This sequence of dates, made clear by the consuls, far more forcibly convicts and utterly overturns the calumnies of the Donatists in that case, as we have shown elsewhere. This book begins thus: 'To reply to those who hold opposite opinions.' CHAPTER 61. ON THE MAXIMIANISTS, AGAINST THE DONATISTS, ONE BOOK. I also wrote, among other things against the Donatists, a book not very brief, as before, but a large one, much more carefully composed; in which it appears how the case of the Maximianists alone utterly overturns from the foundation their impious and most arrogant error against the Catholic Church — a schism which was made from the very party of Donatus. This book begins thus: 'We have already said many things, we have already written many things.' CHAPTER 62. ON THE GRACE OF THE NEW TESTAMENT, TO HONORATUS, ONE BOOK.
At that very time, when we were being vigorously exercised against the Donatists, and had already begun to be exercised against the Pelagians, a certain friend sent me five questions from Carthage and asked that I should expound them for him in writing. They are: what that cry means: 'God, my God, why have you forsaken me?'; and what it is that the Apostle says: 'that, being rooted and grounded in charity, you may be able to comprehend, with all the saints, what is the breadth and length and height and depth'; and what are the five foolish virgins and which the wise; and what are the outer darknesses; and how it is to be understood: 'the Word was made flesh.'
Now, having in view the aforesaid heresy, that new enemy of the grace of God, I set before myself as a sixth question the matter of the grace of the New Testament. In discussing it I inserted an exposition of the twenty-first Psalm, at whose head is written that which the Lord cried out upon the cross, the very thing which that friend had, first of all, proposed to me for exposition; and I resolved all those five points, not in the order in which they had been set forth, but as, while I was treating of the grace of the New Testament, they could fittingly come up, each as it were in its own place. This book begins thus: 'Five questions you have set before me to treat.' CHAPTER 63. ON THE SPIRIT AND THE LETTER, TO MARCELLINUS, ONE BOOK. To him I had written three books whose title is:
'On the Deserts and Remission of Sins,' where the baptism of infants is also carefully discussed. He wrote back to me that he had been troubled because I had said it was possible for a man to be without sin, if his will did not fail while the divine help assisted—although no one has been, or is, or will be of so perfect a righteousness in this life. For he asked how I could say that a thing was possible of which there is no example. On account of this inquiry of his I wrote a book whose title is 'On the Spirit and the Letter,' treating through the apostolic sentence where he says: 'The letter kills, but the spirit gives life.' In which book, so far as God helped me, I disputed fiercely against the enemies of the grace of God, by which the ungodly is justified.
But when I was treating of the observances of the Jews who, according to the old law, abstain from certain foods, I said: 'the ceremonies of certain foods'—a term which is not in use in the sacred Scriptures. Nevertheless it seemed to me fitting, because I held in memory that ceremonies (ceremoniae) were so called from 'lacking' (carere), as it were carimoniae, since those who observe them lack (carent) those things from which they abstain. But if the origin of this name is one that recoils from true religion, I did not speak according to that, but according to the one which I mentioned above. This book begins thus: 'Having read the little works which I lately composed for you, dearest son Marcellinus.' CHAPTER 64. ON FAITH AND WORKS, ONE BOOK.
Meanwhile there were sent to me by certain brethren—laymen indeed, but zealous students of the divine oracles—some writings which so distinguished Christian faith from good works, that it was urged that without faith one could not, but without works one could, attain to eternal life. Answering these I wrote a book whose name is 'On Faith and Works,' in which I discussed not only how those regenerated by the grace of Christ ought to live, but also of what sort men should be who are admitted to the laver of regeneration. This book begins thus: 'To certain persons it seems.' CHAPTER 65. A SUMMARY OF THE CONFERENCE WITH THE DONATISTS, THREE BOOKS.
After our conference with the Donatists had taken place, I briefly recorded what had been done, and set it down in writing according to the three days on which we conferred with them; and I judged this work useful, so that anyone thus informed might either know without labour what was done, or, by consulting the numbers which I noted for each item, might read in those same acts at whatever place he pleased, since those acts weary the reader by their excessive length. The title of this work is 'A Summary of the Conference.' This work begins thus: 'When the Catholic bishops and those of Donatus' party.' CHAPTER 66. AFTER THE CONFERENCE, AGAINST THE DONATISTS, ONE BOOK.
I also wrote a book, sufficiently large as I reckon, addressed carefully to the Donatists themselves after the conference which we held with their bishops, lest they should be further led astray by them. In it I answered also certain vain assertions of theirs which had been able to reach us, which, though vanquished, they boasted of where they could and how they could—besides those things which I said concerning the acts of the conference, whence one might briefly learn what had been done. But I dealt with this much more briefly in a certain letter again addressed to them; yet because it was resolved in the council of Numidia that this be done by all of us who were there, it is not among my letters. For it begins thus:
'Silvanus the elder, Valentinus, Innocentius, Maximinus, Optatus, Augustine, Donatus, and the rest of the bishops, from the council of Zerta, to the Donatists.' This book begins thus: 'Why, Donatists, are you still being led astray?' CHAPTER 67. ON SEEING GOD, ONE BOOK. On seeing God I wrote a book, in which I deferred to a more careful inquiry the question of the spiritual body which will be in the resurrection of the saints—whether or how God, who is a Spirit, may be seen through such a body; but that question, truly most difficult, I afterwards explained sufficiently, as I judge, in the last, that is, in the twenty-second book of 'The City of God.'
I have also found in a certain codex of ours, in which this book too is contained, a certain memorandum made by me on this matter, addressed to Fortunatianus, bishop of Sicca, which is noted in the index of my little works neither among the books nor among the letters. This book begins thus: 'Mindful of my debt'; but the other: 'As when present I asked, so now also I admonish.' CHAPTER 68. ON NATURE AND GRACE, ONE BOOK. There came also then into my hands a certain book of Pelagius, in which he defended, with as much argumentation as he could, the nature of man against the grace of God by which the ungodly is justified and by which we are Christians. So the book by which I answered him, defending grace not against nature, but that by which nature is set free and governed, I entitled 'On Nature and Grace.'
In it there were certain words which Pelagius had put forward as though they were of Xystus, the Roman bishop and martyr; and I defended them as though they truly were of that same Xystus, for so I had supposed. But afterwards I read that they were of Sextus the philosopher, not of Xystus the Christian. This book begins thus: 'The book which you sent.' CHAPTER 69. ON THE CITY OF GOD, TWENTY-TWO BOOKS. Meanwhile Rome was overthrown by the irruption of the Goths acting under their king Alaric, and by the onset of a great disaster. The worshippers of the false and many gods, whom by the customary name we call pagans, attempting to refer this overthrow to the Christian religion, began to blaspheme the true God more sharply and bitterly than was their wont.
Whereupon I, burning with zeal for the house of God against their blasphemies or errors, set about to write the books 'On the City of God.' This work held me for some years, because many other matters intervened which ought not to be deferred and which occupied me first in their solving. But this great work 'On the City of God' was at length completed and bounded in twenty-two books. Of these the first five refute those who wish human affairs to prosper in such a way that they judge the worship of the many gods, whom the pagans were wont to worship, to be necessary for this end, and contend that because they are forbidden, these evils arise and abound.
The following five, however, speak against those who admit that these evils neither have ever been, nor ever will be, wanting to mortals, and that they, now great now small, vary according to places, times, and persons—but who argue that the worship of the many gods, by which sacrifice is offered to them, is useful on account of the life to come after death. By these ten books, therefore, those two vain opinions, hostile to the Christian religion, are refuted. But lest anyone should reproach us for having only refuted the doctrines of others, and not asserted our own, the other part of this work, which is contained in twelve books, accomplishes this—although, where need is, in the former ten also we assert what is ours, and in the latter twelve refute the adverse doctrines.
So of the twelve following books, the first four contain the rise of the two cities, of which one is God's, the other of this world; the second four, their course or progress; the third, which are also the last, their due ends. Thus, though all the twenty-two books are written concerning both cities, yet they took their title from the better, so that they should rather be called 'On the City of God.' In their tenth book, the flame miraculously produced from heaven, which ran between the divided victims in Abraham's sacrifice, ought not to have been set down as a miracle, since this was shown to him in a vision. In the seventeenth, what was said of Samuel—'he was not of the sons of Aaron'—should rather have been said: 'he was not the son of a priest.'
For it was rather the lawful custom for the sons of priests to succeed priests when they died; now among the sons of Aaron is found the father of Samuel, yet he was not a priest, nor was he among the sons in such a way that Aaron himself begot him, but as all of that people are called sons of Israel. This work begins thus: 'The most glorious City of God.' CHAPTER 70. TO OROSIUS THE PRESBYTER, AGAINST THE PRISCILLIANISTS, ONE BOOK. Amid these things I answered, with as much brevity and clarity as I could, the consultation of one Orosius, a Spanish presbyter, concerning the Priscillianists and certain opinions of Origen which the Catholic faith disapproves. The title of this little work is 'To Orosius, against the Priscillianists and Origenists.'
For his consultation itself was joined at the beginning of my reply. This book begins thus: 'To answer you who ask, most beloved son Orosius.' CHAPTER 71. TO JEROME THE PRESBYTER, TWO BOOKS: ONE ON THE ORIGIN OF THE SOUL, AND THE OTHER ON A SENTENCE OF JAMES. I also wrote two books to the presbyter Jerome, dwelling at Bethlehem: one on the origin of the human soul, the other on that sentence of the apostle James where he says: 'Whosoever shall keep the whole law, but offend in one point, is become guilty of all,' consulting him about both. But in the former I did not myself solve the question which I set forth; in the latter, however, I did not keep silent as to what seemed to me right for its solution, but I consulted him whether he too would assent to this.
He wrote back, praising this same consultation of mine, yet replied that he had no leisure to answer it. But I, as long as he was in the body, was unwilling to publish these books, lest perchance he should at some time answer, and they should rather be published together with his own reply. But after his death I published the former for this end, that whoever reads it may be admonished either not to inquire at all how the soul is given to those being born, or at least, concerning a most obscure matter, to admit such a solution of this question as is not contrary to the most manifest truths—although, concerning original sin, the Catholic faith knows that in infants, unless they be regenerated in Christ, they are without doubt condemned; and the latter book for this end, that of the question
which is there treated, the very solution too which seemed good to us might be known. This work begins thus: 'Our God, who has called us.' CHAPTER 72. TO EMERITUS, BISHOP OF THE DONATISTS, AFTER THE CONFERENCE, ONE BOOK. To Emeritus, bishop of the Donatists, who in our conference which we held with them seemed chiefly to conduct their cause, I wrote, some time after that same conference, a sufficiently useful book, since it embraces with convenient brevity the matters by which they are conquered or are shown to have been conquered. This book begins thus: 'If even now, brother Emeritus.' CHAPTER 73. ON THE PROCEEDINGS OF PELAGIUS, ONE BOOK.
About the same time in the East—that is, in Syria Palaestina—Pelagius was brought by certain Catholic brethren to episcopal proceedings; and in the absence of those who had lodged the petition against him (since they could not appear on the day of the synod), he was heard by fourteen bishops, where, since he condemned the very dogmas which were read against him from the petition as hostile to the grace of Christ, they pronounced him Catholic. But when those same acts had come into our hands, I wrote a book about them, lest, he being as it were acquitted, those dogmas too should be thought to have been approved by the judges—dogmas which, had he not condemned them, he would by no means have come away from them except as condemned himself. This book begins thus: 'After there came into our hands.' CHAPTER 74.
ON THE CORRECTION OF THE DONATISTS, ONE BOOK. At the same time I also wrote a book on the correction of the Donatists, on account of those who were unwilling that they should be corrected by the imperial laws. This book begins thus: 'I praise and rejoice and marvel.' CHAPTER 75. ON THE PRESENCE OF GOD, TO DARDANUS, ONE BOOK. On the presence of God I wrote a book, in which our intention watches most vigilantly against the Pelagian heresy, though not expressly named. But in it there is also disputed, laboriously and subtly, concerning the presence of that Nature which we call God, both supreme and true, and concerning His temple. This book begins thus: 'I confess, most beloved brother Dardanus.' CHAPTER 76.
AGAINST PELAGIUS AND CAELESTIUS, ON THE GRACE OF CHRIST AND ON ORIGINAL SIN, TO ALBINA, PINIANUS, AND MELANIA, TWO BOOKS. After the Pelagian heresy, together with its authors, had been convicted and condemned by the bishops of the Roman church—first Innocent, then Zosimus—with the cooperation of the letters of the African councils, I wrote two books against them: one on the grace of Christ, the other on original sin. This work begins thus: 'How much we rejoice over your bodily and especially spiritual welfare.' CHAPTER 77. THE PROCEEDINGS WITH EMERITUS THE DONATIST, ONE BOOK. Some time after the conference which we held with the Donatist heretics, a necessity arose for us of proceeding into Mauritania Caesariensis.
There, at Caesarea itself, we saw Emeritus, bishop of the Donatists—one, namely, of those seven whom they had chosen for the defence of their cause, and one who had laboured most in that same cause. What we transacted with him, in the presence of the bishops of that same province and of the people of the Caesarean church—in which city he had been both a citizen and bishop of the aforesaid heretics—the ecclesiastical acts bear witness, which are contained in my little works. There, finding nothing to answer, he listened as though mute to my whole discourse, which I unfolded solely about the Maximianists in his hearing and that of all who were present. This book, or rather these acts, begin thus: 'To the most glorious Honorius Augustus, for the twelfth time, and to Constantius, for the second time, most illustrious men,'
'as consuls, on the eleventh day before the Kalends of October, at Caesarea, in the greater church.' CHAPTER 78. AGAINST A SERMON OF THE ARIANS, ONE BOOK. Amid these things there came into my hands a certain sermon of the Arians, without the name of its author. To this, at the asking and urging of him who had sent it to me, I replied with as much brevity and swiftness as I could, joining that same sermon at the head of my reply and applying numbers to each point, by inspecting which one may easily discern what we answered to which passage. This book, after their sermon which is joined at the head, begins thus: 'To their preceding argument I reply by this argument.' CHAPTER 79. ON MARRIAGE AND CONCUPISCENCE, TO VALERIUS, TWO BOOKS.
I wrote two books to the illustrious man, Count Valerius, when I had heard that the Pelagians had written I know not what to him about us—namely, that we condemn marriage by asserting original sin. The title of these books is 'On Marriage and Concupiscence.' For we defend the goodness of marriage, lest the concupiscence of the flesh, and the law in the members warring against the law of the mind, be thought to be its vice—which evil of lust conjugal chastity uses well for the procreation of children. But that there might be two books, the first came into the hands of Julian the Pelagian, and he wrote four books against it, from which someone copied out certain portions and sent them to Count Valerius, and he in turn to us. When I had received these, I answered these very things in another book.
The first book of this work begins thus: 'The new heretics, most beloved son Valerius'; and the second thus: 'Amid the cares of your military service.' CHAPTER 80. THE BOOKS OF EXPRESSIONS, SEVEN BOOKS. I made seven books from the seven books of the divine Scriptures—that is, the five of Moses, and one of Joshua son of Nun, and another of Judges—noting the expressions of each which are less usual to our tongue, which those who read the divine oracles, by too little heeding the sense, take for questions, whereas it is a form of expression; and sometimes they carve out something which does not indeed recoil from the truth, yet the author by whom it was written is not found to have meant that, but it appears more credible that he said this by a form of expression.
But many things in the sacred Scriptures which are obscure become clear when the form of expression is recognized. On this account these same forms of expression are to be learned, where the meanings are open, so that even where they lie hidden, the very knowledge may come to aid and lay them open, present to the attentive mind. The title of this work is 'Expressions on Genesis,' and so on for the several books. But what I set down in the first book—that it is written: 'And Noah did all the words which the Lord commanded him, so he did'—and said that this expression is similar to that where, in the establishment of the creature, after it is said: 'And so it was made,' there is added: 'And God made'—does not seem to me in every way similar to this same. For there the sense also lies hidden; here it is a matter of expression alone. This work begins thus:
'The expressions of the Scriptures.' CHAPTER 81. THE BOOKS OF QUESTIONS, SEVEN BOOKS. At the same time I also wrote seven books of questions on those same divine books, which I wished to entitle thus for this reason: because the things there discussed I set forth rather as things to be inquired into than as inquiries resolved—although many more of them seem to me to be so treated that they may not undeservedly be judged even as solved and expounded. The books of Kingdoms too I had already begun to consider in the same manner; but not having made much progress, I turned my mind to other things which pressed more urgently.
But in the first book, where it is treated of the variegated rods which Jacob placed in the water, so that the ewes, when set to conceive, might see them as they drank and bear variegated young, the reason was not well expounded by us why he did not place them for those conceiving again—that is, when they were conceiving other young—but at the first conception. For the exposition of another question—where it is asked why Jacob said to his father-in-law: 'You have deceived my wage of ten she-lambs'—shows sufficiently truly that this former question, though it ought to have been solved, was not solved.
In the third book too, where it is treated of the high priest—how he begot sons, since he had the necessity of entering twice a day into the holy of holies, where was the altar of incense, to offer incense morning and evening; into which, as the law says, one unclean could not enter, and the same law says that a man is made unclean even by conjugal intercourse, whom indeed it bids to be washed with water, but even when washed says he is unclean until evening—whence I said it followed that either he must be continent, or on certain days the incense must be intermitted—I did not see that it did not follow. For it can be so understood, what is written:
'he shall be unclean until evening,' so that by that very evening he was now no longer unclean, but only up to it—so that at the eventide time, now clean, he might offer the incense, since on account of begetting children he had, after the morning incense, been united to his wife. Likewise, where it was asked how the high priest was forbidden to enter over the corpse of his father, since he ought not to be made priest—when there was but one—except after the death of his priestly father, I said that on this account it was necessary that, the father not yet buried, immediately after his death his son should be appointed to succeed the father, also on account of the continuity of the incense, which had to be offered twice a day—the priest who is forbidden to enter over the death of his father not yet buried.
But I took too little into account that this could rather have been enjoined on account of those who were to be future high priests, not succeeding fathers who were high priests, but nevertheless from among the sons—that is, from among the posterity of Aaron—if perchance a high priest either had no sons, or had sons so reprobate that none of them ought to succeed the father, as Samuel succeeded the high priest Eli, though he himself was not the son of a priest, yet was nevertheless from among the sons—that is, from among the posterity—of Aaron. Concerning the thief too, to whom it was said, 'Today you shall be with me in paradise,' I set down as certain that he was not visibly baptized, whereas it is uncertain, and it is rather to be believed that he was baptized, as I too have afterwards argued elsewhere.
Likewise, what I said in the fifth book—where the mothers in the evangelical genealogies are mentioned, that they are placed only together with the fathers—is indeed true, but it does not pertain to the matter which was under discussion. For the discussion was about those who married the wives of their brothers or kinsmen who had died without children, on account of the two fathers of Joseph, one of whom Matthew mentions, the other Luke. On which question I discoursed carefully in this work, when we were retracting our work against Faustus the Manichaean. This work begins thus: 'When the sacred Scriptures, which are called canonical.' CHAPTER 82. ON THE SOUL AND ITS ORIGIN, FOUR BOOKS.
At the same time a certain Vincentius Victor in Mauritania Caesariensis found, with a certain Spanish presbyter Peter, a certain little work of mine, where in a certain passage, concerning the origin of the soul of individual men—whether they are propagated from that of the first man, and thereafter from the parents, or whether, as to that first one, they are given singly to individuals without any propagation—I confessed that I did not know, yet nevertheless that I knew the soul to be not body but spirit. And against these views of mine he wrote two books to the same Peter, which Renatus the monk sent to me from Caesarea. Having read them, I gave back four in my reply: one to Renatus the monk, another to the presbyter Peter, and two to the same Victor.
But that to Peter, although it has the length of a book, is nevertheless a letter, which I was unwilling to separate from the other three. In all these, however, in which many necessary matters are discussed, I defended, concerning the origin of the souls which are given to individual men, my hesitation, and I pointed out the many errors and perverse presumptions of his. Yet him, being a young man, I treated as one not to be too hastily detested, but still to be taught, with as much gentleness as I could; and I received from him a writing of his own correction. The book of this work to Renatus begins thus: 'Your sincerity toward us'; but that to Peter thus: 'To the most beloved lord and father and fellow-presbyter Peter'; and of the two last, to Vincentius Victor, the first begins thus: 'That I thought I must write to you.'
CHAPTER 83. TO POLLENTIUS, ON ADULTEROUS MARRIAGES, TWO BOOKS. I wrote two books on adulterous marriages, desiring, so far as I could according to the Scriptures, to solve a most difficult question. Whether I have done this most clearly, I do not know; nay rather, I feel that I have not attained to the perfection of this matter, although I have opened up many of its recesses, as anyone who reads intelligently will be able to judge. The first book of this work begins thus: 'The first question is, most beloved brother Pollentius'; but the second thus: 'To those things which you had written to me.' CHAPTER 84. AGAINST AN ADVERSARY OF THE LAW AND THE PROPHETS, TWO BOOKS.
Meanwhile a certain book of a certain heretic—whether a Marcionite or of any one of those whose error supposes that this world was not made by God, nor is the God of the law which was given through Moses and of the prophets pertaining to that same law the true God, but a most wicked demon—when at Carthage, with many flocking together and most attentively listening, it was being read in a street by the sea, some most zealous Christian brethren came upon it, and sent it to me to be refuted, without any delay, earnestly begging that I too should not defer to answer. I refuted it in two books, which I therefore entitled 'Against an Adversary of the Law and the Prophets,' because the codex itself which was sent had not the name of its author. This work begins thus:
'The book which you sent, most beloved brethren.' CHAPTER 85. AGAINST GAUDENTIUS, BISHOP OF THE DONATISTS, TWO BOOKS. About the same time Dulcitius, a tribune and notary, was here in Africa as the executor of the imperial commands issued against the Donatists. When he had sent a letter to Gaudentius of Tamugadi, bishop of the Donatists—one of those seven whom they had chosen as authorities for their defence in our conference—exhorting him to Catholic unity and dissuading him from the burning by which he threatened to consume himself and his own, together with the very church in which he was, and adding also that, if they thought themselves righteous, they should rather flee according to the precept of the Lord Christ than consume themselves in unspeakable fires, Gaudentius wrote back two letters: one brief,