Richard Baxter's Catholic theology plain, pure, peaceable, for pacification of the dogmatical word-warriors who,…Richard Baxter's Catholick theologie plain, pure, peaceable, for pacification of the dogmatical word-warriours who,…

168. But if this were so, then ☞ 1. The suspension of the will might be nevertheless by force or restraint: which is a non velle; And so when they say Voluntatem ab ipso Deo non cogi posse, because when it acteth it acteth willingly, (that is, when it willeth, it willeth) the consequence holdeth not, because it may be forced from all action: (unless they mean that it cannot nolle & non agere at once). 2. And if this were so, then either they mean that God cannot naturally necessitate the will to act, or that such a natural necessitation consisteth with its Liberty. If ⟨p. 29⟩the first, they destroy their doctrine of Predetermination: For what is that but Gods Physical irresistible efficacious premotion, determining the will to act? And what is natural necessitation if this be not? If the latter, then they contradict their own definition of Liberty, which they oft give us, that it is Liberty from natural necessity (which Twiss calleth Libertas naturae distinct from Libertas conditionis, vel civilis.) And what more natural necessity than that which resulteth from that premotion of God as the first cause of all action, without which no agent natural or free can act, and which none can resist?

168. But if this were so, then ☞ 1. The suspension of the will might be nevertheless by force or restraint: which is a non velle; And so when they say Voluntatem ab ipso Deo non cogi posse, because when it acteth it acteth willingly, (that is, when it willeth, it willeth) the consequence holdeth not, because it may be forced from all action: (unless they mean that it cannot nolle & non agere at once). 2. And if this were so, then either they mean that God cannot naturally necessitate the will to act, or that such a natural necessitation consisteth with its Liberty. If ⟨p. 29⟩the first, they destroy their doctrine of Predetermination: For what is that but Gods Physical irresistible efficacious premotion, determining the will to act? And what is natural necessitation if this be not? If the latter, then they contradict their own definition of Liberty, which they oft give us, that it is Liberty from natural necessity (which Twiss calleth Libertas naturae distinct from Libertas conditionis, vel civilis.) And what more natural necessity than that which refulteth from that premotion of God as the first cause of all action, without which no agent natural or free can act, and which none can resist?