“The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it? I the Lord search the heart, I try the reins…”
Jer. 17:9-10
“And God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.”
Gen. 6:5
“As it is written, There is none righteous, no, not one: There is none that understandeth, there is none that seeketh after God. They are all gone out of the way…”
Rom. 3:10-12
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Subsections
Natural vs. Moral Inability
Virtues & Good Works of Unbelievers
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Order of Contents
Statement of Issue
Articles 14+
Book 1
Quotes 6+
Latin 1
Utter Depravity 3
Early Church 1
Historical 2
Contra Romanism 2
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Statement of the Issue & Reasons
Peter van Mastricht
Theoretical-Practical Theology (RHB), vol. 3, bk. 4, ch. 2
section 25, pp. 462-63
“…the Reformed customarily distinguish on the one side a fourfold good with which a person can be occupied in his choice, namely: (1) natural good, walking, reasoning; (2) moral good, the exercise of some sort of civil virtue; (3) ecclesiastical good, to which sort belong the duties of external divine worship; and (4) a spiritual and saving good, which accompanies salvation (Heb. 6:9)…
With these things posited, they determine that… In the state of grace, through regeneration he recovers the strength lost by sin for doing spiritual and saving good, yet with some sort of a surviving inclination to evil…
in the state of sin [being unconverted], to him is present some sort of strength toward natural, moral, and ecclesiastical good, but absolutely none for spiritual and saving good.”
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section 26, p. 463
“…not only was original righteousness taken away on account of the fall, but by the same stroke the entire nature of man was so morally corrupted as regards the intellect, the will, the affections, that by nature he is blind in respect to all spiritual truth, likewise incompetent for any spiritual good, and prone to all evil in respect to his will.
These are the chief reasons of the Reformed:
(1) Scripture declares that man is dead in sin (Eph. 2:1, 5; Matt. 8:22; 1 Tim. 5:6; Rom. 5:12), yet death pertains to nature.
(2) All of man’s faculties are said to be corrupted: a blind intellect (Eph. 4:18), which does not perceive the things that are of the Spirit, and considers them as foolishness (1 Cor. 2:14–15), a will averse to spiritual good, enmity toward God, which does not subject itself to the divine law, neither indeed can it (Rom. 8:7), an impure conscience (Titus 1:15), distorted affections (Gal. 5:24; Rom. 7:5), members (Rom. 6:19), the whole man entirely corrupted (Isa. 1:4, 6), the flesh, the fleshly man, the old man.
(3) We are said to be alienated from the life of God, that is, from the divine, spiritual, and heavenly life (Eph. 4:18), and destitute of the glory of God (Rom. 3:23).
(4) We are all said to be under sin (Rom. 3:9ff.).
(5) There is made known in us a total powerlessness toward spiritual good (Jer. 13:23; 2 Cor. 3:5; Rom. 7:14–25).”
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Articles
Anthology of the Post-Reformation
Heppe, Heinrich – ch. 15, ‘Sin, or Man’s State of Corruption & Misery’ in Reformed Dogmatics ed. Ernst Bizer, tr. G.T. Thomson (1861; Wipf & Stock, 2007), pp. 320-71
Heppe (1820–1879) was a German reformed theologian.
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1500’s
Vermigli, Peter Martyr – The Common Places… (d. 1562; London: Henrie Denham et al., 1583), pt. 2
1. ‘Of Sin, especially Original, and of the Depraving of the Whole Nature of Man’ 213
‘By what means the corruption thereof is derived into the posterity’ 231, 239
‘That Sin is the Cause of Death’ 243
‘That by Sin All Things are Subject to Vanity’ 247
Beza, Theodore
A Brief & Pithy Sum of the Christian Faith made in Form of a Confession (London, 1562)
pp. 23-28 in A Book of Christian Questions & Answers… (London, 1574)
Viret, Pierre – A Christian Instruction… (d. 1571; London: Veale, 1573)
The Summary of the Christian Doctrine
Of the Corruption of Man & how hard it is for him to do well
A Familiar Exposition of the Principal Points of the Catechism
Of the Weakness & Default of Power that is in Man to accomplish the Law of God
Prime, John – A Fruitful & Brief Discourse in Two Books: the One of Nature, the Other of Grace, with Convenient Answer to the Enemies of Grace, upon Incident Occasions Offered by the Late Rhemish Notes in their New Translation of the New Testament, & Others (London, 1583), bk. 1
‘The blindness of man’s understanding’
‘The perverseness and frowardness of man’s will’
Prime (c.1549-1596) was a reformed Anglican clergyman and Oxford scholar.
Virel, Matthew – 2. Of the knowledge of man, who being a most miserable sinner, is before God guilty of eternal death in A Learned & Excellent Treatise Containing All the Principal Grounds of Christian Religion (London, 1594), bk. 1
Virel (1561-1595)
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1600’s
Perkins, William – The Foundation of Christian Religion, Gathered into Six Principles an appendix to A Golden Chain (Cambridge: Legat, 1600)
2nd Principle: Man Corrupted
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Bucanus, William – 18. ‘Of Free-Will after the Fall’ in Institutions of Christian Religion... (London: Snowdon, 1606), pp. 181-89
What is usually understood in this disputation by the name of free-will?
What is the reason of this name, Liberum arbitrium?
Is there such free-will in man after the Fall?
What think you then of the free-will of man before his conversion?
Are we therefore like senseless stocks in regard of spiritual things?
Does not Paul say, Rom. 2:14, that ‘the gentiles by nature do the work of the law,’ and in the 15th verse that they show the work of the law written in their hearts?
But the gentiles excelled in notable gifts, which gifts seem to show that man’s nature is not altogether corrupted
Therefore what kind of will is remaining in a man not regenerate?
But does not man’s will freely incline to evil?
How stands the will of man in his conversion, is it merely passive or active also?
How is that to be understood which Christ speaks, Jn. 6:44, ‘No man comes to Me except the Father draw him’?
What therefore be the causes of our conversion?
What manner of free-will is there in a regenerate man?
How to good?
How is there in them a free-will to evil?
Is it in our power to refuse or accept the grace of God offered to us, and continue in grace, or again to fall from it?
But after we have been converted and have given place to the first grace, does not our strength work together with the grace which follows?
If a man can do nothing in spiritual things, in vain therefore are propounded all punishments, precepts, reproofs, exhortations and promises, as these, ‘If you will do this’ etc. ‘You shall eat the good things of the land’ etc.
But Zech. 1:3, seems to part and divide the effects of our conversion betwixt God and us, saying, ‘Turn you unto Me and I will turn unto you’?
But Moses, Dt. 30:11,14, speaks thus, ‘The commandment which I command thee this day, is not hid from thee, neither is far off, but it is with thee, even in thy mouth and in thy heart that thou mayest do it’?
What is the use of this doctrine?
What things oppose this doctrine?
Davenant, John – ‘Free-Will is Not Granted to the Unregenerate for their Spiritual Good’ in The Determinations, or Resolutions of Certain Theological Questions, Publicly Discussed in the University of Cambridge trans. Josiah Allport (1634; 1846) bound at the end of John Davenant, A Treatise on Justification, or the Disputatio de Justitia... trans. Josiah Allport (1631; London, 1846), vol. 2
Turretin, Francis – Institutes of Elenctic Theology, tr. George M. Giger, ed. James Dennison Jr. (1679–1685; P&R, 1992), vol. 1, 10th Topic
4. ‘Whether the free will in a state of sin is so a servant of and enslaved by sin that it can do nothing but sin; or whether it still has the power to incline itself to good, not only civil and externally moral, but internal and spiritual, answering accurately to the will of God prescribed in the law. The former we affirm; the latter we deny, against the papists, Socinians and Remonstrants.’ 668
5. ‘Whether the virtues of the heathen were good works form which the power of free will to good can be inferred. We deny against the papists.’ 683
van Mastricht, Peter – ch. 4, ‘The Penalty & State of Sin’ in Theoretical Practical Theology (2nd ed. 1698; RHB), vol. 3, pt. 1, bk. 4, pp. 519-60
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1700’s
à Brakel, Wilhelmus – ch. 15, ‘Man‟s Free Will or Impotency & the Punishment Due Upon Sin’ in The Christian’s Reasonable Service, vols. 1 ed. Joel Beeke, trans. Bartel Elshout Buy (1700; RHB, 1992/1999), pp. 407-27
a Brakel (1635-1711) was a contemporary of Voet and Witsius and a major representative of the Dutch Further Reformation.
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1800’s
Hodge, Charles
‘The Total Depravity of Man’ in Way of Life (1841)
15. ‘Inability’ in Systematic Theology, vol. 2, Part II, ‘Anthropology’, ch. 8, ‘Sin’, pp. 257-79
Atwater, Lyman – ‘The Power of Contrary Choice’ in Princeton Theological Essays (1840), pp. 250-64
Atwater was an old school presbyterian and professor at Princeton Seminary. The first two pages are very helpful on distinguishing the point at hand. Atwater delineates five senses of the power of contrary choice that are not in debate. The 6th sense is that which Atwater hangs the issue. Atwater defends the necessitarianism of Jonathan Edwards.
Alexander, Archibald – ‘The Inability of Sinners’ in Princeton Theological Essays (1831), pp. 265-84
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Book
1600’s
Perkins, William – A Treatise of Man’s Imaginations, showing his Natural Evil Thoughts: His want of Good Thoughts: The Way to Reform them (Cambridge: Legat, 1607) ToC
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Quotes
400’s
Augustine
“The will is free, but only to evil.”
“Man, by making a bad use of his free will, lost both himself and it.”
“God requires of us what we cannot perform, in order that we may know what we ought to ask from Him.”
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1600’s
Synod of Dort
The Canons of Dordt, Head 3/4, Article 2
“There is, to be sure, a certain light of nature remaining in man after the fall, by virtue of which he retains some notions about God, natural things, and the difference between what is moral and immoral, and demonstrates a certain eagerness for virtue and for good outward behavior.
But this light of nature is far from enabling man to come to a saving knowledge of God and conversion to him—so far, in fact, that man does not use it rightly even in matters of nature and society. Instead, in various ways he completely distorts this light, whatever its precise character, and suppresses it in unrighteousness. In doing so he renders himself without excuse before God.”
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Peter van Mastricht
Bk. 3, ch. 9, section 39
“The image of God which we have spoken about neither completely perished through sin, nor completely survived from sin. Therefore it remains in some measure (Gen. 9:6; James 3:9; 1 Cor. 11:7, where without doubt the topic is not the past state, but the current one). It remains, I say, to the extent that it consists: (1) in the very nature of man, of the body and soul. (2) In the natural faculties of the soul, in the intellect and will. (3) In certain gifts of the intellect and will, insofar as among the worst is still seen some use of reason, and also some propensity to good, even moral good (Rom. 1:19; 2:15; 1 Cor. 5:1). Furthermore, (4) in at least some remnants of original dominion (Gen. 7:2). God willed all these bits of his own image to survive in us from the fall, first so that they may be witnesses of his own most undeserved goodness toward us…”
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On the 1600’s
eds. van Asselt, Bac, Velde
Reformed Thought on Freedom: the Concept of Free Choice in Early Modern Reformed Theology (2010), p. 15
“Being faced with the choice between good and bad, only rightly willing was taken to be properly free [by the Reformed scholastics]. A will in bondage to sin was denied to be free, though it acted freely in its own choice to sin.”
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1800’s
Archibald A. Alexander
Thoughts on Religious Experience (Philadelphia: Presbyterian Board of Publication, 1841)
ch. 1, p. 13
“There is no necessity for any other proof of native depravity, than the aversion, which children early manifest to religious instruction and to spiritual exercises.
From this cause it proceeds, that many children, who have the opportunity of a good religious education, learn scarcely any thing of the most important truths of Christianity. If they are compelled to commit the Catechism to memory, they are wont to do this without ever thinking of the doctrines contained in the words which they recite; so that, when the attention is at any time awakened to the subject of religion, as a personal concern, they feel themselves to be completely ignorant of the system of divine truth taught in the Bible.”
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ch. 2, p. 23
“I know, indeed, that many conceive that infants are naturally free from moral pollution, and, of course, need no regeneration; but this opinion is diametrically opposite to the doctrine of Scripture, and inconsistent with the acknowledged fact, that, as soon as they are capable of moral action, all do go astray, and sin against God. If children were not depraved, they would be naturally inclined to love God, and delight in his holy law; but the reverse is true.”
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Latin Article
1600’s
Voet, Gisbert – II. Of Enslaved & Free Choice in Syllabus of Theological Problems (Utrecht, 1643), pt. 1, section 1, tract 4 Abbr.
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Contra Utter Depravity, that No One, Not even the Regenerate, can do any Good
Order of Quotes
Rutherford
Mastricht
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1600’s
Samuel Rutherford
Lex Rex... (1644; Edinburgh: Ogle, 1843), p. 30
“It is true that people, through corruption of nature, are averse to submit to governors ‘for conscience sake, as unto the Lord,’ because the natural man, remaining in the state of nature, can do nothing that is truly good, but it is false that men have no active moral power to submit to superiors, but only a passive capacity to be governed.
He [John Maxwell] quite contradicts himself; for he said before (ch. 4, p. 49) that there is an ‘innate fear and reverence in the hearts of all men naturally, even in heathens, toward their sovereign;’ yea, as we have a natural moral active power to love our parents and superiors (though it be not evangelically, or legally in God’s court, good) and so to obey their commandments, only we are averse to penal laws of superiors. But this proves no way that we have only by nature a passive capacity to government; for heathens have, by instinct of nature, both made laws morally good, submitted to them, and set kings and judges over them, which clearly proves that men have an active power of government by nature.
Yea, what difference makes the Prelate betwixt men and beasts? for beasts have a capacity to be governed, even lions and tigers; but here is the matter, if men have any natural power of government, the Popish Prelate would have it, with his brethren the Jesuits and Arminians, to be not natural, but done by the help of universal grace; for so do they confound nature and grace. But it is certain our power to submit to rulers and kings, as to rectors, and guides, and fathers, is natural;”
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Christ Dying & Drawing Sinners to Himself (London: 1647), p. 85
“…for as the love of Christ, our prayers, humility, are not formally sins, but only concomitantly, in regard that sin adheres to them, as muddy water is not formally clay and mud, but in mixture it’s clay and muddy, so our faith is concomitantly sinful; both because often it’s weak, and so wanting [lacking] many degrees and mixed with sin, deserves a curse, as well as works of sanctification, but it apprehends Christ and righteousness in Him and so it bottoms our assurance.”
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Peter van Mastricht
Theoretical-Practical Theology (RHB), vol. 3, bk. 4, ch. 4, ‘The Penalty of Sin’, section 12, p. 528
“Yet God tempers the severity of this spiritual slavery, first inwardly, by certain remaining shards of the divine image and original righteousness (James 3:9): first with respect to wisdom in the intellect, when he leaves to it certain principles of truth, through which man’s judgment, both theoretical and practical, is directed, the prior through the knowledge of what is speculatively true and false, for example, that God exists, and so forth, which we observed in all people who are not thoroughly demented (Rom. 1:19–21, 32; 2:14–15), but the latter through the knowledge of what is upright and fair, and what is unfair, for example, that God must be worshipped, that to each must be rendered his own, that to another must not be done what you do not want done to yourself (Rom. 2:15), from which things the natural conscience receives some force (Rom. 2:15).
Then with respect to some inclination and propensity to good in the will, one that is indeed frail and dead, but yet not absolutely non-existent, and indeed such a one as that at least the appearances of virtues are approved and honored by all (2 Tim. 3:5). In addition to these things, with regard to both intellect and will, there is, internally, restraining grace, by which sin itself is not removed or diminished, but its action is curbed so that it would not burst its restraint, a grace also by which the more upright at least abhor more atrocious sins (1 Cor. 5:1); then externally, through certain political, ecclesiastical, economic, and academic remedies, by which in some measure the license of sin is restrained, and indeed there is added a stimulus to perform upright deeds.”
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The Early Church
Ussher, James – ‘Of Free Will’ & ‘Of Merits’ (†1656) being chs. 11 & 12 of Answer to a Jesuit with Tracts on Popery, pp. 445-505
In the context against Romanism, Ussher surveys the early Church’s teaching on the Will and the nature of the freedom and inability therein.
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Historical Theology
On the Post-Reformation
Johnson, Charles – ‘Thomas & TULIP’ (2020) 20 paragraphs at Reformed Theology Delatinized
“This article will address the claim that Thomas Aquinas held to an Augustinian doctrine of predestination essentially compatible with that of the Reformed Churches, showing in what ways Thomas’s doctrine is compatible with the doctrine of the Reformed Churches and important ways in which it differs.”
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On the 1800’s
Dissertation on Original Sin in American Presbyterianism
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Contra Romanism
Quote
Peter van Mastricht
Theoretical-Practical Theology, vol. 3, bk. 4, ch. 2
section 26, pp. 463-4
“It is asked, sixth, whether original sin consists only in the privation of original righteousness… The papists certainly acknowledge an original righteousness, but one which was not natural to man, but a supernatural gift, like a certain golden bridle, conferred upon natural man to restrain the conflict between the flesh and the spirit. So that they may obtain that the things natural to man, among which is free choice, have remained unwounded by the fall of our first parents, and likewise so that they may hold to this conflict between the flesh and the spirit, or the concupiscence of the flesh against the spirit, and thus that, such conflict notwithstanding, in this life man can be morally perfect, they state that original sin does not consist in anything but the privation of original righteousness, through which the spirit, in the conflict with the flesh, devoid of the assistance of original righteousness, contracted a languor through which it cannot as promptly and successfully repress the attacks of the flesh.
The opinion of the Reformed with their reasons.
The Reformed on the contrary, because they believe that original righteousness was natural, that is, owed to a morally intact nature, state that not only was original righteousness taken away on account of the fall, but by the same stroke the entire nature of man was so morally corrupted as regards the intellect, the will, the affections, that by nature he is blind in respect to all spiritual truth, likewise incompetent for any spiritual good, and prone to all evil in respect to his will.”
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section 27, pp. 465-66
“7. Is original corruption seated only in the lower part of our soul?…
The papists, especially the Jesuits, so that they might hold that the higher part of the soul, as they say, in which is the free choice, was unwounded by corruption, and also so that they might obtain that concupiscence is not sin, and accordingly, that notwithstanding concupiscence, a person can be perfect in this life, state that original corruption is only in the lower part of the soul, that is, in sensuality, in concupiscence, in the rebellion of the lower forces.
And of the Reformed with their reasons
The Reformed on the contrary refer original corruption not only to the lower faculties of the soul, but also to the higher faculties, and indeed more so to the higher than to the lower.
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(1) the apostle expressly refers corruption to the mind in 1 Timothy 6:5, “the mind of corrupt men,” and in Colossians 2:18, “puffed up by the mind of his flesh.”
(2) Christ claims that evil thoughts, envy, and blasphemy are from the heart (Mark 7:21), without a doubt from the intellect and will. Moreover,
(3) Paul attributes to the flesh its own φρόνημα, wisdom (Rom. 8:7), and such a wisdom by which the natural man does not perceive those things which are of the Spirit, and indeed considers them as foolishness (1 Cor. 2:14), which undoubtedly pertains to the intellect, and does not subject himself to the divine law, which concerns the will. Let me add
(4) that the body, or the flesh and sensuality, does not drag the spirit along, but the spirit drags along the body, and accordingly corruption inheres rather in the spirit, or in the higher faculties, than in the flesh or lower faculties, as the papists say (Gen. 8:21).”
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“Life to the lost, to the dead, could come from no other source than the eternal life itself.”
“We bring… not only our sins, but our sinfulness to Christ.”
John ‘Rabbi’ Duncan
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