Selected quad for the lemma: cause_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
cause_n	heart_n	lord_n	sin_n	2,722	5	4.5112	4	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A55751	The position of John Preston, Doctor in Divinity ... concerning the irresistiblenesse of converting grace; De gratia convertentis irresistibilitate. English	Preston, John, 1587-1628.	1654 (1654)	Wing P3305; ESTC R13567	15,446	23

that it need not be proved for it is frequently found in Scripture The Lord converteth the Lord gives repentance that God circumciseth and takes away the stony heart and gives a heart of flesh Lastly That God doth regenerate and by his owne power raise from the death of sin I let passe the force of the similitude as no man can contribute any thing to his owne generation or resurrection so neither to his spirituall regeneration or resurrection God I say doth all these things but they could not be attributed to him alone if he had any cause so co-operating with him as that if it refused no such effect could follow I adde that of the Schoole-men is most true That God is the cause of the whole Being that is although God be not the efficient cause of sinne which is not a being but rather a defect of what should be in a faculty or act but rather a deficient will but of every good work of which kinde our first conversision is a chiefe one if it be most full of Being or if it be a whole Being as it is of such a whole work I say it is necessary that God should be the cause for God alone is the cause of the whole Being wheresoever it is found Yea all Divines acknowledge that so farre as Sinne it selfe is a Being God is the cause of it Wherefore although the Will be the secondary and subordinate efficient cause of conversion from whence it is that the Scriptures doe exhort us to turne our selves and circumcise our hearts and so forth Yet as a co-ordinate cause it no way can resist the quickning grace of God and receive it in vaine as Arminius speaks I adde although God would admit of a Partner in this work yet the will which is wholly depraved and dead in sinne can no more co-operate with exciting and moving grace than a carkasse prepared and disposed by rubbing can revive it selfe and put forth vitall acts But that I may conclude this reason Let it be supposed that the Will may work together with the grace of God or not according to its liberty yet if this opinion stand how much more than is meet will bee arrogated unto man and derogated from the glory of God Man may well boast that his will contributed so much to regeneration that if he had not willed it had never been produced For as he who being admonished by another gives an almes doth attribute the work more to himselfe than to him that perswaded him or stirred him up to it so he whose will being onely moved or admonished by assisting grace turnes it selfe unto God doth more or at least equally ascribes his conversion to himselfe than to Divine Grace which had never produced that effect unlesse he himselfe had consented unto it and made its perswasions effectuall whereas it was in his power to have rendred them frustrate The fourth reason is taken from hence That the Decree of Election by which God determined with himselfe to save some persons selected from the common Masse is absolute and therefore doth necessarily and in●●●libly attaine its effect That the Decree of Election is absolute so that the Lord looked upon nothing foreseen in the persons chosen but absolutely decreed to work in them all conditions required to salvation is so clearel● manifest from many places of Scripture that it scarce needes any proof for if we chuse not God but he us Ioh. 15. if we are chosen that we might be holy not holy that we might be chosen If he chose Iacob rather than Esau when both were of like and equall condition Rom. 9. If effectuall vocation and justifying faith are the fruits and effects of predestination not the foregoing conditions Rom. 8. Lastly If Gods meer good pleasure be the onely reason of the Decree He hath mercy on whom he will and hardeneth whom he will It necessarily followes that God hath absolutely decreed to save some and to that purpose to bestow upon them Grace Faith and Holinesse Granting these things it appeares that God converts all the Elect after a manner by them irresistible on this manner Because if they could resist that Grace which is fit to convert them being also given to this end that they might be converted then this absolute and peremptory Decree of God might be disappointed by the creature which must not be imagined Neither is there ground that they should now object that by the same reason those whom God hath rejected do sinne irresistibly For we deny that there is the same reason of both for although Faith be the effect of predestination yet infidelity is not the proper effect of Reprobation Whereas Faith requires a cause of it selfe efficient which hath a true and proper influence into its effect But there is no efficient cause required to unbeliefe but deficient because it followes upon the meere defect and absence of that cause by which Faith should be wrought As to the illumination of the aire there is required the Sun or some other efficient cause having influence into that effect but the absence of the Sunne is enough to cause darknesse In like manner although the sinnes of Reprobates do infallibly follow from the determinate counsell of God who hath decreed their event yet Conversion and Faith doe follow the absolute Decree of God after a much different manner sinnes do follow infallibly indeed but onely by a necessity of consequence that is God not at all causing or effecting but onely permitting but Faith and good Works follow by a necessity of the consequent as of which God must most properly be called the Author according to all Divines For no man ever said that men did believe were segenerate and turned to God did good works God onely permitting but causing and working But if this be granted to us as needs it must that Faith and Conversion do follow the absolute decree of God by a necessity of the consequent that is a necessity causing and co-working I see not how it can be denyed that it is wrought in us after an irresistble manner For when any Agent so worketh upon the patient that it necessarily overcomes it it is properly said to work irresistibly In like manner God if he so convert a sinner that he is necessarily Converted by a necessity of the consequent then he converts it irresistibly that is after such a manner as the patient must needs yeld from whence I wonder that those who deny election to depend on foreseen faith doe yet defend that conversion is wrought after a resistible manner and so as it may be frustrated Let this be the fist and last reason If conversion be wrought after that resistible manner as is described by them who follow Arminius then Divine election cannot be certaine according to their principles because it dependeth on the mutable will of man which as it is described by Arminius I dare say could not be foreseene by God himselfe for let it be supposed which they lay as the foundation of that praevision that God doth perfectly foresee all the wayes whereby the will may be turned aside or inclined unto good Let it also be supposed that God fore-knowes all objects or circumstances which may any way be offered or proposed to the will Lastly let it also be supposed that God doth perfectly know how every object or circumstance is fit to move the will and drive it this way or that way by perswasion Yet if this be the condition of the will that allowing any objects yea further allowing any fitnesse in these objects or circumstances to incline the will this way or that way it may yet by vertue of its intrinsecall liberty act or not act I see not how God can foresee what the will certainly and infallibly will doe that is whether it will turne to God or not Not that God by reason of any impotency is not able to search out what the will shall endeavour but because the thing it selfe is not knowable For there cannot be greater certainty in the knowledge than in the object from whence I thus reason If it be certaine that the will shall assent unto grace offered then it is falsly said that the Will supposing all the actions of God that are requisite may turne it selfe or not On the other side if it be uncertaine whether the will shall resist this grace or not then that foreknowledge which God hath of it cannot be certaine for that which is to be knowne is the measure of knowledge and therefore it is a contradiction to say that the knowledge is true and yet there is more certainty in the knowledge than in the thing knowne As it implyes a contradiction to say that the thing measured is greater or lesse then the measure and yet to be equall to it I adde although it be true that God knowes all the wayes according to which the will may be well or ill inclined Yet if the will be altogether undetermined admitting nothing to determine it neither within it selfe nor without it whether created or uncreated as they defend implyes a contradiction that any certaine way whereby it should fall out that the will should be ordered or disordered can be determined by God himselfe Out of all these things it is gathered that if converting grace move the will after a manner that may be resisted by it God cannot infallibly foreknow who shall believe and who not and consequently all election should be utterly taken away Therefore it remaines That converting grace is both imparted by God and received by us after a manner Irresistible FINIS

in it selfe and equally inclined unto either part whence is that facility and promptitude in working for as by evil actions the Will contracts a stain whereby it is habitually disposed unto evill so by good actions the soule is touched with a better tincture whereby it is habitually inclined unto good and that setting aside the operation of moving and exciting Grace 7. All Divines of better note acknowledge That charity or the love of God is not a meere act but a permanent habit but that habit hath no place in the understanding because it is an affection nor in the sensitive appetite which cannot be raised to spirituall love It remaineth therefore that it be peculiar to the Will and so the Will to be most properly capable of habits and of habituall Grace 8. Lastly How absurd is it to grant the whole man to be dead in sinne so that it can no way reach unto any good truly spirituall and yet to defend that the Will which is the very leader of the soule the driver of all faculties the Lady and Queene of humane acts and that principle which impaireth spirituall good or evill unto all actions which men performe How absurd I say is it to hold that this faculty was neither spirituall before the Fall nor carnall after the Fall but to be utterly void both of the corruption brought in by the first fault and of spirituall gifts infused in the regeneration of man It were easie to overwhelme this Opinion with more absurdities but these shall suffice By all these things it is apparent enough that a new quality or habit of grace is infused into or impressed upon the Will which is earnestly denyed by the Arminians as hath been before proved by their own words But who so yet doubts whether this be their Opinion let him read the Hague Conference pag. 298. of Bertius Translation where they do industriously and purposely defend that in spirituall death spiritual gifts are not separated from the will of man neither were implanted in it before that death in the state of Innocency because if by these kinde of gifts the will were inclined unto either part the liberty of it were taken away which they say consists in this That it can equally bend it self to either part when all requisites unto action are afforded It remaines now briefly to be proved that God whether immediately or mediately both by infused grace and morall perswasion turneth sinners unto himselfe after an irresistible manner But this caution is to be premised that by the word Irresistibly we doe not understand any force offered to the Will which is repugnant to its nature but onely an insuperable efficacy of Divine Grace which inclines the Will sweetly and agreeably to its owne nature but so certainely and necessarily we understand that Necessity which even now we called Certainty that it cannot be put off by the Will 1. The truth of this Opinion is manifest from hence That every where in Scripture the conversion and regeneration of a sinner is attributed to God alone and to his good will and pleasure but every even the least co-operation is taken away from man himselfe Rom. 9. It is not of him that willeth nor of him that runneth but of God that sheweth mercy Hee hath mercy on whom he will have mercy and whom he will he hardeneth which could not be truly said if a man at his owne freedome and pleasure allowing all the actions of God requisite to conversion might receive the quickning grace of God in vaine and make it void as Arminius speaks And let it be observed from these words That this mans repenting and that mans hardening is not only attributed to God alone but the will and endeavours of man is utterly excluded from having any part in this businesse It is not saith the Apostle of him that willeth nor of him that runneth c. As the wheele doth not run well that it may be round but because it is first round so a man doth not therefore will or run that God might have mercy on him and regenerate him by the quickning grace of the spirit but because God first hath mercy therefore he willeth and runneth in the way of righteousnesse 2. The second reason is taken from the infallible connexion of the Effect with the Cause that is of Conversion with converting and quickning Grace For if this quickning Grace alwayes attaine its effect neither is offered to any but those in whom it is effectuall to the healing and regenerating of their soule we must necessarily attribute unto it a certaine prevalent and irresistible working But it appeares by many places of Scripture that this grace doth alwayes attain its end in those to whom it is communicated Iohn 6. 37. Whatsoever my Father giveth me cometh unto me Jer. 31. 23. Turn thou me and I shall be turned From whence it is gathered That into whomsoever grace fit for the conversion of a man is infused that man is certainly and infallibly converted otherwise a man could not thus addresse to God Turne me that is doe what thou art wont to doe by the help of thy Spirit and the infusion of thy Grace and I shall be converted for perhaps the will in whose power it is to receive or reject grace may make it void The same is evident from Iohn 6. 45. Whosoever hath heard and learned of the Father cometh unto me that is whosoever hath so heard and beene taught of God that he hath also received and drunk in the quickning Grace of the Spirit he hath certainly come unto mee Whence it appeares That Grace fit for the conversion of a man is never frustrated but it attaines its effect after an insuperable manner so that it can never be put off by the will of man Which is further confirmed from the nature of Grace and that powerfull manner whereby God infuseth it into the heart of man For if Grace be the effect of infinite power as it is and that man be regenerated by the same power wherewith Christ was raised from the dead then God in the implanting of it in the will of man puts forth that almighty power which no created faculty is able to withstand or resist 3. This Argument may also be added The grace of God is so the efficient cause of Conversion that it admits no joyn'd and co-ordinate cause although it hath a subordinate cause to wit the will of man adjoyned to it But if the Will when it is excited by assisting grace as they call it can resist it then it may also assist it if it may withstand it then it may also joyn endeavour with it to produce the same effect if it can make it void it may also make it effectuall and so may be a cause co-ordinate with the grace of God in bringing forth the first act of its conversion But that God doth convert or regenerate men by his owne and onely work excluding all co-ordinate causes is so cleare