certain that we will when we will; but He who makes us will is He of
whom it is written: It is God who worketh in us to will. _Certum est nos
velle cum volumus; sed ille facit, ut velimus, de quo dictum est: Deus
est, qui operatur in nobis velle._" (Frank 1, 238.)

In his objections to the doctrine that man is purely passive in his
conversion, Strigel protested again and again that man is not like a
block or stone when he is converted. "That is true," said Flacius, "for
a block can neither love nor hate God, while man by nature hates God,
and scoffs at Him. Rom. 8, 1; 1 Cor. 2. Thus God is dealing with one
whose will and heart is altogether against Him. But here [in the denial
that man is purely passive in conversion] is buried a popish _meritum de
congruo_ and a particle of free will." (Preger 2, 191.) Flacius
furthermore explained that in his conversion man is able to cooperate
just as little as a stone can contribute to its transformation into a
statue. Indeed, man's condition is even more miserable than that of a
stone or block (_miserior trunco_), because by his natural powers he
resists, and cannot but resist, the operations of the Spirit. (Planck 4,
696f.)

Strigel reasoned: If man is converted without his consent, and if he
cannot but resist the operations of the Holy Spirit, conversion is an
impossibility, a contradiction. He said: "If the will, even when
assisted by the Holy Spirit, is unable to assent, it must of necessity
resist Him perpetually, drive out, reject, and repudiate the Word and
Holy Spirit; for it is impossible that motions extremely conflicting and
contradictory, the one embracing, the other repudiating and persistently
rejecting, should be in the same will. _Si voluntas etiam adiuta a
Spiritu Sancto non potest assentiri, necesse est, ut perpetuo ei
repugnet, ut excutiat, reiiciat et repudiet Verbum et Spiritum Sanctum.
Nam impossibile est in eadem voluntate esse motus extreme pugnantes et
contradictorios, quorum alter est amplecti, alter repudiare et quidem
perstare in reiectione._" Flacius replied: You need but distinguish
between the sinful natural will inherited from Adam, which always
resists, and the new consenting will implanted by God in conversion.
"Man consents with the faith given by God, but he resists with the
inborn wickedness of his Old Adam." Your error is that you acknowledge
only an inciting grace, which mere incitation presupposes powers of
one's own to do and to perform (_