“With Dangers Compast Round” 1660–1665incline, in the exercise of their own uncontrolled liberty. What then? shall we say that
this foresight or foreknowledge on the part of God imposed on them the necessity of
acting in any definite way? No more, certainly, than if the future event had been
foreseen by any human being. For what any human being has foreseen as certain to
happen, will not less certainly happen than what God himself has predicted.... Nothing
happens of necessity because God has foreseen it; but he foresees the event of every
action, because he is thoroughly familiar with their natural causes, which, by his own
decree, are left to act freely.... Thus he knew that Adam would fall of his own free
will; his fall was therefore certain, but not necessary.^109Milton’s deep investment in this argument is founded in its implications for human
freedom and moral responsibility. On any Calvinist determinist theory, “we shall
have to jettison entirely all man’s freedom of action and all attempt or desire on his
part to do right... liberty will be an empty word, and will have to be banished
utterly not only from religion but also from morality and even from indifferent
matters” (CPW VI, 157, 164).
Chapter 4 describes predestination as a Special Decree pertaining to humans
alone, whereby God, “before the foundation of the world” and foreknowing the
Fall, predestined to salvation the general category of “those who should believe and
continue in the faith” (CM XIV, 91). But he separates himself from Arminius in
treating some aspects of predestination. First, he restricts it only to election: deny-
ing the reprobation of particular individuals for foreknown sins, he marshals a plethora
of scripture passages that make salvation conditional upon faith and proclaim the
death of sinners to be wholly contrary to God’s express wish. Moreover, while for
Arminius God predestines to election particular individuals whose faith and virtue
he foresees, Milton refers that term to the general category of believers.^110 It be-
comes applicable to individuals only as they live out their voluntary choices to
believe and to continue:
It seems then that predestination and election are not particular but only general – that
is, they belong to all who believe heartily and continue to believe. Peter is not predes-
tinated or elected as Peter, or John as John, but each only insofar as he believes and
perseveres in his faith. In this way the general decree of election is made personally
applicable to each particular believer and made sure to those who persevere.^111Milton avoids the Pelagian concept that good works may help to merit salvation by
stipulating that it is only God’s grace, won through Christ’s sacrifice and offered at all
stages, that makes salvation possible to any. To accommodate scripture texts asserting
the potter’s right to deal with his pots as he chooses (Romans 9:20–1), he allows that
God may give more grace to some than to others. Yet he insists that all are offered
grace sufficient for salvation: “he undoubtedly gives grace to all, if not in equal meas-
ure, at least sufficient for attaining knowledge of the truth and salvation”; it belongs
to God’s supreme will “that an equal portion of grace should not be extended to all,