DECRETUM, HORRIBILE. Calvin (Institutes, III, xxiii, 7) refers to the decree of reprobation as a decretum horribile. Some interpret this to mean that even Calvin had qualms about his terrible Calvinism. Charles Wesley wrote two hymns lampooning this "horrible decree." However, Augustus Toplady (Complete Works, 1869, p. 274) gives the correct interpretation: "I would willingly imagine that Mr. Wesley is not so wretched a Latinist as to believe that he and his subaltern acted fairly in rendering the word borribilis, as it stands in the above connection, by the English adjective 'horrible.' Though there is a sameness of sound, there is no necessary sameness of signification in the two epithets. We have annexed a secondary idea to the English words 'horror' and 'horrible,' which the Latin horror and horribilis do not always import." After quoting Cicero, Virgil, and other Latin sources to prove his point, Toplady concludes, "Calvin therefore might well term God's adorable and inscrutable purpose respecting the fall of man decretum horribile, i.e., not a horrible, but an awful (one producing awe), a tremendous, and a venerable decree."
Gordon H. Clark
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