Perfection of parts granted, perfection of degrees denied
Thesis XXXVI. What has been cited also shows something else. When these same Protestants say that believers keep the commandments of the divine law in a begun way and not absolutely, imperfectly and not completely, they do not mean to deny that the obedience believers give the law is whole and sincere. Nor do they deny that by it believers submit to the whole divine law and to each of its precepts, so that it makes up a righteousness that pleases God, has his approval, and will one day be graciously rewarded by him. The doctors of the Roman Church usually charge them with denying this.
So Protestants do not refuse the obedience of the regenerate the perfection we have called perfection of parts; they deny it only the one called perfection of degrees. They regularly use the distinction for this purpose, as can be seen in John Davenant, on actual righteousness, chapter 51:
'We have never denied that the regenerate, filled with the spirit of love, can love even their enemies, and can perform the other acts the Decalogue commands. But in doing these works they reach only what theologians call perfection of parts, not perfection of degrees.'
Latin
XXXVI. Ex iis etiam quae allata sunt patet, quum Protestantes iidem, affirment legis divinae mandata a fidelibus servari inchoate, non absolute; imperfecte, non consummate: per id eos negare nolle quin obedientia illa quam legi praestant, integra atque sincera sit, & quin per eam toti legi divinae, & singulis ejus praeceptis se submittant: adeoque quin constituat justitiam talem quae Deo placeat & probetur, & quam Deus olim benigne sit remuneraturus: contra quam ipsis tribuere solent Ecclesiae Romanae Doctores. Proindeque Protestantes Renatorum obedientiae non denegare perfectionem illam, quam partium diximus, & ab ea solum removere, quam graduum appellant. Quae distinctio in hunc usum ab ipsis adhiberi solet, ut videre est apud Joannem Davenantium, de justitia actuali, cap. 51. Neque nos, inquit, unquam inficias ivimus posse Renatos, & spiritu charitatis imbutos, etiam hostes suos diligere, posse etiam caeteros actus facere qui mandantur in Decalogo. Sed in operibus hisce faciendis, assequuntur illam solummodo quam Theologi appellant perfectionem partium, non perfectionem graduum.