guard your souls; but by the same Spirit another prophet proclaims: unless the Lord guard the city, in vain has he watched who guards it. The Apostle, writing to the Philippians, that he may designate their free will, says: with fear and trembling work out your salvation; but that he may show its infirmity, he adds: for it is God who works in us both to will and to accomplish, according to his good will.
And so these things are in some way so indiscriminately mingled and confused that among many it is debated with great questioning which of them depends on which—that is, whether it is because we have furnished the beginning of good will that God has mercy on us, or whether it is because God has mercy that we obtain the beginning of good will. For many, believing each of these singly and asserting it more than is right, have become entangled in various and mutually contradictory errors. For if we should say that the beginning of good will is ours, what was it in Paul the persecutor, what in Matthew the publican—of whom the one, brooding over the blood and torments of the innocent, the other over acts of violence and public rapine, is drawn to salvation?
But if we should say that the beginnings of good will are always inspired by the grace of God, what shall we say of the faith of Zacchaeus, what of the piety of that robber on the cross, who, by their own desire bringing a certain violence upon the kingdom of heaven, forestalled the special summonses of vocation? But if we should attribute the consummation of the virtues and the performance of God's commandments to our own will, how is it that we pray: confirm, O God, that which you have wrought in us, and: direct the works of our hands over us? We know that Balaam was hired to curse Israel, but we see that it was not permitted to him, though he desired to curse. Abimelech is guarded, lest by touching Rebecca he sin against God.
Joseph is sold through the envy of his brothers, that the going-down of the sons of Israel into Egypt might come to pass, and that for them, while they were plotting concerning their brother's death, the remedies against the coming famine might be prepared. This same Joseph, when recognized by his brothers, makes it plain, saying: do not be afraid, nor let it seem hard to you that you sold me into these regions; for God sent me before you for your salvation; and further: for God sent me ahead, that you may be preserved upon the earth, and may have food to keep you alive. Not by your counsel, but by the will of God I was sent, who has made me as a father to Pharaoh, and lord of his whole house, and prince over all the land of Egypt. And when, after his father's death, he removed the suspicion of fear from his fearful brothers, he said: do not fear;
Can we resist the will of God? 'You devised evil against me, but God turned it into good, that he might exalt me, as you now behold, and that he might save many peoples.' This too the blessed David declared in like manner in the one hundred and fourth Psalm, showing that it was done at that time by a divine dispensation, when he said: 'And he called a famine upon the land, and broke every staff of bread. He sent a man before them: Joseph was sold as a slave.' These two things, therefore, namely the grace of God and free will, seem indeed mutually opposed to one another, yet both are in harmony, and we gather by the reasoning of piety that we ought to accept them both alike, lest by withdrawing one of them from man we should seem to have departed from the rule of the Church's faith.
For when God sees us inclined to will the good, he comes to meet us, guides and strengthens us: for at the voice of your cry, as soon as he shall hear it, he will answer you; and, 'Call upon me,' he says, 'in the day of tribulation, and I will deliver you, and you shall glorify me.' And again, if he perceives that we are unwilling or grown lukewarm, he applies salutary exhortations to our hearts, whereby a good will may be either restored or formed anew in us. For God is not to be believed to have made man such that he can neither ever will nor be able to do the good. Otherwise he did not grant him free will at all, if he granted him only to will and to be able to do evil, but did not grant him of himself either to will or to be able to do the good.
And how shall that sentence of the Lord, pronounced after the transgression of the first man, stand: 'Behold, Adam is become as one of us, knowing good and evil'? For he must not be thought to have been formerly such that he was wholly ignorant of good. Otherwise he must be confessed to have been fashioned like some irrational and senseless animal, which is quite absurd and utterly foreign to the catholic faith. Nay rather, according to the sentence of the most wise Solomon, 'God made man upright,' that is, that he might continually enjoy the knowledge of good alone; 'but they themselves sought out many devices': for they became, as it is said, knowing good and evil.
Adam therefore, after the transgression, conceived the knowledge of evil which he had not had, but did not lose the knowledge of good which he had received. That the human race, after Adam's transgression, did not lose the knowledge of good is most clearly declared also by the sentence of the Apostle, in which he says: 'For when the Gentiles, who have not the law, do by nature the things that are of the law, these, having not the law, are a law to themselves; who show the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience bearing witness to them, and their thoughts among themselves accusing or also defending one another, in the day when God shall judge the secrets of men.'
In which sense the Lord also, through the prophet, rebukes the blindness of the Jews as not natural but voluntary, which they obstinately brought upon themselves. 'Hear, you deaf,' he says, 'and you blind, look and see. Who is deaf, but my servant? and blind, but he to whom I sent my messengers?' And lest perchance anyone should ascribe this blindness of theirs to nature and not to will, he says elsewhere: 'Bring forth the people that are blind, and have eyes: that are deaf, and have ears.' And again: 'You who having eyes see not, and ears, and hear not.' The Lord likewise says in the Gospel: 'Because seeing they see not, and hearing they hear not, neither do they understand. And in them is fulfilled the prophecy of Isaiah, saying:'
'By hearing you shall hear, and shall not understand; and seeing you shall see, and shall not perceive. For the heart of this people is grown gross, and with their ears they have heard heavily, and their eyes they have closed; lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and be converted, and I should heal them.' Finally, to signify that the possibility of good was in them, rebuking the Pharisees he says: 'And why even of yourselves do you not judge that which is just?' Which surely he would not have said to them, had he not known that by natural judgment they could discern what is right. Hence we must beware lest we so refer all the merits of the saints to the Lord that we ascribe to human nature nothing but what is evil and perverse.
In this indeed we are refuted by the testimony of these words of the most wise Solomon, nay rather of the Lord himself: for thus, when he prayed at the completion of the building of the temple, he spoke: 'And David my father wished to build a house to the name of the Lord God of Israel; and the Lord said to David my father: Whereas you thought in your heart to build a house to my name, you have done well in having this very thing in your mind; nevertheless you shall not build the house to my name.' This thought, then, and this deliberation of king David, ought it to be called good and from God, or evil and from man? For if that thought was good and from God, why is its accomplishment denied to him by the one by whom it was inspired? But if it was evil and from man, why is it praised by the Lord?
It remains, therefore, that it be believed to have been both good and from man. In which manner we can also daily judge our own thoughts. For it was granted neither to David alone to think good of himself, nor is it naturally denied to us that we should ever be able to be wise or to think anything good. It cannot therefore be doubted that there are indeed by nature seeds of virtues implanted in every soul by the kindness of the Creator; but unless these have been quickened by the help of God, they will not be able to attain to the increase of perfection, because, according to the blessed Apostle, 'neither he that plants is anything, nor he that waters, but God who gives the increase.'
That freedom of choice, moreover, lies open to man on whichever side, that book too which is called the Shepherd most plainly teaches, in which two angels are said to cleave to each one of us, that is, a good and an evil one, but that it rests in man's choice which of them he shall follow. And therefore free will always remains in man, which can either neglect or love the grace of God. For the Apostle would not have commanded, saying: 'With fear and trembling work out your own salvation,' had he not known that it could be either cultivated or neglected by us. But lest they should think that they did not need the divine aid for the work of salvation, he adds: 'For it is God who works in you both to will and to accomplish, according to his good will.'
And therefore, admonishing Timothy, he says: 'Neglect not the grace of God which is in you'; and again: 'For which cause I admonish you that you stir up the grace of God which is in you.' Hence it is that, writing also to the Corinthians, he exhorts and warns them not to show themselves unworthy of the grace of God by fruitless works, saying: 'And helping, we exhort you that you receive not the grace of God in vain.' Which grace, since Simon had without doubt received it in vain, the reception of the saving grace profited him nothing. For he chose not to obey the precepts of blessed Peter, who said: 'Do penance from this your wickedness, and pray God, if perhaps this thought of your heart may be forgiven you: for I see you are in the gall of bitterness and in the bond of iniquity.'
God therefore anticipates the will of man, for it is said: 'My God, his mercy shall go before me'; and again, our will anticipates God when he tarries and, in a manner profitably holds back, so as to prove our choice, when it is said: 'And in the morning my prayer shall come before you'; and again: 'I anticipated the dawn, and cried'; and: 'My eyes have anticipated the morning.' He also calls us and invites us, when he says: 'All the day long I stretched out my hands to a people that believed not and contradicted me'; and he is entreated by us, when we say to him: 'All the day long I stretched out my hands to you.' He waits for us, when it is said through the prophet: 'Therefore the Lord waits, that he may have mercy on you'; and he is waited for by us, when we say:
'With patience I waited for the Lord, and he looked upon me'; and: 'I have waited for your salvation, O Lord.' He strengthens us, when he says: 'And I instructed them and strengthened their arms, and they imagined evil against me'; and he exhorts us to strengthen ourselves, when he says: 'Strengthen the weak hands, and confirm the feeble knees.' Jesus cries out: 'If any man thirst, let him come to me and drink'; the prophet also cries out to him: 'I have labored with crying, my jaws are become hoarse; my eyes have failed, while I hope in my God.' The Lord seeks us, saying: 'I sought, and there was no man; I called, and there was none to answer'; and he himself is sought by the bride tearfully lamenting: 'In my bed by night I sought him whom my soul loveth:'
'I sought him, and found him not; I called him, and he answered me not.' And thus the grace of God ever cooperates with our will for the good part, and in all things aids, protects, and defends it, so that sometimes it even requires or awaits from it certain efforts of good will, lest it should seem to confer its gifts upon one wholly asleep or slack in idle leisure; seeking, as it were, occasions whereby, the torpor of human sluggishness being shaken off, the bounty of its munificence may not seem unreasonable, since it imparts that bounty under the guise of a certain desire and labor:
And nonetheless the grace of God remains gratuitous, since in return for certain slight and trifling efforts it bestows with inestimable bounty so great a glory of immortality, so great gifts of everlasting blessedness. For it is not because the faith of that thief on the cross had gone before that we must declare the blessed dwelling of paradise was not freely promised to him; nor that the penitence of king David, by that one word in which he said, 'I have sinned against the Lord,' rather than the clemency of God, took away his two so grievous crimes, so that through the prophet Nathan he deserved to hear: 'And the Lord hath taken away your iniquity: you shall not die.' That therefore he added homicide to adultery was assuredly of free will:
But that he was reproved through the prophet is of the grace of the divine condescension. Again, that he humbly acknowledges his sin is his own; but that within a very brief point of time he obtains pardon for such crimes is the gift of the merciful Lord. And what shall we say of this so brief confession and the incomparable immensity of the divine recompense, when the blessed Apostle, looking to that greatness of the future reward, has pronounced concerning his own so innumerable persecutions in a way it is very easy to consider? For 'this momentary,' he says, 'and light tribulation of ours works in us above measure, beyond comparison, an eternal weight of glory.' Concerning which he also elsewhere steadfastly declares, saying:
'For the sufferings of this time are not worthy to be compared with the glory to come, that shall be revealed in us.' However much, therefore, human frailty shall have striven, it will not be able to be equal to the future recompense, nor will it so diminish the divine grace by its labors that grace should not ever remain gratuitous. And therefore the aforesaid teacher of the Gentiles, although he testifies that he obtained the rank of the apostolate by the grace of God, saying: 'By the grace of God I am what I am,' nevertheless declares that he too responded to the divine grace, saying: 'And his grace in me was not void, but I labored more abundantly than they all: yet not I, but the grace of God with me.' For when he says 'I labored,' he marks the effort of his own will:
When he says 'yet not I, but the grace of God,' he shows the power of the divine protection; when he says 'with me,' he declares that it cooperated with him, not idle nor secure, but laboring and toiling in sweat. This too we read that the divine justice provided in Job, his most approved athlete, when the devil had demanded him for single combat. For if he had engaged against the enemy not by his own valor but solely by the grace of God protecting him, and, without any valor of his own patience, upheld only by the divine aid, had borne those manifold masses and destructions of temptations, sought out with all the cruelty of the enemy, how would the devil not with more justice have repeated against him that slanderous voice which he had uttered before:
'Doth Job serve God for nought? Hast thou not fenced him in, and all his substance round about? But put forth thy hand,' that is, allow him to contend with his own strength together with me, 'unless he bless thee to thy face.' But since the slanderous foe dares not repeat any complaint of this kind after the conflict, he confesses himself vanquished not by God's strength, but by that man's.
Although we must believe that the grace of God was not entirely wanting to him either, which granted to the tempter only so much power of tempting as it knew him to have valor of resisting; not so protecting him from that assault as to leave no room for human valor, but only providing this, that the most violent enemy might not, by making his soul senseless and bereft of feeling, overwhelm him with an unequal and unjust weight of combat. That the Lord is sometimes wont to try our faith, that it may become stronger or more glorious, we are taught by the example of that centurion in the Gospel, whose servant, though the Lord knew he would surely heal him by the power of his word, he chose rather to offer his bodily presence, saying:
'I will come and heal him.' But when the centurion surpassed this offer of his by the ardor of a more fervent faith, saying: 'Lord, I am not worthy that you should enter under my roof; but only say the word, and my servant shall be healed,' the Lord marvels at him and praises him, and prefers him to all those who had believed out of the people of Israel, saying: 'Amen I say to you, I have not found so great faith in Israel.' For it would have been of no praise or merit had Christ preferred in him that which he himself had bestowed. This trial of faith we read that the divine justice also dispensed in that most magnificent patriarch, when it is said:
'And it came to pass after these words, that God tempted Abraham.' For the divine justice willed to prove, not that faith which the Lord was inspiring in him, but that which, once called and enlightened by the Lord, he could exhibit through the choice of his liberty. Hence not without reason is the constancy of his faith approved, and, the grace of God coming to his aid, which had for a little while left him in order to prove him, it is thus said: 'Lay not your hand upon the boy, neither do anything to him: for now I know that you fear the Lord, and have not spared your beloved son for my sake.' That this kind of temptation can befall us too for the merit of proving us is quite plainly foretold by the lawgiver in Deuteronomy:
'If there rise up among you a prophet, or one who says he has seen a dream, and he foretells a sign and a wonder, and that which he spoke comes to pass, and he says to you: Let us go and serve strange gods, which you know not: you shall not hear the words of that prophet or dreamer: for the Lord your God tempts you, whether you love him with all your heart and keep his commandments, or not.' What then? When God permits such a prophet or dreamer to arise, is he to be believed that he will so protect those whose faith he purposes to prove, that he reserves to their free choice no room at all whereby they may contend with their own strength against the tempter?
And what need is there that those be even tempted whom he knows to be so weak and frail that they can by no means resist the tempter by their own valor? But surely the justice of the Lord would not have permitted them to be tempted at all, had he not known that there was in them an equal valor of resisting, whereby by the judgment of equity they might be judged in either merit, whether guilty or praiseworthy. Such also is that which is said by the Apostle: 'Therefore he that thinks himself to stand, let him take heed lest he fall. Let no temptation take hold on you but such as is human. And God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that which you are able, but will make also with the temptation issue, that you may be able to bear it.' For when he says:
'He that stands, let him take heed lest he fall,' he renders the liberty of choice solicitous, which he well knew, when grace had been received, could either stand through diligence or fall through negligence. But when he adds: 'Let no temptation take hold on you but such as is human,' he reproaches their weakness and inconstancy, their mind not yet robust, whereby they could not as yet be assailed by the whirlwinds of spiritual wickednesses, against which he knew that he himself and those perfect ones daily contended, of whom he says to the Ephesians: 'For our wrestling is not now against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of this world of darkness, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places.' But when he subjoins:
'And God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that which you are able,' he by no means wishes that the Lord would not permit them to be tempted, but that they should not be tempted above what they were able to bear. For the former indicated the capacity of human choice; the latter shows the grace of the Lord moderating the struggles of the temptations.
In all these things, therefore, it is approved that the divine grace always so incites the choice of man that it does not in all cases so protect and defend it as not also to make him engage by his own efforts against the spiritual enemies, in which he may understand either the grace of God as victor, or his own weakness when overcome; and thus learn to hope not in his own strength, but ever in the divine support, and continually to have recourse to his protector. And that this may be approved not by our conjecture, but by yet more evident testimonies of divine Scripture, let us reconsider that which is read in Joshua the son of Nun:
'These nations,' it says, 'the Lord left, and would not destroy them, that in them he might prove Israel, whether they would keep the commandments of the Lord their God, and that they might have practice of warring with their enemies.' And, that we may compare with the incomparable clemency of our Creator some mortal thing, not according to an equality of tenderness, but from some likeness of indulgence:
If a devoted and careful nurse long carries an infant in her bosom, that at some time she may teach it to walk, and first indeed permits it to crawl, then, setting it upright, upholds it by the strength of her right hand that it may lean upon alternate steps, presently, leaving it alone a little, if she sees it tottering, at once catches hold of it, supports it as it wavers, raises it when it has fallen, and either wards it from falling or, even letting it gently fall, lifts it after the tumble; but when she has brought it on to the strength of boyhood or of youth and young manhood, she lays upon it certain burdens or labors by which it may not be overwhelmed but exercised, and permits it to contend with rivals:
How much more does that heavenly Father of all know whom to carry in the bosom of his grace, whom to exercise unto virtue in his sight by the choice of free will, and yet aids him when laboring, hears him when calling, forsakes him not when seeking, snatches him from danger sometimes even when he knows it not. By which it is evidently shown that the judgments of God are unsearchable and his ways past finding out, whereby he draws the human race to salvation. This too we can prove by the examples of the Gospel callings. For Andrew and Peter and the rest of the apostles, thinking nothing of the remedy of their salvation, he chose beforehand by the spontaneous condescension of his grace:
Zacchaeus, faithfully stretching himself to the sight of the Lord and raising the smallness of his stature by the loftiness of a sycamore, he not only receives, but even honors with the blessing of dwelling together with him. Paul, unwilling and resisting, he draws to himself. Another he commands to cleave inseparably to him, so that he grants him, when he asks, not the briefest respite for the burial of his father. To Cornelius, persevering constantly in prayers and alms, as it were by way of recompense the way of salvation is shown, and he is bidden by the visitation of an angel that, sending for Peter, he may learn from him the words of salvation by which, together with all his household, he might be saved.
And thus that manifold wisdom of God dispenses the salvation of men with a manifold and unsearchable tenderness, and imparts the grace of its bounty according to the capacity of each one, so that he has willed to exercise even his very cures not according to the uniform power of his majesty, but according to the measure of faith in which he finds each one, or as he himself has apportioned to each. For to him who believed that the will of Christ alone sufficed for the cleansing of his leprosy, he granted healing by the mere assent of his will, saying: 'I will; be you made clean.' To another, beseeching that, coming by the imposition of his hand, he would raise up his dead daughter, entering his house, he granted in the same manner in which the man had hoped that which was asked:
To another, believing that the sum of salvation consisted in the command of his word alone and answering, 'Say but the word, and my servant shall be healed,' by the command of his word he restored the loosened limbs to their former strength, saying: 'Go, and as you have believed, so be it done to you.' To others, hoping for a medicine from the touch of his fringe, he plentifully bestowed the gifts of health. To the diseases of others, being asked, he granted a cure. To others he offered an unsought medicine. Others he exhorted to hope, saying: 'Will you be made whole?' To others, not hoping, he brought help unbidden. The desires of others, before he satisfied their will, he searched out, saying: 'What will you that I do for you?'
To another, ignorant of the way whereby he might obtain that which he had desired, he kindly showed it, saying: 'If you shall believe, you shall see the glory of God.' Among others he so abundantly poured out the power of his cures, that the evangelist records concerning them: 'And he healed all their sick.' But among others that immense abyss of Christ's benefits was so stopped up, that it is said: 'And Jesus could not do miracles among them because of their unbelief.' And thus the bounty of God is itself also shaped according to the capacity of human faith, so that to this one indeed he says: 'According to your faith be it done to you'; but to that one: 'Go, and as you have believed, so be it done to you'; to another: 'Be it done to you as you will'; and again to another: 'Your faith has made you whole.'
But let no one suppose that these things have been brought forward by us to the end that we should strive to establish that the sum of salvation consists within the domain of our faith, according to the profane opinion of certain persons, who, imputing the whole to free will, define that the grace of God is dispensed according to the merit of each one; but we pronounce plainly with an absolute sentence that the grace of God even superabounds, and sometimes transgresses the narrow bounds of human unbelief. Which we remember to have been done in that little son in the Gospel, who, while he more easily believes his sick son could be cured than a dead one raised, hastily implores the Lord's presence, saying: 'Lord, come down before my son dies.' Although Christ reproved his unbelief with these words:
'Unless you see signs and wonders, you believe not,' nevertheless he did not exercise the grace of his divinity according to the weakness of his faith, nor by his bodily presence, as the man had believed, but by the word of his power he shut out the deadly diseases of the fever, saying: 'Go, your son lives.' This superabundance of grace we read that the Lord poured out also in the cure of that paralytic, when to him seeking remedies only for his infirmity, by which his body had been dissolved, he first bestowed health upon his soul, saying: 'Be of good heart, son, your sins are forgiven you.'