SECTION V.
The Objection drawn from the supposed Calvinism of Thomas Aquinas, refuted, with a word concerning St. Austin.
But, it seem Austin and Aquinas were "two champions for predestination:" and "their names," I am farther told, "have as much weight in the Church of Rome as they have with"1 the vicar of Broad Hembury. I am apt to think, that Mr Sellon's acquaintance, either with St. Austin's writings, or with those of Aquinas, is, at best, extremely slender. However his bare mention of those foreign names may serve to give Mr. Wesley's old women an huge idea of "brother Sellon's purdigious larning."
Whatever may be said for the truly admirable bishoo of Hippo; it is certain, that the ingenious native of Aquino was by no means a consistent predestinarian. He had, indeed, his lucid intervals; but, if the Arminians should find themselves at a loss for quibbles, I would recommend to them a diligent perusal of that laborious hair-splitter; who will furnish them in their own way, with many useful and necessary quirks, without the assistance whereof their system had, long ago, lost its hold even on the prejudiced and the superficial.
Of all Aquinas's numerous writings (which are said to amount to 17 folio volumes), I have only his Summa Theologiae, and his Commentaries on the Gospels, and St. Paul's Epistles. To collect all the Semi-pelagian passages, with which those two performances are fraught, would be a task equally prolix and unprofitable. My citations, therefore, shall be few and short: but such as may suffice to evince, that this scholastic Papist does, in many material points respecting the present argument, shake hands from his grave, with his younger brethren, the modern Arminians. "The Book of Life," says he, "is the enrolment of those who are ordained to life eternal. Whoever is in present possession of grace, is, by virtue of that very possession, deserving of eternal life. This ordination, however, sometimes fails: for, some people are ordained to have eternal life, by the" [inherent] "grace they possess, which eternal life, they, notwithstanding, come short of, by the commission of deadly sin. They who are appointed to life eternal, not by God's predestination, but only through the grace" [they are partakers of], "are said to be written in the Book of Life, not absolutely, but under certain limitations."2 Let me add a word from this author, concerning justification, which he supposes to be synonymous with the infusion of grace: "Free-will," says he, "is essential to the nature of man: consequently, in that person, who has the use of his free-will God worketh no motion unto righteousness without the motion of the man's free-will."3 In his comment on the first Epistle to Timothy, he thus asserts the merit of works: "Spiritual treasure is no other than an assemblage of merits; which merits are the foundation of that future building which is prepared for us in Heaven: for the whole preparation of future glory is by merits, which merits we acquire by grace; and this grace is the fountain of merit."4
Now let any man judge, whether this Popish writer does not, in these and similar passages, speak the language of Pelagius. That he sometimes stumbles on great and precious truths, cannot be denied. Where this is the case, let him, have his due commendation. But the least that can be said is, that those of his lucubrations which I have met with abound with such astonishing self-contradictions, as are only to be paralleled in the puny publications wherewith Mr. John Wesley hath edified his readers.
So much for Thomas Aquinas. Next, for the celebrated African bishop; concerning whom, Mr. Sellon thus descants: "Austin'a writings are judged to confirm the Popish doctrines so much, that the effigy of that father is set with three others, to support the papal chair. And suppose I was to make the effigy of Arminius serve as a leg to my chair, would it thence follow that I am an Arminian? As little does it follow, that the doctrine of predestination asserted by St. Austin, is the received doctrine of Rome, only because the Pope affects to sit on the shoulders of Austin's wooden image. If my adversary has only such wooden arguments to urge, the interests of his dearly beloved Arminianism will be as ridiculously and as feebly supported, as is the Pope's5 chair by the worm-eaten effigy. Is it true, that the system of grace, maintained by Austin, is espoused by the Roman Church? Quite the reverse. The writers of that communion do, indeed, make very pompous use of St. Austin's name, and pretend to pay no little deference to his authority: but with just as much sincerity, as Mr. Sellon professes to revere and vindicate the Church of England. Papists dazzle the vulgar by the mention of St. Austin, that the brightness of his name may render their apostacy from his doctrines impreceivable.
With what propriety St. Austin's image lends its shoulder to the Pope's haunch, may be judged from the following brief sketch of Austin's doctrine: which I shall give in the words of the honest and learned Mr. Du Pin.
"Sinners," says St. Augustin, "sin voluntarily, and without compulsion: and they cannot complain that God hath denied them his grace, or the gift of perseverance, since he owes his grace to no-body."6 The historian goes on: "He [Austin] again insisteth upon the same matter, and upon the same principles, in both the books which he writ in answer to Hilary's and Prosper's letters. The first is, of the predestination of the saints; and the second, of the gift of perseverance: wherein he demonstrates, that the beginning of faith and good purposes is the gift of God; and that so, our predestination, or vocation, doth not depend upon our merits. The second book concerns the gift of perseverance; which he shews to depend equally on God, as the beginning of our conversion. St. Augustin composed these treatises in the year 429.7
"St. Augustin's principles, concerning predestination and reprobation, do exactly agree with his opinion touching grace. Both those decrees, according to him, suppose the fore- knowledge of original sin, and of the corruption of the whole mass of mankind. If God would suffer all men to remain there, none could complain of that severity, seeing they are all guilty and doomed to damnation, because of the sin of the first man. But God resolved, from all eternity, to deliver some, whom he had chosen out of pure mercy, without any regard to their future merits; and, from all eternity, he prepared, for them that were thus chosen, those gifts and graces which are necessary to save them infallibly: and these he bestows upon them in time. All those, therefore, that are of the number of the elect, hear the gospel, and believe, and persevere in the faith working by love, to the end of their lives. If they chance to wander from the right way, they return, and repent of their sins: and it is certain, that they shall all die in the faith of Jesus Christ."8
Let the reader but compare the above summary of St. Austin's doctrine with the determinations of the Council of Trent, quoted in the 3d of the preceding sections; and he will, at first view, perceive, how little stress is to be laid on the Pope's reposing his loins upon St. Austin's effigy, while he tramples the leading9 doctrines of that predestinarian saint under foot, and anathematises all who embrace them.
Had I any kind of intercourse with his Arminian holiness of Rome, I would advise him to cashier the image of St. Austin from serving any longer as a support to his easy chair. I would recommend to him a log, made of Ledsham ash: which he might soon obtain, by ordering one of his emissaries (whereof he has a pretty many) in this kingdom, to procure an effigy of Mr. Walter Sellon, as nearly resembling the original, as it can be made; to serve not, indeed, upon due recollection, as a stay to his Holiness's throne - nor even as a prop to his foot-stool - but, which would be perfectly in character, as a leg to a certain convenience (a sella perforata, though not the sella porphyretica,) whereon, I presume his Holiness deigns, occasionally, to sit: and which, the wooden effigy of this wooden Arminian would, with all imaginable propriety and gracefulness, assist in supporting.
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