The Bell Witch: The Full Account (48 page)

F I T Z H U G H

us be ashamed to be ignorant of some things

relative to a subject in which there is a kind of

learned ignorance. Rather let us abstain with

cheerfulness from the pursuit of that knowledge,

the affectation of which is foolish, dangerous, and

even fatal.

But if we are stimulated by the wantonness of

intellect, we must oppose it with a reflection

calculated to repress it, that as “it is not good to

eat much honey, so for men to search their own

glory, is not glory.” For there is sufficient to deter

us from that presumption, which can only

precipitate us into ruin.

III. Others, desirous of remedying this evil, will

have all mention of predestination to be as it were

buried; they teach men to avoid every question

concerning it as they would a precipice. Though

their moderation is to be commended, in judging

that mysteries ought to be handled with such

great sobriety, yet, as they descend too low, they

have little influence on the mind of man, which

refuses to submit to unreasonable restraints. To

observe, therefore, the legitimate boundary on this

side also, we must recur to the word of the Lord,

which affords a certain rule for the

understanding. For the Scripture is the school of

the Holy Spirit, in which, as nothing necessary

and useful to be known is omitted, so nothing is

taught which is not beneficial to know.

Whatever, therefore, is declared in the Scripture

concerning predestination, we must be cautious

not to withhold from believers, lest we appear

either to defraud them of the favor of their God, or

to reprove and censure the Holy Spirit for

publishing what it would be useful by any means

to suppress. Let us, I say, permit the Christian

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man to open his heart and his ears to all the

discourses addressed to him by God, only with

this moderation, that as soon as the Lord closes

his sacred mouth, he shall also desist from

further inquiry. This will be the best barrier of

sobriety, if in learning we not only follow the

leadings of God, but as soon as he ceases to

teach, we give up our desire of learning. Nor is

the danger they dread, sufficient to divert our

attention from the oracles of God.

It is a celebrated observation of Solomon, that “it

is the glory of God to conceal a thing.” But, as

both piety and common sense suggest that this is

not to be understood generally of every thing, we

must seek for the proper distinction, lest we

content ourselves with brutish ignorance under

the pretext of modesty and sobriety. Now, this

distinction is clearly expressed in a few words by

Moses “The secret things,” he says, “belong unto

the Lord our God; but those things which are

revealed belong unto us, and to our children

forever, that we may do all the words of this law.”

For we see how he enforces on the people

attention to the doctrine of the law only by the

celestial decree, because it pleased God to

promulgate it; and restrains the same people

within those limits with this single reason, that it

is not lawful for mortals to intrude into the secrets

of God.

IV. Profane persons, I confess, suddenly lay hold

of something relating to the subject of

predestination, to furnish occasion for objections,

cavils, reproaches, and ridicule. But if we are

frightened from it by their impudence, all the

principal articles of the faith must be concealed,

for there is scarcely one of them which such

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persons as these leave unviolated by blasphemy.

The refractory mind will discover as much

insolence, on hearing that there are three persons

in the Divine essence, as on being told, that when

God created man, He foresaw what would happen

concerning him. Nor will they refrain from

derision on being informed that little more than

five thousand years have elapsed since the

creation of the world. They will ask why the

power of God was so long idle and asleep.

Nothing can be advanced which they will not

endeavor to ridicule. Must we, in order to check

these sacrileges, say nothing of the Divinity of the

Son and Spirit, or pass over in silence the

creation of the world? In this instance, and every

other, the truth of God is too powerful to dread

the detraction of impious men; as is strenuously

maintained by Augustine, in his treatise on the

Perseverance of the Faithful.

We see the false apostles, with all their

defamation and accusation of the true doctrine of

Paul, could never succeed to make him ashamed

of it. Their assertion, that all this discussion is

dangerous to pious minds, because it is

inconsistent with exhortations, shakes their faith,

and disturbs and discourages the heart itself, is

without any foundation. Augustine admits, that

he was frequently blamed, on these accounts, for

preaching predestination too freely; but he readily

and amply refutes them.

But as many and various absurdities are crowded

upon us here, we prefer reserving every one to be

refuted in its proper place. I only desire this

general admission, that we should neither

scrutinize those things which the Lord has left

concealed, nor neglect those which He has openly

exhibited, lest we be condemned for excessive

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curiosity on the one hand, or for ingratitude on

the other. For it is judiciously remarked by

Augustine, that we may safely follow the

Scripture, which proceeds as with the pace of a

mother stooping to the weakness of a child, that it

may not leave our weak capacities behind.

But persons who are so cautious or timid, as to

wish predestination to be buried in silence, lest

feeble minds should be disturbed, with what

pretext, I ask, will they gloss over their arrogance,

which indirectly charges God with foolish

inadvertency, as though He foresaw not the

danger which they suppose they have had the

penetration to discover. Whoever, therefore,

endeavors to raise prejudices against the doctrine

of predestination, openly reproaches God, as

though something had inconsiderately escaped

from Him that is pernicious to the Church.

V. Predestination, by which God adopts some to

the hope of life, and adjudges others to eternal

death, no one, desirous of the credit of piety,

dares absolutely to deny. But it is involved in

many cavils, especially by those who make

foreknowledge the cause of it. We maintain, that

both belong to God; but it is preposterous to

represent one as dependent on the other.

When we attribute foreknowledge to God, we

mean that all things have ever been, and

perpetually remain, before His eyes, so that to His

knowledge nothing in future or past, but all

things are present; and present in such a manner,

that He does not merely conceive of them from

ideas formed in His mind, as things remembered

by us appear present to our minds, but really

beholds and sees them as if actually placed before

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Him. And this foreknowledge extends to the

whole world, and to all the creatures.

Predestination we call the eternal decree of God,

by which He has determined in Himself what

would have to become of every individual of

mankind. For they are not all created with a

similar destiny; but eternal life is fore-ordained for

some, and eternal damnation for others. Every

man, therefore, being created for one or the other

of these ends, we say, he is predestinated either to

life or to death. This God has not only testified in

particular persons, but has given a specimen of it

in the whole posterity of Abraham, which should

evidently show the future condition of every

nation to depend upon His decision. “When the

Most High divided the nations, when he separated

the sons of Adam, the Lord's portion was His

people; Jacob was the lot of His inheritance.”

The separation is before the eyes of all: in the

person of Abraham, as in the dry trunk of a tree,

one people is peculiarly chosen to the rejection of

others: no reason for this appears, except that

Moses, to deprive their posterity of all occasion of

glorying, teaches them that their exaltation is

wholly from God's gratuitous love. He assigns

this reason for their deliverance, that “He loved

their fathers, and chose their seed after them.”

More fully in another chapter: “The Lord did not

set His love upon you, nor choose you, because

you were more in number than any people; but

because the Lord loved you.” He frequently

repeats the same admonition: “Behold, the heaven

is the Lord's thy God, the earth also, with all that

therein is. Only the Lord had a delight in thy

fathers to love them, and He chose their seed after

them.”

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In another place, sanctification is enjoined upon

them, because they were chosen to be a peculiar

people. And again, elsewhere, love is asserted to

be the cause of their protection. It is declared by

the united voice of the faithful, “He hath chosen

our inheritance for us, the excellency of Jacob,

whom He loved.” For the gifts conferred on them

by God, they all ascribe to gratuitous love, not

only from a consciousness that these were not

obtained by any merit of theirs, but from a

conviction, that the holy patriarch himself was not

endued with such excellence as to acquire the

privilege of so great an honor for himself and his

posterity. And the more effectually to demolish all

pride, he reproaches them with having deserved

no favor, being “a stiff-necked and rebellious

people.”

The prophets also frequently reproach the Jews

with the unwelcome mention of this election,

because they had shamefully departed from it.

Let them, however, now come forward, who wish

to restrict the election of God to the desert of men,

or the merit of works. When they see one nation

preferred to all others…when they hear that God

had no inducement to be more favorable to a few,

and ignoble, and even disobedient and obstinate

people…will they quarrel with him because he has

chosen to give such an example of mercy? But

their obstreperous clamors will not impede this

work, nor will the reproaches they hurl against

Heaven, injure or affect his justice; they will

rather recoil upon their own heads. Lo, this

principle of the gracious covenant, the Israelites

are also recalled whenever thanks are to be

rendered to God, or their hopes are to be raised

for futurity.

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“He hath made us, and not we ourselves,” says

the Psalmist: “we are His people, and the sheep of

His pasture.” It is not without reason that the

negation is added, “not we ourselves,” that they

may know that of all the benefits they enjoy, God

is not only the Author, but derived the cause from

Himself, there being nothing in them deserving of

such great honor. He also enjoins them to be

content with the mere good pleasure of God, in

these words: “O ye seed of Abraham His servant,

ye children of Jacob His chosen.” And after

having recounted the continual benefits bestowed

by God as fruits of election, he at length

concludes that He had acted with such liberality,

“because He remembered His covenant.”

Consistent with this doctrine is the song of the

whole Church: “Thy right hand, and Thine arm,

and the light of Thy countenance, gave our fathers

the land, because Thou hadst a favor unto them.”

It must be observed that where mention is made

of the land, it is a visible symbol of the secret

separation, which comprehends adoption. David,

in another place, exhorts the people to the same

gratitude: “Blessed is the nation whose God is the

Lord; and the people whom He hath chosen for

His own inheritance.” Samuel animates to a good

hope: “The Lord will not forsake His people, for

His great name's sake; because it hath pleased

the Lord to make you His people.” David, when

his faith is assailed, thus arms himself for the

conflict: “Blessed is the man whom Thou

choosest, and causest to approach unto thee; he

shall dwell in Thy courts.”

But since the election hidden in God has been

confirmed by the first deliverance, as well as by

the second and other intermediate blessings, the

word choose is transferred to it in Isaiah: “The

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