On God’s Revealed Will

“The secret things belong unto the Lord our God: but those things which are revealed belong unto us and to our children for ever, that we may do all the words of this law.”

Dt. 29:29

“And Simon Peter answered and said, ‘Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God.’ And Jesus answered and said unto him, ‘Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona: for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven.'”

Mt. 16:16-17

Subsections

Revealed Will vs. Will of Decree
Signified Will
Semiotics
Antecedent / Consequent Will
Conditional Will
Gospel Call as God’s Desire, Wish & Pleasure
Revealed Will Being God’s Will, Desire, Pleasure & Wish
Divine Disposition, Inclination & Willingness
Affections of God
Reformed vs. Aquinas

Order of Contents

Articles
. Latin
Quotes
Foundation in God
Improperly God’s Will
Has Purpose 10+
Aquinas vs. Scotus 1

Articles

See also ‘Expositions of the Lord’s Prayer’ on the 3rd Petition.

1500’s

Musculus, Wolfgang

Common Places of the Christian Religion (1560), Of the Will of God, col. 386a ff.

1. That the Will of God towards us is to be considered Two Ways, cols. 386b-387b

2. That the Will of God is the Foundation of Faith, Godly Life & of our Salvation, col. 387b

3. Whereby the Will of God may be Known, cols. 388a-389a

Whether that the Will of God may be Hindered or Letted [Prevented]?, cols. 392a-393a He treats of Mt. 23:37; 1 Tim. 2:4 & Eze. 33

Calvin, John – Book 1, ch. 18, ‘The Instrumentality of the Wicked Employed by God…, sections 3-4 in Institutes of the Christian Religion tr. Beveridge (1559)

Marbeck, John – ‘Will of God’, ‘How there is Two Wills in God’ in A Book of Notes and Common Places with their expositions, collected and gathered out of the works of divers singular writers and brought alphabetically into order (1581)

Zanchi, Jerome – Section 2, ‘Will of God’, Positions 2-4 in ‘Observations on the Divine Attributes; Necessary to be Premised in order to our Better Understanding the Doctrine of Predestination’ prefixed to The Doctrine of Absolute Predestination Stated & Asserted, trans. Augustus Toplady (London, 1769), pp. 4-7

Zanchi (1516-1590)

Rollock, Robert – A Brief Instruction on the Eternal Approval & Disapproval of the Divine Mind 1593/4 6 pp. trans. Charles Johnson & Travis Fentiman

Rollock, a fountain of reformed theology in Scotland, here treats of the important distinctions to be recognized within God’s decree of predestination, especially as it comes to be variously executed through time in providence. Of special interest is his formulations relating to what would be later known as the sincere free offer of the Gospel:

“Approval without the decree belongs to all good things with respect to themselves, though they are not at any time realized, of which sort are the conversion, faith, and salvation of reprobates; which God surely approves of simply, but does not decree to come about… 1 Tim. 2:4, ‘Who will have all men to be saved, and to come unto the knowledge of the truth.’”

Rollock’s early paradigm appears to have been influential through later reformed thought as reflections of it occur in later reformed scholastics, including in the Metaphysical Disquisitions of Samuel Rutherford at the end of his Latin treatise on Providence.

Morton, Thomas – pp. 131-134 of ch. 3, section 5 of A Treatise of the Nature of God (London, 1599)

Morton (fl.1596-1599) of Berwick was reformed.

1600’s

Daille, John – pt. 2, ‘That God wills all men to be saved who hear
or read His Word’ tr. by AI by Onku 35 pp. in Apology for the Two National Synods of Protestant Churches in France held in, for the one, Alencon, 1637, and the other, Charenton, 1645, against the Exercitations on Universal Grace by Frederick Spanheim (Amsterdam, 1655), vol. 1, p. 99 ff. Latin

Daille was a hypothetical universalist, which shows in the last two paragraphs.

Lyford, William – Ch. 2, ‘Errors Against the Nature & Essence of God… Answered and Cleared’, Section 5, pp. 104 & 108 in The Instructed Christian, or the Plain Man’s Senses Exercised to Discern Both Good and Evil, being a discovery of the Errors, Heresies, and Blasphemies of these Times, and the Toleration of them… (Philadelphia, 1847)

Lyford (†1653)

Leigh, Edward – pp. 165-166 of ch. 7, ‘Of God’s Understanding that He is Omniscient, and of his Will’ in A System or Body of Divinity (1654)

Rutherford, Samuel

Rutherford’s Examination of Arminianism: The Tables of Contents with Excerpts from Every Chapter trans. Johnson & Fentiman (RBO, 2019)

ch. 2, ‘On God’

Section 18, ‘On God’s Revealed Will and Will of Good-Pleasure’, pp. 54-56

Section 19, ‘Whether in the calling of all in the visible Church is the intention of God that all and every person obey and be saved?’, pp. 56-57

Section 20, ‘Whether because God amiably invites and by supplications solicits, entreats and calls upon reprobates, and as He mourns over them, is grieved by them and laments on account of the disobedient, whether He, therefore, intends the obedience of them?’, pp. 57-58

“1. Because out of the amiable invitation, this only is concluded: the simple obligation of the creature to obedience, an earnest approbation and complacency which God has with respect to the obedience, inasmuch as the thing is holy, has been required of him, is morally pleasing, and as it is unto the convenience and salvation of a man.

On account of this disposition in God, nothing is further added by the simple complacency of God around obedience except a certain quasi-intention and vehemency of divine obligation to the thing, which testifies to the obedience of all by an earnestness from the precept and from having obliged men to the thing; and thus it is to Him singularly and vehemently pleasing in his sight inasmuch as salvation is made glorious to men; but except He decree it, by the corruption of men, it will not come to be.” – pp. 57-58

ch. 4, section 12, ‘Whether God willed absolutely that men would do no more good than what they do? We affirm with a distinction against the Remonstrants.’, pp. 77-78

2. ‘What is the nature of the permissive will of God, and of the will of good pleasure and sign. The Remonstrants, Arminians are called to the discussion’ in A Scholastic Disputation on Divine Providence, chs. 1-10 tr. by AI by Onku (Edinburgh, 1649), pp. 11-20 Latin

London Presbyterian Ministers – Divine Right of Church Government (London, 1645; 1654), pt. 1

ch. 2, ‘Of the Nature of a Divine Right in General’

ch. 3, ‘Of the Nature of a Divine Right in particular. How many ways a thing may be of Divine Right. I. Of a Divine Right by the true light of nature’

ch. 4, ‘II. Of a Divine Right by obligatory Scripture Examples’

ch. 5, ‘III. Of a Divine Right by Divine Approbation’

ch. 6, ‘IV. Of a Divine Right by Divine Acts’

ch. 7, ‘V. Of a Divine Right by Divine Precepts’

Owen, John – pp. 44-49 of Ch. 5, ‘Whether the Will and Purpose of God may be Resisted, and He be Frustrate of his Intentions’ in A Display of Arminianism in Works, vol. 10

Turretin, Francis – Institutes of Elenctic Theology, ed. Dennison Buy (1679–1685; P&R, 1992), vol. 1, 3rd Topic, ‘The Will of God’, 15th Question, ‘May the will be properly distinguished into the will of decree and of precept, good purpose (eudokias) and good pleasure (euarestias), signified, secret and revealed? We affirm.’, pp. 220-26

“I. Although the will in God is only one and most simple, by which He comprehends all things by a single and most simple act that He sees and understands all things at one glance, yet because it is occupied differently about various objects, it thus happens that in our manner of conception, it may be apprehended as manifold (not in itself and intrinsically on the part of the act of willing, but extrinsically and objectively on the part of the things willed).
…

XVIII. There cannot be contrariety between these two wills because they do not will and nill the same thing in the same manner and respect…
…

XIX. Although God may be said to will the salvation of all by the will of sign and to nill it by the beneplacit will, yet there is no contradiction here….”

Edwards, John – ‘The eternal and intrinsick reasons of good and evil a sermon preach’d at the commencement at Cambridge, on Sunday the 2nd day of July, 1699’ (Cambridge, 1699)

1700’s

à Brakel, Wilhelmus – pp. 120-121 of ‘Our Conduct & God’s Will’ in Ch. 3, ‘The Essence of God’ in The Christian’s Reasonable Service, vol. 1 Buy (1700) trans. Bartel Elshout

Pictet, Benedict – Book 2, ch. 5, ‘Of the Will and Affections of God’ in Christian Theology, pp. 81-89

Pictet (d. 1724) was the Swiss professor of divinity in Geneva after Turretin. He was the last to hold the orthodox faith there before the rise of the Enlightenment.

Howe, John

John Howe on God’s Revealed Will is Actually His Will

John Howe on What Anthropopathisms Attributed to God Mean

John Howe on the Sincere Free Offer of the Gospel

1800’s

Heppe, Heinrich – Ch. 5, ‘The Attributes of God’, Sections 25-28 in Reformed Dogmatics, ed. Bizer (1950; Wipf & Stock, 2007), pp. 85-92

Heppe quotes Seegedin, Polanus, Durandus, Walaeus, Hottinger, Braun, Heidan, Alting, Heidegger, Mastricht, Rissen & Trelcatius for the distinction between the hidden and revealed will of God (and related terms).

Hodge, Charles – C. ‘The Decretive & Preceptive Will of God’ through F. ‘The Will of God as the Ground of Moral Obligation’ in Part 1, Ch. 5, ‘The Nature & Attributes of God’, Section 9, ‘The Will of God’ in Systematic Theology (New York, 1884), vol. 1, pp. 403-406

Latin Articles

1500’s

Zanchi, Jerome

Of the Nature of God, or of the Divine Attributes, in 5 Books (Heidelberg, 1577), Book 3, ch. 4, ‘Of the Will of God’

III. Whether it is only one will or whether it may truly be multifold? And if multifold, in what way multifold? And further, whether there are many wills? 307

V. Further, what difference is there between the will by which it wills good things and by which it wills evil things? We are not able, in fact, to simply exclude the will of God from evil, unless we deny his foreknowledge and omnipotence, and by that his providence and deity. 332

XII. Whether God’s will may always be just & the rule of all justice? 370

Zanchi (1516-1590) was an Italian, protestant Reformation clergyman and educator who influenced the development of Reformed theology during the years following John Calvin’s death.

Beumler, Marcus – Theses 19-24 in Theses on the Will of God under Christ (Zurich: 1599)

Beumler (1555-1611) was a professor of Greek, Catechesis & Greek at Zurich.

1600’s

Polanus, Amandus – ‘4th, the Will of God is Revealed or Hidden’ in Book 2, ch. 19, ‘Of the Will of God in General’ in A System of Theology (Hanau, 1609; 1615), 1.1030

Thysius, Sr., Antoine – Thesis 34 in The Sixth of the Theological Disputations in On the Nature of God & the Divine Attributes (d. 1640; Leiden, 1620) This disputation is also in the Synopsis of Pure Theology as disputation 6.

Thysius (1565–1640) was a Dutch, reformed theologian and professor at the University of Harderwijk and the University of Leiden, known for his being one of the four professors who oversaw the disputations published in A Synopsis of Pure Theology.

“34. The Will of God is the other faculty of the life of God, or the act that follows, by which God knows Himself and wills and approves of all good things as they agree unto the nature and order of his mind, the contraries He necessarily disapproves, which will is called approving; and out of which things He is able to do, some He freely wills, chooses and decrees by a foregoing wisdom, and does, which is the effecting will; and He wills, from Himself commanding, good things to be done and brought forth by the creatures, which is the commanding will; but evil things which He prohibits, however, done from the creatures, assuredly He wills to permit by counsel, which will is called permissive.” – trans. T. Fentiman

Diodati, Giovanni – Theses 27-28 in A Theological Disputation On God (Geneva, 1625)

Diodati (1576-1649) was a Genevan-born Italian, reformed theologian and translator. He was the first translator of the Bible into Italian from Hebrew and Greek sources.

Maccovius, Johannes

A Theological Collection of all that which is Extant, including Theological Theses through Common Places in the Academy of Franeker (Franeker, 1641), First Part, Collection 1, ‘of Predestination’

Disputation 2, ‘Of the Will of Sign’, pp. 4-8
Disputation 5, ‘Of the Effective & Approving Will, or Approving so far’, pp. 13-15

Maccovius (1588-1644)

Rutherford, Samuel

Exercise 2, ‘Of Notions of the Divine Will’, ch. 1, ‘Of God’s Revealed Will [Signi] and His Will of Good-pleasure’ in Apologetic Exercises for Divine Grace (Amsterdam, 1636; 1651), pp. 213-238

“From this, these things we posit, saying:

1. God seriously wills, that is, He loves, approves and by an act of complacency He lifts up for the obedience of reprobates, insofar as it is a good and holy thing, whether the obedience may come forth by the act, or not…
…

5. For God to intend and decree the death of a sinner, and for God not to delight in the death of a sinner, as He swears in Eze. 33:11, are in no way contradictions.” – p. 232-233

A Scholastic Disputation on Divine Providence (Edinburgh, 1649)

ch. 2, ‘What is the permissive nature of the will of God, and of the Will of Sign and the will of good pleasure: the Arminian Remonstrants are invoked for their part.’, pp. 3-12

Metaphysical Inquiries

10 – Whether the Creator may be able to command something injurious to the creature [No], and what sort of right does God have in the creatures? 573

To what extent justice belongs to God essentially, and what follows. 584

Whether the Will of Sign is the Will of God improperly and metonymically? [Yes; Rutherford explains that the Approving will that lies behind it in God is properly called his will, though the communication directing that to the creature, by creaturely signs and commands, is not properly God’s will as God has not willed it to be in the event.] 605

Whether the act, or whether truly the lawlessness or malice of the act may be formally prohibited? 608

Whether God properly dispensed with the law when He commanded Abraham to slay his only begotten son? It is minimally true. 610

Whether the will of sign & the permitting will may coincide? 611

Concerning the conflict in God’s will as it is falsely imputed to our side, pp. 613-615

Concerning the Will of Approval and the Will of Good-Pleasure, a debater is examined who says that God wills every possibility, pp. 615-620

Trigland, Sr., Jacob

Meditations of Jacob Trigland on Various Opinions on the Will of God & Universal Grace, where is yet something of Middle Knowledge (Leiden, 1642)

‘Whether God does not will Misery’, pp. 85-87

‘Of the Will of Sign & of Good-Pleasure’, pp. 158-165 See especially pp. 160-161 where Trigland affirms arguments of the Medieval Scholastics that the Will of Sign always externally signifies something of the internal will of God and his good-pleasure. He then gives counter arguments to those who deny such.

“Rightly therefore and truly we say those signs truly and properly are signs of the divine will.” – p. 163

End of Thesis 5 to Thesis 13 in A Theological Disputation on the Will of God ([Leiden?], 1651)

Trigland (1583-1654) was a reformed, Dutch, professor of theology at Leiden. He succeeded Andrew Rivet and wrote against the Remonstrants after the Synod of Dort (1618-19).

Chamier, Daniel – ch. 2, ‘In which it is Proved out of Sacred Scripture that Theology has been Revealed’ in A Body of Theology, or Theological Common Places by way of Public Lectures in the Academy… (Geneva, 1653), pp. 2-3

Chamier (1564–1621)

Strang, John

Of the Will & Actions of God Surrounding Sin in Four Books: the Judgment of the Reformed Churches, especially of the Scottish, is humbly offered and with much pleasure submitted (1657) 600 pp. Extended ToC Indices: Subject Scripture Authors

Strang (1584-1654) was a Scottish minister and principal of Glasgow University. This work of his was an infralapsarian response to Rutherford’s Treatise on Providence (which cause him a bit of turmoil with the covenanters).

Preface – Alexander Morus
To the Reader

bk. 1, The state of the controversy is explicated and some things are premitted which serve the coming disputation 1

1. I propose the subject, and two extreme sentences are equally rejected. 1
2. The presentation of some hypotheses 4
3. Of the distinctions and divisions of the divine will’ 8
4. On the will of God determined by consequence 19
5. Refutation of those who attribute to God a universal will of beneplacitum and salvation 25
6. Refutation of those who attribute to God a will of beneplacitum, according to the modes of beneplacitum and sign 34
7. On the particular disposition towards Israel, Rom. 9:3, and its effects 43
8. Explanation of the places of Holy Scripture witnessed, Mat. 23:37, 2 Pet. 3:9, etc. 55
9. On the preordination to eternal life, Eph. 1:11, Ex. 33:19, etc., and its correct interpretation 67
10. On preordination to evil, and what should be understood about God’s will regarding eternal death 75
11. On the cause of reprobation and the decree of retribution 81
12. On the addition of Divine Concurrence or Influence 94
13. On the formation of man before the fall in paradise 97
14. On original justice, before and after the fall 103
15. On the fall of the angels 107
16. On the permission and cause of new sins 109
17. The formation of man by God before the fall and His permissive will 117
18. If the purpose of sin should be repaired by faith or redemption 124

bk. 2, God never wills sins or determines the created will to them, or is the cause of them, but He permits and orders them 136

1. On the various actions by which God is said to permit sin, but in no way is He its cause 136
2. When God does not use His own instrument, He is not the author 145
3. When God ordains and governs the actions of life and virtue 151
4. Explanation of what should be understood by preordination 155
5. When preordination is not necessary and can be annulled with human free will 163
6. Whether all voluntary and necessary actions belong to God’s preordained decree 166
7. Whether God acts directly through the decree 173
8. On the divine decree, preordination, and free actions of all beings 184
9. On the consideration of the sin of unbelief: God does not preordain sin for the elect 190
10. On preordination in relation to the fall of the righteous, and the necessity of preordination 195
11. On preordination and what should be understood about God’s preordination 201
12. When preordination transforms into an absolute decree of retribution 271
13. Refutation of all adversarial arguments 288
14. When the permissive will can be understood in the salvation of men 304
15. Explanation of what should be understood by the necessity of the decree and its goodness 317
16. Explanation of how the human will is connected to freedom 323
17. Explanation of the influence of divine permission in redemption 334
18. How the justice of God is rightly understood and applied 342
19. Explanation and refutation of adversarial arguments on divine permission 350

bk. 3, Some doubts are explicated which occur in this matter. Of the predefinition and knowledge [scientia] of God and of our free-choice 537

1. Whether God preordained all future things. The state of the controversy and several opinions are explained 537
2. How all free actions, except sin, are preordained 547
3. Solution of objections based on the Scriptures 554
4. Response to arguments based on reason 565
5. Whether God’s foreknowledge is based on His decree 573
6. General response to adversarial arguments based on reason and divine foreknowledge 589
7. When foreknowledge is necessary for divine understanding 598
8. Specific response to parts of the argument presented in ch. 6 601
9. Response to the argument based on the salvation of the elect 617
10. Distinction on divine knowledge 642
11. On God’s conditional and middle knowledge 649
12. Whether God preordained free agents before giving His grace 658

bk. 4, Some Scripture testimonies and reasons, out of which it appears to be collected that sins are ascribed to God as the author and cause, are expended 758-886

1. General refutation of the arguments and testimonies from the Scriptures 758
2. Response to objections and explanation of some testimonies from the Scriptures that are frequently cited 767
3. On the meaning of God hardening and inducing to evil 776
4. Explanation of other testimonies from Scripture, Deut. 13:1 and 1 Sam. 16:14 783
5. Explanation of the words “Lead us not into temptation.” 790
6. Explanation of the clearest testimonies 794
7. Explanation of other testimonies that deal with the abandonment of men to their own depravity 803
8. How God exceeds creation 811
9. Explanation of additional testimonies 815
10. Response to arguments based on the teachings of Bellarmine and other theologians 835
11. Explanation of Bellarmine’s doctrine and refutation of his propositions 847
12. On the arguments of Bellarmine and his disciples on the theology of salvation 874
13. Epilogue of the entire work 878

Amyraut, Moses – Disputation 8, ‘Theological Theses on the Will of God’, Sections 13-21 in Cappel, Louis; Moses Amyraut & Joshua La Place, An Arrangement of the Theological Theses Disputed at various times in the Academy of Salmur, vol. 1 (2nd ed. Saumur, 1664-5), Part 4, pp. 109-112. See especially the end of Thesis 20.

Amyraut (1596–1664)

Cocceius, Johannes – Sections 43 & 47-48 of ch. 10, ‘Of the Communicable Attributes of God’ in A Sum of Theology Rehearsed out of the Scriptures (Geneva, 1665), pp. 149-150 See especially the end of section 47.

Cocceius (1603-69)

Speaking of the Revealed Will:

“48. That which God wills, that is, swears to be, is not in diverse times, nor does He swear [jubet, commandingly oblige] and call by distinct actions, but by one most simple act. And therefore diverse decrees ought not to be discerned in God. Nor is it true with [amidst, apud] God ‘that which is last in execution, that is the first in intention’, unless we may assuredly so interpret this phrase, ‘that which is last in execution, that is the first in intention’ in the manner that every good most evidently shines forth from preceding acts.”

Wyss, David – Theses 23-24 in A Theological Disputation on the Divine Attributes, in General & in Specific 1676

Wyss (1632-1700) was a reformed professor of philosophy, Hebrew, theology and catechetical theology at Bern, Switzerland.

1700’s

Holtzfus, Barthold – in ch. 8, ‘Of the Will of God & of the Distinctions of the Divine Will’ in A Theological Tract on God, Attributes and the Divine Decrees, Three Academic Dissertations (1707), pp. 109-122

Thesis 6 on Hidden & Revealed

Thesis 7 on Good-Pleasure & Sign

Theses 8-9 on Antecedent & Consequent

Thesis 11 on Governor of the World vs. the Legislator

Thesis 12 on Effectual & Ineffectual

Holtzfus (1659-1717) was a reformed professor of philosophy and theology at Frankfurt.

Roy, Albert – Theses 10-16 in Theological Exercise 24, which is on the Will of God (Bern, 1717)

Roy (1663-1733) was a reformed, professor of Hebrew, Catechesis and theology at Lausanne, Switzerland.

Quotes

Order of Quotes

Perkins
Ames
Rutherford
Turretin
Muller

1600’s

William Perkins

A Golden Chain: or The Description of Theology containing the order of the causes of salvation and damnation, according to God’s Word (Cambridge, 1600), ch. 54, ‘Concerning a New Devised Doctrine of Predestination, taught by some New and Late [Arminian] Divines’, the 1st Error, the Confutation

“Objection V: God will not the death of a sinner, but rather that he repent and live, Eze. 18:23.

Answer. Augustine in his 1st book to Simplicius, 2nd question, answers this question. You must, says he, distinguish betwixt man, as he is born man, and man as he is a sinner. For God is not delighted with the destruction of man, as he is man, but as he is a sinner: neither will He simply the death of any as he is a sinner, or as it is the ruin and destruction of his creature: but in that, by the detestation and revenge of sin with eternal death, his glory is exceedingly advanced.

God therefore will the death of a sinner, but as it is a punishment, that is, as it is a means to declare and set out his divine justice: and therefore it is an untruth for a man to say that God would have none condemned. For whereas men are once condemned, it must be either with God’s will, or without it: if without it, then the will of God must needs suffer violence, the which to affirm is great impiety: if with his will, God must needs change his sentence before set down, but we must not presume to say so.”

Samuel Rutherford

Christ Dying, pp. 349-50

“…there is a two-fold will of God; one that is revealed in Scripture, or the Law of Nature, and that is the Moral good that God approves and enjoins to us, rather than the will of God; this the Familists call the exterior or accidental will of God, because God’s will, as his essence, should have been entire and self-sufficient, though God had never revealed any such will to men or angels, yea though He had never made the world, or men, or angel.”

A Survey of the Survey of that Sum of Church-Discipline Penned by Mr. Thomas Hooker (1658), Book 1, ch. 8, p. 33

“Mr. [Thomas] Hooker [a congregationalist] leaves out the chief word, wherein stands the force of my argument, he speaks nothing of God’s revealed intention and command to call in fools that they may be made wise, and he frames his answer, as if I had argued from the bare intention and hidden decree of God.

But I find that Mr. Hooker utterly mistakes the distinction of God’s decree, and of his approving will, and therefore he takes for one and the same, the decree or intention of God (from which I bring not my argument) and the revealed intention of God, or his commanding will: the ignorance of which is a stumbling to Arminians, and Socinians, and to Mr. Hooker, who, as we shall hear, goes on with them, but I judge it one mistake in judgment in that godly man, but no heretical spirit, and therefore his defenders and followers would take heed to it.”

Francis Turretin

Institutes (P&R), vol. 1, 4th Topic, 17th Question, ‘Can there be attributed to God any conditional will, or universal purpose of pitying the whole human race fallen in sin, of destinating Christ as Mediator to each and all, and of calling them all to a saving participation of his benefits? We deny.’, p. 412

“XXXVIII. Although God can be said to will men to be saved who yet are not saved (when it treats of the will of complacency [eurestias] which commands man’s duty and declares what is pleasing to God), yet this cannot be said equally of the will of decree. As many as God wills to be saved, He also wills to save and actually saves at the appointed time, that his will may not be rendered vain and frustrated.

But in this question (as was just said), it is not treated simply of that which He holds dear and wills to be done by men, but of that which He Himself wills to do towards men by destinating to them salvation under the condition of faith, and determining to send Christ for this end that He might acquire it for them. Therefore they are mistaken who discover a hiding place in this distinction, as if in this affair the question were only whether God wills all men to be saved and not whether He wills to save them.”

1900’s

Richard Muller, PRRD, vol. 3 (Baker, 2003), pt. 2, ch. 5.4, E., ‘The Ad Intra–Ad Extra Distinctions’, sections 4, p. 463

“…but they [the reformed scholastics] nonetheless assume that the revealed will is largely preceptive and promissory, not utterly reflecting the divine good pleasure: in his revealed will, God genuinely calls all who hear the gospel and promises to accept all who answer his invitation–in his hidden will, He determines those to whom the grace will be given that enables response to his calling.”

That there is an Eternal Foundation in God with Regard to the Revealed Will

Order of

Article
Quotes

Article

Turretin, Francis – On Natural Law in Institutes

Quotes

Order of

Junius
Rollock
Thysius
Mayer
Rutherford
Polhill
Turretin
Howe
Edwards
Berkhof
Muller

1500’s

Francis Junius

The Mosaic Polity (Sources in Early Modern Economics, Ethics, and Law) (CLP Academic, 2015), thesis 2

p. 42

“We assert that the eternal law is above the nature of all other laws (as we just now said). For when we call the eternal law the immutable concept and form of reason, we demonstrate that it is pure, unadulterated act, just as God is a simple actuality on whom, as the universal principle, entirely all things depend. Moreover, when we say that that form of reason has been conceived by God and in God for the common good, we manifestly distinguish the eternal law of God from the rest of the reason of the divine wisdom that acts and occupies itself with created things. For the reason of that divine wisdom, which is prominent in acting, moving, and sustaining created things, is occupied with all things all the time.”

p. 43

“This law is eternal and divine, and therefore the universal principle and exemplar of all other rules. This law is immutable, and accordingly (as we should say with the scholastics) it is never ruled by any other law… the law is nothing other than the very wisdom of God that determines the rationale of what is lawful and unlawful in all things created according to his own image.”

Robert Rollock

‘A Brief Instruction on the Eternal Approval & Disapproval of the Divine Mind’ trans. Charles Johnson & Travis Fentiman (1593/4; ReformedBooksOnline, 2020), p. 3 Rollock here positis an eternal foundation for the revealed will of God, namely God’s will of approval and disapproval. This paradigm would continue through Rutherford and others.

“God from eternity either approves or disapproves of something. Approval in general is either bare and without the decree, or it is with the decree. Approval without the decree is when God approves something simply, yet He does not decree that it be chosen or followed after.

Approval without the decree belongs to all good things with respect to themselves, though they are not at any time realized, of which sort are the conversion, faith, and salvation of reprobates; which God surely approves of simply, but does not decree to come about; thus He decrees them not to come about…

Concerning approval without the decree, see Dt. 5:29, “O that there were such a heart in them, that they would fear me and keep all my commandments always, that it might be well with them, and with their children forever!” 1 Tim. 2:4, “Who will have all men to be saved, and to come unto the knowledge of the truth.” 1 Tim. 4:10, “…who is the Savior of all men, specially of those that believe.””

1600’s

Anthoy Thysius, Sr.

Thesis 34 in The Sixth of the Theological Disputations in On the Nature of God & the Divine Attributes (d. 1640; Leiden, 1620) This disputation is also in the Synopsis of Pure Theology as disputation 6.

John Mayer

Commentary on the Whole Bible (London, 1631), vol. 1, pp. 495-498

There is then another exposition [of 1 Tim. 2:4-6], understanding by God’s will, his delight and desire, out of the infinite goodness and benignity of his nature: For this is, that all and every one should be saved, according to the reason by and by rendered, for there is one God, who created and made all men, and therefore as they are his own creatures, his will is, that they should all be saved, and not one of them damned.”

Samuel Rutherford

Rutherford’s Examination of Arminianism: The Tables of Contents with Excerpts from Every Chapter trans. Johnson & Fentiman (RBO, 2019), Ch. 2, ‘On God’, Section 20, ‘Whether because God amiably invites and by supplications solicits, entreats and calls upon reprobates, and as He mourns over them, is grieved by them and laments on account of the disobedient, whether He, therefore, intends the obedience of them?’, pp. 57-58

“1. Because out of the amiable invitation, this only is concluded: the simple obligation of the creature to obedience, an earnest [seria] approbation and complacency which God has with respect to the obedience, inasmuch as the thing is holy, has been required of him, is morally pleasing, and as it is unto the convenience and salvation of a man.

On account of this disposition [affectus] in God, nothing is further added by the simple complacency of God around obedience except a certain quasi-intention and vehemency of divine obligation to the thing, which testifies to the obedience of all by an earnestness from the precept and from having obliged men to the thing; and thus it is to Him singularly and vehemently pleasing in his sight inasmuch as salvation is made glorious to men; but except He decree it, by the corruption of men, it will not come to be.”

A Scholastic Disputation on Divine Providence (Edinburgh, 1649), Metaphysical Inquiries, p. 605 Trans. T. Fentiman. A ‘metonymy’ is something that is indirectly named by something closely related to it. Rutherford here delineates the eternal foundation of the will of sign, namely what Rollock had elucidated, the will of approval in God, which wills the goodness of things in and of themselves.

“[Margin note:] How far the will of sign may be a will

Question 33, Whether the will of sign may improperly and metonymically be the will of God?

Response: The will of sign, according as it designates what is the pleasing and acceptable revealed will of God to us, that which is of our duty, so it is called the approving will, contradistinguished from the will of good-pleasure [of decree], and refers to two things:

1. To that which we ought to believe or do, inasmuch as that is obliging of consciences, since we ought to will to please God and will the reward of obedience following.

2. It refers to obedience, and this so far as God displays that to us by an act, either through special grace or a common concursus.

The first will is of complacency and is properly called will, whose object is the duty of the rational creature. In this way God sincerely [serio] approves and wills obedience, and is pleased in this moral good as a rule and norm, and it is not less a will than that which is called of good-pleasure [or the will of decree].

But the latter way is not an executing will as the will of good-pleasure is, nor does God will, intend or decree through grace or concursus, to work in the creatures that which He commands or prohibits, because He commands or prohibits it.

And in this way the will of sign is so far improperly called ‘the will of sign’; indeed, the punishment is called the wrath of God, because assuredly God punishes that which is done, as men are accustomed to do such being angry and in the passion of wrath, being aroused and agitated, although nonetheless, passions do not occur in God.”

Edward Polhill

‘Edward Polhill (1622-1694) on Matthew 23:37’ in “The Divine Will Considered in its Eternal Decrees” in The Works of Edward Polhill (Morgan, PA.: Soli Deo Gloria Publications, 1998), pp. 208-10

“1. God by a virtual or ordinative will does will the turning and salvation of all men within the bosom of the church; for they have Jesus Christ set before their eyes, and what was the true end of Christ’s coming, but to turn every one from his iniquities, (Acts 3:26)…

Neither will it salve the business, to say, there is a voluntas signi [will of sign] in all this; for what is voluntas signi, if it be not signum voluntatis [asign of the will]? If it be only an outward sign or appearance, and there be no counterpane or prototype thereof, within the divine will, how is it a true sign? which way could it be breathed out from God’s heart? When God makes his great gospel supper, and says, ‘Come, for all things are ready;’ he is not, he cannot be like him with the evil eye, who says, Eat and drink, but his heart is not with thee, (Prov.xxiii.6.7.) No, God’s heart goes along with every offer of grace; he never calls, but in a serious manner.”

Francis Turretin

Institutes of Elenctic Theology, ed. Dennison Buy (1679–1685; P&R, 1992), vol. 1, 3rd Topic, ‘The Will of God’, 15th Question, ‘May the will be properly distinguished into the will of decree and of precept, good purpose (eudokias) and good pleasure (euarestias), signified, secret and revealed? We affirm.’, pp. 222, 224

“X. We may sometimes interchange the eudokian [good-purpose of decree] for the euarestia [good-pleasure or complacency of the revealed will], when it is spoken of those things with which God is pleased because there is in them some quality or condition which agrees with the nature of God and therefore conciliates his favor…

XI. Eurestia contradistinguished from eudokian in this connection means nothing else than the mere complacency by which God approves anything as just and holy and delights in it (and besides wills to prescribe it to the creature as his most just duty). Hence it does not properly include any decree or volition in God, but implies only the agreement of the thing with the nature of God (according to which He cannot but love what is agreeable to his holiness)…
…

XX. The will of sign which is set forth as extrinsic ought to correspond with some internal will in God that it may not be false and deceptive; but that internal will is not the decree concerning the gift of salvation to this or that one, but the decree concerning the command of faith and promise of salvation if the man does believe (which is founded both upon the connection established by God between faith and salvation and the internal disposition of God by which, as He loves Himself, He cannot but love his image wherever He sees it shining and is so much pleased with the faith and repentance of the creature as to grant it salvation).”

1700’s

John Howe

The Redeemer’s Tears Wept Over Lost Souls, in Works (d. 1705), vol. 2, pp. 358-361 on Lk. 19:41-42

“But when expressions that import anger, or grief, are used [Gen. 6:6; Jud. 10:16; Ps. 78:40; 95:10; etc.], even concerning God Himself, we must sever in our conception everything of imperfection, and ascribe everything of real perfection. We are not to think such expressions signify nothing, that they have no meaning, or that nothing at all is to be attributed to Him under them.

Nor are we, again, to think they signify the same thing with what we find in ourselves, and are wont to express by those names. In the divine nature, there may be real, and yet most serene complacency and displacency, viz. that are unaccompanied with the least commotion, and import nothing of imperfection, but perfection rather, as it is a perfection to apprehend things suitably to what in themselves they are. The holy Scriptures frequently speak of God as angry, and grieved for the sins of men, and their miseries which ensue therefrom: and a real aversion and dislike is signified thereby, and by many other expressions which, in us, would signify vehement agitations of affection that we are sure can have no place in Him. We ought, therefore, in our own thoughts to ascribe to Him that calm aversion of will, in reference to the sins and miseries of men in general…
…

so these expressions, though they signify not in God such unquiet motions and passions as they would in us, they do signify a mind and will, really, though with the most perfect calmness and tranquility, set against sin and the horrid consequences of it, which yet, for greater reasons than we can understand, He may not see fit to do all He can to prevent. And if we know not how to reconcile such a will in God, with some of our notions concerning the divine nature; shall we, for what we have thought of Him, deny what He has so expressly said of Himself, or pretend to understand his nature better than He Himself does?”

The Reconcileableness of God’s Prescience of the Sins of Men with the Wisdom and Sincerity of His Counsels, Exhortations, and Whatsoever Means He Uses to Prevent Them, Section 19, page 51-2

“It seems, I confess, by its more obvious aspect [in the term ‘will of sign’, which is often misunderstood], too much to countenance the ignominious slander which profane and atheistical dispositions would fasten on God, and the course of his procedure towards men; and which it is the design of these papers to evince of as much absurdity and folly, as it is guilty of impiety and wickedness: as though He only intended to seem willing of what He really was not; that there was an appearance to which nothing did subesse [exist under].

And then why is the latter called voluntas [will]? unless the meaning be, He did only will the sign; which is false and impious;”

The Redeemer’s Tears Wept Over Lost Souls, Appendix, “How God is said to Will the Salvation of them that Perish”, pp. 386-8

“Shall it be said that sin does not displease God; that He has no will against sin; it is not repugnant to his will? Yes; it is to his revealed will, to his law. But is that an untrue revelation? His law is not his will itself, but the signum [sign], the discovery of his will. Now, is it an insignificant sign? A sign that signifies nothing? Or to which there belongs no correspondent significatum [signification]? –nothing that is signified by it? Is that which is signified (for sure no one will say it signifies nothing) his real will, yea or no? Who can deny it? That will, then (and a most calm, sedate, impassionate will it must be understood to be), sin and consequently the consequent miseries of his creatures, are repugnant unto.
…

Therefore, it seems out of question, that the holy God does constantly and perpetually, in a true sense, will universal obedience, and the consequent felicity of all his creatures capable thereof; i.e. He does will it with simple complacency, as what were highly grateful to Him, simply considered by itself. Who can doubt, but that purity, holiness, blessedness, wheresoever they were to be beheld among his creatures, would be a pleasing and delightful spectacle to Him, being most agreeable to the perfect excellency, purity, and benignity of his own nature, and that their deformity and misery must be consequently unpleasing?”

Jonathan Edwards †1758

Remarks on Important Theological Controversies, Ch. 3, “Concerning the Divine Decrees in General, & Election in Particular,” from paragraphs 9 & 13, in The Works of Jonathan Edwards, ed. Edward Hickman, vol. 2, pp. 527-28

13. …There is all in God that is good, and perfect, and excellent in our desires and wishes for the conversion and salvation of wicked men. As, for instance, there is a love to holiness, absolutely considered, or an agreeableness of holiness to his nature and will; or, in other words, to his natural inclination. The holiness and happiness of the creature, absolutely considered, are things that he loves. These things are infinitely more agreeable to his nature than to ours.

There is all in God that belongs to our desire of the holiness and happiness of unconverted men and reprobates, excepting what implies imperfection. All that is consistent with infinite knowledge, wisdom, power, self-sufficience, infinite happiness, and immutability. Therefore, there is no reason that his absolute prescience, or his wise determination and ordering what is future, should hinder his expressing this disposition of his nature, in like manner as we are wont to express such a disposition in ourselves, viz. by calls and invitations, and the like.

The disagreeableness of the wickedness and misery of the creature, absolutely considered, to the nature of God, is all that is good in pious and holy men’s lamenting the past misery and wickedness of men. Their lamenting these, is good no farther than it proceeds from the disagreeableness of those things to their holy and good nature. This is also all that is good in wishing for the future holiness and happiness of men.”

1900’s

Louis Berkhof

Systematic Theology (1951), V. Calling in General & External Calling, C. External Calling

2. The Characteristics of External Calling

b. It is a bona fide [by good-faith] calling. The external calling is a calling in good faith, a calling that is seriously meant. It is not an invitation coupled with the hope that it will not be accepted. When God calls the sinner to accept Christ by faith, He earnestly desires this; and when He promises those who repent and believe eternal life, His promise is dependable. This follows from the very nature, from the veracity, of God. It is blasphemous to think that God would be guilty of equivocation and deception, that He would say one thing and mean another, that He would earnestly plead with the sinner to repent and believe unto salvation, and at the same time not desire it in any sense of the word. The bona fide character of the external call is proved by the following passages of Scripture: Num. 23:19; Ps. 81:13-16; Prov. 1:24; Isa. 1:18-20; Ezek. 18:23,32; 33:11; Matt. 21:37; 2 Tim. 2:13.”

2000’s

Richard Muller

PRRD, vol. 3 (Baker, 2003), Part 2, ch. 5.4, E., ‘The Ad Intra–Ad Extra Distinctions’, sections 1, p. 458

“The term voluntas signi, literally, the will of the sign, is closely related to the term signum voluntatis, the sign of the will or purpose. It indicates an overt sign or indication that someone wills something and can therefore be understood as a revealed will or, specifically, as a revealed precept or ‘preceptive will’–thus, what is literally called the ‘signified will’ is a will that God makes known and in effect ‘signifies’ what is commanded… The voluntas signi, therefore, is not a ‘mere sign’ but one that corresponds with something that is truly in God.”

Latin Article

1600’s

Trigland, Sr., Jacob – ‘Of the Will of Sign & of Good-Pleasure’, pp. 158-64 in Meditations of Jacob Trigland on Various Opinions on the Will of God & Universal Grace, where is yet something of Middle Knowledge (Leiden, 1642)

Trigland here affirms arguments of the Medieval Scholastics that the Will of Sign always externally signifies something of the internal will of God and his good-pleasure. He then gives counter arguments to those who deny such.

“Rightly therefore and truly we say those signs truly and properly are signs of the divine will.” – p. 163

Webpages

On the Affections of God

On Absolute & Relative Attributes of God (the latter being founded on the former)

The Revealed Will is Improperly God’s Will in Some Respect(s)

Compare also, ‘The Will of Sign is an Expression of God’s Will for the Creature’.

Order of

Quotes 6+
Latin 6

Quotes

Order of

Aquinas
White
Wolleb
King
Ames
Rutherford
Muller

1200’s

Thomas Aquinas

Summa, pt. 1, q. 19, art. 11

“The will of God is one, since it is the very essence of God. Yet sometimes it is spoken of as many, as in the words of Ps. 110:2: ‘Great are the works of the Lord, sought out according to all His wills.’ Therefore sometimes the sign must be taken for the will…

Some things are said of God in their strict sense; others by metaphor, as appears from what has been said before (q. 13, art. 3). When certain human passions are predicated of the Godhead metaphorically, this is done because of a likeness in the effect. Hence a thing that is in us a sign of some passion, is signified metaphorically in God under the name of that passion… In the same way, what is usually with us an expression of will, is sometimes metaphorically called will in God; just as when anyone lays down a precept, it is a sign that he wishes that precept obeyed. Hence a divine precept is sometimes called by metaphor the will of God, as in the words: ‘Thy will be done on earth, as it is in heaven’ (Matt 6:10)… Therefore in God there are distinguished will in its proper sense, and will as attributed to Him by metaphor. Will in its proper sense is called the will of good pleasure; and will metaphorically taken is the will of expression [signi], inasmuch as the sign itself of will is called will…

Expressions [signa] of will are called divine wills, not as being signs that God wills anything; but because what in us is the usual expression [signa] of our will, is called the divine will in God. Thus punishment is not a sign that there is anger in God; but it is called anger in Him, from the fact that it is an expression [signum] of anger in ourselves.”

1600’s

John White

A Defence of the Way to the True Church… wherein the motives leading to papistry… are handled and fully disputed (London: Field, 1614), ch. 25, pp. 212-14 White (1570–1615) was an English clergyman, a royal chaplain and controversialist.

“6. Next it must be noted how peremptorily he [a Romish adversary] charges me with ignorance for saying this antecedent will is not simply, properly and formally in God. But he should have considered that when I said so, I spoke in the words of Durand (Durand, bk. 1, dist. 46, quest. 1), one of his own side, whom I alleged in the margin: that, if it were false I said, yet the ignorance should not be fathered on me, but on them that begot it.

For I said the truth, and himself is ignorant of the doctrine of his own Church. For Thomas handling this antecedent will, says (pt. 1, quest. 19, art. 6, to obj. 1), ‘We do not simply will what we will antecedently; and therefore this antecedent will may rather be called a velleity than an absolute will. (magis dici potest velleitas quam absoluta voluntas) A velleity, that is to say as Gregory of Valence expounds him (Commentary on Thomas, pt. 1, disp. 1, quest. 19, point 2), ‘a certain conditionated will; when that only can be said simply to be willed, that is willed consequently.’ Where we see that Thomas reduces this antecedent will to an imperfect kind of willing, which he calls a velleity, which is not a simple, proper or formal will: and the most Schoolmen follow him upon this ground, because there cannot be a formal will in God which is not fulfilled, as the salvation of all men is not.

Hence it is says Suarez (Tract on Predestination, bk. 4, ch. 2, no. 2), that some have inferred that this of God whereby He would the salvation of all men, is no proper and formal act of willing in God: because He has no imperfect act of willing, as they call velleity, but only a signification of will (voluntatem signi), which only is metaphorical and interpretative, in that He carries Himself towards men, as if He had that act of willing. Thus think Cajetan and Marsilius.

Others say, the formal and proper will of God reaches not to the salvation of all men, for that cause because it is not fulfilled, but only to the giving of sufficient means: which will, only to appoint sufficient means, is formal in God, and thereof God is said to will the salvation of all men: and of this mind are many Schoolmen. This will of God, says Vasquez (in pt. 1 of Thomas, disp. 83, no. 22), whereby He would the salvation of all men, even of the reprobate, very many Schoolmen, especially the newer, think to be only a conditionated will, which they call a velleity: whose act is not absolute and perfect, but under condition. Now the probabler opinion, says Dominicus Bannes (Commentary, pt. 1, quest. 19, art. 6, conclusion 2), is that there is formally no will in God which is signified by the name of velleity.

Whence it follows that since by the doctrine of Thomas and many others, this antecedent will is but a velleity, it cannot be formally in God. But to take down this raw student yet a little more, Soto Major says (in tome above, p. 274): This word, God will the salvation of all men, by the good leave of so many ancient authors, we will not only expound of will properly so called, which is God’s good pleasure, but of his antecedent will; that is to say, an imaginary and metaphorical will: according to the which, it is no inconvenience to say, God will have all men to be saved: of which antecedent will, or will improperly so called, Damascene speaks (p. 279). And again: Damascene’s antecedent will is but a general, metaphorical and improper will, which they call a velleity.

Here you see that Damascene and Thomas’s antecedent will is but a velleity, and this velleity is no will simply or formally in God; and therefore I spoke not ignorantly, but after the mind of the best Schoolmen that write when I said out of Durand that this antecedent will is not simply, properly and formally the will of God, but knew well enough what I said: and such as hold the contrary, that this antecedent will whereby God is said to will the salvation of all men, is simply, properly or formally the will of God, are driven to hold a paradox, that God’s absolute will, which is defined to be the will of his good pleasure, may be defeated and not accomplished (Opus est fateri non omnem voluntatem Benepla∣citi semper impleri. Magal. in Tim., p. 252): which is a desperate shift and contrary to the doctrine of the best ancient divines in the Church of Rome (Thomas, pt. 1, quest. 19, art. 6; Master [of the Sentences, Lombard], bk. 1, dist. 46, where Scotus, Ockham, Dionysius Capreollus, dist. 45, quest. unic. art. 2, concl. 5; Cajetan on 1. Tim. 2:4; Dominic Banez, pt. 1, quest. 19, art. 6, concl. 2, in sum. text. Perer., Select Disputations on Jn. 1, no. 73); and directly against the Scripture, which says, ‘Our God has done whatsoever pleased Him in heaven and earth.’ (Ps. 135:6) ‘Who has resisted his will?’ (Rom. 9:19) ‘Who works all things according to the counsel of his own will.’ (Eph. 1:11)”

Johannes Wolleb

The Abridgment of Christian Divinity... (d. 1629; London: Mabb, 1660), bk. 1, ch. 3, Concerning the Works of God & the Decrees of God in General, The Rules, pp. 33-37

“[I] This is called his [Greek] (Acts 2:23), Determined purpose, [Greek] (Acts 4:28), The hand and counsel of God; [Greek] (Eph. 1:9), The good pleasure of God and Gods eternal providence. (Now this is called his eternal providence, that it may be distinguished from actual providence, which is nothing else but the execution of God’s decrees.)

II. This is called, the Will of God, or The will of his good pleasure.

Indeed the decree is the very will of God; yet for our better understanding, the will is considered as the cause efficient, the decree is the effect. Now whereas this word ‘will’ is taken diversely, it is diverse ways distinguished by divines, to wit, into the will of his good pleasure and the will of the sign; into an antecedent and consequent; into absolute, and conditional; into secret and revealed.

But these are not real distributions of the divine will, but distinctions only of the name: For to speak properly, there is in God but one only will, which is called the will of his good pleasure, because out of his most free good pleasure He has decreed what shall be done: It is called also his antecedent will because it had existence before any creature and from eternity with God it was established: It is named also absolute, because it depends upon God’s good pleasure and not from the things which are done in time. Lastly it is called secret, because in respect of priority it is known neither to men nor angels. But these things are improperly styled by the name of divine will which are comprehended in that ordinary verse:

Praecipit, et prohibet, promittit, consulit, implet:
“Commands, forbids, promises, consults, fulfills.”

(Alexander Ross: The Schoolmen take God’s antecedent will in another sense, for his velleity [willing, desire or wish], and they call it conditional; they make his consequent will absolute and which is always fulfilled, the other not always.)

For as the magistrates’ commands are called his will, so the name of will is attributed to precepts, prohibitions, promises, to effects also and events. And this is it which is called the will of the sign, because it signifies what is acceptable to God and what He would have done by us. It is also called his consequent will because it follows that eternal antecedent will: And ’tis a conditional will because God’s precepts, prohibitions, comminations and promises have the condition of obedience and disobedience annexed.

Lastly, his revealed will, because it’s daily set forth in God’s Word. This distinction of the will is duly to [be] observed lest we should imagine that there are in God either really different or contrary wills.

III. What things are done against the will of God are not done besides his will.

Henry King

An Exposition upon the Lord’s Prayer, delivered in certain sermons in the cathedral Church of St. Paul (London: Haviland, 1628), ‘Thy will be done in earth as it is in heaven’, pp. 146-47 King (1592–1669) was the Bishop of Chichester, a poet and a friend of John Donne.

“Secondly, there is Voluntas Signi [will of sign], a manifestation of his will, whether it be in his works, which are the fruits of his will, or his Word which is the evidence of his will, directing us to the knowledge what He would have us do. A sense tropical and figurative, yet most proper to inform us: and this is scattered into five divisions or species.

First, Permissio, his permission or allowance, or privilege to things, without which they cannot be; Non fit aliquid nisi omnipotens fieri velit, vel sinendo ut fiat, vel faciendo [Nothing comes to be unless the Omnipotent wills it to come to be, either by permitting it to come to pass or by bringing it about]. (Augustine, Enchiridion)

Secondly, Impletio, the perfecting or fulfilling of them.

Thirdly, Consilium, his revealed decree.

Fourthly, Praeceptum, his positive law; his precepts wherein He teaches and commands us to do what is acceptable in his sight.

Fifthly and lastly, Prohibitio, the restraint He lays upon us, his command for the eschewing those actions which are contrary to his will.”

William Ames

The Marrow of Theology (d. 1633; 1997), bk. 1, ch. 7, pp. 99-100

“48. In whatever God wills He is universally effectual; He is not hindered or frustrated in obtaining what He wills. For if He should properly will anything and not attain it He would not be wholly perfect and blessed.
…

53. Those means through which that will is revealed are the ‘intention of the sign’ [voluntas signi]–rightly so called not only by metaphor because they show men what they mean, but also by metonymy because they are the effects or adjuncts or partial declarations of God’s own will.”

Samuel Rutherford

Apologetic Exercitations for Divine Grace, Exercitation 2, ch. 1, pp. 201-2

“Hence is that, Aquinas, Valentia, Durandus and Suarez† want the will of God divided thus: it is the will improperly and the division is by a homonym in homonyms, so that the will of sign is the will improperly. Thus Durand, on folio 13, ‘A command,’ he says, ‘is not directly and always a sign that the one commanding wants the thing commanded to be, but only that He wants to oblige the subject.’

† Aquinas, in pt. 2, q. 9, art. 11; Valentia, tome 1, disp. 1, q. 19, punc. 2; Durandus, bk. 1, dist. 48, q. 3; Suarez, tome 1, Of the Attributes of God, bk. 3, ch. 8.”

Christ Dying & Drawing Sinners to Himself, pp. 349-50

Scholastic Disputation on Divine Providence, Metaphysical Inquiries, p. 605 tr. T. Fentiman

“[Margin note:] How far the will of sign may be a will

Question 33, Whether the will of sign may improperly and metonymically be the will of God?

1. To that which we ought to believe or do, inasmuch as that is obliging of consciences, since we ought to will to please God and will the reward of obedience following.

2. It refers to obedience, and this so far as God displays that to us by an act, either through special grace or a common concursus.

2000’s

Richard Muller

PRRD 3.459

“In light of such problems, Leigh, Maccovius, and Twisse (very much following the tradition) indicate that the voluntas propositi or beneplaciti [proposed will or of good pleasure, i.e. the will of decree] alone is properly called the will of God, ‘which none can resist, Rom. 9:19,’ whereas the voluntas signi or commandment is only ‘improperly’ called God’s will… Baxter does agree with Twisse, however, that the commandments or signs of God are only improperly designated as the divine will.”

Latin Articles

1300’s

Scotus, Duns – pt. 1, q. 19, art. 11, ‘Whether the will of sign is to be distinguished in God?’ in Summa (Rome: Sallustiana, 1900), vol. 1, pp. 510-12

Scotus (c. 1265/66–1308) was a Scottish, Romanist priest and Franciscan friar, university professor, philosopher and theologian.

Durandus – bk. 1, dist. 48, q. 3, ‘Whether God is able to command that which He does not will?’ in Commentaries on the Theological Sentences of Peter Lombard (Leiden: William Rovillius, 1563), fol. 203b-204

Durandus of Saint-Pourcain (c. 1275–1334) was a French Dominican, philosopher, theologian and bishop.

1500’s

Cajetan, Thomas – pt. 1, q. 19, art. 11, ‘Whether the will of sign is to be distinguished in God?’ in Commentary on the Summa (Lyra: Joseph van In, 1892), vol. 1, p. 219

Cajetan (1469–1534) was an Italian philosopher, theologian, a master of the Order of Preachers and cardinal from 1517 until his death. He is now best known as the spokesman for Romanist opposition to the teachings of Luther and the Protestant Reformation while he was the Pope’s legate in Augsburg.

1600’s

Valencia, Gregory – disp. 1, q. 19, p. 2, ‘How manyfold is the will of God?’ in Theological Commentaries (d. 1603; Leiden: Cardon, 1609), vol. 1, cols. 221-335

Gregory (c. 1550–1603) was a Spanish humanist and scholar who was a professor at the University of Ingolstadt.

Suarez, Francis – bk. 3, ch. 8, ‘Of the will of sign and good-pleasure, and antecedent and consequent’ in Commentaries & Disputations on the First Part of Thomas the Divine, on God One & Three (Moguntia: Balthasar, Lippi, 1607), pp. 148-49

Suarez (1548-1617) was a Spanish Jesuit priest, philosopher and theologian, one of the leading figures of the School of Salamanca movement.

Salmanticenses (Antonio de la Madre de Dios) – pt. 1, q. 19, art. 11, ‘Whether the will of sign is to be distinguished in God?’ in A Theological Course new ed. (1637; Paris: 1876), vol. 2, p. 235

Salmanticenses. The work sought to maintain strict scholastic Thomism.

That the Revealed Will may Express Purpose

Order of

Quotes 6
Historical 5

Quotes

Order of

Davenant
Rutherford
Shepard
Baxter
Polhill
Murray

1600’s

John Davenant

Tract on the Gallican Controversy, pt. 1, pp. 564-65 appended to Davenant, An Exposition of Colossians, vol. 2 ed. Josiah Allport (London, 1832)

“What is added in the last place, concerning the general intention of God, by which He wills that all men individually should be saved through the death of his Son, needs explanation. It must be observed, therefore, that according to the custom of the Scriptures, the Divine will or intention sometimes denotes merely the appointment of means to an end, although there is no determinate will in God of producing that end by those means.

And the Schoolmen refer this intention or will of God to the common order of providence. In this sense He willed and intended the obedience and salvation of the angels who apostatized, inasmuch as He furnished them with gifts, fit in themselves and suitable, to perform obedience and obtain salvation. And in this sense God, with a general intention, wills life to all men, inasmuch as he willed the death of Christ to be the fountain and cause of life to all men individually, according to the tenor of the evangelical covenant.¹

¹ [Davenant calls the gospel offer, that whosoever believes in Christ will be saved (Jn. 3:16), established with all men as men, a “covenant,” and the “evangelical covenant”. While this call and offer does not reach all persons, yet, according to some, it potentially could save all persons if it were not for the sin of persons after Adam and Eve not continuing in their responsibility and for persons not obeying the command to preach the gospel to every creature. This potential power of providential means, designed unto the end of salvation, however varied or inaccessible through human history, yet reflects, for some theologians, God’s gracious will of providence in some way for the life and salvation of every human individual, especially in contrast to the demons which receive no such favors.]

But we must observe, that the Scriptures mention another will or intention of God, and that properly so called, which never fails in producing the good intended, and which the Schoolmen refer to the order of special predestination…

But if by this general intention they mean nothing more than a general aptitude and sufficiency in the death of Christ to effect the salvation of all men individually in the mode of an universal cause, or a general appointment of God concerning the salvation of all men individually, who, through the grace of God, duly apply to themselves this universal cause, then there is no need to reject this form of speaking.”

On Davenant & Aquinas

Quote

Michael Lynch, John Davenant’s Hypothetical Universalism: a Defense of Catholic & Reformed Orthodoxy (Oxford Univ. Press, 2021)

p. 138

“Davenant recognized that if God wills the means of salvation to be procured for the reprobate, then God’s intention to save appears thwarted. Does this not imply that God’s will is ineffectual because of God’s universal desire to save all?

Davenant responds to God’s apparent impotence by noting that God oftentimes obtains (and sometimes actually grants) the means to an end wherein the end is never attained. Davenant appeals to the scholastic distinction between providence and predestination employed by Aquinas. (Davenant, De Morte Christi, in DD, 23 (370); Davenant, Sententia de Gallicana controversia, in DD, fol. Ii4v. Cf. Aquinas, [Disputed Questions,] De Veritate, in CT, q. 6 [on Predestination] a. 2 co. [actually art. 3, body]) Providence is a general appointment of a thing toward an end (universaliter ordinationem in finem), whereas predestination represents the outcome or result of an ordering (exitum vel eventum ordinis). Predestination differs from providence in that “not everything that is ordained to an end [as in providence] reaches that end.” (Aquinas, De Veritate, in CT, q. 6 a. 2 co. [actually art. 3, body])

Like providence, then, the evangelical covenant is grounded upon an ordination to an end that does not infallibly obtain. God has ordained that Christ make a universal satisfaction on condition of belief, which condition being not always fulfilled, necessitates that not all are forgiven. This evangelical covenant, which displays the “freedom, mercy, and justice of God,” is made, consonant with God’s general love for mankind, between humanity and God promising the saving benefits of Christ to those who repent and believe.”

pp. 152-53

“In accordance with God’s love of simple complacency and his signified will is the divine will toward the good whereby God has given to his creatures fitting means for the obtaining of such good. Hence Davenant writes,

“God is said to will, desire, aim- at that good for the obteining whereof he affordeth fitting means, though withall he willeth that it shall be within the liberty of the creature to hinder & frustrate those means, & though he have absolutely decreed to permit the creature to abuse them unto his own destruction.”

Davenant notes that theologians often call this sort of divine willing “voluntas antecedens, voluntas conditionata, voluntas simplicis complacentiae.”

This granting of various gifts and graces to creatures is understood by Davenant with Aquinas’s doctrine of God’s providence in view. Davenant illustrates this order of providence by observing from the natural world that God has provided for us many bodily remedies that are applicable to heal us, though not infallibly ordained to heal us. In the realm of theology, Davenant explains God’s providential will in furnishing the angels, both elect and nonelect, with many gifts ordained by God to the end of the angels’ felicity, even though not every angel obtained such felicity. According to this will, God may be said to have

“willed and intended the obedience and salvation of the angels who apostatised, inasmuch as he furnished them with gifts, fit in themselves and suitable, to perform obedience and obtain salvation.”

According to Davenant, these gifts can be either external or internal, with respect to human beings. One such external gift of God’s providence is the death of Christ, which has been ordained as a universal remedy for the sins of all human beings. Moreover, Davenant argues that within the scope of the church community, God has provided many graces (including the preaching of the word, and even internal graces such as knowledge of one’s own sin and the fear of punishment); these graces, although they all are generally ordered to the salvation of those to whom such graces come, do not infallibly obtain that end. In order to avoid confusion, Davenant emphasizes that when one speaks of “the end of such an action of God or of such a gift of God,” we are not to understand such an end as that which causes the divine volition but rather that God gave to such actions and gifts a “fitness or aptnesse to produce such an end.” All such gifts reveal to us, according to Davenant, an antecedent and conditional will or decree in God for the good of all human beings:

“We cannot but acknowledge in [“the blessings and means which God has afforded to the angels, to Adam, and which he continually affordeth unto wicked men”] an antecedent and gracious will [in God] to do them good.””

Samuel Rutherford

Christ Dying & Drawing Sinners to Himself... (London: J.D., 1647), “Of the third article”, p. 273

“Assertion 3. There be two things in the Law: 1. The authority and power to command, direct, and regulate the creature to an end, in acts of righteousness and holiness…”

A Scholastic Disputation on Divine Providence, chs. 1-10 tr. by AI by Onku (Edinburgh, 1649), ch. 2. ‘What is the nature of the permissive will of God, and of the will of good pleasure and sign. The Remonstrants, Arminians are called to the discussion’, p. 16

“The revealed will of sign, as such, teaches, illuminates, directs and obligates men to the regulation of acts, whether those regulated acts actually exist and happen, or not.”

Thomas Shepard

Subjection to Christ in all his Ordinances & Appointments the best means to preserve our Liberty: together with a Treatise of Ineffectual Hearing the Word... (d. 1649; London: S.G., 1657), ‘Of Ineffectual Hearing’, pp. 89-90

“There is a twofold Word, or rather a double declaration of the same Word: 1. There is God’s external or outward Word, containing letters and syllables, and this is his external voice. 2. There is God’s internal Word and voice, which secretly speaks to the heart, even by the external Word, when that only speaks to the ear.
…

2. This inward Word is double: 1. ineffectual (though inward); 2. effectual.

1. Ineffectual, is that which has some inward operation upon the heart, but it attains not God’s end to bring a man into a state of life; and thus, Heb. 6:2, 5. Many tasted of the good Word of God, yet fell away. And such a heart is compared to a field which a man plows and sows, and rain falls on it, and yet the end is not attained: it brings forth thistles; and this many Jews did hear, and hence had some kind of faith in Christ.”

Richard Baxter

Universal Redemption of Mankind by the Lord Jesus Christ (London: Salusbury, 1694), pp. 305-8

“5. In so doing God does all that belongs to Him to do as Legislator: For it must be understood that here He speaks those words ‘that the world by Him might be saved’ not as absolute-Lord merely or properly, but as Rector per Leges [a Governor through laws]; And it belongs to Him as Legislator only to propound salvation to man as his end: and to promise it on his conditions, and prescribe those conditions and command man to perform them: and to threaten him with the loss of that end (of salvation) if he perform them not.

But to give faith, which is the condition itself, does not belong so God as Legislator. (No man living can claim the first act of faith, or effectual grace thereto, from God by any promise that He has made): But He gives it as Dominus absolutus [an absolute Lord], and as one that may do with his own as he list. So that it is Finis prescriptus et conditionaliter datus [the end prescribed and conditionally given], that is here spoken of; and not Finis Decretus [the end decreed] to be by God eventually infallibly accomplished. It is the end of God’s Law and Legislative Will, and so of God as mere Legislator or Rector per Leges: and not of his decretive will de eventu [of the event], and of God as absolute Lord above Laws, without them disposing of his own. (The prediction of events does collaterally and secundum quid [according to that] belong to his Law: but not per se and directly.)

And 6. Consider that if it be never so much denied that God has properly a conditional will de rerum eventu [respecting the event of things], yet it is beyond all question true that He has a conditional will de debito [of debt or obligation] (officii, Præmii et Pænæ [of office or duty, reward and punishment]) and so his Law is conditional most commonly. He has constituted the Debitum pramii [debt of reward], the dueness of salvation on condition of believing, loving and sincerely obeying Christ. And therefore they must nor deny conditional promises and threatnings, though they deny conditional, decrees.

This I add, because I know they here usually answer that God intends no end conditionally, but where He intends also the condition itself, that so it may be equivalent to absolute: But He intends as Legislator that faith shall be the prescribed means to glory, and glory the end promised to all that perform that condition; and so conditionally gives it.”

Edward Polhill

“Query 3: Whether the will of God touching conversion be always accomplished therein? For answer whereunto I must first lay down a distinction as a foundation. God may be said to will the conversion of men two ways: either by such a will as is effective and determinative of the event, or by such as is only virtual and ordinative of the means tending thereunto: both parts of this distinction are bottomed upon scripture…

…[W]herefore, in respect of that ordination, God may be truly said, by a kind of virtual and ordinative will, to will the turning and salvation of all men. This I shall explain:

1. With reference to those in the bosom of the Church.
2. With reference to those out of it.

1. God by a virtual or ordinative will does will the turning and salvation of all men within the bosom of the church; for they have Jesus Christ set before their eyes, and what was the true end of Christ’s coming but to turn every one from his iniquities (Acts 3:26). They have the gospel preached unto them: there we have God spreading out his hands all the day, standing and knocking at the door of the heart, crying out with redoubled calls, “Turn ye, turn ye, why will ye die?” Wooing and beseeching men, ‘Be ye reconciled unto Me;’ making his salvation bringing grace appear unto all men, even to the non-elect themselves…

the true end of his call is their conversion, and that that end is not attained, the only reason lies within themselves, in their own corrupt, unbelieving hearts. Moreover, it is worthy of our consideration that those scriptures (which the Remonstrants urge to prove that all the operations of grace, even those in the very elect who actually turn unto God, are resistible) do signally set forth this ordinative will of God. As first, they urge that (Mt. 23:37):

“O Jerusalem, Jerusalem! thou that kills the prophets and stones them which are sent unto thee, how often would I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathers her chickens under her wings, and ye would not.”

Here, say they, is resistible grace. Very well; but what grace does the text speak of. It speaks only of the grace afforded to those Jews which were never gathered or converted thereby, but not a title [tittle?] of the grace afforded to those Jews which were thereby actually gathered or converted; and how then can it prove that this latter grace (of which it speaks not at all) was resistible?…

wherefore, this will is God’s ordinative will, imported in the ministry of Christ and the prophets, the proper end and tendency whereof was to gather them into the bosom of his grace…

Wherefore our Savior’s words show not forth the weakness or separableness of grace as to the elect, but the true end and scope of Christ’s preaching as to the non-elect; what He spoke to them was in order to their salvation…

John’s baptism was not a mere external sign or shadow, but imported God’s ordinative counsel to bring men to repentance; it was eis matanoian, to repentance, as its proper end (Mt. 3:11). Gospel-preaching is not a mere sound or voice of words, but it imports God’s ordinative counsel to turn men unto Himself. Hence every true minister is said to stand in God’s counsel, and for this very end, to turn them from the evil of their doings (Jer. 22:22). Every ordinance speaks an ordinative counsel for some spiritual end, a serious ordination for the good of souls…

Now, by all this it appears that that parable of the vineyard proves not that the internal grace afforded to those Jews which were thereby converted was resistible; but it proves that the proper end and tendency of the means afforded to the Jewish Church was that they might bring forth good fruits to God; and in respect of that ordination, God is said to expect those good fruits from them.”

1900’s

John Murray

‘Report of the Committee on the Free Offer of the Gospel presented to the Fifteenth (1948) General Assembly of the Orthodox Presbyterian Church’, On 2 Pet. 3:9

“In Romans 2:4, it [longsuffering] is associated with the goodness and forbearance of God, and subsumed under his goodness, as that which is despised by the impenitent who treasures up for himself wrath in the day of wrath, who does not know that the goodness of God “leadeth him to repentance” (eis metanoian se agei).

The choice of the verb agein is to be noted. Since the impenitent are in view, it cannot refer to efficacious grace. Nevertheless, it is a strong verb as its use in Romans 8:14 shows: “As many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are the sons of God” (cf. Gal. 5:18). It must be understood as a constraining influence flowing from the goodness of God which is calculated to bring men to repentance. The construction in Romans 2:4 is remarkably similar to that in II Peter 3:9.”

Historical

On the Post-Reformation

Quotes

Richard Muller

Dictionary of Latin & Greek Theological Terms: Drawn Principally from Protestant Scholastic Theology 1st ed. (Baker, 1985), pp. 222, 329 & 332-33

permissio efficax

“Effective permission or willing permission; especially, the providential concursus (q.v.) underlying evil acts of human beings; a concept typical of Reformed theology, which will not allow a bare or ineffectual permission on the part of God and which will acknowledge no realm of activity outside of the will of God. God therefore is viewed as positively willing to permit the free agency of human beings and as supporting their acts with his providential concursus even when those acts go against his revealed will.”

vocatio, ‘calling‘

“specifically, the call of God to be his children, which occurs by the grace of the Holy Spirit, both generally in the government of the world and the manifestation of divine benevolentia [goodwill] (q.v.) toward all creatures, and specially in and through the proclamation of the Word.”

voluntas Dei, ‘the will of God’

“The Reformed [of the 1500’s and 1600’s], by contrast [from the Lutherans], argue a hidden will of God to bestow special saving grace irresistibly upon the elect, a voluntas decreti sive beneplaciti arcana [will of decree or hidden good-pleasure], more ultimate than the revealed will of God to offer salvation to all by means of a universal grace…

The voluntas signi vel praecepti, the will of the sign or precept, is the voluntas revelata, or revealed will, of God and the voluntas moralis, or moral will, according to which God reveals in signs and precepts his plan for mankind both in the law and in the gospel. Here, again, the Lutherans and Reformed differ insofar as the former [the Lutherans] deny the contrast between a universally offered salvation revealed in the voluntas signi and a secret elective will in the voluntas beneplaciti.
…

The Reformed further argue the distinction of the voluntas decreti vel beneplaciti [will of decree or good-pleasure] or voluntas decernens [decreeing will] into the categories of voluntas efficiens, effecting will, and voluntas permittens, permitting will. Under the former category, God is viewed as directly or indirectly through instrumental causes effecting his positive will, whereas under the latter category God is understood as permitting both contingent events and acts of free will even when such events and acts go against his revealed will.”

Post-Reformation Reformed Dogmatics (Baker, 2003), vol. 3

ch. 5.4, Will and Freedom, E. The Ad Intra–Ad Extra Distinctions, 1. Voluntas beneplaciti and voluntas signi, p. 458

“The term voluntas signi, literally, the will of the sign [the revealed will], is closely related to the term signum voluntatis, the sign of the will or purpose. It indicates an overt sign or indication that someone wills something and can therefore be understood as a revealed will or, specifically, as a revealed precept or ‘preceptive will’—thus, what is literally called the ‘signified will’ is a will that God makes known and in effect ‘signifies’ what is commanded. This signified or perceptive will moreover, does not contradict the will of the divine good pleasure, although the relationship between the two may sometimes be difficult to establish immediately. The voluntas signi, therefore, is not a ‘mere sign’ but one that corresponds with something that is truly in God.”

ch. 6.3, The Divine Affections and Virtues, C. Divine Grace and Favor, 2. The Reformed Orthodox doctrine of the gratia Dei, p. 574

“[Edward Leigh:] ‘God is patient, Psalm 103:8; Job. 21:7. God’s patience is that whereby He bears the reproach of sinners and defers their punishments; or it is the most bountiful will of God, whereby He doth long bear with sin which He hates, sparing sinners, not minding their destruction, but that He might bring them to repentance. See Acts 13:18.’¹

…
It is, thus, ‘the most bountiful will of God not suffering his displeasure suddenly to rise against his creatures offending, to be avenged of them, but He does warn them beforehand, lightly correct and seek to turn them unto Him.’²

¹ Leigh, Body of Divinity, II.xiii (p. 299), citing marginally Nahum 1:3 and Isa. 30:18; cf. Cocceius, Summa theol., III.x.67.

² Leigh, Treatise, II.xiii (p. 106).”

On the Teaching of Thomas Aquinas vs. John Duns Scotus

Article

1600’s

Macedo, Francisco – 2. ‘General will of God concerning the salvation of all men, 1 Tim. 2:4’ in Collations of the Teachings of St. Thomas & Scotus, with the Differences between the Two… vol. 1 tr. AI by Vertias (Padua: Frambotti, 1671), bk. 1, Collation 12, pp. 841-73 A more detailed ToC is given at the beginning of the volume.

Macedo (1596-1681), known as S. Augustino, was a Portuguese Franciscan theologian. While exercising independent judgment, he tends to lean original-Scotus. He had a very good knowledge of Aquinas’s works (and of Thomists and their works) through his life (vol. 2, p. 424).

Thomas, while allowing for other interpretations, preferred taking 1 Tim. 2:4, about God willing all men to be saved, to refer to an antecedent will of God, in contrast to a consequent will of God. He also speaks of it as a conditional and imperfect will, and a velleity (disposition or willingness) in contrast to the absolute will of God. (Summa, pt. 1, q. 19, art. 6, ‘Whether the will of God is always fulfilled’ [Aquinas distinguishes]) Macedo adds:

“Hence it is commonly called a will of sign and opposed to the will of good pleasure, which is always fulfilled — as several weighty Thomists here expound: Cajetan, Bañez, Zumel, cited by González (disp. 56, sect.1)…”

It appears correct that Thomas did understand the antecedent will as a part of the will of sign (or revealed will), as Thomas says in the same place that such a will refers to things as good in themselves, and (Reply to Objection 1):

“This distinction [between antecedent and consequent] must not be taken as applying to the divine will itself, in which there is nothing antecedent nor consequent, but to the things willed.”

Macedo goes on regarding Scotus:

These difficulties [between other Thomists] are not found in Scotus, who places the antecedent will as inefficacious and insofar as it depends on God bestowing by it the common aids, which is likewise a will of sign (as Lychetus expounds there), and calls the consequent will one of good pleasure and the ultimate determination, which produces its effect and is therefore efficacious…

that passage of Scotus in the same place (1st dist., q. 46, sole question, respondeo enim secundo): ‘When the divine will determines itself to placing something in being in the ultimate determination, it will exist.'” p. 844

Related Pages

On Calling

Is an Aspect of God’s Will Ineffectual?

Compatibility of Irresistible & Resistible Grace

On Revealed or Supernatural Theology

On the Will of God

On Predestination & the Decrees of God