The Literary Remains of Samuel Taylor Coleridge by Unknown
page 92 of 433 (21%)
page 92 of 433 (21%)
![]() | ![]() |
|
Yet doth not God's working upon the will take from it the power of
dissenting, and doing the contrary; but so inclineth it, that having liberty to do otherwise, yet she will actually determine so. This will not do. Were it true, then my understanding would be free in a mathematical proportion; or the whole position amounts only to this, that the will, though compelled, is still the will. Be it so; yet not a free will. In short, Luther and Calvin are right so far. A creaturely will cannot be free; but the will in a rational creature may cease to be creaturely, and the creature, [Greek: apostasis], finally cease in consequence; and this neither Luther nor Calvin seem to have seen. In short, where omnipotence is on one side, what but utter impotence can remain for the other? To make freedom possible, the 'antithesis' must be removed. The removal of this 'antithesis' of the creature to God is the object of the Redemption, and forms the glorious liberty of the Gospel. More than this I am not permitted to expose. Ib. p. 283. It is not given, nor is it wanting, to all men to have an insight into the mystery of the human will and its mode of inherence on the will which is God, as the ineffable 'causa sui'; but this chapter will suffice to convince you that the doctrines of Calvin were those of Luther in this point;--that they are intensely metaphysical, and that they are diverse 'toto genere' from the merely moral and psychological-- tenets of the modern Calvinists. Calvin would have exclaimed, 'fire and fagots!' before he had gotten through a hundred pages of Dr. Williams's Modern Calvinism. |
|