proves, Romans 8:28 sqq., when he says: "We know that to them that love God all things work together for good, even to them that are called to be righteous according to his purpose," that is, the purpose of predestination. "For whom he foreknew, them he also predestinated to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the first-born among many brethren. And whom he predestinated, them he also called; and whom he called, them he also justified." And he concludes by calling them predestinate after suffering a long trial when he said: "I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor might,[1] nor depth, nor any creature shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord."
Besides, it is to be noted that, as many say, the relation of pilgrims to holy mother church is fourfold. Some are in the church in name and in fact, as are predestinate Catholics, obedient to Christ; some are neither in fact nor in name, as are the reprobate heathen; some in name only, as are reprobate hypocrites; and some are in the church in fact, although they may seem in name to be outside, as are predestinate Christians whom the satraps of antichrist seem to be damning before the very eyes of the church, for so pontiffs and Pharisees condemned by bitter death our Redeemer as a blasphemer, and consequently as an heretic, "who was predestinated to be the Son of God" (Romans 1:4).
Further, it is to be noted that no place, or human election, makes a person a member of the holy universal church, but divine predestination does in the case of every one who persists in following Christ in love. And, according to Augustine—de predestinatione sanctorum [Nic. Fathers, 5: 498 sqq.]—predestination is the election of the divine will through grace; or, as it is commonly said, predestination is the preparation
- ↑ Fortitudo with the Vulgate, but Huss omits the Vulgate's neque altitudo—"nor height."
