Page:The Protestant ethic and the spirit of capitalism.djvu/251

 who teaches the mildest form of predestination, faith means subjection to Christ in heart and in deed. “Do what you are able first, and then complain of God for denying you grace if you have cause", was his answer to the objection that the will was not free and God alone was able to insure salvation (Works of the Puritan Divines, IV, p. 155). The investigation of Fuller (the Church historian) was limited to the one question of practical proof and the indications of his state of grace in his conduct. The same with Howe in the passage referred to elsewhere. Any examination of the Works of the Puritan Divines gives ample proofs.

Not seldom the conversion to Puritanism was due to Catholic ascetic writings, thus, with Baxter, a Jesuit tract. These conceptions were not wholly new compared with Calvin's own doctrine (Instit. Christ, chap. i, original edition of 1536, pp. 97, 113). Only for Calvin himself the certainty of salvation could not be attained in this manner (p. 147). Generally one referred to 1 John iii. 5 and similar passages. The demand for fides efficax is not—to anticipate—limited to the Calvinists. Baptist confessions of faith deal, in the article on predestination, similarly with the fruits of faith ("and that its—of regeneration proper evidence appears in the holy fruits of repentance and faith and newness of life"—Article 7 of the Confession printed in the Baptist Church Manual by J. N. Brown, D.D., Philadelphia, Am. Bapt. Pub. Soc.). In the same way the tract (under Mennonite influence), Oliif-Tacxken, which the Harlem Synod adopted in 1649, begins on page 1 with the question of how the children of God are to be known, and answers (p. 10): "Nu al is't dat dasdanigh vruchtbare ghelove alleene zii het seker fondamentale kennteeken—om de conscientien der gelovigen in het nieuwe verbondt der genade Gods te versekeren."

53. Of the significance of this for the material content of social ethics some hint has been given above. Here we are interested not in the content, but in the motives of moral action.

54. How this idea must have promoted the penetration of Puritanism with the Old Testament Hebrew spirit is evident.

55. Thus the Savoy Declaration says of the members of the ecclesia pura that they are "saints by effectual calling, visibly manifested by their profession and walking”.

56. "A Principle of Goodness", Charnock in the Works of the Puritan Divines, p. 175.

57. Conversion is, as Sedgwick puts it, an "exact copy of the decree of predestination". And whoever is chosen is also called to obedience and made capable of it, teaches Bailey. Only those whom God calls to His faith (which is expressed in their conduct) are true believers, not merely temporary believers, according to the (Baptist) Confession of Hanserd Knolly.

58. Compare, for instance, the conclusion to Baxter's Christian Directory.