Letters & Polemics (CSEL) 35

On Faith and Works. It seems to certain persons that all are to be admitted indiscriminately to the laver of regeneration, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord, even if they have refused to change an evil and shameful life marked by most manifest crimes and disgraceful deeds, and have declared, even by open profession, that they will persevere in it.

For example, if anyone clings to a harlot, let it not first be enjoined upon him that he should depart from her and then come to baptism; but even while remaining with her, and confessing — or even openly professing — that he will remain, let him be admitted and baptized, and not be hindered from becoming a member of Christ, even though he should persist in being a member of a harlot; but let him afterward be taught how great an evil this is, and, once baptized, be instructed about changing his morals for the better. For they think it perverse and preposterous first to teach how a Christian ought to live and then to baptize him. But they judge that the sacrament of baptism ought to precede, so that the teaching of life and morals may then follow: which, if he should be willing to hold and keep, he will have acted profitably;

but if he should be unwilling, then, retaining the Christian faith, without which he would perish forever, he will remain in whatsoever crime and uncleanness, yet will be saved as though through fire, like one who has built upon the foundation, which is Christ, not gold, silver, precious stones, but wood, hay, stubble — that is, not just and chaste morals, but iniquitous and unchaste ones. To this argument they seem to have been driven because it moved them that those are not admitted to baptism who, having dismissed their wives, have married others, or women who, having dismissed their husbands, have married others; because the Lord Christ testifies, without any doubt, that these are not marriages but adulteries.

For since they could not deny that it was adultery, which Truth confirms without ambiguity to be adultery, and yet wished to lend support toward receiving baptism to those whom they saw so caught in a snare of this kind that, if they were not admitted to baptism, they would rather live or even die without any sacrament than be freed by breaking the bond of adultery, they were moved by a certain human pity to take up their cause in such a way that they judged all the wicked and disgraceful — even those corrected by no prohibition, set right by no instruction, changed by no penance — ought to be admitted to baptism along with them, thinking that these, unless it were done, would perish forever;

but if it were done, even while persevering in those evils, they would be saved through fire. Answering these men, I say first this: let no one so receive those testimonies of the Scriptures which indicate the present, or foretell the future, commingling of the good and the evil in the Church, as to think that the severity or diligence of discipline is to be altogether dissolved and set aside — being deceived not by those writings, but by his own opinion. For it is not the case that, because Moses the servant of God most patiently endured that commingling of the first people, therefore he did not also avenge it with the sword upon many; and Phinehas the priest transfixed with avenging steel the adulterers found together.

And this assuredly was signified to be done at this time by degradations and excommunications, when in the discipline of the Church the visible sword was to cease. Nor, because the blessed Apostle most tolerantly groans among false brethren, and permits some, even goaded by the diabolical stings of envy, nevertheless to preach Christ, does he therefore judge that man to be spared who had his father's wife — whom he commands, the church being gathered, to be handed over to Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus — or does he therefore himself not hand over others to Satan, that they might learn not to blaspheme, or does he say in vain:

I wrote to you in the epistle not to keep company with fornicators — not indeed with the fornicators of this world, or the covetous, or robbers, or those who serve idols; otherwise you would have had to go out of this world. But now I have written to you not to keep company, if any who is called a brother be either a fornicator, or a server of idols, or covetous, or a reviler, or a drunkard, or a rapacious man — with such a one not even to take food. For what have I to do to judge those who are without? Do you not judge those who are within? But those who are without, God will judge. Put away the evil from among your own selves. Here indeed some understand what is said, 'from among your own selves,' in such a way that each one should put away evil from his own self — that is, that he himself should be good.

But in whichever way it be understood — whether that by the severity of the Church the evil be corrected by excommunications, or that each one, by correcting and setting himself right, should put away evil from himself — nevertheless that which was said above has no ambiguity, where he enjoins not to keep company with those brethren who are named in any of the aforesaid vices — that is, who are known and notorious. But with what mind and with what charity this merciful severity is to be applied, he clearly shows not only in that place where he says: that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus, but also elsewhere, saying: If anyone does not obey our word by the epistle, note that man, and do not keep company with him, that he may be ashamed; and do not esteem him as an enemy, but rebuke him as a brother.

And the Lord Himself, the singular example of patience, who even among the twelve apostles endured the devil up to the passion, and who said: Let both grow until the harvest, lest perchance, while you wish to gather the tares, you also root up the wheat together with them; and who foretold, by that likeness of the net, that the Church, up to the shore — that is, up to the end of the world — would have both good and bad fish; and the rest, whatever He spoke, whether openly or through likenesses, about the commingling of the good and the bad, did not on that account judge that the discipline of the Church was to be omitted; nay rather, He admonished that it was to be applied, when He said: Take heed to yourselves; if your brother sin against you, go, rebuke him between you and him alone.

If he hears you, you have gained your brother. But if he does not hear you, take with you one or two more, that in the mouth of two or three witnesses every word may stand. But if he will not hear them, tell the church. But if he will not hear the church either, let him be to you as a heathen and a publican. Then He added the most grievous terror of that very severity, saying also in that place: Whatsoever you shall loose on earth shall be loosed also in heaven, and whatsoever you shall bind on earth shall be bound also in heaven; He also forbids that the holy be given to dogs. Nor is the Apostle contrary to the Lord, because he says: Them that sin, rebuke before all, that the rest also may have fear — while the Lord says: Rebuke him between you and himself alone.

For both are to be done, as the diversity of infirmity of those men admonishes, whom we have undertaken not to destroy, but to correct and to heal; and one is to be healed thus, another otherwise. So too there is a reason for overlooking and tolerating the evil in the Church; and there is again a reason for chastising, rebuking, not admitting, or removing from communion. But men err by not observing the measure; and when they have begun to go pronely to one side, they do not look back at the other testimonies of the divine authority, by which they might be recalled from that inclination and take their stand in the truth and moderation that is tempered from both — and not only in this matter, about which the question now is, but also in many others.

For some, looking at those testimonies of the divine writings by which one God is instilled as to be worshipped, thought the same to be the Father who is the Son and the Holy Spirit; others again, laboring as it were with the contrary disease, when they attended to those things by which the Trinity is declared, and were not able to understand how there is one God — since the Father is not the Son, nor is the Son the Father, nor is the Holy Spirit either the Son or the Father — thought that diversities also of substances must be asserted. Some, looking at the praise of holy virginity in the Scriptures, condemned marriages; some again, following those testimonies by which chaste marriages are proclaimed, made virginity equal to nuptials. Some, when they read:

It is good, brethren, not to eat flesh nor to drink wine, and some similar things, deemed a creature of God, and whatever foods they pleased, to be unclean; while some, reading: Every creature of God is good, and nothing to be rejected which is received with thanksgiving, sank into gluttony and wine-drinking, being unable to remove vices from themselves, unless equal or even greater ones succeeded them from the opposite side.

So too in this present matter now in hand, certain people, looking to the precepts of severity by which we are admonished to correct the unruly, not to give what is holy to dogs, to hold an ecclesiastical despiser as a heathen, and to tear from the frame of the body the member that gives offence, so disturb the peace of the Church that they attempt to separate the tares before the time; and, blinded by this error, they themselves are rather cut off from the unity of Christ. Such is our case against the schism of Donatus — and this not with those who knew that Caecilianus was assailed with charges that were not true but slanderous, and who will not abandon their deadly opinion out of a lethal shame, but with those to whom we say:

Even if those on whose account you are not in the Church had been wicked, you ought nevertheless, by bearing with those whom you could by no means either amend or set apart, to have remained within the Church.

But certain others, on the contrary, running into danger — when they have perceived that a mixture of good and bad in the Church has been shown or foretold, and have learned the precepts of patience (which so establish us in firmness that, even if there seem to be tares in the Church, neither our faith nor our love is thereby hindered, so that, because we discern there to be tares in the Church, we should ourselves withdraw from the Church) — think that ecclesiastical discipline is to be abandoned, granting to those set over the Church a most perverse sense of security, as though it pertained to them only to say what is to be avoided and what is to be done, but to care nothing about whatever anyone may do.

We, however, judge that it belongs to sound doctrine to regulate our life and opinion from both classes of testimony, so that both for the sake of the Church's peace we tolerate the dogs within the Church, and where the peace of the Church is secure we do not give what is holy to the dogs.

When therefore, whether through the negligence of those set over us, or through some excusable necessity, or through hidden creepings-in, we find wicked men in the Church whom ecclesiastical discipline can neither correct nor restrain, then, lest there rise up in our heart the impious and pernicious presumption by which we suppose that we must separate ourselves from these, in order that we be not defiled by their sins, and thus try to draw after us, as it were pure and holy disciples, cut off from the frame of unity as from a fellowship of the wicked — let those passages come to mind.

— those similitudes from the Scriptures and divine oracles or most certain examples, by which it has been shown and foretold that the wicked, mingled with the good in the Church, will be there even to the end of the age and to the time of judgment, and that nothing will harm the good, who have not consented to the deeds of the wicked, within the unity and participation of the sacraments.

But when to those by whom the Church is governed there is present, with the Church's peace preserved, the power of exercising discipline against the wicked or wicked-doers, then again, lest we slumber in slackness and sloth, we must be roused by other goads of precepts which pertain to the severity of correction, so that, directing our steps in the way of the Lord from both classes of testimony, with Him as guide and guardian, we neither grow torpid under the name of patience nor rage under the pretext of diligence.

Preserving therefore this moderation according to sound doctrine, let us see what is at issue — namely, whether men are to be admitted to receiving baptism in such a way that no diligence keeps watch there, lest what is holy be given to dogs; to such a degree that not even the most open perpetrators of adultery and the professed persisters therein seem to be barred from the sacrament of so great a holiness — from which they would beyond doubt not be admitted, if, during those very days on which, being about to receive that same grace, having given in their names, they are purified by abstinence, fastings, and exorcisms, they were to profess that they would lie even with their own lawful and true wives, and would keep no continence in this matter (though at another time lawful) during those few solemn days.

How then is the adulterer who refuses correction admitted to those holy things, when the married man who refuses the observance is not admitted to them? 'But let him first be baptized,' they say, 'and then be taught what pertains to a good life and character.' This is done when perhaps the last day presses upon someone, so that at very few words (in which nevertheless all things are contained) he may believe and receive the sacrament, in order that, if he departs from this life, he may go forth freed from the guilt of all past sins. But if he seeks it while sound and there is space for learning, what other more opportune time can be found for him to hear how he ought to become and to live as a believer, than that when, with a more attentive mind and suspended by the very reverence of religion, he seeks the sacrament of the most healthful faith?

Or do we so far dissemble from our own senses that we do not even remember our own selves — how attentive and anxious we were as to what they who catechized us were enjoining upon us, when we sought the sacraments of that font and were for this reason even called 'competentes'? Or do we not observe others, who year by year run to the laver of regeneration, what they are on those very days on which they are catechized, exorcized, and scrutinized — with how great vigilance they come together, with what zeal they are fervent, with what care they are on tenterhooks? If then is not the time for saying what manner of life befits so great a sacrament as they desire to receive, when will it be?

Or indeed, when they have received it, are they to remain in such crimes even after baptism — not new men, but guilty old ones? So that, with wonderful perversity, you first say to them, 'Put on the new man,' and when they have put him on, afterward it is said, 'Put off the old,' while the Apostle, keeping the sound order, says, 'Put off the old and put on the new'; and the Lord Himself cries, 'No one sews a new patch on an old garment, and no one puts new wine into old wineskins.' But what else does the whole time do, during which they hold the place and name of catechumens, than that they may hear what faith and what manner of life a Christian ought to have, so that, when they have proved their own selves, they may then eat of the table of the Lord and drink of the cup?

For 'he who eats and drinks unworthily, eats and drinks judgment to himself.' But that which is done throughout the whole time during which it has been wholesomely established in the Church that the rank of catechumens should receive those coming to the name of Christ — this is done much more diligently and urgently in those days on which they are called 'competentes,' when they have already given their names for receiving baptism. 'What,' they say, 'if a maiden, unknowingly, has married another woman's husband?' If she is always ignorant of this, she will never on this account be an adulteress; but if she knows it, she now begins from this to be one, from the point at which she has knowingly lain with another woman's husband.

Just as in the law of estates, anyone is most rightly called a possessor in good faith so long as he is unaware that he possesses what belongs to another; but when he has come to know it and yet has not withdrawn from another's possession, then he is held to be of bad faith, then he is justly called unjust. Far be it therefore that, with a sense plainly not human but plainly empty, we should so grieve when disgraceful acts are corrected, as though marriages were being broken up — especially in the city of our God, in His holy mountain, that is, in the Church, where not only the bond but even the sacrament of marriage is so commended that it is not lawful for a man to hand over his own wife to another, which in the then Roman commonwealth Cato is reported to have done not only not blamably at all, but even praiseworthily.

Nor is there need to dispute longer on this point now, since even those to whom I am replying dare not affirm that this is no sin, nor deny that it is adultery, lest they be openly convicted of withstanding the Lord Himself and the holy Gospel. But when it pleases them that such people should first be admitted to receiving the sacrament of baptism and to the Lord's table, even if they have refused correction with a most manifest voice — nay rather, that they ought not to be admonished at all about this matter, but afterward to be taught, so that, if they receive the observance of the precept and correct their fault, they may be held among the wheat, but if they scorn it, they may be tolerated among the tares — they sufficiently show that they are not defending these crimes, nor treating them as though they were light or non-existent.

For what Christian of good hope would think adultery to be no crime or a small one? Yet they suppose that they bring forth from the holy Scriptures the order in which these things are either to be corrected or borne in others, when they say that the apostles acted thus, and they bring forward certain testimonies from their letters, where they are found first to have instilled the doctrine of faith and then to have handed down precepts of morals. And from this they wish it to be understood that only the rule of faith is to be instilled into those about to be baptized, but afterward, to those already baptized, the precepts of life to be changed for the better are to be handed down —

as though they were reading certain epistles of the apostles given to those who are to be baptized, in which they disputed about faith, and others to those already baptized, in which are contained precepts about avoiding evils and establishing good morals. Since therefore it is agreed that they gave their letters to those already Christians and baptized, why are they woven together with both kinds of discourse — namely that which pertains to faith and that which pertains to the good life? Or does it perhaps now please them that we should give neither of the two to those about to be baptized, and render both to the baptized?

But if that is absurd to say, then let them confess that the apostles put into their epistles their teaching complete from both parts, but that for this reason they for the most part instilled faith first and then subjoined what pertains to the good life, because in man himself too, unless faith precede, a good life cannot follow. For whatever a man may seem to do rightly, unless it be referred to the piety which is toward God, ought not to be called right. And if some foolish and too ignorant people were to think the epistles of the apostles were given to catechumens, assuredly they too would confess that precepts of morals which accord with the faith must be imparted, together with the rules of faith, to those not yet baptized —

unless perhaps these men, by their argument, drive us to this necessity: that they would wish the first parts of the apostolic epistles, where they speak of faith, to be read to the catechumens, but the later parts to the faithful, where it is now prescribed how Christians ought to live. But if it is most foolish to say this, then there is no document of this opinion from the epistles of the apostles, why we should for this reason judge that the baptized are to be admonished about faith alone, and the baptized about morals, because they commended faith in the first parts of their letters and afterward, consequently, exhorted that the faithful should live well.

For although the former comes first and the latter after, yet very often both, in one weaving of discourse, are to be preached — both to catechumens, both to the faithful, both to those about to be baptized, both to the baptized, whether that they may be instructed or that they may not forget, whether that they may profess or that they may be confirmed — by a most sound and most diligent teaching. And so to the epistles of Peter, the epistles of John, from which they recall certain testimonies, let them add also those of Paul and of the other apostles. It is on that principle that we must receive the fact which they have noticed, that faith is spoken of first and then morals — which, unless I am mistaken, I have most plainly set forth.

'But in the Acts of the Apostles,' they say, 'Peter thus addressed those who, having heard the word, were baptized in one day, three thousand, so that he preached to them faith alone, by which they should believe in Christ.' When they had said, 'What shall we do?' he answered them: 'Do penance, and let each one of you be baptized in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ unto the remission of sins, and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.' Why then do they not notice what was said: 'Do penance'? For there is the stripping off of the old life, that the new may be put on by those who are baptized. But to whom is penance fruitful — penance which is done concerning dead works — if he persists in adultery and other crimes by which the love of this world is entangled?

'But,' they say, 'he wished them to do penance only for the unbelief by which they had not believed in Christ.' A wonderful presumption — I do not wish to say anything more grievous — that, when this was heard which was said, 'Do penance,' it is said to be done for unbelief alone, whereas by the evangelical doctrine there was being handed down a life to be changed from the old into the new, wherein assuredly is also that which the Apostle sets down in that sentence: 'He who stole, let him now steal no more,' and the rest, in which he follows out what it is to lay aside the old man and to put on the new. But in these very words of Peter they have that whereby they could have been admonished, if they had been willing to attend diligently. For when he had said:

'Do penance, and let each one of you be baptized in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ unto the remission of sins, and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. For to us is this promise, and to our sons, and to all who are far off, whomsoever the Lord our God shall have called' — immediately he who wrote the book subjoined and said: 'And with many other words he testified,' saying, 'Save yourselves from this crooked generation.' And they, most eagerly seizing them, received the words and believed and were baptized; and there were added on that day three thousand souls.

Who here does not understand that by 'many other words,' which are passed over by the writer on account of length, Peter did this: that they should save themselves from this crooked generation — since the sentence itself is briefly set down, for the persuading of which Peter was insisting with many words? For the very sum is set down when it is said, 'Save yourselves from this crooked generation'; but with many words Peter was testifying that this should be done. In these words was the condemnation of dead works, which the lovers of this world wickedly do, and the commendation of the good life, which those should hold and pursue who save themselves from this crooked generation.

Now therefore, if it please them, let them try to affirm that he saves himself from this crooked generation who only believes in Christ, even if he persists in whatever disgraceful acts he wishes, even to the profession of adultery. But if to say this is impious, let those to be baptized hear not only what they ought to believe, but also how they may save themselves from this crooked generation. For there it is necessary that they hear how believers ought to live. 'That eunuch,' they say, 'whom Philip baptized, said nothing more than: I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, and upon this profession he was immediately baptized.' Does it then please them that men should answer only this and be immediately baptized?

Is nothing to be said by the one catechizing, and professed by the one believing, about the Holy Spirit, nothing about the holy Church, nothing about the remission of sins, nothing about the resurrection of the dead, and finally about the Lord Jesus Christ Himself nothing except that He is the Son of God — nothing about His incarnation from the Virgin, nothing about His passion, about the death of the cross, about the burial, about the resurrection on the third day, about the ascension and session at the right hand of the Father? For if the eunuch, when he had answered, 'I believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God,' this seemed sufficient for him, so that, immediately baptized, he departed, why do we not follow this?

Why do we not imitate this and take away the rest, which we hold necessary — even when the shortness of time presses toward baptizing — to express by questioning, so that the one to be baptized may answer to all things, even if his memory has not been free for them? But if Scripture was silent and left to be understood the rest which Philip did with that eunuch to be baptized, and in that which it says:

'Philip baptized him,' it wished it to be understood that all things were fulfilled which, although they are passed over in silence in the Scriptures for the sake of brevity, we nevertheless know are to be fulfilled by the sequence of tradition — in like manner also in that which is written, that Philip evangelized to the eunuch the Lord Jesus, it is in no way to be doubted that those things also were said in the catechizing which pertain to the life and morals of him who believes in the Lord Jesus.

For this is to evangelize Christ: not only to say what things are to be believed concerning Christ, but also what things are to be observed by him who comes to the frame of the body of Christ — nay rather, to say all the things that are to be believed concerning Christ, not only whose Son He is, whence He was begotten according to divinity, whence according to the flesh, what things He suffered and why, what is the power of His resurrection, what gift of the Spirit He promised and gave to the faithful, but also what kind of members He seeks, forms, loves, frees, and leads to eternal life and honour — members of whom He is the head. When these things are said, sometimes more briefly and compactly, sometimes more broadly and richly is Christ evangelized;

and yet not only what pertains to the faith, but also what pertains to the morals of the faithful, is not passed over. This can be understood also in that which they recall the Apostle Paul to have said: 'I judged myself to know nothing among you, except Jesus Christ, and Him crucified.' Which they think was said as though nothing else had been instilled into them, so that they should first believe and then, once baptized, learn whatever pertains to life and morals. 'This,' they say, 'was enough and more than enough for the Apostle,' who said to them that although they had many tutors in Christ, yet they had not many fathers, because he himself had begotten them in Christ Jesus through the Gospel.

If therefore he who begot them through the Gospel — although he gives thanks that he baptized none of them except Crispus and Gaius and the household of Stephanas — taught them nothing more than Christ crucified, what then? If someone should say that they did not even hear that Christ had risen, when they were begotten through the Gospel — whence then is it that he says to them: 'For I delivered to you first of all, that Christ died according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He rose again on the third day according to the Scriptures,' if he had taught nothing but the crucified?

But if they do not so understand it, but contend that this too pertains to Christ crucified, let them know that in Christ crucified men learn many things, and above all that our old man was crucified together with Him, that the body of sin might be done away, and that we should no longer be in bondage to sin. Whence he also says of himself: 'But far be it from me to glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom the world is crucified to me and I to the world.' Therefore let them attend and see how Christ crucified is taught and learned, and let them recognize that it pertains to His cross that we too are crucified to the world in His body — wherein is understood every restraint of evil concupiscences.

And on this account it cannot be that to those who are formed by the cross of Christ, professed adulteries should be permitted. For the Apostle Peter also admonishes concerning the sacrament of the cross itself, that is, of the passion of Christ, that those who are consecrated by it should cease to sin, speaking thus: 'Christ therefore having suffered in the flesh, arm yourselves also with the same thought, for he who has died in the flesh ceases from sin,' so that he may now live the rest of his time in the flesh no longer by the desires of men, but by the will of the Lord God — and the rest, by which he consequently shows that he belongs to Christ crucified, that is, having suffered through the flesh, who, with his carnal desires crucified in His body, lives well through the Gospel. What then?

Do they think that even those two precepts, on which the Lord says the whole Law and the Prophets hang, favour this their opinion? And they recall them thus: since the first precept was spoken, 'You shall love the Lord your God with your whole heart and with your whole soul and with your whole mind,' and the second, like to this, 'You shall love your neighbour as yourself,' they believe the first to pertain to those to be baptized, where the love of God is enjoined, but the second to the baptized, where the morals of human conversation seem to be — thus forgetting what is written: 'If you do not love your brother whom you see, how will you be able to love God whom you do not see?' and that other in the same epistle of John:

'If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him.' But to what do all the disgraceful acts of evil morals pertain, except to the love of this world? And on this account that first precept, which they judge to pertain to those to be baptized, can in no way be observed without good morals. I do not wish to dwell on many things; for, when these two precepts are diligently considered, they are found so connected the one from the other, that neither can the love of God be in a man if he does not love his neighbour, nor the love of the neighbour if he does not love God. But for the matter which is now at issue, what we have said of these two precepts suffices.

'But indeed the people of Israel,' they say, 'were first led through the Red Sea, by which baptism is signified, and afterward received the Law, where they might learn how to live. Why then do we hand over the Creed to those to be baptized, and require it to be rendered back? For no such thing was done toward those whom God freed from the Egyptians through the Red Sea.' But if they rightly understand this to be signified by the preceding mysteries — concerning the blood of the lamb smeared on the doorposts and concerning the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth — why do they not also consequently understand that the very separation from the Egyptians signifies the departure from sins which those to be baptized profess? For to this pertains what was said by Peter:

'Do penance, and let each one of you be baptized in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ,' as though he were saying: Withdraw from Egypt and pass through the Red Sea. Whence also in the epistle which is inscribed 'To the Hebrews,' when the beginnings of those who are baptized were being recalled, penance from dead works was set down there. For thus it says: 'Therefore, leaving the word of the beginning of Christ, let us look toward completion, not laying again the foundation of penance from dead works and of faith toward God, of the doctrine of the laver, of the laying on of hands, of the resurrection also of the dead and of eternal judgment.' All these things, therefore, Scripture sufficiently and openly testifies to pertain to the beginnings of the newly-baptized.

But what is penance from dead works, except from those things which ought to be mortified, that we may live? And if adulteries and fornications are not these, what now is to be named among dead works? But thus the profession of withdrawal from such things does not suffice, unless also by the laver of regeneration all past sins — which, as it were, pursue us — are blotted out, just as it does not suffice for the Israelites to withdraw from Egypt, unless that multitude of enemies which pursued them should perish in the waves of the same sea, which lay open for God's people about to pass over and to be freed. He therefore who professes that he is unwilling to change from adultery, how shall he be led through the Red Sea, when he still refuses to depart from Egypt?

Next, they do not attend to the fact that in that Law which was given to that people after the passage of the Red Sea, the first precept is: 'You shall have no other gods besides Me. You shall not make for yourself idols nor any likeness, whatsoever things are in heaven above and whatsoever are on the earth below and whatsoever are in the water and under the earth. You shall not adore them nor serve them' — and the rest that pertains to this precept.

Let these men therefore affirm, if they wish, against their own very assertion, that even concerning the worship of the one God and the idolatry to be avoided, it is to be preached not to those still to be baptized, but to those already baptized; and let them no longer say that to those about to receive baptism only the faith which is in God is to be instilled, and that after the reception of that sacrament they are to be instructed about the morals of life, as about the second precept, which pertains to the love of the neighbour. For the Law contains both, which the people received after the Red Sea as after baptism;

nor was the distribution of the precepts so made that before the passage of that sea the people should be taught about idolatry to be avoided, and, after they had passed over, should hear that father and mother are to be honoured, that one must not commit adultery, must not kill, and the rest of the good and innocent human conversation. If therefore anyone should thus come to the petition for the holy laver, so that he professes that he will not withdraw from the sacrifices of idols unless perhaps afterward, when it shall please him, yet nevertheless demands baptism this very instant and clamours to be made a temple of the living God — not only a worshipper of idols, but even persisting in some such nefarious priesthood — I ask of these men whether they judge that he should be made even a catechumen: which without doubt they will cry out ought not to be done;

For nothing else ought to be supposed about their heart. Let them therefore give an account, according to the testimonies of the Scriptures which they think are to be understood in this way, of how they dare to contradict the man who protests and says: 'I have learned and I venerate Christ crucified; I believe that Christ Jesus is the Son of God. Put me off no longer, ask nothing further of me.' Those whom the Apostle begot through the Gospel he wished to know nothing more at that time than Christ crucified; and after the eunuch's word, by which he answered that he believed Jesus Christ to be the Son of God, Philip did not delay to baptize him at once. 'Why do you forbid me from the worship of idols and yet not admit me to the sacrament of Christ before I have first departed from it?'

'That practice I learned from childhood; I am held down there by a most heavy habit. I will do it when I can, when it is convenient; and even if I do not do it, still I will not end this life without the sacrament of Christ, lest God require my soul at your hands.' What do they think should be answered to such a man? Do they hold that he ought to be admitted? Far from it! In no way would I believe that they go so far as that. What then will they answer to one who says these things and adds that nothing at all needed to be said to him about forsaking idolatry before baptism, just as that first people heard nothing about it before the Red Sea, since this is the very law which, once freed from Egypt, they received? Surely they will say to the man: 'You are to become a temple of God when you have received baptism'; but the Apostle says:

'What agreement has the temple of God with idols?' Why, then, do they not see that it must be said in like manner: 'You are to become a member of Christ when you have received baptism; the members of Christ cannot be the members of a harlot'? For this too the Apostle says, who in another place also says: 'Do not err; neither fornicators nor those who serve idols' — and the rest which he there enumerates — 'shall possess the kingdom of God.' Why then do we not admit to baptism those who serve idols, yet think that fornicators are to be admitted, when both to these and to the rest of the wicked he says: 'And such were some of you; but you are washed, but you are sanctified, but you are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the Spirit of our God'?

What reason, then, is there that, when the power to forbid both lies open, I should allow one who comes to baptism to remain a fornicator, yet not allow one to remain a servant of idols, when I hear it said of both alike: 'And such were some of you, but you are washed'? But these men are moved by this, that they think the salvation of such people is secure — though it be through fire — provided they have believed in Christ and received his sacrament, that is, have been baptized, even if they are so negligent about correcting their morals that they live wickedly. Whence presently, if God helps, I shall consider what ought to be held according to the Scriptures.

Now I am still occupied with this question, in which it seems to them that the baptized are to be admonished concerning the morals belonging to the Christian life, but that to those about to be baptized only the faith is to be instilled. But if this were so, then — apart from all the many things we have said — John the Baptist would not have said to those coming to his baptism: 'Brood of vipers, who has shown you to flee from the wrath to come? Bring forth therefore fruit worthy of repentance,' and the rest, whereby he admonishes them not indeed about faith, but about good works. Whence also, when the soldiers said, 'What shall we do?' he did not say, 'For the present believe and be baptized, afterward you will hear what you ought to do,' but he spoke beforehand, he forewarned them, that, as a forerunner, he might cleanse the way in their heart for the Lord who was to come:

'Do violence to no one, accuse no one falsely, and be content with your wages.' Likewise to the publicans who asked what they ought to do, he said: 'Exact nothing more than what is appointed you.' By briefly recalling these things, the evangelist — for he need not insert whole catechisms — sufficiently indicated that it belongs to him by whom the one to be baptized is catechized, to teach and admonish concerning morals. But if they had answered John:

'We will by no means bring forth fruits worthy of repentance; we intend to accuse falsely, we intend to do violence, we intend to exact what is not owed to us' — and if nonetheless he had baptized them after this profession — even so it could not be said, which is the very point now at issue, that when anyone is to be baptized there is no time to speak to him first about how he ought to lead a good life. What did the Lord himself — to pass over other things — reply, when that rich man asked him what good he should do to obtain eternal life? Let them recall his answer. 'If you wish to come,' he said, 'to life, keep the commandments.' The man said, 'Which?' Then the Lord recalled the precepts of the law: 'You shall not kill, you shall not commit adultery,' and the rest.

And when the man had answered that he had done these things from his youth, the Lord added also the precept of perfection: that, having sold all his goods and bestowed them as alms upon the poor, he might have treasure in heaven and follow the same Lord. Let them therefore observe that it was not said to him that he should believe and be baptized — the sole help by which these men think a man comes to life — but that precepts of morals were given to the man, which certainly cannot be kept and observed without faith. Nor yet, because here the Lord seems to have been silent about instilling faith, do we lay it down and contend that only precepts of morals are to be spoken to men desiring to attain to life.

For both are mutually bound together, as I said before, since neither can there be love of God in a man who does not love his neighbor, nor love of neighbor in one who does not love God. And therefore Scripture is sometimes found to mention one without the other — whether the one or the other — as though it were the full teaching, so that even in this way it may be understood that the one cannot exist without the other: because both he who believes God ought to do what God commands, and he who does something for the very reason that God has commanded it, must of necessity believe God.

Wherefore let us now consider that which must be shaken out of religious hearts, lest by an evil complacency they lose their salvation, if they suppose that faith suffices to obtain it, while they neglect to live well and to keep to the way of God by good works. For even in the times of the apostles, certain obscure sayings of the apostle Paul being misunderstood, some men thought he was saying: 'Let us do evil that good may come,' because he had said: 'The law entered in that the offense might abound; but where the offense abounded, grace did more abound.'

This is true for this reason: that men, receiving the law, who most proudly presumed on their own powers and did not by a right faith obtain the divine help for conquering their evil desires, were burdened with more and graver sins, the law also being transgressed; and so, compelled by great guilt, they fled to faith, whereby they might merit the mercy of pardon and help from the Lord, who made heaven and earth, that with love shed abroad through the Holy Spirit in their hearts, they might do with love the things which were commanded against the desires of this world, according to what had been foretold in the psalm: 'Their infirmities were multiplied; afterward they made haste.'

When therefore the Apostle says that he reckons a man to be justified by faith without the works of the law, he does not do this in order that, faith having been received and professed, works of righteousness may be despised, but that each one may know that he can be justified by faith, even if the works of the law have not gone before. For they follow the man who has been justified; they do not go before the man to be justified. Whence in the present work there is no need to dispute more at length, especially because out of this question I have published a lengthy book entitled 'On the Letter and the Spirit.' Since therefore this opinion had then arisen, other apostolic letters — of Peter, John, James, Jude — direct their aim against it, so as vehemently to establish that faith without works profits nothing:

just as Paul himself defined not any sort of faith by which one believes in God, but that saving and plainly evangelical faith whose works proceed from love. 'And faith,' he says, 'which works through love.' Whence he asserts that that faith which seems to some to suffice for salvation profits nothing at all, so as to say: 'If I should have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, but have not charity, I am nothing.' But where faithful charity works, without doubt one lives well; for love is the fulfilling of the law.

Whence Peter, evidently in his second epistle, when he was exhorting to holiness of life and morals and foretelling that this world would pass away, but that new heavens and a new earth were to be awaited, which would be handed over to be inhabited by the just, so that from this they might attend to how they ought to live that they might be made worthy of that dwelling — knowing that from certain obscure sayings of the apostle Paul some wicked men had taken occasion, as though secure of the salvation which is in faith, to have no care to live well — mentioned that there are certain things in his epistles difficult to understand, which men would pervert, as also the other Scriptures, to their own destruction:

since nevertheless that apostle also held, concerning eternal salvation which is not given except to those who live well, the same things which the other apostles held. Thus therefore Peter: 'Seeing then,' he says, 'that all these things shall perish, what manner of persons ought you to be in holy conduct and godliness, looking for and hastening unto the coming of the day of the Lord, through which the burning heavens shall be dissolved and the elements shall melt with the heat of fire! But we look for new heavens and a new earth according to his promises, wherein righteousness dwells.

Wherefore, beloved, seeing that you look for these things, be diligent that you may be found by him without spot and blameless in peace; and account the longsuffering of our Lord to be salvation, even as our most beloved brother Paul also, according to the wisdom given to him, has written to you; as also in all his epistles, speaking in them of these things, in which are some things hard to understand, which the unlearned and unstable pervert, as they do also the other Scriptures, to their own destruction. You therefore, most beloved, knowing this beforehand, beware lest, led astray by the error of the wicked, you fall from your own steadfastness; but grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To him be glory both now and unto the day of eternity.'

But James is so vehemently hostile to those who hold that faith without works avails for salvation, that he even compares them to demons, saying: 'You believe that there is one God? You do well; the demons also believe and tremble.' What could be said more briefly, more truly, more forcibly, since we also read in the Gospel that the demons said this, when they confessed Christ to be the Son of God and were rebuked by him — that which in Peter's confession was praised? 'What shall it profit,' says James, 'my brethren, if a man say he has faith, but have not works? Can faith save him?' He says also that faith without works is dead. How long, then, are they deceived who promise themselves everlasting life from a dead faith!

Wherefore we must diligently attend to how that saying of the apostle Paul is to be received, plainly difficult to understand, where he says: 'For other foundation can no man lay than that which is laid, which is Christ Jesus. Now if any man build upon this foundation gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, stubble, every man's work shall be made manifest; for the day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed in fire, and the fire shall try every man's work of what sort it is. If any man's work abide, which he has built thereon, he shall receive a reward; but if any man's work shall be burned, he shall suffer loss; but he himself shall be saved, yet so as by fire.'

This they think must be so understood, that those seem to build upon this foundation gold, silver, precious stones, who add good works to the faith which is in Christ; but those build wood, hay, stubble, who, while they have the same faith, do evil works. Whence they suppose that through certain penalties of fire these can be purged unto receiving salvation, on account of the foundation.

If this is so, we admit that these men strive with a praiseworthy charity, that all without distinction may be admitted to baptism — not only adulterers and adulteresses who, against the Lord's sentence, allege false marriages, but even public prostitutes persevering in their most shameful trade, whom certainly not even the most negligent church has been accustomed to admit unless first freed from that prostitution. But by this reasoning I do not at all see why they should not be admitted in every way. For who would not prefer that these women, the foundation being laid — even if they heap up wood and hay and stubble — should be purged by a fire somewhat more long-lasting, rather than perish forever? But then those sayings will be false which have no obscurity or ambiguity:

'If I should have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, but have not charity, I am nothing'; and: 'What shall it profit, my brethren, if a man say he has faith, but have not works? Can faith save him?' That too will be false: 'Do not err; neither fornicators, nor those who serve idols, nor adulterers, nor the effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with men, nor thieves, nor the covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor the rapacious shall possess the kingdom of God.' False too will be that:

'The works of the flesh are manifest, which are: fornications, uncleannesses, wantonness, idolatry, sorceries, enmities, contentions, jealousies, animosities, dissensions, heresies, envyings, drunkennesses, revellings, and such like; of which I foretell you, as I have foretold, that they who do such things shall not possess the kingdom of God.' These things will be false. For if they only believe and be baptized, though they persevere in such evils, they will be saved through fire, and thus even those baptized in Christ who do such things will possess the kingdom of God. But then it is said in vain: 'And such were some of you, but you are washed,' since even the washed do these things. Vainly too will seem that which was said by Peter:

'So also baptism doth now save you by a like figure — not the putting away of the filth of the flesh, but the answer of a good conscience.' Since even those who have the worst consciences, full of all shameful deeds and crimes, and unchanged by any repentance for those evils, are nevertheless saved by baptism; for on account of the foundation which is laid in that baptism, they will be saved, though through fire. That too I do not see, why the Lord said: 'If you wish to come to life, keep the commandments,' and recalled those things which pertain to good morals, if, even with these not kept, one can come to life through faith alone, which without works is dead. And then how will that be true which he will say to those whom he shall set on the left hand:

'Go into everlasting fire, which is prepared for the devil and his angels'? Whom he does not rebuke because they did not believe in him, but because they did not do good works. For assuredly, lest anyone should promise himself eternal life from faith which without works is dead, therefore he said that he would separate all the nations, which, mingled together, made use of the same shepherds, so that it might appear that they would say to him: 'Lord, when did we see you suffering this and that, and did not minister to you?' — those who had believed in him, but had taken no care to do good works, as though from that very dead faith one might come to eternal life.

Or shall they perhaps go into everlasting fire who did not do works of mercy, and shall they not go who plundered others' goods, or who by corrupting the temple of God in themselves were unmerciful to their own selves? As though works of mercy profited anything without love, when the Apostle says: 'If I should distribute all my goods to the poor, but have not charity, it profits me nothing'; or as though anyone loved his neighbor as himself who does not love himself. 'For he who loves iniquity,' he says, 'hates his own soul.' Nor can that be said here, in which some deceive themselves, [saying] that it was 'everlasting fire' that was spoken of, not the punishment itself as everlasting.

For they suppose that those to whom they promise salvation through fire on account of a dead faith will pass through a fire which will be eternal, so that, forsooth, the fire itself be eternal, but the burning of them — that is, the operation of the fire — be not eternal upon them; whereas the Lord, foreseeing even this, as Lord, so concluded his sentence, saying: 'So shall these go into everlasting burning, but the just into life everlasting.' There will therefore be an everlasting burning, just as the fire is everlasting; and Truth itself said that those would go into it whose faith it declared to have been present, but whose good works it declared to have been lacking.

If therefore all these things, and the rest which can be found stated without ambiguity throughout all the Scriptures — things innumerable — will be false, then that interpretation about the wood and the hay and the stubble may be able to be true, namely that those will be saved through fire who, holding faith in Christ alone, neglected good works. But if these things are both true and clear, then beyond doubt another interpretation must be sought in that saying of the Apostle, and it must be reckoned among those which Peter says are in his writings, certain things difficult to understand:

which men ought not to pervert to their own destruction, so as, against the most evident testimonies of the Scriptures, to make secure concerning the receiving of salvation the most wicked, who most obstinately cleave to their wickedness and are not changed by amending or repenting. Here perhaps it may be asked of me what I myself think about that very saying of the apostle Paul, and in what way I hold it is to be understood.

I confess that on this matter I would rather hear those more intelligent and more learned, who so expound it that all those things remain true and unshaken which I have recalled above, and whatever others I have not recalled, by which Scripture most plainly testifies that faith profits nothing except that which the Apostle defined, that is, the faith which works through love; and that without works it cannot save, neither apart from fire nor through fire — because, if it saves through fire, then it certainly saves. But it is said absolutely and openly: 'What does it profit, if a man say he has faith, but have not works? Can faith save him?'

Nevertheless I too will say, as briefly as I can, what I think about that saying of the apostle Paul, difficult to understand — provided that this, which pertains to my profession, be chiefly held: that concerning this matter I have said I would rather hear those better than myself. The foundation is Christ, the structure of the wise architect. This needs no exposition, for it is openly said: 'For other foundation can no man lay than that which is laid, which is Christ Jesus.' But if Christ, then beyond doubt the faith of Christ; for through faith Christ dwells in our hearts, as the same Apostle says. Further, if the faith of Christ, then certainly that faith which the Apostle defined, which works through love.

For that faith of the demons cannot be received as the foundation, though they too believe and tremble and confess Jesus to be the Son of God. Why? Except that it is not the faith which works through love, but that which is expressed through fear. The faith of Christ, therefore — the faith of Christian grace, that is, the faith which works through love, placed in the foundation — permits no one to perish. But as to what it is to build upon this foundation gold, silver, precious stones, and wood, hay, stubble — if I should try to discuss it more subtly, I fear lest the exposition itself be more difficult to understand; yet I shall strive, as far as the Lord helps, to set forth what I think both briefly and, as far as I can, clearly.

Behold, that man who inquired of the good Master what he should do that he might have eternal life, and heard that, if he wished to come to life, the commandments were to be kept by him; and when he asked which commandments, it was said to him: 'You shall not kill, you shall not commit adultery, you shall not steal, you shall not bear false witness, honor your father and your mother,' and: 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself' — this man, doing these things in the faith of Christ, would beyond doubt hold the faith which works through love. For he would not love his neighbor as himself except by having received the love of God, without which he would not love himself. Further, if he did that which the Lord also added, saying:

'If you wish to be perfect, go, sell all that you have, and give to the poor, and you shall have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me' — then he would build upon that foundation gold, silver, precious stones; for he would think of nothing but the things which are God's, how he might please God. And these thoughts are, as I reckon, the gold, the silver, the precious stones.

But if he were held by a certain carnal affection concerning his riches — although out of them he gave many alms, and contrived nothing of fraud or plunder to increase them, nor, out of fear of diminishing or losing them, slipped into any crime or shameful deed (otherwise he would in this way already withdraw himself from the stability of that foundation) — but, on account of the carnal affection, as I said, which he had in them, whereby he could not be without such goods without grief, then he would build upon that foundation wood, hay, stubble; especially if he had a wife in such a way that even for her sake he thought of the things which are of the world, how he might please his wife.

These things, therefore, since when loved with a carnal affection they are not lost without grief, on that account those who so possess them that they have in the foundation the faith which works through love, and by no reasoning or desire prefer these things to it, in the loss of them, having suffered detriment, come to salvation through a certain fire of grief. From which grief and detriment each one is the more secure, the less he has loved these things, or the more he has possessed them as though not possessing. But whoever, for the sake of retaining or acquiring those things, has committed murder, adultery, fornication, idolatry, and any such like, will not be saved through fire on account of the foundation, but, the foundation being lost, will be tormented in eternal fire.

Wherefore, as to that also which they say — as if wishing to prove how much faith alone avails — where the Apostle says: 'But if the unbeliever departs, let him depart; for a brother or a sister is not under bondage in such cases,' that is, that on account of the faith of Christ the lawful wife joined in wedded society may without any fault be left, if she has been unwilling to remain with a Christian husband precisely because he is a Christian — they do not consider that in this way she is most rightly dismissed, if she says to her husband:

'I will not be your wife unless you either amass riches for me by robbery, or, even as a Christian, ply the accustomed procurings by which you used to maintain our household' — or if she had known of some other criminal or shameful thing in her husband, wherein she took delight and either satisfied her lust, or had an easy living, or even went about more finely adorned. For then that man, to whom his wife says this, if he has truly repented from dead works when he came to baptism and has in the foundation the faith which works through love, will beyond doubt be held more by love of divine grace than of a wife's flesh; and the member which offends him, he bravely cuts off.

But whatever grief of heart he shall endure in this separation on account of the carnal affection for his spouse — this is the detriment which he will suffer, this is the fire through which, the hay burning, he himself will be saved. But if he already had a wife as though not having her — not for the sake of concupiscence, but for the sake of mercy, lest perchance he might save her, rendering rather than exacting the marriage debt — then assuredly he will not grieve carnally when such a wedlock is separated from him; for he thought of nothing in her but the things which are God's, how he might please God.