Volume Iv Part 2 (1/2)

In like manner if he sincerely repent and believe, his sins are forgiven, whether the minister absolve him or not. Now if M + 5 =5, and 5-M = 5, M = O. If he be impenitent and unbelieving, his sins are detained, no doubt, whether the minister do or do not detain them.

Ib. p. 163.

Adam was created of G.o.d in such sort righteous, as that he became of a righteous an unrighteous person; as Paul himself argueth, and withall instructeth himself, where he saith, The law is not given for a righteous man, but for the lawless and disobedient.

This follows from the very definition or idea of righteousness;-it is itself the law;--[Greek: pas gar dikais autonomos.]

Ib.

The Scripture saith, G.o.d maketh the unG.o.dly righteous; there he calleth us all, one with another, despairing and wicked wretches; for what will an unG.o.dly creature not dare to accomplish, if he may but have occasion, place, and opportunity?

That is with a l.u.s.t within correspondent to the temptation from without.

A Christian's conscience, methinks, ought to be a 'Ja.n.u.s bifrons',--a Gospel-face retrospective, and smiling through penitent tears on the sins of the past, and a Moses-face looking forward in frown and menace, frightening the harlot will into a holy abortion of sins conceived but not yet born, perchance not yet quickened. The fanatic Antinomian reverses this; for the past he requires all the horrors of remorse and despair, till the moment of a.s.surance; thenceforward, he may do what he likes, for he cannot sin.

Ib. p. 165.

All natural inclinations (said Luther) are either against or without G.o.d; therefore none are good. We see that no man is so honest as to marry a wife, only thereby to have children, to love and to bring them up in the fear of G.o.d.

This is a very weak instance. If a man had been commanded to marry by G.o.d, being so formed as that no sensual delight accompanied, and refused to do so, unless this appet.i.te and gratification were added,--then indeed!

Chap. X. p. 168, 9.

Ah Lord G.o.d (said Luther), why should we any way boast of our free-will, as if it were able to do anything in divine and spiritual matters were they never so small? * * * I confess that mankind hath a free-will, but it is to milk kine, to build houses, &c., and no further: for so long as a man sitteth well and in safety, and sticketh in no want, so long he thinketh he hath a free-will which is able to do something; but, when want and need appeareth, that there is neither to eat nor to drink, neither money nor provision, where is then the free will? It is utterly lost, and cannot stand when it cometh to the pinch. But faith only standeth fast and sure, and seeketh Christ.

Luther confounds free-will with efficient power, which neither does nor can exist save where the finite will is one with the absolute Will. That Luther was practically on the right side in this famous controversy, and that he was driving at the truth, I see abundant reason to believe. But it is no less evident that he saw it in a mist, or rather as a mist with dissolving outline; and as he saw the thing as a mist, so he ever and anon mistakes a mist for the thing. But Erasmus and Saavedra were equally indistinct; and shallow and unsubstantial to boot. In fact, till the appearance of Kant's 'Kritiques' of the pure and of the practical Reason the problem had never been accurately or adequately stated, much less solved.

26 June, 1826.

Ib. p. 174.

Loving friends, (said Luther) our doctrine that free-will is dead and nothing at all is grounded powerfully in Holy Scripture.

It is of vital importance for a theological student to understand clearly the utter diversity of the Lutheran, which is likewise the Calvinistic, denial of free-will in the unregenerate, and the doctrine of the modern Necessitarians and ('proh pudor!') of the later Calvinists, which denies the proper existence of will altogether. The former is sound, Scriptural, compatible with the divine justice, a new, yea, a mighty motive to morality, and, finally, the dictate of common sense grounded on common experience. The latter the very contrary of all these.

Chap. xii. p. 187.

This is now (said Luther), the first instruction concerning the law; namely, that the same must be used to hinder the unG.o.dly from their wicked and mischievous intentions. For the Devil, who is an Abbot and a Prince of this world, driveth and allureth people to work all manner of sin and wickedness; for which cause G.o.d hath ordained magistrates, elders, schoolmasters, laws, and statutes, to the end, if they cannot do more, yet at least that they may bind the claws of the Devil, and to hinder him from raging and swelling so powerfully (in those which are his) according to his will and pleasure.

And (said Luther), although thou hadst not committed this or that sin, yet nevertheless, thou art an unG.o.dly creature, &c. but what is done cannot he undone, he that hath stolen, let him henceforward steal no more.

Secondly, we use the law spiritually, which is done in this manner; that it maketh the transgressions greater, as Saint Paul saith; that is, that it may reveal and discover to people their sins, blindness, misery, and unG.o.dly doings wherein they were conceived and born; namely, that they are ignorant of G.o.d, and are his enemies, and therefore have justly deserved death, h.e.l.l, G.o.d's judgments, his everlasting wrath and indignation. Saint Paul, (said Luther), expoundeth such spiritual offices and works of the law with many words.

Rom. vii.

Nothing can be more sound or more philosophic than the contents of these two paragraphs. They afford a sufficient answer to the pretence of the Romanists and Arminians, that by the law St. Paul meant only the ceremonial law.