No Preperation for Conversion - Whitby's Argument Seven
IX. ARGUMENT SEVEN
If man be purely passive in the whole work of his conversion, and it can only be wrought in him by an irresistible act of God upon him, then can nothing be required as a preparation, or a prerequisite to conversion; for either that prerequisite is something to be done on our part in order to God's irresitible act, or it is not ; if nothing is so to be done on our part in order to the work, no preparation can be requisite in order to it; if anything is to be done on our part, it is certain that we are not purely passive in the whole work of our regeneration, since he that must prepare himself for his conversion, must act in order to it.
Now as all God's exhortations to men to consider and turn unto the Lord, demonstrate, that this consideration is a prerequisite to conversion, so the parable of the seed sown shows. (1.) Negatively, that the word becomes unfruitful, either because men do not at all attend to it, or because they are diverted from that attention by the intervening cares and pleasures of the worId, which break off that attention, or are affrighted from it by the fears of suffering; and (2) affirmatively, that it becomes fruitful by being 'received into a good and honest heart.' And sure the devil must be a fool, according to this doctrine, when he comes to ''take away the word out of men's heart, lest they should believe and he saved,' if that word could have no influence upon men to salvation, when it was not attended with an unfrustrable assistance; and where it was so, all his attempts to hinder the believing of it to salvation, must be vain.
If man be purely passive in the whole work of his conversion, and it can only be wrought in him by an irresistible act of God upon him, then can nothing be required as a preparation, or a prerequisite to conversion; for either that prerequisite is something to be done on our part in order to God's irresitible act, or it is not ; if nothing is so to be done on our part in order to the work, no preparation can be requisite in order to it; if anything is to be done on our part, it is certain that we are not purely passive in the whole work of our regeneration, since he that must prepare himself for his conversion, must act in order to it.
Now as all God's exhortations to men to consider and turn unto the Lord, demonstrate, that this consideration is a prerequisite to conversion, so the parable of the seed sown shows. (1.) Negatively, that the word becomes unfruitful, either because men do not at all attend to it, or because they are diverted from that attention by the intervening cares and pleasures of the worId, which break off that attention, or are affrighted from it by the fears of suffering; and (2) affirmatively, that it becomes fruitful by being 'received into a good and honest heart.' And sure the devil must be a fool, according to this doctrine, when he comes to ''take away the word out of men's heart, lest they should believe and he saved,' if that word could have no influence upon men to salvation, when it was not attended with an unfrustrable assistance; and where it was so, all his attempts to hinder the believing of it to salvation, must be vain.
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