They violated the catholic Christian consciousness. They were at once opposed by Rabanus Maurus, Archbishop of Mayence, (ob. 856,) who affirmed that predestination was based on foreknowledge, that Christ died for all men, and that God would that all should be saved. How repulsive to the Christian public the views of Gottschalk were is plain from this statement of Rabanus to Hincmar, (see Hagenbach, ii, 57 :) “Notum sit dilectioni vestrae, quod quidem gyrovagus monachus; nomine Gotescale, qui se asserit sacerdotem in nostra parochia ordinatum, de Italia venit ad nos Moguntiam, novas superstitiones et noxiam doctrinam de praedestinatione Dei introducens et populos in errorem mitteus; dicens quod praedestinatio Dei, sicut in bono, sic ita et in malo, at tales sint in hoc mundo quidam, qui propter praedestinationem Dei, quae eos cogat in mortem ire, non possint ab errore et peccato se corrigere, quasi Deus eos fecisset ab initio incorrigibilis esse, et poenae obnoxios in interitum ire."

Gottschalk's views were condemned by the Synod of Mayence in 848, and by that of Quiercy in 849. By the influence of Hinemar a second synod of Quiercy in 853 affirmed that election is conditioned upon foreknowledge, that the freedom of will lost in Adam is restored in Christ, that Christ died for all, and that God willed the salvation of all.

A few dissident bishops in vain opposed these positions in synods at Valence and at Langres, (859.) The revival of Augustinianism was but of spasmodic duration. The catholic consciousness would not, and never did, give up these sentiments, (affirmed at Quiercy in 853,) to wit: "Homo libero arbitrio male utens peccavit et cecidit. Deus elegit secundum praescientiam suam. Perituros non praedestinavit ut perirent. Libertatem arbitrii quam in primo homine perdidimus, per Christum recepimus. Et habemus liberum arbitrium ad bonum, praeventum et adjutum gratia; et habemus liberum arbitrius ad malum, desertum gratia. Deus omnes homines sine exceptione vult salvos fieri, licet non omnes salventur."

From Hinemar we pass now to the next great exponent of catholicity, Peter Lombard, ob. cir. 1160. Lombard is an earnest defender of the ethical nature of the religious life. He holds that faith, though assisted by prevenient grace, is an act not of God but of man, and that this act is pleasing to

God, and is rewarded by God by richer gifts of grace. He says, (Sent., lib. ii, d. 27:) "Actus nostri sunt meritorii in quantum procedunt ex libero arbitrio moto a Deo per gratiam. Unde omnis actus humanus, qui subjicitur libero arbitrio, si sit relatus in Deum, potest meritorius esse. Ipsum autem credere est actus intellectus assentientis veritati divinae ex imperio voluntatis a Deo motae per gratiam : et sic subjacet libero arbitrio in ordine ad Deum: unde actus fidei potest esse meritorius si tamen adsit caritas."

In Anselm (ob. 1109) there is a partial leaning toward Augustine. Nevertheless, he held it as absurd to say that man is free to evil but not free to good, ("non esse liberum arbitrium nisi ad mala.") He endeavored to maintain freedom of will without giving up predestination. The beginning of a holy life presupposes prevenient grace; its continuance, attending grace. Anselm makes no use of merely formal freedom, therein agreeing with Augustine.

Bernard (ob. 1153) taught that freedom of will remains after the fall. It is real, though feeble-" etsi miserum, tamen integrum." To will (velle) is present, but to accomplish (posse) is lacking. Here is the need of grace. In this Bernard agrees with Lombard, who says: "Dei gratiam non advocat hominis voluntas vel operatio, sed ipsa gratia voluntatem praevenit praeparando ut velit bonum, et praeparatam adjuvat ut perficiat." Thus, though man is free, yet without grace he cannot free himself from the bondage of depravity. This brings us back to the true catholic view, which has prevailed, on the whole, from the beginning.

The slightly wavering course of Anselm was followed by Hugo, St. Victor, Alexander Hales, Albertus Magnus, Thomas Aquinas, and some others. These all insist, however, on the moral autonomy of man, and thus defend the original and permanent catholic view in a manner which Augustine would have condemned; but yet they retained the use of the Augustinian phraseology on the subject of foreknowledge and predestination, and vainly endeavored to explain the latter into consistency with the former.

St. Victor (ob. 1141) says: "We must distinguish from each other the act of willing in itself and the direction of the will to a particular object. Willing in itself is purely the act of

man; but as soon as it directs itself to particular objects it finds itself limited by the divine order of the world, so that it can take only the direction where the way has been left open for it by the latter." Before his fall man was equally able to sin or not to sin, "posse peccare et posse non peccare.” After the fall, and without grace, he can only sin, "posse peccare et non posse non peccare." By the aid of prevenient grace he can sin or not sin, "posse peccare et posse non peccare." In the state of Christian sanctification he has risen above the liability to sin, "posse non peccare et non posse peccare.' With such essentially catholic synergistic views the retention of predestination could manifestly be but an empty phraseology.

Alexander Hales (ob. 1245) says: "God's foreknowledge is all-embracing, and yet man's acts are truly free and contingent. Free-will and destination stand in no contradiction to each other Ipsum liberum nostrum arbitrium est una causarum secundum cujus ordinationem ad suos effectus currit series fati." With these views of Hales Albertus Magnus fully coincides. He distinctly holds that human volition is a true

cause.

Thomas Aquinas, (ob. 1274,) though seriously entangled in the innovations of Augustine, yet constantly repels the unethical consequences of that system. He assigns a positive value to the free-will of man. Says Shedd, (ii, 312) Aquinas "teaches that the remission of sin depends to a certain extent upon the character and conduct of the individual." Thus Aquinas is a synergist.

Bonaventura (ob. 1274) speaks of predestination, but bases it in God's foreknowledge of the free conduct of man: "Praescientia includit in cognitione liberum arbitrium et ejus cooperationem et vertibilitatem." This is the uniform catholic view.

Duns Scotus (ob. 1308) is no longer hampered by the novelties of Augustine. He thoroughly safeguards man's moral autonomy. In the will we are to distinguish between potentia and habitus, between formal freedom and determined freedom. The latter is generated by the action of the former, and not the converse, as Augustine taught; otherwise, freedom would be compromised. Conformity to the will of God, as effected by man in co-operation with grace, constitutes a fitness for

heavenly reward. Predestination is contingent. It in no way binds the freedom of man.

The tendency of Duns Scotus in respect to man's moral autonomy was the prevailing one in the following centuries.

We pass at once to the last of the scholastics, Gabriel Biel, ob. 1495. Biel taught that inherited depravity is not per se positive, damnable sin. It is a defect, (“ carentia justitiae originalis.") Man, though free, is yet unable without assisting grace ("gratia gratum faciens ") to lead a God-pleasing life. It is only by the co-operation of grace and our own moral nature that rewardable virtue (" bonum meritorium ") is possible. Biel went so far as to hold that as man possesses real, not seeming, moral freedom, hence he is abstractly able to avoid sin; but that, nevertheless, in the concrete reality of life this abstract possibility is never realized. A holy life is never realized without grace. Such is the extent of Biel's much-decried Pelagianism.

But the uncatholic fatalism of Augustine was not entirely lost sight of. Occasionally an isolated mind, charmed with its seeming high appreciation of grace, raised a feeble voice in its behalf. Thus Thomas Bradwardine (ob. 1349) pro

claimed the most absolute fatalism. In order to exalt God and abase man he held that God is the sole, direct, absolute cause of all that takes place in time. Hence there is no ground for a distinction between foreordination and foreknowledge. Predestination does not depend on foreknowledge-"quod nulla scientia Dei causatur a posterioribus rebus scitis." Even sin is, in a certain sense, willed by God. Man's will is a mere form in which God's will operates. God's will and grace are irresistible and unconditioned.

It was only by such uncatholic, unscriptural, fatalistic, and pantheistic errors that earnest though narrow men like Gottschalk and Bradwardine undertook to counteract the over-emphasizing of human ability which had practically, not theoretically, been occasionally exhibited by official orthodoxy. It is but the uniform phenomenon of human weakness. "Similia similibus curantur." One error is thought to be cured by another. But the matter is worse than that in this case. For a merely practical error is thought to be cured by committing a grave theological one. Human autonomy, moral liberty, is

thought to be kept within due limits by suppressing it altogether. Divine co-operating grace is thought to be honored by making it all-operative, and by changing it from an ethical to a magico-dynamic character.

The earnest Wiclif (ob. 1384) fell into this fatalistic departure from catholicity. In the footsteps of Bradwardine he held that God's causative action is the sole cause of all that is. And he avoided making God the direct cause of sin only by denying all positive character to sin. Sin is not an actuality, but simply a non ens. So far as sin exists, it is willed by God: "Deus necessitat creaturas singulas activas ad quemlibet actum suum." This manifestly annihilates all possibility of human freedom. And yet Wiclif stands aghast at this consequence, and endeavors by subtleties to avoid it. Thus his moral consciousness is synergistic and catholic, while his speculations are Augustinian and Gottschalkian.

It is by a curious though entirely unessential connection of things that the Reformation of the sixteenth century-that intense virtualization of man's moral autonomy, (avrežovolov,) that highest proof of the reality of man's individual initiative power-becoming outwardly associated with an unorthodox form of doctrine, theoretically annihilated that very autonomy of which it was itself the intensest exemplification. That this association of a revived Christian life in Luther, Zwinglius, and Calvin with uncatholic and unorthodox notions of an unconditional predestination and of the irresistibility of grace, was not essential but simply incidental, is evident (to cite but a single reason) from the entire absence of these notions from the great Wesleyan revival of the eighteenth century. What more thorough, spiritual, and lasting reformation than this can be cited in the whole history of the Church? And who denies its thoroughly synergistic character ?

But the alliance of the Reformation with an uncatholic speculative theology is readily accounted for on historical grounds. By the time of the Reformation it had become a long-standing tradition that opposition to the official orthodoxy should assume the form of an exaggerated Augustinianism. In the first place the predestinarian innovations of Augustine himself had been officially condemned. Then, in the ninth century, when the wandering monk, Gottschalk, put himself