Chapter 2 Section 9.

- Cyprian

The
CAUSE OF GOD AND TRUTH.
Part 4
Chapter 2—Of Redemption

Section 9—Cyprian. A.D. 250.

Cyprian, in many places of his writings, very expressly limits Christ’s sufferings and death to certain persons
described by him; as when he says,[1] "Though we are many shepherds, yet we feed but one flock; and ought to gather
together and cherish oves universas quas Christus sanguine suo et passione quaesivit ‘all the sheep which Christ hath
sought up by his blood and sufferings;’ nor should we suffer our supplicant and grieving brethren to be cruelly
despised and trodden down by the proud presumption of some persons." And in another place he asks,[2] "What can
be a greater sin, or what a fouler spot, than to stand against Christ, than to scatter his church? quam ille sanguine suo
praeparabit et condidit, ‘which he has prepared and obtained by his own blood?’" And elsewhere he says,[3] ‘Christ is
the bread off life; et panis hic omnium non est, sed noster est; and this bread does not belong to all, but is ours;’ and as
we say, our Father, because he is the Father of them that understand and believe, so we call Christ our bread, qui
corpus contigimus, ‘who have touched his body;’" in which words all but believers are excluded from having any
share in Christ, the bread of life. And having in another place[4] mentioned Ezekiel 9:4, where a mark is ordered to be
set upon the foreheads of the men that sigh and cry for the abominations of Jerusalem, he makes this observation;
"This sign belongs to the passion and blood of Christ; et quisquis in hoc signo invenitur, ‘and whosoever is found with
this sign shall be preserved safe and whole?’" which is approved by the testimony of God, saying, And the blood shall
be for a sign upon the houses where you are, etc. What preceded in type before the Lamb was slain, is fulfilled in
Christ, the truth following after; as there Egypt being smitten, the Jewish people could not escape but by the blood and
token of the Lamb; so when the world shall begin to be wasted and smitten, quisquis in sanguine et signo Christi
inventus fuerit, solus evadet, "whosoever shall be found in the blood, and with the mark of Christ, shall only escape."
From whence it is evident, that Cyprian did not think that every individual of mankind is interested in the blood and
death of Christ. And a little after, in the same epistle,[5] speaking of immortality, he has these words; "This grace
Christ imparts, this gift of his mercy he gives, by subduing death through the victory of the cross; redimendo
credentem pretio sauguinis sui, ‘by redeeming the believer with the price of his blood;’ by reconciling man to God the
Father, and by quickening the dead with the heavenly regeneration." And in one of his tracts,[6] animating the saints
against the fears of death, he says, "Let him be afraid to die qui non Christi cruce et passione censetur, ‘who is not
reckoned to have any part in the cross and sufferings of Christ;’ let him be afraid to die who will pass from this death
to a second death." And a little after,[7] "We who live in hope, and believe in God, and trust, Christum passum esse
pro nobis, ‘that Christ has suffered for us, and rose again;’ abiding in him, and rising again by him and in him, why
should we be unwilling to depart hence out of this world? or, why should we mourn over and grieve for our departed
friends, as if they were lost. And in another place,[8] giving an account of our Lord’s behavior before Pilate, makes
this remark, "This is he, who when he held his peace in his passion, will not be silent afterwards in his vengeance: this
is our God; id est, omnium, sed fidelium el credentium Deus, that is, not the God of all, but of the faithful and
believers." To all which may be added another passage of his, which runs thus,[9] "Writing to the seven churches, and
intimating to each of them their sins and transgressions, he said repent; to whom? but quos pretio magno sui samguinis
redemerat, ‘whom he had redeemed with the great price of his blood.’" This last passage is indeed taken out of an
epistle which Erasmus thought was not Cyprianbut Cornelius’s, bishop of Rome; however, he afterwards judged it to
be a learned piece, and not unworthy of Cyprian; Gravius and Palemius affirm it to be his;[10] and if it was
Cornelius’s, the citation may be properly enough made here, since he was contemporary with Cyprian. The passages
cited by Monsieur Daille[11] from this writer, as being on the side of universal redemption, only set forth either the
great encouragement given by God to penitent sinners, or that Christ came to be the Savior of mankind, to be given
unto men, and that he came for the sake of all; which Cyprian explains in the very same passage,[12] of all sorts of
men, learned and unlearned, of every age and sex; as in another of them, by a simile taken from the general and equal
diffusion of the sun’s light, he shows,[13] that Christ, the sun and true day, equally gives the light of eternal life in sua
ecclesia, "in his own church;" and that the Israelites had an equal measure of the manna, without any difference of age
or sex; so the heavenly grace is equally divided to all without any difference of sex or years, and without respect of
persons; and the gift of spiritual grace poured forth super omnem Dei populum, "upon all the people of God." Some
testimonies are next produced by Monsieur Daille[14] out of Novatian, Medhodius, and Arnobius; the first of these

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Chapter 2 Section 9. - Cyprian

writers, in one of the passages cited, signifies that, there is hope of salvation for men in Christ: which is not at all
against us; for hope is not taken away, but established upon better grounds by the doctrine of particular, than by that of
general redemption; since according to the latter, all men are indeed redeemed by Christ, but it was possible that none
might be saved by him; whereas the former secures the certain salvation of all the redeemed ones: and in the other of
them he suggests, that the anger, hatred, and threatenings of God, are for the good of men, and in order to move upon
them, and bring them to that which is right and good; but not a word does he say concerning the death of Christ, and
redemption by it. The second of these authors referred to, explains the text in Romans 9:21, one vessel to honor, and
another to dishonor, thus, "not that God makes some good and others evil, but that is to be understood of the power
God has of doing what he will." Nor do we say that God makes any man evil, but that man made himself so; though
we think none are good but whom God makes good. This writer indeed suggests, that it is the will of God that all men
should be good, virtuous, and faithful, which is true of his approving but not of his determining will; and also
intimates that all the good things of God are common to all, which in some sense holds good of the common bounties
of providence, but not of the riches of grace. The third proposes a pagan objection, formed thus; "If Christ came to be
the Savior of mankind, why does he not, with equal bounty, deliver all alike?" This objection, supposes, that according
to the Christian scheme, all men were not delivered or redeemed by Christ. Arnobius answers to it, not by asserting a
deliverance or redemption of every individual of mankind, but by putting another question thus, "Does not he equally
deliver, who equally calls all?" In which he argues indeed, from the extent of the call to the extent of the deliverance;
but then the call he speaks of seems to be not of every individual person, but of some of all sorts; a grant from Christ
of coming to him to some of all sorts, sublimibus, infimis, servis, faeminis, pueris, "high and low, servants, women,
and children;" which are his own words;[15] and consequently the deliverance he argues from hence must be only of
some of all sorts; which is what we contend for.

ENDNOTES:

[1] Ep. 67, p. 164.

[2] Ep. 72, p. 180.

[3] De Oratione Dominics, p. 268.

[4] Ad Demetrianum, p. 283.

[5] Page 284.

[6] De Mortalitate, p. 208.

[7] Page 299.

[8] De Bono Patienttiae, p. 319.

[9] In Epist. ad Novatianum. p. 436, 437.

[10] Vide Rivet. Crit. Sacr. 1. 2, c. 15, p. 212.

[11] Page 768-770.

[12] De Oratione Dominica, 270.

[13] Ep. 76, p. 212.

[14] Page770, 771.

[15] Arnobius adv. Gentes, 1. 2, p. 109.

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Chapter 2 Section 9. - Cyprian

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