Latin original · 38 verses · some words can be tapped for a gloss · long chapter, split into parts; this part covers 5:3556–5:3593 (4615 verses in all)
I went to the Lord and besought Him. God therefore does not only help us in this, that we may know what is to be done, but also that we may do by loving what we already know by learning. And so no one can be, not only knowing but also continent, unless God give it. Whence, when that man already had knowledge, he prayed that he might have continence also, that there might be in him also that which he knew was not his of himself. Or if, on account of his own choice, it is somewhat also from him, yet not except from Him, because no one can be continent unless God give it. But that man, concerning spiritual riches — among which is assuredly also that very luminous and beautiful continence — does not say: 'They can be in you and from you', but says:
'They cannot be except from you and in you' — so that, just as they are nowhere for her except in her, so it may be believed that they can be from nowhere for her except from her; and on this account — which may the merciful Lord turn away from her heart! — she may so glory as though she had not received. And we indeed, concerning the holy virgin's discipline and Christian humility in which she was nurtured and educated, suppose this: that when she read those words, if indeed she read them, she groaned and humbly smote her breast, and perhaps even wept, and faithfully prayed to God, to whom she is consecrated and by whom she has been sanctified, that, as those are not her own words but another's, so neither may her faith be such that she should believe herself to have anything whereof she might glory in herself and not in the Lord.
For her glory indeed is in herself, not in another's words, as the Apostle says: But let every man prove his own work, and then he shall have glory in himself alone, and not in another. But far be it that her glory should be herself and not He to whom it is said: My glory, and the lifter up of my head. For thus indeed her glory is in her wholesomely, when God, who is in her, is Himself her glory — from whom she has all the good things by which she is good, and shall have all those by which she shall be better, as far as in this life she shall be able to be better; and those by which she shall be perfect, when she shall have been made perfect by divine grace, not by human praise. For in the Lord shall her soul be praised, who has satisfied her desire with good things.
Because this desire also He Himself inspired, lest His virgin should so glory in any good, as though she had not received it. Concerning this her disposition, then, whether we are not deceived, make us rather more certain by writing back. For that we know very well: that you, with all your household, are and have been worshippers of the undivided Trinity. But not from this quarter alone does human error creep in, that something be thought amiss concerning the undivided Trinity; for there are also other matters in which men err most perniciously, such as is this, whereof we have perhaps spoken in this letter at greater length than would have been enough for your faithful and chaste prudence.
And yet, whoever denies that the good which comes from God is from God, we do not know to whom he does injury except to God, and through this surely to that Trinity — an evil which we believe to be, and pray may be, far from you. Far be it entirely that any such thing should be in the mind. We do not say that your book, or that of your daughter the holy virgin, but that the book of any servant or handmaid of yours of the lowest merit should have done this — the book from which we thought fit to set down a few words that might be more easily understood. But if you attend carefully even to those things which there seem to be said as though on behalf of grace or the help of God, you will find them so ambiguous that they can be referred either to nature, or to teaching, or to the remission of sins.
For even the fact that they are compelled to confess that we ought to pray lest we enter into temptation, they can refer to this: that we are helped only so far that, when we pray and knock, the understanding of the truth is opened to us, where we may learn what we ought to do — not that our will may receive strength by which to do what we learn. And when they say that the Lord Christ is set before us as an example of living well, in the grace or help of God, they recall this too to the same teaching, namely because in His example we learn in what manner we ought to live; but they do not wish us to be helped to this, that what we come to know by learning we should also do by loving. But by all means find something in that same book, if you can.
There, apart from nature — apart from that which pertains to the same nature, the free choice of the will — apart from the remission of sins and the revelation of teaching, he confesses such a help of God as he confesses who said: 'Since I knew that no one can be continent unless God grant it, and this very thing was of wisdom, to know whose gift it was, I went to the Lord and besought Him.' For that man neither wished by prayer to receive the nature in which he had been created, nor was he anxious about the natural choice of the will with which he had been created, nor did he desire the remission of sins — he who rather longed for continence, that he might not sin, or desired to know what was to be done.
Since he already confessed that he knew whose gift this was, yet he surely wished to receive by the Spirit of wisdom such great strength of will, such an ardor of love as would suffice to fulfill the greatness of continence. If then you have been able to find something of this kind there, we give most abundant thanks, if by writing back you deign to make it known to us.
For it cannot be said enough how greatly we desire to find, in the writings of those men who are read by very many for their keenness and eloquence, an open confession of that grace which the Apostle so vehemently commends — he who says that God has apportioned to each one even the measure of that faith, without which it is impossible to please God, by which the just man lives, which works through love, before which and without which no good works of anyone whatever are to be reckoned (since everything that is not of faith is sin) — and that we are divinely helped, that we may live piously and justly, not by the revelation of knowledge alone, which puffs up without charity, but also by the inspiration of that very charity, which is the fullness of the law and which our heart...
...that knowledge may not puff up, but build up. But as yet nowhere have we been able to find anything of this kind in their writings. Above all we would wish it to be in this book, from which we have set down those transcribed words, where, praising the virgin of Christ, he does so as though no one but she herself could confer spiritual riches upon her, and as though they could not exist except from herself; he does not wish her to glory in the Lord, but so to glory as if she had not received. In which book, although he expressed neither your name nor that of your reverence, yet he records that he was asked by the mother of the virgin to write to her.
But in a certain letter of his, the same Pelagius — where he most openly sets down his own name and does not conceal the name of the holy virgin — says that he wrote to her, and by the testimony of that same work of his he strives to prove that he most openly confesses the grace of God, which he is alleged either to pass over in silence or to deny. But whether this be the very book in which he set down those words about spiritual riches, or whether it has reached your holiness, we ask that you deign to make us more certain by your reply. 189. To his excellent lord, distinguished and honorable by merit, his son Boniface, Augustine sends greeting in the Lord.
I had already written back to your charity; but while an occasion for sending the letter was being sought, there came my most beloved son Faustus, on his way to your Excellency. When he had received those very letters, which I had already composed, to be delivered to your benevolence, he suggested to me that you greatly desire that I should write something to you which might edify you unto everlasting salvation, the hope of which is yours in Christ Jesus our Lord. And although he pressed me, occupied as I am, so much that I should not defer to do it, you know how sincerely he loves you. Therefore, hastening to meet him as he hastened, I preferred to write something in haste rather than to hold back your religious desire, my excellent lord and by merit distinguished and honorable son.
What then I can say briefly is this: 'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength,' and: 'Love your neighbor as yourself' — for this is the word which the Lord summarized upon the earth, saying in the Gospel: 'On these two commandments hang the whole law and the prophets.' In this love, therefore, advance daily, both by praying and by acting well, so that, with the help of Him who commanded and granted it to you, it may be nourished and grow, until, being perfected, it perfects you. For this is that charity of which, as the Apostle says, 'it has been poured out in our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us'; this is that of which he likewise says: 'The fullness of the law is charity.'
This is that through which faith works, whence he again says: 'Neither circumcision avails anything nor uncircumcision, but faith which works through love.' In this all our holy fathers and patriarchs and prophets and apostles pleased God; in this all the true martyrs contended even unto blood against the devil, and, because in them it did not grow cold nor fail, therefore they conquered; in this all good believers advance daily, desiring to arrive not at the kingdom of mortals but at the kingdom of heaven, not at a temporal but at an everlasting inheritance, not at gold and silver but at the incorruptible riches of the angels, not at any goods of this world —
— among which men live in fear, nor can anyone carry them away with him when he dies; but they desire to arrive at the vision of God, whose sweetness and delight surpasses all the beauty not only of earthly but even of heavenly bodies, surpasses all the comeliness of souls however just and holy, surpasses every form of the supernal angels and powers, surpasses whatever is said of Him, indeed even whatever is thought. Nor let us despair of so great a promise because it is exceedingly great; but rather, because He who promised it is exceedingly great, let us believe that we shall receive it. For as the blessed Apostle John says: 'We are the sons of God, and it has not yet appeared what we shall be; but we know...'
...that when He shall appear, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is.' Do not think that no one can please God who serves as a soldier in weapons of war. Among such was holy David, to whom the Lord bore so great a testimony; among such also were very many just men of that time. Among such was that centurion too, who said to the Lord: 'I am not worthy that You should enter under my roof, but only say the word, and my servant shall be healed. For I too am a man set under authority, having soldiers under me, and I say to this one, 'Go,' and he goes, and to another, 'Come,' and he comes, and to my servant, 'Do this,' and he does it.' Of whom the Lord also said: 'Amen I say to you, I have not found so great faith in Israel.' Among such was also that Cornelius, to whom the angel who was sent said:
'Cornelius, your alms have been accepted and your prayers have been heard' — where he admonished him to send to the blessed Apostle Peter and to hear from him what he ought to do; to which apostle, that he might come to him, he even sent a religious soldier. Among such were also those who, when they had come to John to be baptized — the holy forerunner of the Lord and friend of the Bridegroom, of whom the Lord Himself says: 'Among those born of women there has not arisen a greater than John the Baptist' — and had asked him what they should do, he answered them: 'Do violence to no one, bring a false accusation against no one; let your wages be sufficient for you.' He certainly did not forbid them to serve as soldiers under arms, they for whom he commanded that their wages ought to suffice.
Those indeed hold a higher place with God who, having forsaken all these secular activities, serve Him also with the highest continence of chastity. But each one, as the Apostle says, 'has his own gift from God, one thus and another thus.' Some therefore, by praying for you, fight against invisible enemies; you, by fighting for them, labor against visible barbarians. Would that there were one faith in all, since then there would be less toil, and the devil with his angels would be more easily conquered! But because in this world it is necessary that the citizens of the kingdom of heaven be agitated by temptations among the erring and the impious,
that they may be exercised and, as in a furnace, tested like gold, we ought not to wish to live before the appointed time with only the saints and the just, that in its own time we may deserve to receive this. This therefore consider first, when you arm yourself for battle: that even that bodily strength of yours is a gift of God; for so you will consider, of a gift of God, not to act against God. For when faith is pledged, it must be kept even to an enemy against whom war is waged; how much more to a friend, for whom one fights! Let the will have peace, and let war be of necessity, so that God may free you from necessity and preserve you in peace. For peace is not sought that war may be stirred up, but war is waged that peace may be acquired.
Be therefore peaceable even in waging war, so that by conquering you may lead those whom you fight to the profit of peace; 'for blessed are the peacemakers,' says the Lord, 'for they shall be called the sons of God.' But if human peace is so sweet for the temporal welfare of mortals, how much sweeter is divine peace for the eternal welfare of the angels! Therefore let necessity, not the will, slay the fighting foe. As violence is repaid to one who rebels and resists, so mercy is now due to one conquered or captured, especially in one from whom no disturbance of the peace is feared. Let conjugal chastity adorn your character, let sobriety and frugality adorn it; for it is exceedingly disgraceful that lust should conquer one whom man does not conquer, and that he whom the sword does not conquer should be overwhelmed by wine.
If worldly riches are lacking, let them not be sought in the world through evil works; but if they are present, let them be stored up in heaven through good works. A manly and Christian spirit ought neither to be exalted if riches come, nor broken if they depart. Let us rather consider what the Lord says: 'Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.' And surely, when we hear that we should have our heart on high, we ought not to answer falsely — which you know that we do answer. And in these things indeed I have known you to be a good student, and I greatly delight in your reputation and greatly rejoice for you in the Lord, so that this letter may rather be a mirror for you, where you may see what you are, than one where you may learn what you ought to be.
But nevertheless, whatever you find, either in this letter or in the holy Scriptures, that is still lacking to you for a good life, press on to acquire it, both by acting and by praying; and out of what you have, give thanks to God as to the fountain of goodness, from whom you have it, and in all your good deeds give to Him the glory, to yourself humility. For as it is written, 'every best gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights.' But however much you may advance in the love of God and neighbor and in true piety, as long as you dwell in this life, do not believe yourself to be without sin; for concerning it we read in the holy writings: 'Is not the life of man upon the earth a temptation?'
Accordingly, since it is always necessary for you, as long as you are in this body, to say in prayer what the Lord taught, 'Forgive us our debts, as we also forgive our debtors,' remember to forgive quickly, if anyone has sinned against you and has begged pardon of you, so that you may truly be able to pray and may be able to obtain pardon for your own sins. These things I have written to your love in haste indeed, since the haste of the bearer pressed me; but I give thanks to God, since in some way I have not failed your good desire. May the mercy of God always protect you, my excellent lord and by merit distinguished and honorable son. 190.
To the most blessed lord, desirable in sincere love, his brother and fellow-bishop Optatus, Augustine sends greeting in the Lord. Although I have received no letters from your holiness addressed to me myself, yet, because those which you sent to Mauretania Caesariensis arrived while I was present at Caesarea — whither an ecclesiastical necessity enjoined upon us by the venerable Pope Zosimus, bishop of the apostolic see, had drawn us — it came about that I too read through those things which you wrote, the same letter of yours being handed to me by the holy servant of God Renatus, our most beloved brother in Christ; at whose request, though I was occupied with other matters and he pressed me vehemently, I was compelled to reply to them.
To this was added also the arrival of another holy brother of ours, to be named with due honor and, as far as I learned from him, a kinsman of yours, Muresis, while we were lingering in the aforesaid town; he reported to me that letters about this matter had been sent to him also by your reverence, and consulted me about this very question, that he might make known to you, by his own or my reply, what I felt about it: namely, whether souls, like bodies, are born by propagation and are from that one soul which was created for the first man, or whether the omnipotent Creator, who indeed works even until now, makes new souls, each proper to each individual, without any propagation.
Concerning which matter, before I admonish your sincerity of anything, I do not wish you to be ignorant that in so many of my little works I have never dared to bring forth a defined opinion about this question, nor shamelessly to put into writing, for the instruction of others, what has not been made clear to me. But by the consideration of what things and causes I am moved, so that my mind's assent inclines to neither assertion, but I still debate between the two, is too long to set forth in this letter, nor is it so necessary. Yet even with this omitted, it is not impossible to discuss what suffices concerning this question — if not to remove hesitation, at least to guard against rashness. For that wherein the Christian faith above all consists...
— namely, that through a man came death, and through a man the resurrection of the dead; for as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive; and that through one man sin entered into this world, and through sin death, and so death passed upon all men, in whom all have sinned; and that the judgment indeed was from one unto condemnation, but grace from many offenses unto justification;
and that 'through one man's offense judgment came upon all men unto condemnation, and through one man's justification the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life'; and if there are any other testimonies which declare that no one is born of Adam except bound by the chain of offense and damnation, and that no one is freed thence except by being reborn through Christ — these we ought to hold so unshaken that we may know that whoever denies this in no way belongs to the faith of Christ, nor to that grace of God which is given through Christ to the small and the great. Hence, if the origin of the soul lies hidden, provided that the redemption is clear, there is no danger; for we do not believe in Christ that we may be born, but that we may be reborn, in whatever way we have been born. But thus far we say that the origin of the soul lies hidden without danger,
provided that we do not, however, believe it to be a part of God, but a creature; nor born of God, but made by Him and to be adopted into His family by the wonderful condescension of grace, not by an equal dignity of nature; nor that it is a body, but a spirit — surely not the Creator, but a creature; nor that it came into this corruptible body, by which it is weighed down, because the merits of a life previously lived ill in the heavens or in any other parts of the world whatsoever compelled it thither; for the Apostle, speaking of Rebecca's twins not yet born, says that they had done nothing of good or evil, so that it might be said, not from works, by which neither was distinguished from the other, but from Him who calls, that the greater should serve the lesser.
These things therefore being most firmly established, if it is so recondite and hidden in the secret works of God — so that it is not declared by the manifest utterance of the divine Scriptures — whether souls are to be believed to have done nothing of good or evil while not yet born because individuals receive souls not propagated from others but newly created out of nothing, or because, though they were originally in their parents, they themselves as yet were no one who might live their own and proper lives: nevertheless let that faith be preserved intact by which we believe that no human being, whether of greater or of however small and recent an age, is freed from the contagion of the ancient death and from the obligation of the sin which he contracted by his first birth, except through the one Mediator of God and men, the man Christ Jesus.
By the most saving faith of this same man who is also God, even those just men were saved who, before He came in the flesh, believed that He would come in the flesh. For the faith is one and the same, both ours and theirs, since they believed that would come to pass which we believe has come to pass. Whence the Apostle Paul says: 'Having, however, the same spirit of faith, according to what is written, 'I believed, therefore I have spoken,' we also believe, therefore we also speak.' If therefore both they who foretold that Christ would come in the flesh, and they who announced that He had come, had the same spirit of faith, the sacraments could be diverse according to the diversity of times, yet most harmoniously converging upon the unity of the same faith.
It is written also in the Acts of the Apostles, the Apostle Peter speaking: 'Now therefore why do you tempt God, to put a yoke upon the neck of the disciples, which neither our fathers nor we were able to bear? But through the grace of the Lord Jesus we believe that we are saved, in the same manner as they also.' If therefore they also, that is, the fathers, being unable to bear the yoke of the old law, believed that they were saved through the grace of the Lord Jesus, it is manifest that this grace also made the ancient just men to live by faith; for 'the just man lives by faith.' 'But the law crept in, that the offense might abound; that grace might super-abound,' by which the abundance of the offense might be healed. For 'if a law had been given which could give life, truly righteousness would be from the law.'
But for what good the law was given, he consequently added, saying: 'But the Scripture concluded all under sin, that the promise by the faith of Jesus Christ might be given to those who believe.' The law therefore had to be given which might more manifestly show man to himself, lest the proud human mind should think it could be righteous of itself and, being ignorant of the righteousness of God (that is, the righteousness which comes to man from God) and wishing to establish its own (that is, as though procured by its own strength for itself), should not become subject to the righteousness of God. It was fitting, therefore, that by the addition of the commandment whose voice is 'You shall not covet,' the crime of transgression too should accrue to the proud sinner, and thus infirmity, not healed by the law but convicted, should seek the medicine of grace.
Accordingly, since all the just — that is, the true worshipers of God, whether before the incarnation or after the incarnation of Christ — have neither lived nor live except by faith in the incarnation of Christ, in whom is the fullness of grace, assuredly what is written, that there is no other name under heaven in which we must be saved, avails for the salvation of the human race from that time onward from which the human race was corrupted in Adam. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive; because, as in the kingdom of death no one is without Adam, so in the kingdom of life no one is without Christ; as through Adam all men, so through Christ all just men.
As through Adam all became, in punishment, mortal sons of this world, so also through Christ all become, in grace, immortal sons of God. But why even those are created whom the Creator knows to belong to damnation, not to grace, the blessed Apostle recalls with a brevity all the more compressed as it is of greater authority. For he says that God, willing to show His wrath and to demonstrate His power, endured in much patience vessels of wrath, which are fitted for destruction, and that He might make known the riches of His glory upon vessels of mercy — whom he had earlier said that God, as a potter of clay, makes out of the same mass one vessel unto honor, another unto dishonor.
But it would rightly seem unjust that vessels of wrath are made thence unto destruction, if that whole mass out of Adam were not condemned. Therefore, that vessels of wrath are made thence by being born pertains to a deserved punishment; but that vessels of mercy are made thence by being reborn pertains to an undeserved grace. God therefore showed His wrath — not indeed a perturbation of mind, such as that which is called the wrath of man, but a just and fixed retribution — because from the stock of disobedience is drawn the offshoot of sin and punishment. And 'man born of woman,' as it is written in the book of Job, 'is of short life and full of wrath.' For a man is a vessel of that with which he is full; whence they are called vessels of wrath.
He showed also His power, by which He uses well even the wicked, bestowing on them many natural and temporal goods, and adapting their malice to the exercising and, by comparison, the admonishing of the good, that in them the good may learn to give thanks to God, because they have been distinguished from those, not by their own merits, which in that same mass were equal, but by His compassion. This appears most of all in little children, of whom, when they are reborn through the grace of Christ and, ending this life in that tender age, pass into the life eternal and blessed, it cannot be said that they are distinguished by free choice from other infants who die without this grace in the damnation of that same mass. But if only those were created out of Adam who were to be recreated by grace,
and besides those who are adopted into the sons of God no other men were born, the benefit which is granted to the unworthy would lie hidden, because to none coming from that same damnable stock would the deserved punishment be rendered. But when He endured in much patience vessels of wrath, which are fitted for destruction, He not only showed His wrath and demonstrated His power by rendering retribution and by using well those who are not good, but He also made known the riches of His glory upon vessels of mercy. For thus the one justified freely learns what is bestowed on him, since he is distinguished from the damned — with whom by the same justice he himself would have been damned — not by his own merit but by the glory of God's most lavish mercy.