God foreordained all men to holiness and salvation, and that Christ died for all and is both willing and able to save all, but not against their will and without their free consent. The vessels of mercy were prepared by God unto glory, the vessels of wrath were not intended by God, but fitted by their own sin, for destruction. The will of man, though injured by the Fall, has still the power to accept or to reject the offer of salvation. It must first obey the divine call. “When we have begun,” he says, in commenting on John i. 38, “when we have sent our will before, then God gives us abundant opportunities of salvation.” God helps those who help themselves. “When God,” he says, “sees us eagerly prepare for the contest of virtue, he instantly supplies us with his assistance, lightens our labors and strengthens the weakness of our nature.” Faith and good works are necessary conditions of justification and salvation, though Christ’s merits alone are the efficient cause. He remarks on John vi. 44, that while no man can come to Christ unless drawn and taught by the Father, there is no excuse for those who are unwilling to be thus drawn and taught. Yet on the other hand he fully admits the necessity of divine grace at the very beginning of every good action. “We can do no good thing at all,” he says, “except we are aided from above.” And in his dying hour he gave glory to God “for all things.” Thus Augustinians and Semi-Pelagians, Calvinists and Arminians, widely as they differ in theory about human freedom and divine sovereignty, meet in the common feeling of personal responsibility and absolute dependence on God. With one voice they disclaim all merit of their own and give all glory to Him who is the giver of every good and perfect gift and works in us “both to will and to work, for his good pleasure” (Phil. ii. 12).31 31 I add the remarks of Stephenson the difference between Chrysostom and Augustin (p. 430): “Unquestionable as the intellectual genius of Chrysostom was, yet it is rather in the purity of his moral character, his single-minded boldness of purpose, and the glowing piety which burns through all his writings, that we find the secret of his influence. If it was rather the mission of Augustin to mould the minds of men so as to take a firm grasp of certain great doctrines, it was the mission of Chrysostom to inflame the whole heart with a fervent love of God. Rightly has he been called the great teacher of consummate holiness, as Augustin was the great teacher of efficient grace; rightly has it been remarked that, like Fénélon, he is to be ranked among those who may be termed disciples of St. John, men who seem to have been pious without intermission from their childhood upwards, and of whose piety the leading characteristics are ease, cheerfulness and elevation; while Augustin belongs to the disciples of St. Paul, those who have been converted from error to truth, or from sin to holiness, and whose characteristics are gravity , earnestness, depth. If Augustin has done more valuable service in building up the church at large, Chrysostom is the more lovable to the individual, and speaks out of a heart overflowing to God and man, un- constrained by the fetters of a severe and rigid system. Yet it is precisely on this account that he has not been so generally appreciated as he deserves. His tone is too catholic for the Romanist, or for the sectarian partisan of any denomination. ‘It would be easy to produce abundant instances of his oratorial abilities; I wish it were in my power to record as many of his evangelical excellencies.’ Such is the verdict of a narrow-minded historian [Milner], and the comparative estimation in which he held St. Augustin and St. Chrysostom may be inferred 31 His Theology and Exegesis.