Thirdly, This is not all that we jway for^ either for ourselves or
' " Inaniter et perftmctorie potius quam veraciter pro eis, iit doctrinfe cui adversantur credendo consentiant, Deo fundimus preces, si ad ejus non pertinet gratiam convertere ad fidem suam, ipsi fidei contrarias horaiuum voluutates." — August. Epist. ccxvii.
312 THE NATURE, CAUSES, AND MEANS [BOOK III.
others, when we beg effectual grace for them or ourselves. There was no argument that the ancients more pressed the Pelagians withal than that the grace which they acknowledged did not answer the prayers of the church, or wliat Ave are taught in the Scrij)ture to pray for. We are to pray only for what God hath pro- mised, and for the communication of it unto us in that way whereby he will work it and effect it. Now, he is at a great indifferency in this matter who only prays that God would persuade him or others to believe aiid to obey, to be converted or to convert himself. The church of God hath always prayed that God would work these things in us; and those who have a real concernment in them do pray continually that God would effectually work them in their hearts. They pray that he would convert them ; that he would create a clean heart and renew a right sj)irit in them; that he would give them faith for Christ's sake, and increase it in them ; and that in all these things he would work in them by the exceeding greatness of his power both to will and to do according to his good pleasure. And there is not a Pelagian in the world who ever once prayed for grace, or gracious assistance against sin and temptation, with a sense of his want of it, but that his prayers contradicted his profes- sion. To think that by all these petitions, with others innumerable dictated unto us in the Scripture, and which a spiritual sense of our wants will engage into, we desire nothing but only that God would persuade, excite, and stir us up to put forth a power and ability of our own in the performance of what we desire, is contrary unto all Christian experience. Yea, for a man to lie praying with importunity, earnestness, and fervency, for that which is in his own power, and can never be effected but by his own power, is fond and ridiculous ; and they do but mock God who pray unto him to do that for them which they can do for themselves, and which God cannot do for them but only when and as they do it themselves. Suppose a man to have a power in himself to believe and repent; suppose these to be such acts of his will as God doth not, indeed can- not, by his grace work in him, but only persuade him thereunto, and show him sufficient reason why he should so do, — to what purpose should this man, or with what congruity could he, pray that God would give him faith and repentance? This some of late, as it seems, wisely observing, do begin to scoff at and reproach the prayers of Christians; for whereas, in all their supplications for grace, they lay the foundation of them in an humble acknowledgment of their own vileness and impotency unto any thing that is spiritually good, yea, and a natural aversation from it, and a sense of the power and work- ing of the remainder of indwelling sin in them, hereby exciting themselves unto that earnestness and importunity in their requests
CHAP, v.] OF REGENERATION. 313
for grace which their condition makes necessary^ (which hath been the constant practice of Christians since there was one in the world), tliis is by them derided and exposed to contempt. In the room, therefore, of such despised prayers, I shall supply them with an an- cient form that is better suited unto their principles.^ The preface unto it is, "Ille ad Deum digne elevat manus, ille orationem bona conscientia effundit qui potest dicere." The prayer followeth: — "Tu nosti Domine quam sanctse et purse et mundge sint ab omni malitia, et iniquitate, et rapina quas ad te extendo manus: quem- admodum justa et munda labia et ab omni mendacio libera quibus offero tibi dei^recationes, ut mihi miserearis." This prayer Pelagius taught a widow to make, as it was objected unto him in the Diospo- litan synod, that is at Lydda in Palestine, cap. vi. ; only he taught her not to say that she had no deceit in her heart, as one among us doth wisely and humbly vaunt that he knoweth of none in his, so every way perfect is the man ! Only to balance this of Pelagius, I shall give these men another prayer, but in the margin,^ not declar- ing whose it is, lest they should censure him to the gallows. Where- as, therefore, it seems to be the doctrine of some that we have no grace from Christ but only that of the gospel teaching us our duty, and pro- posing a reward, I know not what they have to pray for, unless it be riches, wealth, and preferments, with those things that depend thereon. Fourthly, This kind of the operation of grace, where it is solitary, — that is, where it is asserted exclusively to an internal physical work of the Holy Spirit, — is not suited to effect and produce the work of regeneration or conversion unto God in persons who are really in that state of nature which we have before described. The most effectual persuasions cannot prevail with such men to convert them- selves, any more than arguments can prevail with a blind, man to see, or with a dead man to rise from the grave, or with a lame man to walk steadily. Wherefore, the whole description before given from the Scripture of the state of lapsed nature must be disproved and