If man, thus influenced from above, now deliberately uses his will power, and resists the gracious influences of prevenient Grace, he quenches the Holy Spirit of God, whereby he is sealed to the day of redemption.
There is an infusion from God's will into his will, and now prevenient Grace is changed into operating Grace.
If, on the other hand, he even with the assistance ofprevenient Grace, permits it to do its work, the process goes on.
After prevenient Grace, however, begins to make itself felt, then the will begins to take part.
In the former alternative we have a prevenient necessity which determines the will ad unum and consequently destroys its freedom.
It is by physical premotion that God’s prevenient influence effects the free actions of His creatures, without regard to their assent.
If we conceive a continuous series of supernatural graces, each may be called eitherprevenient or subsequent, according as it is regarded either as a cause or as an effect.
Thus it can be readily seen that the fundamental division of actual grace, considered in its relation to free-will, is that into prevenient and coöperating grace.
Prevenient grace, regarded as a divine call to penance, is often styled gratia vocans sive excitans, and if it is received with a willing heart, gratia adiuvans.
Its necessity is evident from the fact that, to be meritorious, an act must be supernatural and consequently cannot be performed without the aid of prevenient and coöperating grace.
Thesis II: The sinner, even after he has received the faith, stands in absolute need ofprevenient and co-operating grace for every single salutary act required in the process of justification.
Among so many prevenient graces there must be one which is preceded by none other (simpliciter praeveniens), and this is preëminently the gratia vocans s.
If the necessity of prevenient grace was not sufficiently emphasized, the circumstances of the time explain, and to some extent excuse, the mistake.
The division of grace into efficacious and merely sufficient is not identical with that into prevenient and coöperating.
In so far as it produces the first of these effects, grace is calledprevenient in respect of the second; and in so far as it produces the second, it is called subsequent in respect of the first.
The Semipelagians ascribed the dispositions necessary for justification to the natural efforts of the will, thereby denying the necessity of prevenient grace.
And as each effect is posterior to one and prior to another, so grace may be called prevenient or subsequent according as we regard it in its relations to different effects.
What must his wrath be that the thirty thousand Needlewomen are still here, and the question of "prevenient grace" not yet settled!
There is a prevenient grace as well as a regenerating grace.
With the doctrine of prevenient grace, the evangelical doctrine stands or falls.
The longing men have to turn over a new leaf in life's book, to break with the past, to assert their better selves, is a preliminary impulse of God's Spirit and an evidence of prevenient grace preparing the way for regeneration.
The division into prevenient and subsequent grace does not divide grace in its essence, but only in its effects, as was already said of operating and cooperating grace.
And hence grace, inasmuch as it causes the first effect in us, is called prevenient with respect to the second, and inasmuch as it causes the second, it is called subsequent with respect to the first effect.
But grace signifies a temporal effect, which can precede and follow another; and thus grace may be both prevenient and subsequent.
Whether Grace Is Fittingly Divided intoPrevenient and Subsequent Grace?
And as one effect is posterior to this effect, and prior to that, so may grace be called prevenient and subsequent on account of the same effect viewed relatively to divers others.
Hence grace is not fittingly divided intoprevenient and subsequent.
Hence if with regard to these, grace must be divided into prevenient and subsequent, it would seem that there are infinite species of grace.
Objection 1: It would seem that grace is not fittingly divided into prevenient and subsequent.
Therefore grace ought not to be divided into prevenient and subsequent.
Therefore grace is not fittingly divided intoprevenient and subsequent.
For subsequent grace, inasmuch as it pertains to glory, is not numerically distinct from prevenient grace whereby we are at present justified.
I answer that, As grace is divided into operating and cooperating, with regard to its diverse effects, so also is it divided into prevenient and subsequent, howsoever we consider grace.
This prevenient purification in the Blessed Virgin was not needed to hinder the transmission of original sin, but because it behooved the Mother of God "to shine with the greatest purity" [*Cf.
Therefore grace is fittingly divided intoprevenient and subsequent.
These texts describeprevenient grace in prayer, in conversion, and in Christian work.
The sinner struggles against the wind of prevenient grace until he seems to strike against a stone wall.
Now, I find thy prevenient grace helping my infirmities, and assisting me to pray as I ought.
Hence God assists us all by his prevenient grace, not waiting till we are worthy to receive it.
He shows us the way by his prevenient grace, which is bestowed on all men without exception.
Behold the prevenient mercy of our Heavenly Father, who graciously looks for his prodigal children.
That the diligent worshipper doeth good to himself; not of himself but by the prevenient grace of God, which is freely given to all men without exception.
The Doctors call this gratiam primam et praevenientem, that is, the first and prevenient grace.
This [according to Melanchthon] is a germ of the positive good will still found in natural man which prevenient grace arouses.
As for Mark, nothing less than God's prevenient grace could explain his presence at Silchester.
The first is our state by nature; the second requires prevenient grace; the third, regenerating grace; and the fourth, sanctifying grace.
Many generous traits and acts of self-sacrifice in the unregenerate must be ascribed to the prevenient grace of God and to the enlightening influence of the Spirit of Christ.
There is none of that prevenient idealism which in the north draws a veil over the crudities of sense, and helps to illuminate the half-truths they reveal.
The uneducated Italian shows his instinctive disgust at what is ugly or horrible and, as we have seen, no prevenient idealism checks the impulse.
Then by His prevenient working within us He moves us to return.
Christian theology teaches the doctrine of prevenient grace, which briefly stated means this, that before a man can seek God, God must first have sought the man.
Grace does no more than give impressions which are conducive to making will operate through fitting motives, such as would be an attention, a dic cur hic, a prevenient pleasure.
