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Augustine of Hippo, A Treatise Against Two Letters of the Pelagians. — Book I
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by aurelius augustin, bishop of hippo
Chapter 1.—Introduction: Address to Boniface.
Chapter 2.—Why Heretical Writings Must Be Answered.
Chapter 3.—Why He Addresses His Book to Boniface.
Chapter 5.—Free Choice Did Not Perish With Adam ’s Sin. What Freedom Did Perish.
Chapter 6 [III.]—Grace is Not Given According to Merits.
Chapter 7.—He Concludes that He Does Not Deprive the Wicked of Free Will.
Chapter 8 [IV.]—The Pelagians Demolish Free Will.
Chapter 9 [V.]—Another Calumny of Julian,—That “It is Said that Marriage is Not Appointed by God.”
Chapter 10—The Third Calumny,—The Assertion that Conjugal Intercourse is Condemned.
Chapter 11 [VI.]—The Purpose of the Pelagians in Praising the Innocence of Conjugal Intercourse.
Chapter 15 [IX.]—He Sins in Will Who is Only Deterred from Sinning by Fear.
Chapter 16.—How Sin Died, and How It Revived.
Chapter 17 [X.]—“The Law is Spiritual, But I Am Carnal,” To Be Understood of Paul.
Chapter 18.—How the Apostle Said that He Did the Evil that He Would Not.
Chapter 19.—What It is to Accomplish What is Good.
Chapter 20.—In Me, that Is, in My Flesh.
Chapter 21.—No Condemnation in Christ Jesus.
Chapter 22.—Why the Passage Referred to Must Be Understood of a Man Established Under Grace.
Chapter 23 [XI.]—What It is to Be Delivered from the Body of This Death.
Chapter 25 [XII.]—The Sixth Calumny,—That Augustin Asserts that Even Christ Was Not Free from Sins.
Chapter 27.—In What Sense Lust is Called Sin in the Regenerate.
Chapter 28 [XIV.]—Many Without Crime, None Without Sin.
Chapter 30.—Secondly, of Marriage.
Chapter 31.—Thirdly, of Conjugal Intercourse.
Chapter 32 [XVI.]—The Aprons Which Adam and Eve Wore.
Chapter 33.—The Shame of Nakedness.
Chapter 34 [XVII.]—Whether There Could Be Sensual Appetite in Paradise Before the Fall.
Chapter 37 [XIX.]—The Beginning of a Good Will is the Gift of Grace.
Chapter 38 [XX.]—The Power of God’s Grace is Proved.
Chapter 39 [XXI.]—Julian’s Fifth Objection Concerning the Saints of the Old Testament.
Chapter 41 [XXIII.]—The Seventh Objection, of the Effect of Baptism.
Chapter 42 [XXIV.]—He Rebuts the Conclusion of Julian’s Letter.
Chapter 1.—Introduction The Pelagians Impeach Catholics as Manicheans.
Chapter 3.—How Far the Manicheans and Pelagians are Joined in Error How Far They are Separated.
Chapter 4.—The Two Contrary Errors.
Chapter 5 [III.]—The Calumny of the Pelagians Against the Clergy of the Roman Church.
Chapter 6 [IV.]—What Was Done in the Case of Cœlestius and Zosimus.
Chapter 7.—He Suggests a Dilemma to Cœlestius.
Chapter 8.—The Catholic Faith Concerning Infants.
Chapter 9 [V.]—He Replies to the Calumnies of the Pelagians.
Chapter 10.—Why the Pelagians Falsely Accuse Catholics of Maintaining Fate Under the Name of Grace.
Chapter 11 [VI.]—The Accusation of Fate is Thrown Back Upon the Adversaries.
Chapter 12.—What is Meant Under the Name of Fate.
Chapter 13 [VII.]—He Repels the Calumny Concerning the Acceptance of Persons.
Chapter 14.—He Illustrates His Argument by an Example.
Chapter 15.—The Apostle Meets the Question by Leaving It Unsolved.
Chapter 18.—The Desire of Good is God’s Gift.
Chapter 19 [IX.]—He Interprets the Scriptures Which the Pelagians Make Ill Use of.
Chapter 20.—God’s Agency is Needful Even in Man’s Doings.
Chapter 21.—Man Does No Good Thing Which God Does Not Cause Him to Do.
Chapter 22 [X.]—According to Whose Purpose the Elect are Called.
Chapter 23.—Nothing is Commanded to Man Which is Not Given by God.
Chapter 2 [II.]—The Misrepresentation of the Pelagians Concerning the Use of the Old Law.
Chapter 3.—Scriptural Confirmation of the Catholic Doctrine.
Chapter 4 [III.]—Misrepresentation Concerning the Effect of Baptism.
Chapter 5.—Baptism Puts Away All Sins, But It Does Not at Once Heal All Infirmities.
Chapter 6 [IV.]—The Calumny Concerning the Old Testament and the Righteous Men of Old.
Chapter 7.—The New Testament is More Ancient Than the Old But It Was Subsequently Revealed.
Chapter 8.—All Righteous Men Before and After Abraham are Children of the Promise and of Grace.
Chapter 9.—Who are the Children of the Old Covenant.
Chapter 10.—The Old Law Also Given by God.
Chapter 11.—Distinction Between the Children of the Old and of the New Testaments.
Chapter 12.—The Old Testament is Properly One Thing—The Old Instrument Another.
Chapter 13.—Why One of the Covenants is Called Old, the Other New.
Chapter 14 [V.]—Calumny Concerning the Righteousness of the Prophets and Apostles.
Chapter 15.—The Perfection of Apostles and Prophets.
Chapter 16 [VI.]—Misrepresentation Concerning Sin in Christ.
Chapter 17 [VII.]—Their Calumny About the Fulfilment of Precepts in the Life to Come.
Chapter 18.—Perfection of Righteousness and Full Security Was Not Even in Paul in This Life.
Chapter 19.—In What Sense the Righteousness of Man in This Life is Said to Be Perfect.
Chapter 20.—Why the Righteousness Which is of the Law is Valued Slightly by Paul.
Chapter 21.—That Righteousness is Never Perfected in This Life.
Chapter 22.—Nature of Human Righteousness and Perfection.
Chapter 23.—There is No True Righteousness Without the Faith of the Grace of Christ.
Chapter 24 [VIII.]—There are Three Principal Heads in the Pelagian Heresy.
Chapter 1 [I.]—The Subterfuges of the Pelagians are Five.
Chapter 2 [II.]—The Praise of the Creature.
Chapter 4 [IV.]—Pelagians and Manicheans on the Praise of the Creature.
Chapter 5.—What is the Special Advantage in the Pelagian Opinions?
Chapter 6.—Not Death Alone, But Sin Also Has Passed into Us by Means of Adam.
Chapter 7.—What is the Meaning of “In Whom All Have Sinned”?
Chapter 8.—Death Passed Upon All by Sin.
Chapter 9 [V.]—Of the Praise of Marriage.
Chapter 10.—Of the Praise of the Law.
Chapter 11.—The Pelagians Understand that the Law Itself is God’s Grace.
Chapter 12 [VI.]—Of the Praise of Free Will.
Chapter 13.—God’s Purposes are Effects of Grace.
Chapter 14.—The Testimonies of Scripture in Favour of Grace.
Chapter 15.—From Such Scriptures Grace is Proved to Be Gratuitous and Effectual.
Chapter 16.—Why God Makes of Some Sheep, Others Not.
Chapter 17 [VII.]—Of the Praise of the Saints.
Chapter 18.—The Opinion of the Saints Themselves About Themselves.
Chapter 19.—The Craft of the Pelagians.
Chapter 20 [VIII.]—The Testimonies of the Ancients Against the Pelagians.
Chapter 21.—Pelagius, in Imitation of Cyprian, Wrote a Book of Testimonies.
Chapter 22.—Further References to Cyprian.
Chapter 23.—Further References to Cyprian.
Chapter 24.—The Dilemma Proposed to the Pelagians.
Chapter 25 [IX.]—Cyprian’s Testimonies Concerning God’s Grace.
Chapter 26.—Further Appeals to Cyprian’s Teaching.
Chapter 27 [X.]—Cyprian’s Testimonies Concerning the Imperfection of Our Own Righteousness.
Chapter 28.—Cyprian’s Orthodoxy Undoubted.
Chapter 30.—The Testimonies of Ambrose Concerning God’s Grace.
Chapter 31.—The Testimonies of Ambrose on the Imperfection of Present Righteousness.
Chapter 32 [XII.]—The Pelagian’s Heresy Arose Long After Ambrose.
Chapter 33.—Opposition of the Manichean and Catholic Dogmas.
Chapter 34.—The Calling Together of a Synod Not Always Necessary to the Condemnation of Heresies.
Chapter 38 [XX.]—The Power of God’s Grace is Proved.
That this is true we do not surmise by human conjecture, but we discern by the most evident authority of the divine Scriptures. It is read in the books of the Chronicles: “Also in Judah, the hand of God was made to give them one heart, to do the commandment of the king and of the princes in the word of the Lord.”84 2 Chron. xxx. 12. Also by Ezekiel the prophet the Lord says, “I will give them another heart, and a new spirit will I give them; and I will take away their stony heart out of their flesh, and I will give them an heart of flesh, that they may walk in my commandments and observe my judgments and do them.”85 Ezek. xxxvi. 26, 27. And what is that which Esther the queen prays when she says, “Give me eloquent speech in my mouth, and enlighten my words in the sight of the lion, and turn his heart to hatred of him that fighteth against us”?86 Esther xiv. 13. How does she say such things as these in her prayer to God, if God does not work His will in men’s hearts? But perchance the woman was foolish in praying thus. Let us see, then, whether the desire of the petitioner was vainly sent on in advance, and whether the result did not follow as of one who heard. Lo, she goes in to the king. We need not say much. And because she did not approach him in her own order, under the compulsion of her great necessity, “he looked upon her,” as it is written, “like a bull in the impulse of his indignation. And the queen feared, and her colour was changed through faintness, and she bowed herself upon the head of her maid, who went before her. And God changed him, and converted his indignation into mildness.”87 Esther xv. 5 ff. Now what need is there to relate what follows, where the divine Scripture testifies that God fulfilled what she had asked for by working in the heart of the king nothing other than the will by which he commanded, and it was done as the queen had asked of him? And now God had heard her that it should be done, who changed the heart of the king by a most secret and efficacious power before he had heard the address of the woman beseeching him, and moulded it from indignation to mildness,—that is, from the will to hurt, to the will to favour,—according to that word of the apostle, “God worketh in you to will also.” Did the men of God who wrote these things—nay, did the Spirit of God Himself, under whose guidance such things were written by them—assail the free will of man? Away with the notion! But He has commended both the most righteous judgment and the most merciful aid of the Omnipotent in all cases. For it is enough for man to know that there is no unrighteousness with God. But how He dispenses those benefits, making some deservedly vessels of wrath, others graciously vessels of mercy,—who has known the mind of the Lord, or who has been His counsellor? If, then, we attain to the honour of grace, let us not be ungrateful by attributing to ourselves what we have received. “For what have we which we have not received?”88 1 Cor. iv. 7.
CAPUT XX.
38. Gratiae Dei vis demonstratur. Hoc verum esse non conjectura suspicamur humana, sed evidentissima divinarum Scripturarum auctoritate dignoscimus. Legitur in Paralipomenon libris: Et quidem in Juda facta est manus Dei, ut daret illis cor unum, ut facerent praeceptum regis et principum in verbo Domini (II Par. XXX, 12). Item per Ezechielem prophetam Dominus dicit: Dabo eis cor aliud, et spiritum novum dabo eis, et evellam cor eorum lapideum de carne eorum, et dabo eis cor carneum; ut in praeceptis meis ambulent, et justificationes meas observent, et faciant eas (Ezech. XXXVI, 26, 27). Quid est autem quod Esther illa regina orat, et dicit, Da sermonem concinnum in os meum, et verba mea clarifica in conspectu leonis, et converte cor ejus in odium impugnantis nos? Utquid ista in oratione dicit Deo, si non operatur Deus in cordibus hominum voluntatem? Sed forte hoc mulier insipienter oravit. Videamus ergo utrum inaniter praemissus fuerit orantis affectus, et consecutus non fuerit exaudientis effectus. Ecce ingreditur ad regem. Ne multa dicamus. Et quia non ordine suo ingrediebatur, magna necessitate compulsa, intuitus est eam, sicut scriptum est, velut taurus in impetu indignationis suae. Et timuit regina, et conversus est color ejus per dissolutionem, et inclinavit se super caput delicatae suae, quae praecedebat eam. Et convertit Deus, et transtulit indignationem ejus in lenitatem. Jam sequentia commemorare quid opus est, ubi Deum complevisse 0569 quod illa rogaverat, divina Scriptura testatur (Esth. XIV-XVI), operando in corde regis, quid aliud, quam voluntatem, qua jussit et factum est quod ab eo regina poposcerat? Quam Deus jam, ut fieret, exaudierat, qui cor regis, antequam mulieris sermonem poscentis audisset, occultissima et efficacissima potestate convertit, et transtulit ab indignatione ad lenitatem, hoc est, a voluntate laedendi ad voluntatem favendi: secundum illud Apostoli, Deus operaturin vobis et velle. Numquid homines Dei qui haec scripserunt, imo ipse Spiritus Dei, quo auctore per eos ista conscripta sunt, oppugnavit liberum hominis arbitrium? Absit: sed Omnipotentis in omnibus et judicium justissimum, et auxilium misericordissimum commendavit. Sufficit enim scire homini quod non est iniquitas apud Deum. Jam quomodo ista dispenset, faciens alios secundum meritum vasa irae, alios secundum gratiam vasa misericordiae (Rom. IX, 14, 22, 23); quis cognovit sensum Domini, aut quis consiliarius ejus fuit (Id. XI, 34)? Si ergo ad honorem gratiae pertinemus, non simus ingrati, tribuendo nobis quod accepimus. Quid enim habemus, quod non accepimus (I Cor. IV, 7)?