at he admits others
fortuitously, or that they by their industry acquire what election
alone confers on a few. Those therefore whom God passes by he
reprobates, and that for no other cause but because he is pleased to
exclude them from the inheritance which he predestines to his
children. Nor is it possible to tolerate the petulance of men in
refusing to be restrained by the word of God, in regard to his
incomprehensible counsel, which even angels adore.

We have already been told that hardening is not less under the
immediate hand of God than mercy. Paul does not, after the example of
those whom I have mentioned, labor anxiously to defend God by calling
in the aid of falsehood; he only reminds us that it is unlawful for
the creature to quarrel with its Creator. Then how will those who
refuse to admit that any are reprobated by God, explain the following
words of Christ? "Every plant which my heavenly Father hath not
planted shall be rooted up" (Matth. xv. 13). They are plainly told
that all whom the heavenly Father has not been pleased to plant as
sacred trees in his garden are doomed and devoted to destruction. If
they deny that this is a sign of reprobation, there is nothing,
however clear, that can be proved to them. But if they will still
murmur, let us in the soberness of faith rest contented with the
admonition of Paul, that it can be no ground of complaint that God,
"willing to show his wrath, and to make his power known, endured with
much long-suffering the vessels of wrath fitted for destruction: and
that he might make known the riches of his glory on the vessels of
mercy, which he had afore prepared unto glory" (Rom. ix. 22, 23). Let
my readers observe that Paul, to cut off all handle for murmuring and
detraction, attributes supreme sovereignty to the wrath and power of
God; for it were unjust that those profound judgments which transcend
all our powers of discernment should be subjected to our calculation.

It is frivolous in our opponents to reply that God does not altogether
reject those whom in lenity he tolerates, but remains in suspense with
regard to them, if peradventure they may repent; as if Paul were
representing God as patiently waiting for the conversion of those whom
he describes as fitted for destruction. For Augustine, rightly
expounding this passage, says that where power is united to endurance,
God does not permit, but rules (August. Cont. Julian., Lib. v., c. 5).
They add also, that it is