How to read these. In Scholar’s Dream, books argue with each other. Each thing a book can do in a debate is a move, and most moves carry a real quotation — the words the book puts on the table when it uses that move.
Strong against lists the opposing books and arguments a move was written to answer. Used against one of them, it hits much harder than usual: ×2 means twice the normal force, ×4 four times. It is the game’s way of saying: this is the sentence that answers that argument. Open an entry to read why.
“That there exists in the human minds and indeed by natural instinct, some sense of Deity, we hold to be beyond dispute, since God himself, to prevent any man from pretending ignorance, has endued all men with some idea of his Godhead…”
Calvin, Institutes I.3.1 (trans. Beveridge, 1845), public domain. (trimmed quote)public domain
Some Sense of Deity
Natural TheologyArgument · power 80 · 100% accurateIn the gameNot an argument for God’s existence — an argument about the person you are talking to. Nobody starts from zero, and the ignorance in front of you is a thing being maintained rather than a thing being suffered.
Strong against
×3Émilea book · why?
Calvin and the Vicar start from the identical observation — a sense of God native to every mind — and part company on what it delivers: enough to leave nobody excused, Calvin says, not enough to save anybody unassisted.
×3The Five Common Notionsan argument · why?
Calvin agrees that every mind has a sense of God. That sense leaves people without excuse. It does not bring them home to God, which is why God has spoken.
×3The Savoyard Vicaran argument · why?
Calvin and the Vicar start from the identical observation — a sense of God native to every mind — and part company on what it delivers: enough to leave nobody excused, Calvin says, not enough to save anybody unassisted.
×2.5Nein!an argument · why?
Calvin says God has planted a sense of himself in every person. It does not save anyone. It leaves them without excuse, and that is why the gospel has a place to land. Barth’s refusal removes the ground the preaching stands on.
×2Man Is Born Freean argument · why?
He wants the natural man good and the institutions corrupt. Turn it over: the ache for God is native, and the man buries it.
×2The Demand for Miraclesan argument · why?
He wants a wonder. There is something older than a wonder already in him.
×2Totem and Tabooan argument · why?
Freud says the idea of God was copied from a human father. Calvin had already claimed it is there before any copy, including in people whose fathers were worth copying nothing from.
“For in him we live, and move, and have our being. As some of your own poets have said.”
Acts 17:28 (WEB) — Paul at the Areopagus, quoting the Athenians’ own poets back to them.
In the gamePick the part of the opponent’s case that is true and affirm it. That point can no longer be used against you, and the opponent’s Defend falls sharply. It deals no damage. Affirm something false and you have only agreed with an error.
“To make everything yield to custom would be to do the greatest injustice. … In short, depraved custom is just a kind of general pestilence in which men perish not the less that they fall in a crowd.”
Calvin, Prefatory Address to Francis I (1536), prefixed to the Institutes of the Christian Religion (trans. Beveridge, 1845), public domain. (trimmed quote)public domain
Depraved Custom
EthicsArgument · power 88 · 100% accurateIn the gameAnswers "everyone has always done it this way" by asking what everyone doing it proves. Numbers do not make a thing right; they only settle how many are carried off by it.
Strong against
×4The Most Ancient Customan argument · why?
Numbers do not make a thing right. They only settle how many are carried off by it.
×0.5The Consent of the Fathersan argument · why?
That answers the custom, not the men. He is talking about the men.
“What was destined only to confirm the truth, shall we misapply to the confirmation of lies? The proper course, therefore, is, in the first instance, to ascertain and examine the doctrine which is said by the Evangelist to precede; then after it has been proved, but not till then, it may receive confirmation from miracles.”
Calvin, Prefatory Address to Francis I (1536), prefixed to the Institutes of the Christian Religion (trans. Beveridge, 1845), public domain.public domain
Doctrine Before Miracles
RationalityArgument · power 88 · 100% accurateIn the gamePuts the two in the right order and the demand collapses. A wonder cannot certify a teaching, because wonders attend lies too; the teaching is examined first, and only then may a sign confirm it.
Strong against
×4The Demand for Miraclesan argument · why?
Puts the two in the right order and the demand falls apart: the teaching is examined first, and only then may a sign confirm it.
×2.5On Baptisma book · why?
Calvin answers his opponents’ miracles with the answer Augustine gave the Donatists. Augustine would agree.
×2Christianity Not Mysteriousan argument · why?
He makes reason the judge of revelation. Put it back under: reason reads what God has said, it does not vote on what He was allowed to say.
×0.5Known by Its Fruitsan argument · why?
He has not asked for a sign. He has pointed at a burnt village.
“justification, as the acceptance with which God receives us into his favor as if we were righteous; and we say that this justification consists in the forgiveness of sins and the imputation of the righteousness of Christ.”
Calvin, Institutes III.11.2 (trans. Beveridge, 1845), public domain.public domain
Imputed Righteousness
SoteriologyArgument · power 95 · 100% accurateIn the gameCalvin defining the verdict in two halves, and the second half is the one Trent condemned by name. Sins forgiven, and a righteousness that is not the sinner’s own CREDITED to him. Not poured in, not grown into. Reckoned.
Strong against
×4The Canons of Trenta book · why?
Canon XI condemned this by its own name. Here it is said plainly, by the man whose book they were answering.
×3The Colloquyan argument · why?
A sentence two doctrines can shelter under is answered by saying exactly what yours is.
“That it long lay buried and unknown is the guilty consequence of man’s impiety; but now when, by the kindness of God, it is restored to us, it ought to resume its antiquity just as the returning citizen resumes his rights.”
Calvin, Prefatory Address to Francis I (1536), prefixed to the Institutes of the Christian Religion (trans. Beveridge, 1845), public domain.public domain
The Returning Citizen
HistoryArgument · power 90 · 100% accurateIn the gameThe answer to "your religion is new," and it concedes nothing. A thing can be buried and dug up; the man who comes home after years away does not thereby become a foreigner.
Strong against
×4The Charge of Noveltyan argument · why?
The exact answer, and it concedes nothing: a thing can be buried and dug up. The man who comes home is not a foreigner.
“He was alone, indeed, and despised, but from his mouth the truth proceeded.”
Calvin, Prefatory Address to Francis I (1536), prefixed to the Institutes of the Christian Religion (trans. Beveridge, 1845), public domain.public domain
From His Mouth the Truth
EcclesiologyArgument · power 82 · 100% accurateIn the gameFour hundred prophets on one side and Micaiah on the other, and the church was where the truth was. An answer to "where was your church" that does not need a building to point at.
Strong against
×3The Charge of Schisman argument · why?
Four hundred prophets on one side and Micaiah on the other, and the church was where the truth was.
×2The Clockwork Cosmosan argument · why?
The machine is HOW God works, not a sign He has stopped. Boyle believed in the mechanism and never thought it left the room empty.
“…all things are ours, to serve, not lord it over us…”
Calvin, Prefatory Address to Francis I (1536), prefixed to the Institutes of the Christian Religion (trans. Beveridge, 1845), public domain. (trimmed quote.) The Beveridge text is quoted only to this point because the CCEL transcription reads “we axe Christ’s only” for “are” in the next clause.public domain
To Serve, Not to Lord It
HistoryArgument · power 84 · 100% accurateIn the gameThe rule for reading the fathers, in one clause. They are ours and we are not theirs — which is why Calvin can quote them for four pages and still not be bound when they are wrong.
Strong against
×4The Consent of the Fathersan argument · why?
The rule for reading them, in one clause. They are ours; we are not theirs — which is why you can quote them for four pages and still not be bound where they are wrong.
×0.5The Most Ancient Customan argument · why?
That ranks the fathers. He is not appealing to the fathers; he is appealing to how it has always been done.
“The word is not received in faith when it merely flutters in the brain, but when it has taken deep root in the heart… there is more distrust in the heart than blindness in the mind; and it is more difficult to inspire the soul with security than to imbue it with knowledge.”
Calvin, Institutes III.2.36 (trans. Beveridge, 1845), public domain. (trimmed quote)public domain
Not Brain, But Heart
FaithArgument · power 90 · 100% accurateIn the gameBelieving a doctrine and trusting it are different acts. A mind can hold the right answer for years while the heart still will not risk resting on it.
Strong against
×2.5Room for Beliefan argument · why?
Kant clears a room reason cannot enter and calls it faith’s. Grant him the room. Calvin asks what is actually standing in it — a proposition safely stored is not yet a heart that has settled on anything.
×2.5The Critique of Pure Reasona book · why?
Kant clears a room reason cannot enter and calls it faith’s. Grant him the room. Calvin asks what is actually standing in it — a proposition safely stored is not yet a heart that has settled on anything.
“It is preposterous to attempt, by discussion, to rear up a full faith in Scripture… these words will not obtain full credit in the hearts of men, until they are sealed by the inward testimony of the Spirit.”
Calvin, Institutes I.7.4 (trans. Beveridge, 1845), public domain. (trimmed quote)public domain
Appeal to the Spirit
SpiritualityArgument · power 84 · 100% accurateIn the gameAn argument for Scripture can always be met with a sharper argument. Calvin holds that the case reaches its limit there, and only the Spirit’s own inward witness seals what argument merely prepares the ground for.
Strong against
×2Room for Beliefan argument · why?
Kant’s own case for the room is an argument, built the same way as every argument reason is barred from settling this by. Calvin’s answer was never going to be a better argument either — the Spirit’s testimony works the same on both sides of the wall Kant drew.
×2The Critique of Pure Reasona book · why?
Kant’s own case for the room is an argument, built the same way as every argument reason is barred from settling this by. Calvin’s answer was never going to be a better argument either — the Spirit’s testimony works the same on both sides of the wall Kant drew.
