13. But they answer and
speak, saying, “If the will of man without any aid of God by
strength of free choice26602660 bears so many grievous and
horrible distresses, whether in mind or body, that it may enjoy the
delight of this mortal life and of sins, why may it not be that in
the same manner the self-same will of man by the same strength of
free-choice, not thereunto looking to be aided of God, but unto
itself by natural possibility sufficing, doth, in all of labor or
sorrow that is put upon it, for righteousness and eternal life’s
sake most patiently sustain the same? Or is it so, say they, that
the will of the unjust is sufficient, without aid of God, for them,
yea even to exercise themselves in undergoing torture for iniquity,
and before they be tortured by others; sufficient the will of them
which love the respiting of this life that, without aid of God,
they should in the midst of 532most atrocious and protracted
torments persevere in a lie, lest confessing their misdeeds they be
ordered to be put to death; and not sufficient the will of the
just, unless strength be put into them from above, that whatever be
their pains, they should, either for beauty’s sake of very
righteousness or for love of eternal life, bear the
same?”