Dist. 40
by St. Bonaventure
Source text: Public Domain Mark 1.0. English translation/apparatus/encoding: CC BY-NC 4.0, Wroot Press.
https://bonaventure.wrootpress.com/browse/1/d/40/q/bon-sent-I-d40-littera
----------------------------------------
### DISTINCTION XL.

Predestination, however, is of saving goods and of human beings to be saved. For as Augustine says in [his] book *On the Predestination of the Saints*: « predestination is the preparation of grace, which cannot be without foreknowledge. But foreknowledge can be without predestination. For by predestination God foreknew those things which He Himself was about to do; but God also foreknew those things which He was not Himself about to do, that is, all evils ». He predestined those whom He chose, but the rest He reprobated, that is, He foreknew [them] as being about to sin unto eternal death.

#### Chapter I.

*Whether any predestined [person] can be damned, or any reprobate be saved.*

None of the predestined seems able to be damned, nor any of the reprobate able to be saved. Whence Augustine in [his] book *On Rebuke and Grace*: « In the Apocalypse, he says, it is said: *Hold what you have, lest another receive your crown*. If another is not going to receive [it], unless this man dif-

fers, the number of the elect is certain », that is, [it] cannot be increased or diminished. — But against this certain [persons] object, striving to prove that the number of the elect can be increased and diminished, thus: God could not apply grace to those to whom He [does] apply [it], and could withdraw [it] from those from whom He does not withdraw [it]; if this should happen, they would assuredly be damned. Therefore those could be damned who nevertheless will be saved. Thus the number of the elect could be diminished; just so it could be increased, because grace could be applied to those to whom it is not applied, by which they would be saved. Therefore those could be saved, having received grace, who nevertheless without it will be damned: thus the number of the elect could be increased. — To which we respond [that] from that ratio [of speaking] it is said and is true, [that] the number of the elect cannot be increased or diminished, because both cannot be at once, namely that anyone be saved and not be predestined, or that anyone be predestined and damned. For the understanding of an implicit condition makes truth in the saying and impossibility in the matter. But if [the saying] is understood simply [i.e., absolutely], the impossibility is not admitted, as when it is said: *the predestined [one] cannot [be damned], or the reprobate can be saved*. For in these and similar locutions, the meaning of the expression is to be judged from the ground of the saying. For one understanding arises if these sayings are taken by way of conjunction, and another if [taken] by way of disjunction, as was previously prefaced above, when foreknowledge was being treated. For if, when you say *the predestined [one] cannot be damned*, you understand it thus — that is, [it] cannot be that he be predestined and [also] damned — you speak truly, because you understand [it] conjunctively; but [it is] false if [understood] disjunctively, as if you should understand that this [person] cannot be damned whom I call predestined. For he could have been not predestined, and so be damned.

Yet still they press on and, arguing by way of conjunction, proceed thus. For, they say, it cannot be that anyone be predestined and damned. Both of these cannot be at once; but one of them cannot not-be, namely that this [person] be predestined: for he is predestined from eternity and cannot now not-be predestined. Since therefore it is impossible that both be at once, and impossible that one not-be, it seems that the other cannot be — namely, that he be damned. But if this is so, then it cannot be that he not be saved. — In the solution of this question I would rather hear others than teach. Yet we say [that] a similar question can be raised about foreknowledge; and so, both here and there, we make one response, saying that what must be determined is that on which the whole of this question rests, namely *it is impossible that the other* *not-be*, namely, that this [person] now is predestined; for from eternity this [person] is predestined. For a distinction must be made when he says: *this [one] cannot now not-be predestined*, or *cannot now be without being predestined*. For this can be understood both conjunctively and disjunctively. For [it] cannot be that he be predestined from eternity and now not be predestined, nor can [it] be at once that he be predestined and not be predestined; yet it could have been from eternity that he were not predestined, and he could from eternity not have been predestined. And just as from eternity God could have not predestined him, so it is conceded by certain [persons] that even now God can not have predestined him. Therefore from eternity God can not have predestined him: therefore this [person] can not have been predestined. But if he had not been predestined, neither would he now be predestined: therefore he can now not-be predestined. So also they say of foreknowledge and of the foreknown; which they in no way concede with regard to actions or operations of God and human beings. For from the [moment] something has been done or said, they do not concede that it can not-be or not have been; on the contrary, [it is] impossible that what has been done or said not-be or [not] have been — referring possibility or impossibility to the nature of the existing thing. But when treating God's foreknowledge or predestination, possibility or impossibility is referred to God's power, which always was and is the same, because predestination, foreknowledge, [and] power are one in God.

#### Chapter II.

*What God's reprobation is, and in what it is considered, and what the effect of predestination is.*

And since predestination is the preparation of grace — that is, the divine election by which He chose those whom He willed *before the founding of the world*, as the Apostle says — reprobation, conversely, is to be understood as the foreknowledge of certain ones' iniquity and the preparation of damnation for those same. For just as the effect of predestination is that grace by which in the present we are justified and helped to live rightly and to persevere in the good, and that [grace] by which we are beatified in the future; so God's reprobation, by which from eternity by not electing He reprobated certain ones, is considered according to two [things], one of which He foreknows and does not prepare, that is iniquity, [and] the other He foreknows and prepares, namely eternal punishment. Whence Augustine to Prosper and Hilary: « This, he says, rule must be unshakably held: that sinners have been foreknown in [their] sins, not prepared [for them], but punishment has been prepared ». « For God prepared, as Augustine says in [his] book *On the Gift of Perseverance*, in His foreknowledge those to whom He willed His own good things; and to whomever He gives, undoubtedly He foreknew Himself as about to give ». « God also prepared, as Fulgentius says, an eternal fire for the wicked — for those, namely, whom He justly prepared for the suffering of punishments; yet He did not

prepare [them] for the doing of sins. For God prepared what divine equity would render, not what human iniquity would commit. For He did not, just as He prepared the saints for the receiving of justice, [so also] prepare the wicked for the losing of justice — because He has never been a preparer of depravity ».

Therefore just as God's predestination, properly [speaking], is the foreknowledge and preparation of God's benefits, by which most certainly are freed whoever are freed; so God's reprobation is the foreknowledge of malice in certain [persons] not [to be] ended and the preparation of punishment not [to be] terminated. And just as the effect of predestination is the application of grace, so of eternal reprobation *the effect seems in some manner to be hardening*. « God does not harden, as Augustine says to Sixtus, by imparting malice, but by not imparting grace, just as [the wicked] are not worthy. For those to whom [grace] is not imparted are neither worthy nor deserving; rather they are worthy and deserve that it should not be imparted ». Whence the Apostle says: *On whom He wills, God has mercy, and whom He wills He hardens* — calling mercy predestination and especially the effect of predestination, that is, the application of grace, and [calling] hardening the privation of grace. « For one ought not, as Augustine says to Simplician, understand that God so hardens as if He compelled anyone to sin; yet to certain sinners He does not bestow the mercy of His justification, and on this account He is said to harden them, because He does not have mercy on them — not because He impels [them] to sin. But He does not have mercy on those to whom He judges grace not [to be] given, by an equity most hidden and most remote from human senses »; « which the Apostle does not unveil but admires, saying: *O depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God!* »

---