What exquisite escape, then, has your gloss effected? While it denies man’s freedom in paltry creature events, it proclaims it in the high events of God. 636 It is like saying, ‘Codrus cannot pay half a crown, but he can pay millions of guineas.’ I am surprised, too, that Diatribe, who has so persecuted that saying of Wickliff’s up to here, ‘all things happen by necessity,’ should now of her own accord concede that events are necessary to us. 637
‘Besides, however much you force it,’ she says, ‘so that it may bear on the subject of Freewill, does not everybody confess that no one can maintain an upright course of life without the grace of God? Meanwhile, however, we also strive according to our own ability, to the extent that we pray daily, “O Lord my God, direct my way in your sight.” The one who sues for help, does not lay aside endeavour.’
Diatribe thinks that what she answers is not a straw man; provided she not be silent, but say something. Having done so, she would be thought to have satisfied everybody; so confident is she in her own authority.
The thing to be proved was whether we strive by means of our own strength; the thing she proves is that she endeavours by praying. Is she mocking us? Is she making fun of the Papists? Whoever prays, prays by means of the Spirit; indeed, the Spirit himself prays in us (Rom 8.26). How is the power of Freewill proved by the endeavour of the Holy Spirit? Is Freewill the same thing as the Holy Spirit in Diatribe’s account? Are we at present discussing what the power of the Spirit is? Diatribe leaves me this passage of Jeremiah thus untouched and unconquerable; and only produces this gloss of her own brain: ‘We also strive with our own strength;’ and Luther is obliged to believe her — if he pleases. 638
SECT. 47. Prov. 16.1 defended.
So again, she maintains that the saying in Proverbs 16.1 also belongs to events: “The preparation of the heart is man’s, the government of the tongue is the Lord’s.”
As if we should be satisfied with this ipse dixit of hers, and require no other authority! And it is surely more than enough answer, that if we even grant this to be its meaning, which applies it to events, then clearly the victory is mine, according to what I said last: since Freewill is nothing in our own works and events, then much more is it nothing in the works and events of God.’ 639
But observe how sharp she is: ‘How can it be man’s work to prepare the heart, when Luther affirms that everything is done by necessity?’
I reply, ‘Since events are not in our own power, as you acknowledge, how can it be man’s work to bring matters to their issue?’
SECT. 48. Much in Proverbs for Freewill.
Take for my answer, the answer which you have given me. No, truly, we must work especially on this account, because all future things are uncertain to us. As the Preacher says, “In the morning sow your seed, and in the evening do not withhold your hand, because you do not know whether this or that will spring up.” I say, they are uncertain to us as to knowledge, but they are necessary as to event. Their necessity inspires us with that fear of God, which is our antidote against presumption and security; while their uncertainty begets a confidence which fortifies our minds against despair.
But she returns to her old song that, ‘In the book of Proverbs many things are said in favour of Freewill,’ such as this, ‘Confess your works to the Lord,’ Do you hear, she asks? Your works. — That is, there are many imperative and conjunctive verbs in that book, and there are many pronouns in the second person: so Freewill is proved by such supporters. For instance, confess; therefore you can confess: your works; therefore you do them. So that saying, “I am your God,” you would understand to mean, ‘you make me your God,’ “Your faith has made you whole.” Do you hear? “Your faith.” Expound it this way, and you make yourself to have faith,’ And now you have proved Freewill. — I am not mocking here, but showing that Diatribe is not in earnest when pleading this cause.
That saying in Prov 16.4, “The Lord has made all things for himself; even the wicked for the day of evil,” she absolutely moulds into a new shape by words of her own; urging in excuse for God, that He has not made any creature evil. 640
It is as if I spoke of creation, and not of that constant operation of God on created things, by which God actuates even the wicked; as I have already said about Pharaoh.
God makes the wicked man, not by creating evil, or an evil creature (which is impossible), but the seed being corrupted upon which God operates, an evil man is made or created. This is not by the fault of the Maker, but through the corruptness of the material.
Nor has that saying from the twenty-first chapter any efficacy in her view, “The heart of the king is in the hand of the Lord; he inclines it wherever he will.” (Pro 21.1) It is not necessary, she says, that he who inclines, compels — as if we were speaking about compulsion, and not rather about a necessity of immutability!
By God’s inclining of the heart is meant, not that sleepy, lazy thing which Diatribe pretends; but that most efficacious operation of God, which the man cannot avoid or change; and by which he necessarily has such a will as God has given him, and such a will as God hurries along with His own motion. I have spoken to this point already.641
Besides, since Solomon speaks of the king’s heart, Diatribe thinks that this text is improperly drawn to express a general sentiment; rather, it means what Job says in another place, “He makes a hypocrite reign for the sins of the people.” Job 33.30. At length she concedes that the king is moved by God to evil, but in some way such as this: God allows the king to be driven by his passions, in order that He may chastise his people.’
I reply, whether God permits or inclines, the very act of permitting or inclining arises from the will and operation of God. This is because the king’s will cannot escape the actuation of the omnipotent God, in that 642 every man’s will is hurried on by Him to will and to do, whether it is good or evil.
As to my having made a general proposition out of the particular one about the king’s will; I have done so, as I imagine, neither unseasonably, nor unwisely. For if the king’s heart, which seems to be especially free and to have lordship over others, cannot however will otherwise than God would have inclined it, then how much less can any of the rest of men do so? And this same consequence would stand good, not only with respect to the king’s will, but also with respect to any man’s will. For if one man, however private, cannot will before God 643 except as God inclines him, the same must be said of all men. So the fact that Balaam could not say what he pleased, is an evident proof contained in the Scriptures, that man is not the free chooser or doer of his own law 644 or work. Otherwise there would be no such thing as examples in the Scriptures. 645
SECT. 49. John 15.5 maintained.
After affirming that many testimonies, such as Luther collects from this book of Proverbs, might indeed be brought together, she claims they would be such that, by a commodious interpretation, they might be made to stand up for Freewill, as well as against it. At length she adduces that Achillean and inevitable lance of Luther’s from John 15.5, “Without me you can do nothing,” etc.
I too commend the skill of this exquisite orator of Freewill, in teaching us, first of all, to shape the testimonies of Scripture by convenient interpretations, as seems good to our own minds, so that they may in reality stand up for Freewill. That is, they may make out, not what they ought to do, but what we please. And then, pretending to have such a great dread of one in particular which she calls Achillean, that the stupid reader may hold the rest in exquisite contempt when this one has been vanquished. But I will look sharply after this magniloquous 646 and heroic Diatribe, to see by what force she gets the better of my Achilles; when she has not yet hit a single common soldier — no, not even a Thersites 647 — but she has destroyed herself most miserably by her own weapons.
So then, she lays hold of this little word ‘nothing,’ and slays it by the aid of many words and many examples — dragging it
