A. We grant that there is a universal gift of the Holy Spirit, if by the Holy Spirit is meant the natural light of reason and conscience, and the manifold impulses to good which struggle against the evil of man's nature. But we regard as wholly unscriptural the assumptions: (a) that this gift of the Holy Spirit of itself removes the depravity or condemnation derived from Adam's fall; (b) that without this gift man would not be responsible for being morally imperfect; and (c) that at the beginning of moral life men consciously appropriate their inborn tendencies to evil.
John Wesley adduced in proof of universal grace the text: John 1:9—“the light which lighteth every man”—which refers to the natural light of reason and conscience which the preincarnate Logos bestowed on all men, though in different degrees, before his coming in the flesh. This light can be called the Holy Spirit, because it was “the Spirit of Christ”(1 Pet. 1:11). The Arminian view has a large element of truth in its recognition of an influence of Christ, the immanent God, which mitigates the effects of the Fall and strives to prepare men for salvation. But Arminianism does not fully recognize the evil to be removed, and it therefore exaggerates the effect of this divine working. Universal grace does not remove man's depravity or man's condemnation; as is evident from a proper interpretation of Rom. 5:12-19 and of Eph. 2:3; it only puts side by side with that depravity and condemnation influences and impulses which counteract the evil and urge the sinner to repentance: John 1:5—“the light shineth in the darkness; and the darkness apprehended it not.” John Wesley also referred to Rom. 5:18—“through one act of righteousness the free gift came unto all men to justification of life”—but here the “all men” is conterminous with “the many”who are “made righteous” in verse 19, and with the “all” who are “made alive” in 1 Cor. 15:22; in other words, the “all” in this case is “all believers”: else the passage teaches, not universal gift of the Spirit, but universal salvation.
Arminianism holds to inherited sin, in the sense of infirmity and evil tendency, but not to inherited guilt. John Wesley, however, by holding also that the giving of ability is a matter of grace and not of justice, seems to imply that there is a common guilt as well as a common sin, before consciousness. American Arminians are more logical, but less Scriptural. Sheldon, Syst. Christian Doctrine, 321, tells us that “guilt cannot possibly be a matter of inheritance, and consequently original sin can be affirmed of the posterity of Adam only in the sense of hereditary corruption, which first becomes an occasion of guilt when it is embraced by the will of the individual.” How little the Arminian means by “sin,” can be inferred from the saying of Bishop Simpson that “Christ inherited sin.” He meant of course only physical and intellectual infirmity, without a tinge of guilt. “A child inherits its parent's nature,” it is said, “not as a punishment, but by natural law.” But we reply that this natural law is itself an expression of God's moral nature, and the inheritance of evil can be justified only upon the ground of a common non-conformity to God in both the parent and the child, or a participation of each member in the common guilt of the race.
In the light of our preceding treatment, we can estimate the element of good and the element of evil in Pfleiderer, Philos. Religion, 1:232—“It is an exaggeration when original sin is considered as personally imputable guilt; and it is going too far when it is held to be the whole state of the natural man, and yet the actually present good, the ‘original grace,’ is overlooked....We may say, with Schleiermacher, that original sin is the common deed and common guilt of the human race. But the individual always participates in this collective guilt in the measure in which he takes part with his personal doing in the collective act that is directed to the furtherance of the bad.” Dabney, Theology, 315, 316—“Arminianism is orthodox as to the legal consequences of Adam's sin to his posterity; but what it gives with one hand, it takes back with the other, [pg 604]attributing to grace the restoration of this natural ability lost by the Fall. If the effects of Adam's Fall on his posterity are such that they would have been unjust if not repaired by a redeeming plan that was to follow it, then God's act in providing a Redeemer was not an act of pure grace. He was under obligation to do some such thing,—salvation is not grace, but debt.” A. J. Gordon, Ministry of the Spirit, 187 sq., denies the universal gift of the Spirit, quoting John 14:17—“whom the world cannot receive; for it beholdeth him not, neither knoweth him”; 16:7—“if I go, I will send him unto you”; i. e., Christ's disciples were to be the recipients and distributers of the Holy Spirit, and his church the mediator between the Spirit and the world. Therefore Mark 16:15—“Go ye into all the world, and preach,”implies that the Spirit shall go only with them. Conviction of the Spirit does not go beyond the church's evangelizing. But we reply that Gen. 6:3 implies a wider striving of the Holy Spirit.
B. It contradicts Scripture in maintaining: (a) that inherited moral evil does not involve guilt; (b) that the gift of the Spirit, and the regeneration of infants, are matters of justice; (c) that the effect of grace is simply to restore man's natural ability, instead of disposing him to use that ability aright; (d) that election is God's choice of certain men to be saved upon the ground of their foreseen faith, instead of being God's choice to make certain men believers; (e) that physical death is not the just penalty of sin, but is a matter of arbitrary decree.
(a) See Dorner, Glaubenslehre, 2:58 (System of Doctrine, 2:352-359)—“With Arminius, original sin is original evil only, not guilt. He explained the problem of original sin by denying the fact, and turning the native sinfulness into a morally indifferent thing. No sin without consent; no consent at the beginning of human development; therefore, no guilt in evil desire. This is the same as the Romanist doctrine of concupiscence, and like that leads to blaming God for an originally bad constitution of our nature....Original sin is merely an enticement to evil addressed to the free will. All internal disorder and vitiosity is morally indifferent, and becomes sin only through appropriation by free will. But involuntary, loveless, proud thoughts are recognized in Scripture as sin; yet they spring from the heart without our conscious consent. Undeliberate and deliberate sins run into each other, so that it is impossible to draw a line between them. The doctrine that there is no sin without consent implies power to withhold consent. But this contradicts the universal need of redemption and our observation that none have ever thus entirely withheld consent from sin.”
(b) H. B. Smith's Review of Whedon on the Will, in Faith and Philosophy, 359-399—“A child, upon the old view, needs only growth to make him guilty of actual sin; whereas, upon this view, he needs growth and grace too.” See Bib. Sac., 20:327, 328. According to Whedon, Com. on Rom. 5:12, “the condition of an infant apart from Christ is that of a sinner, as one sure to sin, yet never actually condemned before personal apostasy. This would be its condition, rather, for in Christ the infant is regenerate and justified and endowed with the Holy Spirit. Hence all actual sinners are apostates from a state of grace.” But we ask: 1. Why then do infants die before they have committed actual sin? Surely not on account of Adam's sin, for they are delivered from all the evils of that, through Christ. It must be because they are still somehow sinners. 2. How can we account for all infants sinning so soon as they begin morally to act, if, before they sin, they are in a state of grace and sanctification? It must be because they were still somehow sinners. In other words, the universal regeneration and justification of infants contradict Scripture and observation.
(c) Notice that this “gracious” ability does not involve saving grace to the recipient, because it is given equally to all men. Nor is it more than a restoring to man of his natural ability lost by Adam's sin. It is not sufficient to explain why one man who has the gracious ability chooses God, while another who has the same gracious ability chooses self. 1 Cor. 4:7—“who maketh thee to differ?” Not God, but thyself. Over against this doctrine of Arminians, who hold to universal, resistible grace, restoring natural ability, Calvinists and Augustinians hold to particular, irresistible grace, giving moral ability, or, in other words, bestowing the disposition to use natural ability aright. “Grace” is a word much used by Arminians. Methodist Doctrine and Discipline, Articles of Religion, viii—“The condition of man after the fall of Adam is such that he cannot turn and prepare himself, by his own natural strength and works, to faith, and calling upon God; wherefore we have no power to do good works, pleasant and acceptable [pg 605]to God, without the grace of God by Christ preventing us, that we may have a good will, and working with us, when we have that good will.” It is important to understand that, in Arminian usage, grace is simply the restoration of man's natural ability to act for himself; it never actually saves him, but only enables him to save himself—if he will. Arminian grace is evenly bestowed grace of spiritual endowment, as Pelagian grace is evenly bestowed grace of creation. It regards redemption as a compensation for innate and consequently irresponsible depravity.
(d) In the Arminian system, the order of salvation is, (1) faith—by an unrenewed but convicted man; (2) justification; (3) regeneration, or a holy heart. God decrees not to originate faith, but to reward it. Hence Wesleyans make faith a work, and regard election as God's ordaining those who, he foresees, will of their own accord believe. The Augustinian order, on the contrary, is (1) regeneration; (2) faith; (3) justification. Memoir of Adolph Saphir, 255—“My objection to the Arminian or semi-Arminian is not that they make the entrance very wide; but that they do not give you anything definite, safe and real, when you have entered.... Do not believe the devil's gospel, which is a chance of salvation: chance of salvation is chance of damnation.”Grace is not a reward for good deeds done, but a power enabling us to do them. Francis Rous of Truro, in the Parliament of 1629, spoke as a man nearly frantic with horror at the increase of that “error of Arminianism which makes the grace of God lackey it after the will of man”; see Masson, Life of Milton, 1:277. Arminian converts say: “I gave my heart to the Lord”; Augustinian converts say: “The Holy Spirit convicted me of sin and renewed my heart.” Arminianism tends to self-sufficiency; Augustinianism promotes dependence upon God.
C. It rests upon false philosophical principles, as for example: (a) That the will is simply the faculty of volitions. (b) That the power of contrary choice, in the sense of power by a single act to reverse one's moral state, is essential to will. (c) That previous certainty of any given moral act is incompatible with its freedom. (d) That ability is the measure of obligation. (e) That law condemns only volitional transgression. (f) That man has no organic moral connection with the race.