"The word grace evidently implies that there is no antecedent merit. And in this way the apostle to the Romans appears to argue, when he says, And if by grace, then is it no more of works: otherwise grace is no more grace. Now to him that worketh is the reward not reckoned of grace, but of debt. All this is perfectly intelligible, even in the conduct of liberal and magnificent human characters. They frequently bestow their gifts from a pure spirit of liberality, without the smallest previous claim on the score of merit. And shall not God, whose perfections are infinite, do more than this?"
Thomas Bradwardine was an English cleric, scholar, mathematician, physicist, courtier and, very briefly, Archbishop of Canterbury. As a celebrated scholastic philosopher and doctor of theology, he is often called Doctor Profundus.
"The mischievous Pelagians maintain that this sort of grace is not given freely by God but is to be obtained by preceding merits. I myself was once so foolish and empty, when I first applied myself to the study of philosophy, as to be seduced by this error."
"St. Augustine confesses that he himself had been formerly in a similar mistake. I was once, says he, a Pelagian in my principles; I thought that faith towards God was not the gift of God, but that we procured it by our own powers, and that then, through the use of it, we obtain the gifts of God; I never supposed that the preventing grace of God was the proper cause of our faith, till my mind was struck in a particular manner by the apostles argument and testimony: What hast thou that thou hast not received, and if thou hast received it, why dost thou glory as if thou hadst not received it? In this whole business I follow the steps of Augustine."
"In 1525 he filled the office of proctur in the university [Oxford]. His great work "concerning the cause of God against the Pelagians," was first delivered in the form of lectures at Oxford. These he afterwards, while chancellor of the diocese of London, at the request of the students of Merton, enlarged and polished. The publication of this book earned for its author the highest reputation. It was speedily in the hands of nil the learned men both in England and on the continent; and Bradwardine was thenceforward known by the title of "the profound doctor." His subject was treated with a mathematical accuracy, and his reasoning was pursued in one connected series of arguments, very different from the discursive remarks of the divines who had preceded him."
"When I heard those parts of the Scriptures read in the Church which extol the grace of God, and lower the free-will of man, for example, It is not of him that willeth, or of him that runneth, but of God that sheweth mercy, and many similar passages,—this doctrine of grace was very disagreeable to my ungrateful mind. But afterwards I began to perceive some few distant rays of light respecting this matter. I seemed to see, but by no means clearly, that the grace of God is prior, both in nature and in time, to any good actions that men can possibly perform; and I return thanks to God, from whom proceeds every good thing, for thus freely enlightening my understanding."
"Bradwardine was solicitous to employ the many talents now entrusted to him to the glory of his divine Master. It was his care to mitigate as far as possible the impetuosity of the kings temper, when immoderately fired with warlike rage, or unbecomingly elated with the advantages of victory. And so much meekness and persuasive eloquence mingled with his addresses to the army, that the soldiers, wrought upon by his earnest admonitions, were more than ordinarily restrained from practising the excesses attendant upon war. In fact, so truly did Bradwardine sustain amid arms the character of an ambassador of peace, and so influential was the spirit which evidently swayed him, that some of the writers of that time do not hesitate to attribute the conquests of the English king rather to the virtues and holiness of his chaplain than to his own conduct, or the prowess of his troops."
"St. Paul says, that God commendeth his love to us in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us: and that when we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son. St. Paul was in a peculiar manner a child of grace: with gratitude, therefore, he honours and extols its efficacy in all his epistles; and particularly in his epistle to the Romans throughout he defends his doctrines with great precision and copiousness. Every mouth, says he, must be stopped, and all the world become guilty before God. By the deeds of the law no flesh can be justified. Man must be justified freely by his grace. By grace are ye saved through faith, and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God: not of works, lest any man should boast."