 1: Seeing that he is, with so much praise set forth
• 1:09:31
  Speaker 1: throughout the whole scripture as being near unto the contrite
• 1:09:34
  Speaker 1: and heart that Isaiah sixty one one through three testifies
• 1:09:39
  Speaker 1: that Christ was sent to preach the gospel to the
• 1:09:41
  Speaker 1: poor and to heal the broken hearted. Wherefore, the work
• 1:09:45
  Speaker 1: of Satan is so to hold men that they come
• 1:09:49
  Speaker 1: not to know their misery, but that they presume that
• 1:09:51
  Speaker 1: they can do all things which are enjoined. But the
• 1:09:55
  Speaker 1: work of Moses the legislature, is the contrary, even that
• 1:09:58
  Speaker 1: by the law he might discover to man his misery,
• 1:10:01
  Speaker 1: in order that he might prepare him thus bruised and confounded,
• 1:10:05
  Speaker 1: with the knowledge of himself, for grace, and might send
• 1:10:08
  Speaker 1: him to Christ to be saved. Wherefore the office of
• 1:10:12
  Speaker 1: the law is not ridiculous, but above all things serious
• 1:10:15
  Speaker 1: and necessary. Those therefore who thus far understand these things
• 1:10:21
  Speaker 1: understand clearly at the same time that the diatribe, by
• 1:10:24
  Speaker 1: the whole string of its arguments, affects nothing whatever, that
• 1:10:28
  Speaker 1: it collects nothing from the scriptures but imperative passages, when
• 1:10:32
  Speaker 1: it understands neither what they mean, nor wherefore they are spoken,
• 1:10:37
  Speaker 1: And that moreover, by the appendages of its conclusions in
• 1:10:41
  Speaker 1: carnal similitudes, it mixes up such a mighty mass of
• 1:10:44
  Speaker 1: flesh that it asserts and proves more than it ever intended,
• 1:10:48
  Speaker 1: and argues against itself, so that there were no need
• 1:10:51
  Speaker 1: to pursue particulars any further, For the whole is solved
• 1:10:55
  Speaker 1: by one solution. Seeing that the whole depends on one argument, however,
• 1:11:00
  Speaker 1: that it may be drowned in the same profusion in
• 1:11:03
  Speaker 1: which it attempted to drown me, I will proceed to
• 1:11:06
  Speaker 1: touch upon a few particulars more. End of Section fifty eight.