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Augustine of Hippo, On Rebuke and Grace
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On Rebuke and Grace, to the same Valentinus and the Monks with Him
Chapter 2.—The Catholic Faith Concerning Law, Grace, and Free Will.
Chapter 3 [II.]—What the Grace of God Through Jesus Christ is.
Chapter 4—The Children of God are Led by the Spirit of God.
Chapter 5 [III.]—Rebuke Must Not Be Neglected.
Chapter 6 [IV.]—Objections to the Use of Rebuke.
Chapter 7 [V.]—The Necessity and Advantage of Rebuke.
Chapter 8.—Further Replies to Those Who Object to Rebuke.
Chapter 10—All Perseverance is God’s Gift.
Chapter 13.—Election is of Grace, Not of Merit.
Chapter 14.—None of the Elect and Predestinated Can Perish.
Chapter 15.—Perseverance is Given to the End.
Chapter 17 [VIII.]—Why Perseverance Should Be Given to One and Not Another is Inscrutable.
Chapter 18.—Some Instances of God’s Amazing Judgments.
Chapter 19.—God’s Ways Past Finding Out.
Chapter 21.—Who May Be Understood as Given to Christ.
Chapter 22.—True Children of God are True Disciples of Christ.
Chapter 23.—Those Who are Called According to the Purpose Alone are Predestinated.
Chapter 24.—Even the Sins of the Elect are Turned by God to Their Advantage.
Chapter 25.—Therefore Rebuke is to Be Used.
Chapter 26 [X.]—Whether Adam Received the Gift of Perseverance.
Chapter 28.—The First Man Himself Also Might Have Stood by His Free Will.
Chapter 29 [XI.]—Distinction Between the Grace Given Before and After the Fall.
Chapter 30.—The Incarnation of the Word.
Chapter 32.—The Gifts of Grace Conferred on Adam in Creation.
Chapter 35.—There is a Greater Freedom Now in the Saints Than There Was Before in Adam.
Chapter 36.—God Not Only Foreknows that Men Will Be Good, But Himself Makes Them So.
Chapter 37.—To a Sound Will is Committed the Power of Persevering or of Not Persevering.
Chapter 38.—What is the Nature of the Gift of Perseverance that is Now Given to the Saints.
Chapter 39 [XIII.]—The Number of the Predestinated is Certain and Defined.
Chapter 40.—No One is Certain and Secure of His Own Predestination and Salvation.
Chapter 41.—Even in Judgment God’s Mercy Will Be Necessary to Us.
Chapter 42.—The Reprobate are to Be Punished for Merits of a Different Kind.
Chapter 43 [XIV.]—Rebuke and Grace Do Not Set Aside One Another.
Chapter 44.—In What Way God Wills All Men to Be Saved.
Chapter 47.—Another Interpretation of the Apostolic Passage, “Who Will Have All Men to Be Saved.”
Chapter 3 [II.]—What the Grace of God Through Jesus Christ is.
For the grace of God through Jesus Christ our Lord must be apprehended,—as that by which alone men are delivered from evil, and without which they do absolutely no good thing, whether in thought, or will and affection, or in action; not only in order that they may know, by the manifestation of that grace, what should be done, but moreover in order that, by its enabling, they may do with love what they know. Certainly the apostle asked for this inspiration of good will and work on behalf of those to whom he said, “Now we pray to God that ye do no evil, not that we should appear approved, but that ye should do that which is good.”11 2 Cor. xiii. 7. Who can hear this and not awake and confess that we have it from the Lord God that we turn aside from evil and do good?—since the apostle indeed says not, We admonish, we teach, we exhort, we rebuke; but he says, “We pray to God that ye do no evil, but that ye should do that which is good.”12 2 Cor. xiii. 7. And yet he was also in the habit of speaking to them, and doing all those things which I have mentioned,—he admonished, he taught, he exhorted, he rebuked. But he knew that all these things which he was doing in the way of planting and watering openly13 In aperto. were of no avail unless He who giveth the increase in secret should give heed to his prayer on their behalf. Because, as the same teacher of the Gentiles says, “Neither is he that planteth anything, neither he that watereth, but God that giveth the increase.”14 1 Cor. iii. 7.
CAPUT II.
3. Intelligenda est enim gratia Dei per Jesum Christum Dominum nostrum, qua sola homines liberantur a malo, et sine qua nullum prorsus sive cogitando, sive volendo et amando, sive agendo faciunt bonum: non solum ut monstrante ipsa quid faciendum sit sciant, verum etiam ut praestante ipsa faciant cum dilectione quod sciunt. Hanc quippe inspirationem bonae voluntatis atque operis 0918 poscebat Apostolus eis, quibus dicebat, Oramus autem ad Deum, ne quid faciatis mali, non ut nos probati appareamus, sed ut vos quod bonum est faciatis (II Cor. XIII, 7). Quis hoc audiat, et non evigilet, atque fateatur a Domino Deo nobis esse, ut declinemus a malo, et faciamus bonum? Quandoquidem non ait Apostolus, Monemus, docemus, hortamur, increpamus: sed ait, Oramus ad Deum, ne quid faciatis mali, sed quod bonum est faciatis. Et tamen etiam loquebatur eis, et faciebat illa omnia quae commemoravi; monebat, docebat, hortabatur, increpabat: sed sciebat haec omnia non valere, quae plantando et rigando faciebat in aperto, nisi eum pro illis exaudiret orantem, qui dat incrementum in occulto. Quoniam sicut idem doctor Gentium dicit, Neque qui plantat est aliquid, neque qui rigat; sed qui incrementum dat Deus (I Cor. III, 7).