ccordance with some
passages of St. Augustine, as if it signified that no men are saved except
those whose salvation he wills, or as if he would save _non singulos
generum, sed genera singulorum_. But I would rather say that there is none
whose salvation he willeth not, in so far as this is permitted by greater
reasons. For these bring it about that God only saves those who accept the
faith he has offered to them and who surrender themselves thereto by the
grace he has given them, in accordance with what was consistent with the
plan of his works in its entirety, than which none can be better conceived.

286. As for predestination to salvation, it includes also, according to St.
Augustine, the ordinance of the means that shall lead to salvation.
'Praedestinatio sanctorum nihil aliud est, quam praescientia et praeparatio
beneficiorum Dei, quibus certissime liberantur quicunque liberantur' (_Lib.
de Persev._, c. 14). He does not then understand it there as an [302]
absolute decree; he maintains that there is a grace which is not rejected
by any hardened heart, because it is given in order to remove especially
the hardness of hearts (_Lib. de Praedest._, c. 8; _Lib. de Grat._, c. 13,
14). I do not find, however, that St. Augustine conveys sufficiently that
this grace, which subdues the heart, is always efficacious of itself. And
one might perhaps have asserted without offence to him that the same degree
of inward grace is victorious in the one, where it is aided by outward
circumstances, but not in the other.

287. Will is proportionate to the sense we have of the good, and follows
the sense which prevails. 'Si utrumque tantundem diligimus, nihil horum
dabimus. Item: Quod amplius nos delectat, secundum id operemur necesse est'
(in c. 5, _Ad Gal._). I have explained already how, despite all that, we
have indeed a great power over our will. St. Augustine takes it somewhat
differently, and in a way that does not go far, when he says that nothing
is so much within our power as the action of our will. And he gives a
reason which is almost tautological: for (he says) this action is ready at
the moment when we will. 'Nihil tam in nostra potestate est, quam ipsa
voluntas, ea enim mox ut volumus praesto est' (lib. 3, _De Lib. Arb._, c.
3; lib. 5, _De Civ. Dei_, c. 10). But that only means that we will when we
will, and not that we will that which we wish to will. There is more reason
for saying with him: '_aut voluntas non est,