01.03. Section II.

ARTICLE II.

(THAT IS, CALUMNY II.)

GOD NOT ONLY PREDESTINATED EVEN ADAM TO DAMNATION, BUT TO THE CAUSES OF THAT DAMNATION ALSO, WHOSE FALL HE NOT ONLY FORESAW, BUT HE ALSO WILLED BY HIS SECRET AND ETERNAL DECREE AND ORDAINED THAT HE SHOULD FALL, WHICH FALL, THAT IT MIGHT, IN ITS TIME, TAKE PLACE, GOD PLACED BEFORE HIM THE APPLE, WHICH SHOULD CAUSE THAT FALL.

C A L U M N I A T O R’S OBSERVATIONS AND STATEMENTS ON

ARTICLE II. Your opponents say that this SECOND ARTICLE is the doctrine of the devil, and they demand of me, Calvin, that I would tell them where, in the Divine Scriptures, the substance contained in this Article is written?

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REPLY OF JOHN CALVIN TO

ARTICLE II., &c., &c.

Under this SECOND ARTICLE you appear again exactly the same man as before. Now just produce the passage from my writings wherein I teach "that the apple was placed by God before Adam, that it might be the cause of his fall." This, in fact, is the very source of all your popularity?the drawing of a cloud of obscuration across the minds of the inexperienced, to prevent them from rising to the height of that truth which is removed out of the reach of the common understanding of the flesh and of the carnal mind. But not to wrangle about words, I willingly, and in a moment, confess that what I have written is this: "That the Fall of Adam was not by accident, nor by chance; but was ordained by the secret counsel of God." And this is the doctrine which you positively pronounce to be "the doctrine of the devil." You are, in your own eyes, I know, a judge of the highest authority, and therefore it is that, in your self-conceit, you imagine that you can, by five words of the foulest abuse, knock down that firm fabric of truth which I have erected, after which I have supported by the most impregnable arguments. You call upon me to produce a testimony from the Scriptures, from which it is manifest that Adam fell not, but by the secret decree of God. But had you read even a few pages of my writings with any attention, that sentiment of mine could not have escaped you which everywhere occurs in my books?that God governs all things by His secret counsel and decree. You ascribe a prescience to God after your own fashion, representing Him as sitting in heaven as an idle, inactive, unconcerned spectator of all things in the life of men. Whereas, God Himself, ever vindicating to Himself the right and the act of holding the helm of all things which are done in the whole world, never permits a separation of His prescience from His, power! Nor is this manner of reasoning mine only, but most certainly Augustine’s also. "If (says that holy father) God foresaw that which He did not will to be done, God holds not the supreme rule over all things. God, therefore, ordained that which should come to pass, because nothing could have been done had He not willed it to be done."

If you judge this to be absurd, you will be just as far off as before, and will fall back into the same confusion into which you fell by making my doctrine to be "the doctrine of the devil." For you ought to have applied that remedy for your evil case, which might have been ready at your hand. But that you did not this, nor could do it, is perfectly plain. You might have thought thus, "God foresaw the Fall of Adam. It was in His power to have prevented it if He would. But He did not will to do so. Why did He not will to do so? No other reason can be assigned for His not willing to do so than that His will had quite another bent, or inclination." But, if you will permit yourself to enter into a contention with God, you had better profanely accuse Him at once and condemn Him, for having so made man of constitutional frailty as to leave him liable to fall, and that into eternal ruin on the account! But you will reply that Adam fell by his own free-will. My reply to you in return is, that Adam had need of being gifted with that fortitude and constancy with which the elect of God are gifted whom God warns to "keep" sound and safe "from falling" (Jude 1:24).

Most certain it is that if fresh strength were not supplied to us from heaven every moment, such is our liability to fall, that we should perish a thousand times over. But God supplies all those whom He hath chosen with an invincible fortitude, by which they are so holden up as to "persevere unto the end." How was it, then, I again ask, that God did not bestow this same fortitude and perseverance on Adam, if He had willed that he should stand fast and in safety? Here, most assuredly, every mouth must be silent and dumb; or, all must confess with Solomon, that "God hath made all things for Himself; yea, even the wicked for the day of evil" (Proverbs 16:4). If this offend you as being an absurdity, think within yourself whether the Scriptures declare so often in vain that the judgments of God are "a great deep." If it were possible for us to measure the incomprehensible counsel of God by the standard of our own human capacity, Moses would have said in vain: "Secret things belong unto the Lord our God: but those things which are revealed belong unto us and to our children for ever" (Deuteronomy 29:29).

You demand of me to cite the place in the Holy Scriptures by which I prove that God did not prevent the Fall of Adam, because His will was not to prevent it. Just as if that memorable reply of God to all such inquiries and inquirers did not contain in itself an all-sufficient proof: "I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy." From which the apostle Paul at once concludes, and justly so, that God hath not mercy upon all, because He wills not to have mercy upon all. And most certainly these words, without the aid of any interpreter, plainly and loudly declare that God is not bound by any law that should compel Him to show mercy unto all men indiscriminately and alike; but that He is the Lord of His own will, to impart pardon to whom He will and to pass by others as He will. It is, moreover, certain that God was the same then as now, when the prophet said of Him, "He doeth according to His will" (Daniel 4:35). If, therefore, God permitted the Fall of Adam against His will (as you would have it), you will next say that He was overcome by Satan in the conflict; and thus you will make, like the Manichees, two ruling principles. But Paul, pleading also this great cause of God, compares Him (and that soberly and solemnly) to a potter, who could of his own will form of the same mass vessels of different kinds as he pleased. Now the apostle might have begun his argument had he been so led from sin. But he does not so. He commences the mighty subject by defending the free right of God from the very beginning of His glorious workmanship, even from His secret eternal and sovereign will. And where he afterwards adds, :That all were concluded under unbelief," does he teach that this took place contrary to, or without, the will of God? Does he not, on the contrary, teach that God was the author of that state of unbelief? If you reply that all were condemned to unbelief as they deserved, the context will not admit even that interpretation, because Paul is there speaking of the secret judgments of God. And that solemn exclamation of his directly militates against such an interpretation, "O the depth!" etc. Wherefore, as God, from the beginning, predestinated Christ to succour those who were lost, so by His inconceivable and inestimable counsel He decreed a way by which He might manifest forth His glory by the Fall of Adam.

I willingly confess that where God is vindicating the free course of His mercy, He speaks of the whole human race generally, which had already perished in Adam; but this same view and consideration held good before Adam fell, that His will was then all-sufficient to show mercy when and as He pleased. Moreover, this His eternal will, though it depends on none and on nothing but Himself, nor has any prior cause to influence it, is nevertheless founded in the highest reason and in the highest equity. For though in the case of men they require a law to rein and restrain their intemperateness it is far otherwise with God. He is His own law?a law unto Himself! And His will is the highest rule of the highest equity.