III. TWO BOOKS ON THE GRACE OF CHRIST AND ON ORIGINAL SIN. BOOK ONE. ON THE GRACE OF CHRIST. How greatly we rejoice over your bodily and especially your spiritual welfare, most sincere brethren beloved of God, Albina, Pinianus, and Melania—since we cannot express it, we leave it for you to consider and believe, so that we may now rather speak of those things about which you consulted us. For, since the bearer is in haste, amid our occupations, which are far more crowded at Carthage than anywhere else, we have dictated these things as we could, so far as God deigned to grant. You wrote to me that you had dealt with Pelagius, that whatever was said against him he should condemn in writing, and that he said, in your hearing:
'I anathematize whoever either holds or says that the grace of God, by which Christ came into this world to save sinners, is not necessary not only through the several hours or the several moments, but also through our several acts; and let those who try to take this away receive eternal penalties.' Whoever hears this and is ignorant of his meaning, which he has expressed clearly enough in his books, thinks—not in those which he says were unemended and foisted upon him, or wholly denies to be his own, but in those which he mentions in the letter which he sent to Rome—that he altogether holds what the truth holds;
but whoever notices what he says more openly in them ought to hold even these words suspect; because, even if he places the grace of God, by which Christ came into the world to save sinners, in the mere remission of sins, he can fit these words to this meaning, saying that it is therefore necessary through the several hours, through the several moments, and through the several acts, in order that, always retaining in memory and remembering that our sins have been forgiven us, we may not sin further—being helped not by any supply of virtue, but by the powers of our own will as it recalls, through the several acts, what was granted to it by the remission of sins.
Likewise, since they are wont to say to us that Christ furnished us help against sinning in this, that by living justly himself and teaching justly he left an example, they can also fit these words to this, so as to say that this kind of grace is necessary to us through the several moments, through the several acts—that is, that in our whole manner of life we may look upon the example of the Lord's manner of life. But your faith perceives how this confession is to be distinguished from the confession of grace, of which the question is; and yet it can be veiled by the ambiguity of those words of theirs. But what wonder is this?
Since Pelagius himself—when in the episcopal acts he condemned, without any refusal, those who say that the grace of God and his help are not given for individual acts, but consist in free will or in the law and teaching (where we thought that all his evasions concerning this matter had been used up), and when he also condemned those who teach that the grace of God is given according to our merits—yet in the books which he published in defense of free will, of which he makes mention in the letter which he sent to Rome, is shown to hold nothing other than that very thing which he seemed to have condemned.
For the grace of God and the help by which we are helped not to sin, he places either in nature and free will, or in the law and teaching, so that, namely, when God helps a man to turn away from evil and do good, he is believed to help by revealing and showing what ought to be done, not also by cooperating and inspiring love, so that a man may do what he has come to know ought to be done. For when he establishes and distinguishes three things by which he says the divine commandments are fulfilled:
possibility, will, action—that is, possibility by which a man can be righteous, will by which he wills to be righteous, action by which he is righteous—of these three the first, that is, possibility, he confesses to be given by the Creator of nature and not to be in our power, but that we have it even if we are unwilling; but the two remaining, that is, will and action, he asserts to be our own, and so attributes them to us that he contends they are from none but ourselves.
Finally, he asserts that the grace of God helps not these two, which he wants to be altogether our own—that is, will and action—but that which is not in our power and is ours from God—that is, possibility; as though those things which are ours, that is, will and action, are so strong for turning away from evil and doing good that they do not need the divine help, while that which is ours from God, that is, possibility, is so weak that it is always helped by the aid of grace. But lest anyone perhaps say that we either do not rightly understand what he says, or with malevolent mind twist into another sense things not so said, receive now his very words. 'We,'
he says, 'thus distinguish these three, and setting them out as it were in a fixed order, we divide them. In the first place we set possibility ('to be able'), in the second willing, in the third being; possibility we locate in nature, willing in the will, being in the effect. That first, that is, being able, pertains properly to God, who conferred it on his creature; but the two remaining, that is, willing and being, are to be referred to man, because they descend from the fountain of the will. Therefore in the good will and work is the praise of man—nay, of both man and God, who gave the possibility of that very will and work, and who always helps that possibility itself by the aid of his grace. But that a man is able to will good and to accomplish it, is of God alone.'
'That one thing, therefore, can be, even if these two are not; but these cannot be without that. Thus it is free for me neither to have a good will nor a good action, but in no way can I not have the possibility of good; it is in me, even if I am unwilling, nor does nature ever admit any respite of itself in this. Let some examples make this meaning clearer to us. That we can see with our eyes is not ours, but that we see well or ill, this is ours; that we can speak is God's, but that we speak well or ill, this is ours. And, to comprise all things generally: that we can do, say, think every good is his who gave this being able, who helps this being able;'
'but that we do, or speak, or think well, is ours, because we can also turn all these to evil. Whence—which must be repeated often on account of your calumny—when we say that a man can be without sin, and by confessing the possibility received we praise God, who bestowed this being able upon us, there is here no occasion of praising man, where the cause of God alone is treated; for the discussion is not of willing nor of being, but only of that which can be.'
Behold, this is the whole dogma of Pelagius, expressed carefully in his third book in defense of free will, in these very words, by which he took such pains, with so great subtlety, to distinguish these three—the one which is being able, the second which is willing, the third which is being, that is, possibility, will, action—so that whenever we read or hear him confessing the help of divine grace, that we may turn away from evil and do good, whether he places it in the law and teaching or anywhere else, we may know what he is saying, and may not err by understanding him otherwise than he means.
For we ought to know that he believes neither our will nor our action to be helped by divine aid, but only the possibility of the will and of the work, which alone among these three he affirms that we have from God—as though this were weak, which God himself placed in nature, while the other two, which he wished to be our own, are so firm and strong and self-sufficient that they need none of his help, and therefore he does not help us to will, does not help us to act, but only helps us so that we may be able to will and to act. On the contrary, the apostle says: «Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.»
And that they might know that they are divinely helped not only in that they can work—for this they had already received in nature and in teaching—but also in that they actually work, he did not say: «For it is God who works in you to be able,» as though they now had both to will and to work of themselves and did not need his help in these two; but he said: «For it is God who works in you both to will and to accomplish,» or, as it is read in other and especially Greek manuscripts, «both to will and to work.»
See whether the apostle, by the Holy Spirit, did not foresee so long beforehand those who would be adversaries of the grace of God, and did not say that God works in us these two things, that is, both to will and to work, which this man wished to be so much our own as though they themselves were not helped by the aid of divine grace. Nor let Pelagius here deceive the incautious and the simple, or even himself, in that, when he had said 'therefore in the good will and work is the praise of man,' he as it were corrected himself and added: 'nay, of both man and God.' For he did not say this because he wished it to be understood according to sound doctrine, that God works in us both to will and to work; but he showed clearly enough why he said this by immediately subjoining:
'who gave the possibility of that very will and work.' But that he places this possibility in nature is clear from his earlier words. Yet lest he should seem to have said nothing about grace, he added: 'and who always helps that possibility itself by the aid of his grace;' he did not say: the will itself or the operation itself—which, if he said it, would seem not to be at variance with apostolic doctrine—but he said:
'that possibility itself,' namely that one of the three which he located in nature, 'he always helps by the aid of his grace;' so that, that is, in the will and action the praise is not both of God and of man because a man so wills that God nevertheless inspires into his will the ardor of love, and so a man works that God nevertheless cooperates—without whose help what is a man?—but he added God to this praise for this reason: that unless there were a nature in which he created us, whereby we might be able to will and to act, we would neither will nor act. But that he confesses this natural possibility to be helped by the grace of God, it is not here open what grace he means, or how far he holds nature to be helped by it;
But as may be understood from other passages in which he speaks more plainly, he means nothing else by grace than the law and teaching by which the natural capacity is assisted. For in one place he says: 'Here the most ignorant of men suppose that we do injury to divine grace, because we say that it in no way perfects holiness in us apart from our own will — as though God had commanded something of His grace and did not also supply the help of His grace to those to whom He gave the command, so that what men are bidden to do by free choice they might more easily fulfil through grace' — and as though about to explain what grace he means, he went on to add, saying:
'which we confess to exist not, as you suppose, in the law alone, but also in God's help.' Who would not here desire that he should show what he wishes to be understood by grace? For on this account above all we ought to expect of him that he should state what he means when he says that he confesses grace to be not in the law alone. But while we are held in suspense by this expectation, observe what he has added. 'For God helps us,' he says, 'by His teaching and revelation, when He opens the eyes of our heart; when He shows us things to come, that we may not be engrossed with things present; when He lays bare the snares of the devil; when He enlightens us with the manifold and ineffable gift of heavenly grace.'
Then, concluding his statement with a kind of summing-up, 'He who says these things,' he says, 'does he seem to you to deny grace, or does he confess both man's free choice and God's grace?' In all these things he has not departed from commending the law and teaching, diligently inculcating that this is the assisting grace, and carrying out what he had proposed when he said: 'but we confess it to be in God's help.' In short, he thought that God's help was to be conveyed in manifold ways by mentioning teaching, and revelation, and the opening of the heart's eyes, and the showing of things to come, and the disclosing of the devil's snares, and the enlightenment of the manifold and ineffable gift of heavenly grace — all this, assuredly, that we may learn the divine precepts and promises.
This, therefore, is to place the grace of God in the law and teaching. Hence, then, it appears that he confesses that grace by which God shows and reveals what we ought to do, not that by which He bestows and helps us to do it — since the knowledge of the law rather avails to this, if the aid of grace be wanting, that transgression of the commandment should be committed. For 'where there is no law,' says the Apostle, 'neither is there transgression'; and: 'I had not known lust, unless the law had said: Thou shalt not covet.'
And by this, law is so far one thing and grace another, that the law not only profits nothing, but even greatly hinders, unless grace assists; and this usefulness of the law is shown, in that, whom it makes guilty of transgression, it compels to flee for refuge to grace to be set free, and to be helped that they may overcome their evil lusts. For it commands rather than helps; it teaches that there is a disease, it does not heal it; nay, rather, by it that which is not healed is increased, that the medicine of grace may be sought more attentively and more anxiously — because the letter kills, but the spirit gives life. For if a law had been given which could give life, righteousness would altogether have been by the law. Yet insofar as the law does help, he adds and says:
'But the Scripture hath concluded all things under sin, that the promise by faith of Jesus Christ might be given to them that believe.' 'Therefore,' he says, 'the law was our schoolmaster in Christ Jesus.' This very thing, then, is useful for the proud — to be shut up more strictly and more manifestly under sin, lest they presume, as it were by the proper powers of free choice, to work righteousness, but that every mouth may be stopped and all the world may become guilty before God, because by the law no flesh shall be justified in His sight; for by the law is the knowledge of sin. But now, apart from the law, the righteousness of God has been manifested, being witnessed by the law and the prophets. How then manifested apart from the law, if witnessed by the law?
Not therefore manifested apart from the law, but the righteousness apart from the law — because it is the righteousness of God, that is, which is ours not from the law but from God; not the righteousness which, when He commands it, is feared by knowing it, but that which, when He bestows it, is held fast by loving it — that he who glorieth may glory in the Lord. What then is it, that this man reckons the law and teaching to be the grace by which we are helped to work righteousness — which, however much it helps, helps to this end, that grace should be sought? For no one can fulfil the law through the law; for love is the fulfilling of the law, and the love of God has been shed abroad in our hearts not through the law, but through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us. Accordingly, through the law grace is shown, that the law may be fulfilled through grace.
For what does it profit Pelagius that in different words he says the same thing, so that it may not be understood that he places grace in the law and teaching, by which he asserts that the capacity of nature is assisted? So far as I judge, he is on this account afraid to be understood, because he condemned those who say that the grace and help of God is not given for individual acts, but lies in free choice, or in the law and teaching; and yet he thinks himself concealed while he turns over the meaning of law and teaching in one phrase after another. And indeed in another place, when he had at length asserted that a good will is wrought in us not by the help of God but out of ourselves, he set against himself a question from the Apostle's epistle, and said: 'And how,' he says, 'shall that saying of the Apostle stand:
'For it is God who works in you both to will and to accomplish'? Then, in order as it were to solve this objection, which he saw to be vehemently contrary to his own doctrine, he went on to add: 'He works in us to will what is good, to will what is holy, while He kindles us — given over to earthly desires and, after the manner of dumb animals, loving only things present — by the greatness of future glory and the promise of rewards; while by the revelation of wisdom He rouses our astonished will into the desire of God; while He persuades us' — a thing which elsewhere you do not fear to deny — 'to all that is good.' What could be plainer than that he says grace, by which God works in us to will what is good, to be nothing else than the law and teaching?
For in the law and teaching of the holy Scriptures the greatness of future glory and of rewards is promised; to teaching it also belongs that wisdom is revealed; to teaching it belongs when all that is good is urged upon us. And if there seems to be some difference between teaching and urging, or rather exhorting, yet this too is included under the generality of teaching, which is contained in any words or writings whatever; for the holy Scriptures both teach and exhort, and in teaching and exhorting there can be also the working of man.
But we wish that these men would at some time confess that grace by which the greatness of future glory is not only promised, but also believed and hoped for; nor is wisdom only revealed, but also loved; nor is all that is good only urged, but also carried into effect by persuasion. For not all have faith who hear through the Scriptures the Lord promising the kingdom of heaven; nor are all persuaded who are urged, that they should come to Him who says: 'Come unto me, all ye that labour.' But whose is the faith, and to whom it is given by persuasion that they come to Him, He Himself has sufficiently shown, where He says:
'No man comes to me, unless the Father who sent me draw him'; and a little later, when He was speaking of unbelievers, 'I said unto you,' He says, 'that no man can come unto me, unless it were given him of my Father.' This grace Pelagius ought to confess, if he wishes not only to be called, but also to be, a Christian. But what shall I say of the revelation of wisdom? For no one would easily hope that in this life he could attain to the greatness of the revelations of the Apostle Paul; and surely in these what else is to be believed to have been usually revealed to him, than what pertained to wisdom? And yet he says: 'Lest I should be exalted by the greatness of my revelations, there was given to me a thorn in my flesh, an angel of Satan, to buffet me.'
'For this thing I besought the Lord thrice, that it might depart from me; and He said unto me: My grace is sufficient for thee; for strength is made perfect in weakness.' Without doubt, if the highest love, to which nothing could be added, and which could in no way be puffed up, had then already been in the Apostle, would there have been need of an angel of Satan, by whose buffeting the elation might be repressed which could arise in the greatness of the revelations? But what else is elation than inflation? And assuredly of love it has been most truly said: 'Love envieth not, is not puffed up.' This love, therefore, even in so great an Apostle, was surely being increased from day to day, so long as his inner man was being renewed from day to day — to be perfected, without doubt, where it could no longer be puffed up.
But at that time his mind was still such that it might be puffed up by the greatness of the revelation, until it should be filled up with the solid building of love; for he had not yet by attaining laid hold of that toward which by advancing he was running. And therefore, to one unwilling to endure the trouble by which his elation was restrained, before there was in him the last and highest perfection of love, it is most rightly said: 'My grace is sufficient for thee; for strength is made perfect in weakness' — in weakness, that is, not, as he supposes, of the flesh only, but both of flesh and of mind; because the mind also, in comparison with that highest perfection, was weak, when it might be exalted.
Accordingly, the thorn in the flesh, the angel of Satan, was understood to have been given, although in comparison with carnal or animal men who do not yet perceive the things which are of the Spirit of God he was most firm. Wherefore, if strength is made perfect in weakness, whoever does not confess himself weak is not made perfect. But this grace, by which strength is made perfect in weakness, leads the predestined and those called according to purpose on to the highest perfection and glorification. By this grace it is brought about not only that we know what things are to be done, but also that we do the things we know; nor only that we believe the things to be loved, but also that we love the things we believe.
If this grace is to be called teaching, let it certainly be so called in such a way that God is believed to pour it in more deeply and inwardly with ineffable sweetness, not only through those who plant and water outwardly, but also through Himself, who secretly ministers His own increase — so that He not only shows the truth, but also imparts love. For thus God teaches those who are called according to purpose, giving them at once both to know what they should do and to do what they know. Whence the Apostle speaks thus to the Thessalonians: 'But concerning brotherly love ye have no need that I write unto you; for ye yourselves are taught of God to love one another.' And to prove that they had been taught of God, he added:
'For indeed ye do this toward all the brethren in the whole of Macedonia' — as though this were the most certain sign that you have been taught of God, if you have done that which you have learned. In this manner all are called according to purpose, as it is written in the Prophets, 'taught of God.' But he who indeed knows what ought to be done and does it not, has not yet been taught of God according to grace, but according to the law; not according to the spirit, but according to the letter — although many seem to do what the law commands through fear of punishment, not through love of righteousness, which the Apostle calls his own righteousness, which is of the law, as though it were commanded, not given. But if it is given, it is not called our righteousness, but God's, because it so becomes ours that it is from God for us. For he says:
'That I may be found in Him, not having my own righteousness which is of the law, but that which is of the faith of Jesus, the righteousness of God.' So great, then, is the distance between the law and grace, that although the law is not doubted to be of God, yet the righteousness which is of the law is not of God, but the righteousness which is consummated through grace is of God. Because that righteousness is said to be of the law which is done for fear of the law's curse, that righteousness is said to be of God which is given through the benefit of grace, so that the commandment may be not terrible but sweet — as it is prayed in the Psalm: 'Thou art sweet, O Lord, and in Thy sweetness teach me Thy righteousness'; that is, that I may not be servilely compelled by dread of punishment to be under the law, but may delight, in free love, to be with the law.
For the precept makes free him who does it willingly. And in this way whoever learns, does entirely whatever he has learned is to be done. Concerning this manner of teaching the Lord also says: 'Every one that hath heard of my Father, and hath learned, cometh unto me.' He therefore who has not come, it is not rightly said of him, 'He indeed heard and learned that he ought to come, but he will not do what he learned' — this is by no means rightly said, of that manner of teaching by which God teaches through grace. For if, as the Truth speaks, every one who has learned comes, then whoever does not come has assuredly not learned. But who does not see that a person both comes and does not come by the choice of the will? Yet this choice can be alone, if he does not come;
but if he comes, it cannot but be helped — and so helped that he not only knows what is to be done, but also does what he has known. And by this, when God teaches not through the letter of the law but through the grace of the Spirit, He so teaches that whatever each one has learned he not only sees by knowing, but also seeks by willing, and accomplishes by doing. And by this divine manner of teaching, the will itself and the working itself, and not merely the natural capacity of willing and working, is assisted. For if only our power were aided by this grace, the Lord would have said thus: 'Every one that hath heard of the Father and hath learned, is able to come to me'; but He did not say so, but 'Every one,' He says, 'that hath heard of the Father and hath learned, cometh unto me.'
Pelagius places the ability to come in nature, or even, as he has just begun to say, in grace — of whatever kind he understands it — 'by which,' as he says, 'the very capacity is assisted'; but coming is now in the will and work. It is not, however, a consequence that he who can come also comes, unless he has willed and done it. But every one who has learned of the Father not only can come, but comes; where now there is both the advance of capacity, and the affection of will, and the effect of action. What then do his examples aim at, except that they have indeed made his meaning clearer to us, as he had promised — not that we should hold those views, but that we should more manifestly and openly know what he himself held?
'What we can see with our eyes,' he says, 'is not ours; but that we see well or ill, this is ours.' Let the Psalm answer him, where it is said to God: 'Turn away mine eyes, lest they behold vanity.' For although this was said of the eyes of the mind, thence assuredly proceeds into these eyes of the flesh the seeing either well or ill — not in the way that those are said to see well who gaze with sound eyes, and ill who are bleary-eyed, but to see well unto relieving, to see ill unto coveting. For although through these outward eyes both the poor man is seen, who is relieved, and the woman is seen, who is coveted, yet from the inward parts, unto seeing ill or well, mercy or lust proceeds. Why then is it said to God: 'Turn away mine eyes, lest they behold vanity'?
Why is that asked for which belongs to our own power, if God does not help the will? 'That we can speak,' he says, 'is of God; but that we speak well or ill, is ours.' He does not teach this who speaks well; 'for it is not ye,' He says, 'that speak, but the Spirit of your Father who speaketh in you.' 'And that I may generally,' he says, 'comprehend all things: that we can do, say, think every good thing, is of Him who bestowed this power, who assists this power.' Behold, here also he repeats the earlier meaning, that of those three — namely, capacity, will, action — only the capacity is assisted.