SECT. 13. Mistakes prohibited.
Do not let anyone therefore think that God, when he is said to harden or to work evil in us (for to harden is to make evil), does so by creating evil in us anew, as it were. It is as if you fancied a malignant vintner who was full of mischief, to pour or mix poison in with the wine. No mischief is in his vessel; the vessel all the while does nothing itself, save that it receives or endures the malignancy of the mixer. But when many hear it said that God works both good and evil in us, and that we are subjected to the operations of God by a mere passive necessity, they seem to fancy that man is a good sort of creature, or at least he is not a bad one; and in some way such as this, he is made the subject of a bad work of God’s. These persons do not sufficiently consider what a restless sort of actor God is, in all his creatures, and how he allows none of them to have a holiday. But let him who would have any understanding about such sayings, settle it thus with himself: that God works evil in us (that is, by us), not through any fault of His, but through our own faultiness.
We being evil by nature, and God being good, He hurries us along by means of his own agency (such is the nature of his omnipotence). And being good as he is in himself, He cannot do other than to work evil by an evil instrument. However, he makes good use of it (such is his wisdom), by turning it to his own glory and our salvation. 508
In like manner, God finds the will of Satan evil, without creating it evil. What has become evil, through God’s deserting of Satan, and through Satan’s sinning — and God finding it evil — He lays hold of it in the course of his operations, and moves it wherever he will. Yet this will of Satan does not cease to be evil, just because God moves it thus. Just so, David says of Shimei (2Sam 16.10), “Let him curse, for God has commanded him to curse David.” How does God command him to curse? Such a malignant and wicked act! There was no external commandment of this kind to be found anywhere. David must, then, regard this consideration: that the omnipotent God speaks, and it is done; that is, He does all things by his eternal word. So then, the divine agency and omnipotence seizes hold of the will of Shimei, together with all his members — that will which was already evil, and which had previously been inflamed against David. He met Shimei at just the right moment, having deserved such a cursing — and even the good God commands this curse (that is, he speaks the word and it is done) which is poured out by a wicked and blasphemous organ. For He seizes hold of that organ, and carries it along with Him in the course of his own agency.
SECT. 14. Pharaoh’s case considered.
Thus God hardens Pharaoh when he presents his words and works to his wicked and evil will, which that will hates — no doubt through innate faultiness and natural corruption.
Now, God does not change this will inwardly, by his Spirit; but He persists in presenting and imposing His words and works. And Pharaoh, on the other hand, considering his strength, wealth and power, confides in them through the same natural depravity. It then comes to pass, on the one hand, that he is puffed up and exalted by his own fancied greatness. And on the other hand, he is rendered a proud despiser of Moses, coming to him in a lowly form, and by the plainness of the word of God. Pharaoh is first hardened thus. And then, the more that Moses urges and threatens him, the more Pharaoh is provoked and aggravated — for this evil will of his would not of itself be stirred to action, nor hardened. But since the omnipotent actor drives it along by an inevitable impulse, as He does the rest of his creatures, will it must. Add to this, that at the same time, He presents from without, that which naturally irritates and offends the will. So that Pharaoh cannot avoid being hardened, any more than he can avoid the agency of the divine omnipotence, or the aversion or malignancy of his own will. Pharaoh’s hardening by God is thus completed.
He sets before his maliciousness that which, of his own nature, he hates from without. After this, he does not cease to stimulate that evil will, just as he finds it, by his own omnipotent impulse within. Meanwhile, the wickedness of his will being such, the man cannot help but hate what is contrary to himself, and to trust in his own strength. Thus he is made obstinate to such a degree that he neither hears nor has any understanding, but is hurried away under the possession of the devil, like one mad and raving. 509
If this view of the case is satisfactory, I have gained my cause. We agree to explode 510 the tropes and glosses of men, and to understand the words of God literally, so that it may not be necessary to make excuses for God, nor to accuse him of injustice. When he says, I will harden Pharaoh’s heart, he speaks in plain language, as if he were to say, I will cause the heart of Pharaoh to be hardened; or, it will be hardened through my doings and workings. We have heard how this is effected: by My exciting his own evil will inwardly using that general sort of impulse by which I move all things, so that he will go on under his own bias, and in his own course of willing — nor will I cease to stimulate him, nor can I do otherwise. At the same time, I will present him with a word and a work which that evil bias of his will run afoul of. For he can do nothing else but choose ill, while I stimulate the very substance of the evil which is in him, by virtue of my omnipotence.
Thus God was most sure, and with the greatest certainty, he pronounced that Pharaoh would be hardened. He was most sure that Pharaoh’s will could neither resist the excitement of God’s omnipotence, nor lay aside its own maliciousness, nor receive Moses as a friend when he presented himself to Pharaoh as an adversary. Rather, Pharaoh’s will would remain evil, and he would necessarily become worse, harder, and prouder, while in pursuing his own natural bias and course, he encountered an opposition which he did not like, and which he despised through a confidence in his own powers.
Thus, you see it confirmed here by this very assertion: that Freewill can do nothing but evil. This is because God — who neither mistakes through ignorance, nor lies through wickedness — so confidently promises the hardening of Pharaoh’s heart. He is sure, truly, that an evil will can will only evil; and if a good which contravenes its own lust is proposed to it, his will can only be made worse by it. 511
SECT. 15. Impertinent questions may still be asked.
It remains therefore, that a man may ask,
‘Why does God not cease from that very stimulation of his omnipotence by which the wicked man’s will is stirred up to continue in its wickedness, and to grow worse?’
I answer,
‘This is to desire that God cease to be God for the sake of the wicked; it to wish that his power and agency cease. In fact, it is to desire that God cease to be good, lest they be made worse.’
But why does he not at the same time change those evil wills which he excites? This pertains to the secrets of his Majesty, in which his judgments are incomprehensible. We have no business asking this question; our business is to adore these mysteries. And if flesh and blood are offended here and murmur, let them murmur. It will get no further, however. God will not be changed for these murmurs. And what if ungodly men go away scandalized in great numbers? The elect will remain, notwithstanding.
The same answer will be given to those who ask,
‘Why did he allow Adam to fall? And why does he go on to make all of us, who are infected through the same sin — when he might have kept Adam from sinning, and might either have created us from another stock, or have purged the corrupted seed first?’
He is God, whose will has no cause or reason 512 which can be prescribed to it for rule and measure, seeing that it has no equal or superior, but is itself the rule of all things. If it did not have any rule or measure, nor any cause or reason, then it could no longer be the will of God. For what He wills is not right because he ought to will so, or ought to have willed so. On the contrary, it is right simply because He wills so; therefore, what is done must be right. Cause and reason are prescribed to the creature’s will, but not to the Creator’s; unless you were to set another Creator over his head. 513
SECT. 16. The trope compared with the text.
The “trope-making” Diatribe is sufficiently confuted by these considerations, I think. But
