Theological Theses · §2522 · Louis Le Blanc de Beaulieu

Molina need not reconcile efficacy with freedom: grace is subject to choice

Thesis LXXXIV. Plainly, then, Molina has no need to labour at reconciling the efficacy of divine grace with the freedom of human choice. He makes God's grace subject to man's free choice, and will not allow any aid of grace to be so efficacious that it determines free choice to act of itself.

Whatever aid from God is supposed to precede a good action, the human will's dissent can always coexist with it, and it remains in a person's power to use it as he pleases or not to use it.

Latin

LXXXIV. Hinc patet nullo modo Molinae laborandum esse, ut efficaciam gratiae divinae cum arbitrii humani libertate conciliet. Siquidem Dei gratiam libero hominis arbitrio subjicit; nec vult ullum ejus auxilium esse tantae efficacitatis, ut liberum arbitrium ad agendum ex se determinet; sed qualecunque Dei auxilium ad bonam actionem praevium supponatur, cum eo semper stare posse voluntatis humanae dissensum, & in hominis potestate manere illo pro libitu uti, vel non uti.

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About this text

Louis Le Blanc, a Reformed professor at Sedan, sets out theology in theses argued against Rome: Scripture, faith, grace, free choice, good works and the saints.

This volume holds the Theses on Theology I–XLIII and On Faith I–XXII, in eighteen sections.

Louis Le Blanc de Beaulieu (1614–1675) was minister and professor of theology at the Academy of Sedan, the Reformed school on France's eastern border. His Theses were disputed by students over many years and collected in a London folio (1675).

The Theological Theses range across the whole Reformed system — Scripture, God, predestination, grace, and justifying faith — in the crisp thesis-and-proof form of the seventeenth-century schools.

Date1675 AD (Sedan theses; London collection)

No modern English.

Reference

ESTC R17887; Wing L802. IA bub_gb_eOkHAW4G0-wC (+ EEBO 1675 for gap leaves).

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