CCXXXI. Corollary XXVII

COROLLARY XXVII.

Thus far we have spoken concerning the things themselves; it now remains that we speak concerning the formulas by which they are customarily expressed and explained. Now among the formulas that one is most commonly used by the Fathers and ecclesiastical writers¹ by which they designate the principal cause of restoration and merciful love with the appellation of the first and antecedent will. Concerning this appellation, indeed, in order that its full force may become known, these things must be investigated before the rest: 1) whence the Fathers and ecclesiastical writers derived it; 2) of what kind they handed down the character and nature of the first will to be; 3) what fountain they assigned to it; and 4) what endowments and properties they ascribed to it. Now, that I may begin from what I placed first, whoever weighs the testimonies, very numerous in number and evident in perspicuity, which we have reported², will be wholly unable to deny that the appellation of the first and antecedent will was drawn from those things which either stand forth in the divine writings, or are elicited from them when compared with one another, or a more inward consideration of the divine nature, such as it shines forth in the Scriptures, supplies of its own accord. And Catholic doctors used it precisely because they judged it to be contained ἀμέσως, immediately, in the Scriptures; because they judged that not a few testimonies of the Scriptures could neither be reduced to harmony nor skillfully explained unless a first and antecedent will were established; and because they finally judged the divine nature to be depicted in the Scriptures with such colors that a first and antecedent will must necessarily be attributed to it. Therefore, no more excellent or more noble origin could belong to this appellation, since it was—

—drawn from those things which Scripture comprehends³ ἀμέσως, immediately, or ἐμμέσως, mediately.