Mozley: A Treatise on the Augustinian Doctrine of

CHAP. in. The Pelagian Controversy. 77
1
under a necessity to evil, was plausible but ; there is
plainly a difference between exposing men to the risk, and
subjecting them to the certainty of moral evil, and that
evil in some cases eternal. The issue being alike foreseen
in both cases ; in the one the sinner has had the opportunity
of a better issue given him, and has therefore only himself
to blame for the worse one ; in the other he has had no
such opportunity. The appeal to God s natural providence
and his support and nourishment of evil men in the world
as an analogous case to the creation of men as evil, was
still more incorrect. 2
2. The objection to the punishment of mankind for the
sin of Adam, on the score of the Divine justice, was an
swered by an appeal to facts ;
an appeal which divided into
two great heads the fact of sin, and the fact of pain.
First, how were we to account for the fact of sin, as it
1 Ut quid creat quos impios
futures et damnandos esse prsescivit.
Op. Imp. 1. 1. c. 48., vid. 119.
121; 1. 5. c. 13.
The argument, however, with a
modification, may claim the more
recent authority of Archbp.Whately,
who : says We should be very
cautious how we employ such wea
pons as may recoil upon ourselves
. . . Why the Almighty does not
cause to die in the cradle every
infant whose future wickedness and
misery, if suffered to grow up, He
foresees, is what no system of re
ligion, natural or revealed, will
enable us satisfactorily to account
for. Essays on S. Paul, p. 88. But
is there not some confusion of
thought in this argument ? As
stated by S. Augustine, it is inform
absurd. For the difficulty in the
constitution of things which he sets
against that of reprobation, or
creating a being to be eternally
miserable, is would be a contradiction that He
should not. Facts cannot first be
foreseen, and then because they a,re
foreseen be prevented. Archbishop
Whately, however, relieves the ar
gument from this absurdity, by
making foresight
this, that God foresees
men s evil lives and their judicial
result, and i/et creates them. But if
God forsees men s evil lives, He by
the hypothesis creates them, and it
to be the foresight
"
of men s future wickedness and
misery if suffered to grow up" But
what can be meant by the foresight
of events which, by the very suppo
sition, may not take place ? This
alleged difficulty, then, in the con
stitution of things, cannot be stated
without a great absurdity and con
tradiction whereas the ;
difficulty of
God creating a being to be eternally
miserable is as plain and simple a
one as can be conceived.
2
Sic creat malos quomodo pascit
et nutrit malos. De Nupt. et Cone.
1. 2. n. 32, 33. Julian : Quod pascit
Deus etiam peccatores, benignusque
est super ingratos et malos pietatis
est ejus testimonium non malignitatis.
. . . Vide ergo quarn nescias
quid loqueris, qui de exemplo misericordiae
voluisti crudelitatem probare.
1. Op. Imp. 5. c. 64.