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Augustine of Hippo, A Treatise On the Grace of Christ, And On Original Sin
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A Treatise on the grace of christ, and on original sin,
3. [III.]—Grace According to the Pelagians.
4.—Pelagius’ System of Faculties.
5. [IV.]—Pelagius’ Own Account of the Faculties, Quoted.
6. [V.]—Pelagius and Paul of Different Opinions.
7. [VI.]—Pelagius Posits God’s Aid Only for Our “Capacity.”
9. [VIII.]—The Law One Thing, Grace Another. The Utility of the Law.
10. [IX.]—What Purpose the Law Subserves.
11. [X.]—Pelagius’ Definition of How God Helps Us: “He Promises Us Future Glory.”
12. [XI.]—The Same Continued: “He Reveals Wisdom.”
13. [XII.]—Grace Causes Us to Do.
14. [XII.]—The Righteousness Which is of God, and the Righteousness Which is of the Law.
15. [XIV.]—He Who Has Been Taught by Grace Actually Comes to Christ.
16. [XV.]—We Need Divine Aid in the Use of Our Powers. Illustration from Sight.
17. [XVI.]—Does Pelagius Designedly Refrain from Openly Saying that All Good Action is from God?
18. [XVII.]—He Discovers the Reason of Pelagius’ Hesitation So to Say.
19. [XVIII.]—The Two Roots of Action, Love and Cupidity And Each Brings Forth Its Own Fruit.
20. [XIX.]—How a Man Makes a Good or a Bad Tree.
21. [XX.]—Love the Root of All Good Things Cupidity, of All Evil Ones.
22. [XXI.]—Love is a Good Will.
23. [XXII.]—Pelagius’ Double Dealing Concerning the Ground of the Conferrence of Grace.
24.—Pelagius Places Free Will at the Basis of All Turning to God for Grace.
25. [XXIV.]—God by His Wonderful Power Works in Our Hearts Good Dispositions of Our Will.
27. [XXVI.]—What True Grace Is, and Wherefore Given. Merits Do Not Precede Grace.
28. [XXVII.]—Pelagius Teaches that Satan May Be Resisted Without the Help of the Grace of God.
31. [XXX.]—Pelagius and Cœlestius Nowhere Really Acknowledge Grace.
35. [XXXII.]—Pelagius Believes that Infants Have No Sin to Be Remitted in Baptism.
36. [XXXIII.]—Cœlestius Openly Declares Infants to Have No Original Sin.
37. [XXXIV.]—Pelagius Nowhere Admits the Need of Divine Help for Will and Action.
38. [XXXV.]—A Definition of the Grace of Christ by Pelagius.
39. [XXXVI]—A Letter of Pelagius Unknown to Augustin.
40. [XXXVII]—The Help of Grace Placed by Pelagius in the Mere Revelation of Teaching.
41.—Restoration of Nature Understood by Pelagius as Forgiveness of Sins.
42. [XXXVIII.]—Grace Placed by Pelagius in the Remission of Sins and the Example of Christ.
44. [XL.]—Pelagius Once More Guards Himself Against the Necessity of Grace.
45. [XLI.]—To What Purpose Pelagius Thought Prayers Ought to Be Offered.
46. [XLII]—Pelagius Professes to Respect the Catholic Authors.
47. [XLIII.]—Ambrose Most Highly Praised by Pelagius.
48. [XLIV].—Ambrose is Not in Agreement with Pelagius.
49. [XLV.]—Ambrose Teaches with What Eye Christ Turned and Looked Upon Peter.
50.—Ambrose Teaches that All Men Need God’s Help.
51. [XLVI.]—Ambrose Teaches that It is God that Does for Man What Pelagius Attributes to Free Will.
52. [XLVII.]—If Pelagius Agrees with Ambrose, Augustin Has No Controversy with Him.
53. [XLVIII.]—In What Sense Some Men May Be Said to Live Without Sin in the Present Life.
54. [XLIX.]—Ambrose Teaches that No One is Sinless in This World.
55. [L.]—Ambrose Witnesses that Perfect Purity is Impossible to Human Nature.
1. [I.]—Caution Needed in Attending to Pelagius’ Deliverances on Infant Baptism.
3. [III.]—Part of the Proceedings of the Council of Carthage Against Cœlestius.
4.—Cœlestius Concedes Baptism for Infants, Without Affirming Original Sin.
5. [V.]—Cœlestius’ Book Which Was Produced in the Proceedings at Rome.
6. [VI.]—Cœlestius the Disciple is In This Work Bolder Than His Master.
7.—Pope Zosimus Kindly Excuses Him.
8. [VII.]—Cœlestius Condemned by Zosimus.
9. [VIII.]—Pelagius Deceived the Council in Palestine, But Was Unable to Deceive the Church at Rome.
10. [IX.]—The Judgment of Innocent Respecting the Proceedings in Palestine.
11. [X.]—How that Pelagius Deceived the Synod of Palestine.
12. [XI.]—A Portion of the Proceedings of the Synod of Palestine in the Cause of Pelagius.
13. [XII.]—Cœlestius the Bolder Heretic Pelagius the More Subtle.
15. [XIV.]—Pelagius by His Mendacity and Deception Stole His Acquittal from the Synod in Palestine.
16. [XV.]—Pelagius’ Fraudulent and Crafty Excuses.
17.—How Pelagius Deceived His Judges.
18. [XVII.]—The Condemnation of Pelagius.
19.—Pelagius’ Attempt to Deceive the Apostolic See He Inverts the Bearings of the Controversy.
20.—Pelagius Provides a Refuge for His Falsehood in Ambiguous Subterfuges.
21. [XIX.]—Pelagius Avoids the Question as to Why Baptism is Necessary for Infants.
22. [XX.]—Another Instance of Pelagius’ Ambiguity.
23. [XXI.]—What He Means by Our Birth to an “Uncertain” Life.
24.—Pelagius’ Long Residence at Rome.
25. [XXII.]—The Condemnation of Pelagius and Cœlestius.
27. [XXIII.]—On Questions Outside the Faith—What They Are, and Instances of the Same.
28. [XXIV.]—The Heresy of Pelagius and Cœlestius Aims at the Very Foundations of Our Faith.
30. [XXVI]—Pelagius and Cœlestius Deny that the Ancient Saints Were Saved by Christ.
31.—Christ’s Incarnation Was of Avail to the Fathers, Even Though It Had Not Yet Happened.
33. [XVIII.]—How Christ is Our Mediator.
34. [XXIX.]—No Man Ever Saved Save by Christ.
35. [XXX.]—Why the Circumcision of Infants Was Enjoined Under Pain of So Great a Punishment.
36. [XXXI]—The Platonists’ Opinion About the Existence of the Soul Previous to the Body Rejected.
37. [XXXII.]—In What Sense Christ is Called “Sin.”
38. [XXXIII.]—Original Sin Does Not Render Marriage Evil.
39. [XXXIV.]—Three Things Good and Laudable in Matrimony.
41. [XXXVI.]—Lust and Travail Come from Sin. Whence Our Members Became a Cause of Shame.
44. [XXXIX.]—Even the Children of the Regenerate Born in Sin. The Effect of Baptism.
45.—Man’s Deliverance Suited to the Character of His Captivity.
46.—Difficulty of Believing Original Sin. Man’s Vice is a Beast’s Nature.
47. [XLI.]—Sentences from Ambrose in Favour of Original Sin.
48.—Pelagius Rightly Condemned and Really Opposed by Ambrose.
5. [IV.]—Pelagius’ Own Account of the Faculties, Quoted.
Lest, however, it should chance to be said that we either do not correctly understand what he advances, or malevolently pervert to another meaning what he never meant to bear such a sense, I beg of you to consider his own actual words: “We distinguish,” says he, “three things, arranging them in a certain graduated order. We put in the first place ‘ability;’ in the second, ‘volition;’ and in the third, ‘actuality.’6 [The three terms here are, posse, velle, esse.—W.] The ‘ability’ we place in our nature, the ‘volition’ in our will, and the ‘actuality’ in the effect. The first, that is, the ‘ability,’ properly belongs to God, who has bestowed it on His creature; the other two, that is, the ‘volition’ and the ‘actuality,’ must be referred to man, because they flow forth from the fountain of the will. For his willing, therefore, and doing a good work, the praise belongs to man; or rather both to man, and to God who has bestowed on him the ‘capacity’ for his will and work, and who evermore by the help of His grace assists even this capacity. That a man is able to will and effect any good work, comes from God alone. So that this one faculty can exist, even when the other two have no being; but these latter cannot exist without that former one. I am therefore free not to have either a good volition or action; but I am by no means able not to have the capacity of good. This capacity is inherent in me, whether I will or no; nor does nature at any time receive in this point freedom for itself. Now the meaning of all this will be rendered clearer by an example or two. That we are able to see with our eyes is not of us; but it is our own that we make a good or a bad use of our eyes. So again (that I may, by applying a general case in illustration, embrace all), that we are able to do, say, think, any good thing, comes from Him who has endowed us with this ‘ability,’ and who also assists this ‘ability;’ but that we really do a good thing, or speak a good word, or think a good thought, proceeds from our own selves, because we are also able to turn all these into evil. Accordingly,—and this is a point which needs frequent repetition, because of your calumniation of us,—whenever we say that a man can live without sin, we also give praise to God by our acknowledgment of the capacity which we have received from Him, who has bestowed such ‘ability’ upon us; and there is here no occasion for praising the human agent, since it is God’s matter alone that is for the moment treated of; for the question is not about ‘willing,’ or ‘effecting,’ but simply and solely about that which may possibly be.”
CAPUT IV.
5. Sed ne quis forsitan dicat, nos vel non recte intelligere quae loquitur, vel malevolo animo in alium sensum quae non ita dicta sunt vertere, ipsa jam verba ejus accipite. «Nos» inquit, «sic tria ista distinguimus, et certum velut in ordinem digesta partimur. Primo loco posse statuimus, secundo velle, tertio esse. Posse in natura, velle in arbitrio, esse in effectu locamus. Primum illud, id est, posse, ad Deum proprie pertinet, qui illud creaturae suae contulit: duo vero reliqua, hoc est, velle et esse, ad hominem referenda sunt, quia de arbitrii fonte descendunt. Ergo in voluntate et opere bono laus hominis est: imo et hominis, et Dei, qui ipsius voluntatis et operis possibilitatem dedit, quique ipsam possibilitatem gratiae suae adjuvat semper auxilio. Quod vero potest homo velle bonum atque perficere, solius Dei est. Potest itaque illud unum esse, etiamsi duo ista non fuerint: ista vero sine illo esse non possunt. Itaque liberum mihi est nec voluntatem bonam habere, nec actionem: nullo autem modo possum non habere possibilitatem boni: inest mihi etiamsi noluero, nec otium sui aliquando in hoc natura recipit. Quem nobis sensum exempla aliqua facient clariorem. Quod possumus videre oculis, nostrum non est: quod vero bene aut male videmus, hoc nostrum est . Et ut generaliter universa complectar, quod possumus omne bonum facere, dicere, cogitare, illius est qui hoc posse donavit, qui hoc posse adjuvat: quod vero bene vel agimus, vel loquimur, vel cogitamus, nostrum est; quia haec omnia vertere in malum etiam possumus. Unde, quod propter calumniam vestram saepe repetendum est, cum dicimus hominem posse esse sine peccato, et confessione possibilitatis acceptae laudamus Deum, qui nobis hoc posse largitus est, nec est ibi ulla laudandi hominis occasio, ubi solius Dei causa tractatur: non 0363 enim de velle, nec de esse, sed tantummodo de eo quod potest esse, disseritur.»