as Satan is regarded and described as the author | as imputable to him. We find these two ways of evil and wickedness in depraved and unbelieving men, so is God the author of goodness and virtue in enlightened Christians. So Rom. v. 5; Ephes. iv. 30, Avaɛiv avevμa äytov, to counteract by sin his salutary influences.

(2) The texts in which all the specific spiritual benefits which Christians enjoy are ascribed to God, or to the Holy Spirit, as the author, or efficient cause. There is not one among all these benefits which is not somewhere described as produced by divine influence. Thus (a) instruction in Christianity (illuminatio), John, vi. 45, 65; Ephes. i. 17, 18, “God gives us лveva copias by the Christian doctrine;", 1 Thess. iv. 9; 1 Cor. xii. 3, 8. (b) Conversion and faith, and the entire sum of Christian blessedness (xλños), Phil. i. 6; Ephes. i. 11; ii. 5, 10; iii. 16; Acts, xvi. 14; 2 Tim. ii. 25. (c) The effects and consequences of faith; such as good intentions, readiness to good works, and skill in doing them, Ephes. iii. 16; 2 Pet. i. 3; 2 Thess. ii. 17; Rom. xv. 5. Indeed, the very execution of our good purposes is represented as the work of the Spirit, 1 Cor. i. 8; 1 Pet. v. 10; Rom. viii. 13, 14; ix. 1; xiv. 7; Phil. ii. 12, 13, "The Christian who is in earnest about his own salvation should exhibit all diligence and zeal; and yet he should cast himself upon the divine guidance and assistance, since he can do nothing of himself. For it was God who had awakened in the Philippians (when Paul was among them) a serious desire for salvation, and who aided in the execution of this desire, (although Paul was absent from them.) And this he did Яp sidoxías―i. e., for all this the Philippians were indebted to the mere mercy of God, to his free, gracious will."

of representing this subject connected together in the same manner in the Old Testament, and in other ancient writings-e. g., those of the Arabians and Greeks. Cf. the texts cited s. 85, II. 3. According to these, God puts good and evil, wisdom and folly, into the hearts of men, and is the author both of their prosperity and their overthrow. And yet, according to these same writers, the good actions of men are rewarded by God, and their wicked actions punished by him, as their own actions; whereas if they came from God, they would not be imputable to those by whom they were performed.

(2) Are not these two representations really contradictory? Such they may appear to us, who are accustomed to different distinctions and expressions from those which were formerly common respecting divine influences, the freedom of the human will, and its relation to Divine Providence. Those especially who are scientifically educated are apt to bring these subjects into a philosophical form, and to express them in scholastic terms. Hence in modern languages we have appropriate expressions with regard to freedom, &c., even in common discourse. Such was not the case in ancient times. And for this reason we frequently find difficulties and contradictions where they saw none. On the one hand, the ancient world acknowledged, with us, that God governs everything, and that nothing can take place without his co-operation; on the other hand, they knew that the human will must at the same time remain free, because the actions of men would otherwise cease to be their own actions. If men were moved like machines, and wrought upon like statues, their actions could not be imputed to them. But in the ancient world, the means by which God acts were

II. Remarks Explanatory of the Scriptural Phrase- not always so carefully distinguished as is com

ology on this subject.

mon at present. And even when these means were known, they were more seldom mentioned. The sacred writers, indeed, well understood them, for they frequently mention them, but not

(1) There are many passages in the Bible which, taken by themselves, appear to affirm an immediate influence of God in the renewal of men—an influence, therefore, which is miracu-in every case distinctly. Thus it happens that lous and irresistible, and involving an exertion of his bare omnipotence. And so there are passages, where, on the other hand, it seems to be taught, that God denies and withholds from men the means for their improvement, and renders them hard, obdurate, &c. In other passages, however, it is expressly said that God employs means, and that these are accessible to all men. Vide s. 130, II. These influences are described in these very passages as resistible. It is distinctly taught that man is not to be compelled; that he himself must not be inactive about his own moral welfare; that he is free to will and choose good or evil. Hence good and evil actions are ascribed to man himself, and considered

many things were generally described by the ancients as the immediate effects of divine power, which actually took place through the instrumentality of means which were either unknown to them, or which they left unmentioned. And so, many effects of the divine agency which have a miraculous aspect were really produced by natural means. To those who are unacquainted with the ancient phraseology, the description given of those effects in the ancient manner of thinking and speaking seems to imply that God brought them to pass by an immediate and irresistible agency. Vide s. 70, Note ad fin.

Now what did Augustine and his followers

in the power and weight of the arguments by which Christianity is proved, or of the truths which it exhibits, but principally in the power and agency of God, who, by means of this doctrine, acts in the souls of men. Theologians say, “Divina efficientia a doctrina ipsa, ejusque viness (uwpia) to him. For such doctrines require et efficacia discernitur." This clearly appears from the passages before cited, especially from 1 Cor. iii. 6, 7; Phil. ii, 12, 13; 2 Thess. ii. 15—17; i. 11; Ephes. i. 16-20; iii. 16-20; 1 Pet. i. 15; Acts, xvi. 14, and many of the discourses of Jesus, especially those recorded in John-e. g., iii. 13—17, &c.

SECTION CXXXII.

was theoretically obscured, and practically also, as far as the image of God, which is never A SKETCH OF SOME OF THE PRINCIPAL THEORIES wholly effaced, can be obscured by theoretic error and moral corruption.

RESPECTING THE OPERATIONS OF GRACE, AND
THE FREEDOM (OR ABILITY) OF MAN IN SPI-
RITUAL THINGS; AND THE CONTROVERSIES ON

THIS SUBJECT IN THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH.

I. Opinions of the early Greek Fathers.

The publication of Christianity cast new light upon the condition and relations of man. While, by revealing a remedy, it implied his helplessness and need, on the other hand, by offering pardon, it implied his guilt and exposure to pu nishment, and by appealing to the divine portion in man it awakened him from his apathy as to moral obligation and effort. The whole nature of the Christian remedy, consisting not of magical or physical influences-which would have been requisite had man been under a natural necessity of sinning-but of moral means, calling our moral faculties into exercise, contained an implied contradiction to the pagan and Manichean philosophy, and struck at the root of every view which derives evil from a necessity of nature rather than from the perverted use of our moral powers.

In the earliest ages, shortly after the time of the apostles, there was no controversy on this subject, as Augustine himself acknowledges. In the exhibition of this doctrine most of the first teachers contented themselves with that simplicity which prevails in the New Testament. They so express themselves, that while they affirm, on one side, that man receives assistance (auxilia) from divine grace, they still allow to him, on the other side, freedom of action. Nothing was said from the first to the third century about irresistible grace. Vide s. 79, in the History of the Doctrine of Original Sin. So Irenæus says in many passages, “that God compels no man; that we are free, and can choose good or evil." Clement of Alexandria says, "that God indeed guides, but never binds our free wills; and that hence to believe and to obey is in man's power." In the third century, Origen expressed his opinion still more definitely than the fathers who had preceded him. In his work ɛpi ȧpx✩v, (1. iii. c. I.) he says, we are indebted for faith to God alone. He gave us the means of faith. From him come both the faculties which man has of doing right, and the preservation of these faculties. But the use of these faculties bestowed upon us de- As it was, the excess to which the Greek pends upon ourselves. When therefore in some fathers carried this point laid the foundation for passages of the New Testament the improvement the divergency between the Eastern and Westof man is ascribed solely to God, and in others ern churches, which will appear in the sequel to man himself, there is no contradiction. For of this sketch. even that which depends upon our own free will cannot take place without the divine assistance; and God does not work in us without our own co-operation. For he does not bind the free human will. With these sentiments, Athanasius, Basilius the Great, Chrysostom, and other fathers of the Greek church, perfectly agree.

From these considerations it may be explained that the early Greek fathers should have insisted so disproportionately upon the freedom of the human will, though they by no means went into the Pelagian excess of ascribing to it an independency on divine grace. Had they been placed in as immediate contact with the stoical or pharisaical doctrine of human self-sufficiency, as with the Pagan and Gnostic idea of natural necessity, they would, doubtless, have given to man's inability and dependence on God that place which human freedom and power now hold in their system.

With regard to the anthropological views of the Greek fathers of this period, cf. Neander, Kirchengeschichte, b. i., Abth. iii. s. 1049— 1060.-TR.]

II. Opinions of the early Latin Fathers; and the
Doctrine of Pelagius.

[Note. The early Greek fathers were led to We find that most of the ancient Latin fainsist thus strongly upon αὐτεξούσιον, ἐλευθερίαν, thers agreed with this simple doctrine of the rpoaipeow, (the self-determination, freedom of the Greek church. So Hilary, of the fourth cenwill) by standing in immediate conflict with tury; nor were any objections made to him bethe views of man prevailing throughout the hea-fore the time of Augustine, near the beginning then world, and especially among the contemporary Gnostic sects. Before Christianity was promulgated, it had become almost universal to regard man as acting under the same necessity to which material nature is subjected. Evil was supposed either to belong to matter, and to be inherent in the human organization, or to result from an irresistible fate and necessity. Thus the free and accountable agency of man

of the fifth century. We find, however, in Africa, even before the time of Augustine, some traces of the peculiar expressions and sentiments which were afterwards formed by him into a system, which he held in opposition to that of Pelagius. Tertullian, who in the rest of his system does not differ from the Greeks, opposes gratiam divinam to natura, and says that the vis gratiæ is potentior natura, (the

natural powers of men,) De Anima, c. 21. He, | however, allows to man liberi arbitrii potestatem. Cyprian, in the third century, comes still nearer to the opinions of Augustine. And indeed there must have been many in Africa before and at the time of Augustine who held the essentials of his system.

arbitrio in spiritualibus)—i. e., is unable to understand spiritual things, (the truths of salvation contained in the scriptures,) or to act conformably with them, without the divine instructions contained in the scriptures, and the gracious assistance of God, although he may possess freedom in natural things (liberum arbitrium habere in naturalibus)—i. e., he may learn God from nature and reason, and fulfil many of his duties. The Bible, too, teaches that the wicked come at length to such a habit of sinning that they become the slaves of sin, (John, viii. 32, 36; Rom. vii. 23,) and that they can be delivered from this slavery only by faith in Jesus Christ and by divine assistance. Since now Augustine was led, by opposition to Pelagius, to exaggerate the doctrine of natural depravity, (vide s. 79, 80,) he represented the assistance afforded by God in the improvement of man as truly compulsory, and of such a nature as to infringe upon human freedom. The ancient fathers, on the other hand, held to rò avržovalov, understanding by this term, or the term liberum arbitrium, (which Tertullian first borrowed from a term in Roman law,) the power of man to choose good or evil freely and without compulsion. This view was universally held in the East, and in the West, too, before the Pelagian controversies.

This induced Pelagius, (who was a native of Britain, but who was extensively read in the works of the Greek fathers,) in the beginning of the fifth century, to analyze and collate the doctrines of the Greek fathers, and especially of Origen, and to draw consequences from them which they themselves had not authorized. He taught that three things should be distinguished in man, the posse, velle, and agere. For the faculty or power to do good men are indebted to God alone (gratiæ), who had granted it to human nature. To will and to act depends upon man himself. Still men are so assisted by the grace of God that their willing and acting is facilitated. But the means which God makes use of in affording his aid are doctrina and reve- | latio. He made this last point more prominent than any of the teachers who had preceded him; and this was well. But in other points he deviated from the doctrine of the Bibleviz., (a) by denying natural depravity; (b) by | deriving our ability to do good solely or principally from the power with which our nature (2) Augustine made a careful distinction bewas originally endowed by God; (c) and by tween nature and grace. Vide s. 129, II., and allowing to God no real instrumentality in the Morus, p. 234, note 2. Grace alone can renew conversion and sanctification of men. Accord- man; he can do nothing for this end by the ing to this system, God works only by means powers of mere nature. And it is true, in a cerof the Christian doctrine-i. e., he is the author|tain sense, according to the Bible, that man of this doctrine, which contains more powerful motives than any other.

Against this system Augustine contended. In Africa, councils were held in opposition to Pelagius, in which his doctrine was condemned. The Christians of the Eastern church, of Palestine and elsewhere, did not, however, assent to this decision; and the same is true of many in the Latin churches beyond the bounds of Africa, and at first even of the Roman bishop himself. This was owing, partly to the extravagant zeal of Augustine, and to the mixture of many erroneous opinions in his system; and partly to the guarded and ambiguous phraseology of Pelagius, by which he concealed his departures from the scriptural doctrine. But at length Augustine succeeded so far in his efforts, that the doctrine of Pelagius was condemned, and the condemnation confirmed by the Emperor. And thus the theory of Augustine obtained the predominance, at least in the West.

III. Augustine's Doctrine respecting Grace. (1) He held that human nature is so depraved (s. 79) that it no longer possesses freedom of will in spiritual things (carere libero

alone cannot deliver himself; that by his own unaided powers he cannot renew himself. But Augustine went further than this, and the additions which he made are not scriptural. Man, he said, can do nothing which will at all contribute to his spiritual recovery. He is like a lump of clay, or a statue, without life or activity. Hence, he denied virtue and salvation to the heathen, and to all who are not enlightened by grace. Vide s. 121.

(3) This divine grace, which alone is able to renew the heart, is described by Augustine as efficax and sufficiens-i. e., alone sufficient to overcome the power of sin, (in which Augustine was right,) and also as irresistibilis. For he conceived grace to be the direct operation of divine omnipotence, acting in a miraculous manner, qua voluntatem hominum indeclinabili vi ad bona trahat.

(4) Augustine made a threefold division of grace, founded on the doctrine which he held in opposition to Pelagius, that to will, to be able, and to perform, depend solely on divine grace— viz., (a) gratia excitans or incipiens, that grace which renders the human will inclined to faith, excites good emotions, and produces the begin