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94. And thus it will be that while the reprobated
angels and men go on in their eternal punishment, the
saints will go on learning more fully the blessings
which grace has bestowed upon them. Then, through the
actual realities of their experience, they will see
more clearly the meaning of what is written in The
Psalms: "I will sing to thee of mercy and judgment, O
Lord"(199) --since no one is set free save by
unmerited mercy and no one is damned save by a
merited condemnation. 95. Then what is now hidden
will not be hidden: when one of two infants is taken
up by God's mercy and the other abandoned through
God's judgment--and when the chosen one knows what
would have been his just deserts in judgment--why was
the one chosen rather than the other, when the
condition of the two was the same? Or again, why were
miracles not wrought in the presence of certain
people who would have repented in the face of
miraculous works, while miracles were wrought in the
presence of those who were not about to believe. For
our Lord saith most plainly: "Woe to you, Chorazin;
woe to you, Bethsaida. For if in Tyre and Sidon had
been wrought the miracles done in your midst, they
would have repented long ago in sackcloth and
ashes."(200) Now, obviously, God did not act unjustly
in not willing their salvation, even though they
could have been saved, if he willed it so.(201)
Then, in the clearest light of wisdom, will be
seen what now the pious hold by faith, not yet
grasping it in clear understanding--how certain,
immutable, and effectual is the will of God, how
there are things he can do but doth not will to do,
yet willeth nothing he cannot do, and how true is
what is sung in the psalm: "But our God is above in
heaven; in heaven and on earth he hath done all
things whatsoever that he would."(202) This obviously
is not true, if there is anything that he willed to
do and did not do, or, what were worse, if he did not
do something because man's will prevented him, the
Omnipotent, from doing what he willed. Nothing,
therefore, happens unless the Omnipotent wills it to
happen. He either allows it to happen or he actually
causes it to happen.
96. Nor should we doubt that God doth well, even
when he alloweth whatever happens ill to happen. For
he alloweth it only through a just judgment--and
surely all that is just is good. Therefore, although
evil, in so far as it is evil, is not good, still it
is a good thing that not only good things exist but
evil as well. For if it were not good that evil
things exist, they would certainly not be allowed to
exist by the Omnipotent Good, for whom it is
undoubtedly as easy not to allow to exist what he
does not will, as it is for him to do what he does
will.
Unless we believe this, the very beginning of our
Confession of Faith is imperiled--the sentence in
which we profess to believe in God the Father
Almighty. For he is called Almighty for no other
reason than that he can do whatsoever he willeth and
because the efficacy of his omnipotent will is not
impeded by the will of any creature.
97. Accordingly, we must now inquire about the
meaning of what was said most truly by the apostle
concerning God, "Who willeth that all men should be
saved."(203) For since not all--not even a
majority--are saved, it would indeed appear that the
fact that what God willeth to happen does not happen
is due to an embargo on God's will by the human will.
Now, when we ask for the reason why not all are
saved, the customary answer is: "Because they
themselves have not willed it." But this cannot be
said of infants, who have not yet come to the power
of willing or not willing. For, if we could attribute
to their wills the infant squirmings they make at
baptism, when they resist as hard as they can, we
would then have to say that they were saved against
their will. But the Lord's language is clearer when,
in the Gospel, he reproveth the unrighteous city:
"How often," he saith, "would I have gathered your
children together, as a hen gathers her chicks, and
you would not."(204)
This sounds as if God's will had been overcome by
human wills and as if the weakest, by not willing,
impeded the Most Powerful so that he could not do
what he willed. And where is that omnipotence by
which "whatsoever he willed in heaven and on earth,
he has done," if he willed to gather the children of
Jerusalem together, and did not do so? Or, is it not
rather the case that, although Jerusalem did not will
that her children be gathered together by him, yet,
despite her unwillingness, God did indeed gather
together those children of hers whom he would? It is
not that "in heaven and on earth" he hath willed and
done some things, and willed other things and not
done them. Instead, "all things whatsoever he willed,
he hath done." |