書信與論戰集（CSEL） 第 12 章

BOOK ONE. I knew you indeed by the widespread report that proclaimed your fame, and by most frequent and truthful tidings I had learned how full you were of the grace of God, most blessed and venerable Pope Boniface. But after my brother Alypius saw you also in bodily presence, and being received by you most kindly and sincerely shared mutual conversations at love's prompting, living with you and, though but for a short time, being joined to you in great affection, he poured both himself and me into your heart, and carried you back to me in his own—so much greater has the knowledge of your holiness become in me, in proportion as the friendship has grown more assured. For you do not disdain, you who are not high-minded although you preside on high, to be the friend of the lowly and to repay the love that is bestowed.

For what else is friendship, which takes its very name from nowhere but from love, and is faithful nowhere but in Christ, in whom alone it can also be everlasting and blessed? Wherefore, having received it through that brother by whom I came to know you more intimately, I have with greater confidence dared to write something to your Blessedness concerning those matters which at this time stir up the episcopal care—if any such care is in us—to a fresher vigilance for the Lord's flock. For those new heretics, the enemies of the grace of God which is given to small and great through Jesus Christ our Lord, although they are now shown up more evidently by a more open reproof and are the more to be guarded against, nevertheless do not cease by their writings to tempt the hearts of the less cautious or the less learned.

To these men an answer must certainly be given, lest they confirm themselves or their followers in that wicked error—even if we did not fear that they might deceive any of the catholics by their plausible speech.

But since they do not cease to rage against the sheepfolds of the Lord's flock, and to seek out from every side an entrance for plundering the sheep redeemed at so great a price, and since the pastoral watchtower is common to all of us who discharge the office of the episcopate—although you yourself stand pre-eminent in it upon a loftier summit—I do what I can for my small share of the ministry, as far as the Lord deigns to grant me, your prayers helping, so that against their pestilent and treacherous writings I may hold out writings that heal and fortify, by which the madness with which they rave may either itself be cured, or be repelled from injuring others.

Now these things, which I am answering in reply to two of their letters—the one, namely, which Julian is said to have sent to Rome (in order, I believe, that through it he might either find or make there such followers as he could), and the other, which eighteen supposed bishops, partakers of his error, dared to write to Thessalonica, not to just anyone, but to test with their craftiness the bishop of that place himself and, if it could be done, to draw him over to their party—these things, then, which I answer to those two letters of theirs by this disputation, I have determined to direct above all to your holiness, not so much to be learned as to be examined, and, where perchance something may displease, to be corrected.

For my brother told me that you yourself deigned to give those letters to him, letters which could not have come into your hands except by the most watchful diligence of our brethren, your sons. And I give thanks to your most sincere goodwill toward us, that you did not wish to hide from me those letters of the enemies of God's grace, in which you found my name expressed slanderously and openly. But I hope in the Lord our God that not without reward—which is in heaven—do they tear me with their railing tooth, against whom I set myself for the sake of the little ones, lest they be abandoned as lost to their deceitful flatterer Pelagius, but be offered to Christ their truthful Savior to be set free. And so now let us answer Julian's letter.

'Those Manicheans,' he says, 'with whom we now hold no communion'—that is, all those with whom we disagree—'say that by the sin of the first man, that is, of Adam, free choice perished, and no one any longer has the power of living well, but all are compelled by the necessity of their flesh into sin.' He calls catholics 'Manicheans,' after the manner of that Jovinian who a few years before, a novel heretic, was destroying the virginity of holy Mary and was making the marriage of the faithful equal to sacred virginity. Nor did he lay this charge against catholics for any other reason than that he wished them to be seen as accusers or condemners of marriage.

But in defending free choice they rush headlong, so that one should trust in it rather than in the Lord's help for the doing of righteousness, and so that each should glory in himself and not in the Lord. Yet which of us says that free choice perished from the human race through the sin of the first man? Liberty indeed perished through sin, but that liberty which was in paradise—of possessing full righteousness together with immortality. On which account human nature stands in need of divine grace, since the Lord says: 'If the Son shall make you free, then shall you be free indeed'—free, that is, to live well and justly.

For free choice has so far from perished in the sinner, that it is precisely through it that all sin most of all who sin with delight and love of sin, and to whom that pleases which delights them. Whence the Apostle also says: 'When you were the servants of sin, you were free from righteousness.' Behold, they are shown to have been unable to serve sin except by another liberty. They are therefore not free from righteousness except by the choice of the will; but they are not made free from sin except by the grace of the Savior. On which account that admirable teacher distinguished the very words: 'For when you were servants of sin,' he says, 'you were free from righteousness. What fruit therefore had you then in those things whereof you are now ashamed? For the end of them is death.'

'But now being made free from sin, and become servants to God, you have your fruit unto sanctification, and the end everlasting life.' He said they were 'free' from righteousness, not 'freed'; but from sin not 'free,' lest they should attribute this to themselves, but most watchfully he preferred to say 'freed,' referring this to that saying of the Lord: 'If the Son shall make you free, then shall you be free indeed.' Since therefore the sons of men do not live well unless they are made sons of God, how is it that this man wishes to attribute to free choice the power of living well, when this power is not given except by the grace of God through Jesus Christ our Lord, the Gospel saying: 'But as many as received him, to them he gave power to become the sons of God'?

But lest perchance they should say that they were helped to this end—that they might have the power of becoming sons of God—but that, in order to be worthy of receiving this power, they first received him by free choice, aided by no grace (for this is precisely the intention by which they strive to destroy grace, that they may contend it is given according to our merits)—lest, therefore, they should perchance so divide this evangelical sentence as to place merit in what is said, 'But as many as received him,' and then place grace, not freely given, but rendered to this merit, in what follows, 'to them he gave power to become the sons of God'—if it be asked of them what 'they received him' means, will they say anything else than 'they believed in him'?

Therefore, that they may know that this too pertains to grace, let them read what the Apostle says: 'In nothing be terrified by the adversaries, which is to them a cause of perdition, but of your salvation, and this from God; for to you it is given for Christ, not only to believe in him, but also to suffer for him'—surely he said that both were given—likewise what he says: 'Peace be to the brethren, and charity with faith, from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.' Let them read also that which the Lord himself says: 'No man can come to me, except the Father who sent me draw him.'

And lest anyone should think that 'to come to me' meant anything other than 'to believe in me,' a little after, when he was speaking of his body and blood, and very many were scandalized at his words, he said: 'The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life. But there are some of you that do not believe.' Then the Evangelist added: 'For Jesus knew from the beginning who they were that believed not, and who he was that would betray him. And he said: Therefore did I say to you, that no man can come to me, unless it be given him by my Father.' He repeated, that is, the sentence in which he had said: 'No man can come to me, except the Father who sent me draw him.' And he made manifest that he had said this on account of those who believe and those who do not believe, explaining what he had said:

'except the Father who sent me DRAW him,' repeating the same thing in other words in that which he says: 'unless it be given him by my Father.' For that man is drawn to Christ to whom it is given to believe in Christ. Therefore power is given, that they may become sons of God who believe in him, since this very thing is given, that they should believe in him. And unless this power be given by God, there can be no power from free choice, because that will not be free in good which the Liberator has not set free; but in evil the will has free choice, into which either a hidden or a manifest deceiver has instilled the delight of wickedness, or the will has persuaded itself of it.

Therefore it is not the case, as certain men say that we say, and as this man moreover dares to write, that 'all are compelled into sin' as though unwilling 'by the necessity of their flesh'; but if they are already of such an age as to use the choice of their own mind, both they are held in sin by their own will and are hurled from sin into sin by their own will. For neither does even he who persuades and deceives work anything in them, except that they commit sin by their will, whether through ignorance of the truth, or through delight in iniquity, or through both evils, of blindness and of infirmity. But this will, which is free in evils because it delights in evils, is for that very reason not free in good things, because it has not been set free.

Nor can a man will anything good unless he is helped by him who cannot will evil—that is, by the grace of God through Jesus Christ our Lord; for 'whatsoever is not of faith is sin.' And by this the good will, which withdraws itself from sin, is faithful, because 'the just man lives by faith'; and it pertains to faith to believe in Christ, and no one can believe in him, that is, come to him, unless it be given him. No one, therefore, can have a righteous will unless, with no merits preceding, he has received the true—that is, the freely given—grace from above. This is what these men, puffed up and proud, refuse to accept—defenders of free choice not by purifying it but by exalting it, indeed casters-down of it—who for no other reason are indignant with us when we say these things,

because they disdain to glory in the Lord. Yet Pelagius feared the episcopal judgment in Palestine and, when it was objected against him that he said 'the grace of God is given according to our merits,' he denied that he said it, and by pronouncing an anathema he condemned those who did say it. And yet he is not found to defend anything else in the books which he afterward wrote, thinking that he had committed a fraud upon the men who judged him by lying, or somehow by cloaking his own meaning in ambiguous words. But now let us see what follows. 'They say also,' he says, 'that these marriages which are now contracted were not instituted by God—which is read in the book of Augustine, against whom I have now replied in four little books.'

'The sayings of this Augustine our enemies have taken up in hatred of the truth.' To these most slanderous words of his I see that a brief answer must be given, since he repeats them later, where he himself wishes to insinuate what they say as though against these positions of ours. There we must contend with him, as far as the matter shall seem to require, with the Lord's help. Now, therefore, I answer that marriage was instituted by God, both then, when it was said: 'For this cause a man shall leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave to his wife, and they shall be two in one flesh,' and now, because it is written: 'A woman is joined to a man by the Lord.' For nothing else is done even now than that a man cleaves to his wife and they become two in one flesh.

For concerning those very marriages which are now contracted, the Lord was consulted by the Jews, whether it were lawful to put away a wife for any cause whatever, and having recalled that testimony of the law, he added: 'What therefore God hath joined together, let no man put asunder.' This testimony of the law the Apostle Paul also employed, when he admonished husbands that they should be loved by their wives. Far be it, then, that this man should have read anything in my book against these divine testimonies; but either by not understanding, or rather by slandering, he tries to twist what he reads into another meaning. And the book of mine, against which he records that he has replied in four little books, I wrote after the condemnation of Pelagius and Caelestius.

I thought this ought to be said, because he says that 'my sayings were taken up by his enemies in hatred of the truth,' lest anyone should think that it was on account of this book of mine that the new heretics, enemies of Christ's grace, were condemned. In that book, moreover, there is rather a defense than a censure of marriage. 'They say also,' he says, 'that the motion of the genitals and the intercourse of spouses were devised by the devil, and that for this reason those who are born are innocent yet guilty, and are made by the devil, not by God, because they are born of this diabolical intercourse. But this, without any ambiguity, is Manichean.'

Nay rather, just as we say that marriage was instituted by God for the ordained begetting of children, so we say that the sowing for the begetting of children could not, even in paradise—if children were to be begotten—have taken place without the motion of the genitals and without the intercourse of spouses. But whether such a motion and intercourse of theirs would have been, if no one had sinned, as it now is with shameful lust—this is a question about which we shall dispute more carefully afterward, if God be not unwilling. Yet what these men want, what they aim at, whither they strive to lead the matter, this man's own added words declare, where he says that we say: 'For this reason those who are born innocent are guilty and are made by the devil, not by God, because they are born of this diabolical intercourse.'

Whereas we neither call the intercourse of spouses diabolical—especially of the faithful, which takes place for the sake of begetting children who are afterward to be regenerated—nor say that any men are made by the devil, but by God, insofar as they are men, and yet that even from faithful spouses the guilty are born.

—as a wild olive from an olive tree—on account of original sin, and on account of this being under the devil unless they are reborn in Christ, since the devil is the author of the fault, not of the nature. Against this, they, saying that little children contract no original sin and therefore are not under the devil, what do they labor to accomplish, except that the grace of God should be made void in the little ones—that grace by which, as the Apostle says, 'he has rescued us from the power of darkness and translated us into the kingdom of the Son of his love'? For since they deny that little children are in the power of darkness even before the aid of the Lord the Liberator, they so praise in them the work of the Creator as to destroy the mercy of the Redeemer.

Since we confess this both in the grown and in the little ones, he says that 'this without any ambiguity is Manichean,' although it is the most ancient catholic doctrine, by which the new heretical dogma of these men is overthrown. 'They say,' he says, 'that the saints in the Old Testament were not without sins—that is, that not even by amendment were they freed from crimes, but were caught by death still in their guilt.' Nay rather, we say that whether before the law, or in the time of the Old Testament, they were freed from sins, not by their own virtue, because 'cursed is everyone who places his hope in man'—and in this curse, without doubt, are those whom the divine psalm too marks out:

'those who trust in their own strength'—nor by the Old Testament, which begets unto bondage, although by the grace of a certain dispensation it was divinely given; nor by the very law, holy and just and good, where it is written: 'Thou shalt not covet,' since it was not given as something that could give life, but 'it was set for the sake of transgression, until the seed should come to whom the promise was made'; but that they were freed through the blood of the Redeemer himself, who is the one mediator of God and men, the man Christ Jesus.

But these enemies of the grace of God, which is given to small and great through Christ our Lord, say that the ancient men of God were of perfect righteousness, for this reason: lest they should be believed to have had need of Christ's incarnation, passion, and resurrection, by faith in which they were saved. 'They say also,' he says, 'that the Apostle Paul, or all the apostles, were always defiled by immoderate lust.' Who, even a profane man, would dare to say this? But no doubt this man slanders us in this way because they contend that what the Apostle said—'I know that in me, that is, in my flesh, dwelleth no good thing;'

'for to will is present with me, but to accomplish that which is good I find not,' and other such things—was not said by him of his own self, but that he introduced the person of some other, whoever it was, who suffered those things. On which account that very passage in his epistle must be carefully considered and scrutinized, lest in some obscurity of it the error of these men lie hidden. Although, therefore, the Apostle disputes on this at greater length in a great and long-continued conflict, defending grace against those who gloried in the law, yet we touch upon a few things pertaining to the matter. Whence he says: 'Because by the law shall no flesh be justified in his sight; for by the law is the knowledge of sin.'

'But now the righteousness of God without the law is made manifest, being witnessed by the law and the prophets; even the righteousness of God by faith of Jesus Christ unto all who believe. For there is no distinction; for all have sinned and need the glory of God, being justified freely by his grace, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.' And again: 'Where is thy glorying? It is excluded. By what law? Of works? No, but by the law of faith. For we account a man to be justified by faith without the works of the law.' And again: 'For not through the law was the promise to Abraham or to his seed, that he should be heir of the world, but through the righteousness of faith. For if they who are of the law are heirs, faith is made void and the promise is made of no effect. For the law worketh wrath;'

'for where there is no law, neither is there transgression.' And in another place: 'But the law entered in, that sin might abound; and where sin abounded, grace did more abound.' Likewise in another place: 'For sin shall not have dominion over you; for you are not under the law, but under grace.' And again in another place: 'Know you not, brethren (for I speak to them that know the law), that the law hath dominion over a man as long as it liveth? For the woman that is under a husband is bound by the law to the living husband; but if her husband die, she is loosed from the law of her husband.' And a little after: 'Therefore, my brethren, you also are become dead to the law by the body of Christ, that you may belong to another, who is risen again from the dead, that we may bring forth fruit to God.'

'For when we were in the flesh, the passions of sins, which were by the law, wrought in our members to bring forth fruit unto death; but now we are loosed from the law of death, in which we were held, so that we should serve in newness of spirit and not in the oldness of the letter.' By these and suchlike attestations that teacher of the nations shows plainly enough that the law could not take away, but rather increased, the sin which grace takes away, since the law knows how to command, to which infirmity succumbs, while grace knows how to help, by which charity is poured in. For lest anyone on account of these testimonies should disparage the law and contend that it is evil, the Apostle saw what might occur to those who misunderstand, and set for himself the same question:

'What shall we say, then?' he says. 'Is the law sin? God forbid. But I did not know sin except through the law.' This he had already said above: 'By the law is the knowledge of sin'; therefore not the removal, but the knowledge. But here he now begins, on account of which we undertook to consider these things, to introduce his own person and to speak as though of himself. Here the Pelagians do not want the Apostle himself to be understood, but that he transfigured another into himself—that is, a man still placed under the law, not yet freed through grace. Here indeed they must already concede that no one is justified in the law, as the same Apostle says elsewhere, but that the law avails unto the knowledge of sin and unto the transgression of the law itself, so that, sin being known and increased, grace may be sought through faith.

But they do not fear that these things should be understood of the Apostle, which he could also say of his own past deeds; rather they fear those that follow. For here he says: 'I had not known concupiscence, unless the law had said: Thou shalt not covet. But sin, taking occasion, wrought in me by the commandment all concupiscence; for without the law sin was dead. And I lived some time without the law; but when the commandment came, sin revived, and I died. And the commandment, which was unto life, the same was found to be unto death to me. For sin, taking occasion by the commandment, deceived me, and by it slew me. Wherefore the law indeed is holy, and the commandment holy and just and good. Was then that which is good made death to me? God forbid!'

'But sin, that it may appear sin, wrought death in me by that which is good, that sin, or the sinner, might become beyond measure through the commandment.' All these things, as I said, the Apostle may be seen to have recalled concerning his own past life—so that what he says, 'But I lived some time without the law,' he may have wished to be understood of his earliest age, from infancy, before the years of reason; while what he added, 'but when the commandment came, sin revived, and I died,' he might show himself now capable of the precept, but not effectual, and therefore a transgressor of the law. Nor let it disturb anyone that he wrote to the Philippians that, according to the righteousness which is in the law, he had been without blame.

For he could inwardly, in his depraved affections, be a transgressor of the law, and yet fulfill the conspicuous works of the law, whether through fear of men or of God himself—but through dread of punishment, not through love and delight of righteousness. For it is one thing to do good by the will to do good, but another to be so inclined by the will to do evil that one would even do it, if this could be permitted with impunity. For thus assuredly he sins within, in the very will itself, who does not refrain from sin by will, but by fear. Knowing that he had been such in these his inner parts before the grace of God which is given through Christ our Lord, the Apostle confesses this most openly elsewhere. For writing to the Ephesians he says:

'And you,' he says, 'when you were dead in your trespasses and sins, wherein in time past you walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, of the spirit that now worketh in the children of unbelief; among whom also we all in time past had our conversation in the desires of our flesh, doing the will of the flesh and of the affections, and were by nature children of wrath, even as the rest. But God, who is rich in mercy, for his exceeding charity wherewith he loved us, even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together with Christ, by whose grace we are saved.' Again to Titus:

'For we ourselves also,' he says, 'were sometime foolish and unbelieving, erring, serving divers desires and pleasures, living in malice and envy, hateful, and hating one another.' Such was Saul when he says that, according to the righteousness which is in the law, he had been without blame. For that it was not after this abominable life that, in order to be without blame, he had made progress in the law and changed his ways, he plainly shows in what follows, since indeed he does not say that he was changed from these evils except through the grace of the Savior; for adding this very thing here too, as to the Ephesians, he says:

'But when the kindness and humanity of God our Savior appeared, not by the works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy, he saved us by the laver of regeneration and renovation of the Holy Spirit, whom he hath poured forth upon us most abundantly through Jesus Christ our Savior, that, being justified by his grace, we may be made heirs according to the hope of life everlasting.' Now, that which he says in this place of the epistle to the Romans: 'sin, that it may appear sin, wrought death in me by that which is good,' agrees with what came before, where he said: 'But I did not know sin except through the law; for I had not known concupiscence unless the law had said: Thou shalt not covet,' and above: 'By the law is the knowledge of sin'; for this he said here too:

'that it may appear sin'—so that what he had said, 'for without the law sin was dead,' we should understand only in the sense that, as if it were not, 'it lies hidden, does not appear, is utterly unknown,' as though it were buried in some darkness of ignorance. And what he says, 'But I lived some time without the law,' what does he say but 'I seemed to myself to live'? And what he added, 'but when the commandment came, sin revived,' what else is this than 'it stood forth and appeared'? Yet he did not say 'it lived,' but 'it revived.' For it had once lived in paradise, when what was committed against the given precept was quite apparent.

But when sin is drawn from those being born, it lies hidden, as though dead, until, resisting righteousness, its evil is felt through prohibition, when one thing is commanded and approved while another delights and holds dominion. Then sin in a certain way comes back to life in the awareness of the newborn man, sin which once had already lived in the awareness of the man first created. But what follows is not so easily understood in reference to Paul. 'For we know,' he says, 'that the law is spiritual; but I am carnal.' He does not say 'I was,' but 'I am.' Was the apostle then carnal when he wrote these words? Or does he say this with respect to the body? For he was still in the body of this death, which was not yet made into that of which he says elsewhere: the natural body is sown, the spiritual body rises.

For then a man will be spiritual wholly, that is, in both parts of which he consists, when even the body shall be spiritual. Nor is it absurd that in that life there should be even a spiritual flesh, if in this life, in those who still relish carnal things, even the spirit itself could be carnal. So then he said 'but I am carnal' for this reason, that the apostle did not yet have a spiritual body, just as he might say 'but I am mortal'—which of course would be understood as said only with respect to the body, which had not yet been clothed with immortality. Likewise, as to what he added, 'sold under sin,' lest anyone should suppose that he was not yet redeemed by the blood of Christ, this too can be understood in the sense of what he says:

and we ourselves also, having the firstfruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, awaiting the adoption, the redemption of our body. For if he calls himself sold under sin in this sense—that his body is not yet redeemed from corruption—or as having once been sold in the first transgression of the commandment, so that he has a corruptible body which weighs down the soul: what prevents us from understanding the apostle here to speak of himself in such a way that it may be understood also of himself, even if in his own person he wishes not himself alone but all to be included, all who know that by spiritual love they contend against the affection of the flesh without consent? Or do we perhaps fear the words that follow: for what I work, I do not know;

for what I would, that I do not; but what I hate, that I do—lest perhaps from these words someone should suspect the holy apostle of consenting to the concupiscence of the flesh unto evil works? But we must consider what he adds: but if I do what I would not, I consent unto the law, that it is good. For he says rather that he consents to the law than to the concupiscence of the flesh—for this he calls by the name of sin; therefore he said that he does and works, not by the affection of consenting and fulfilling, but by the very motion of desiring. 'Hence therefore,' he says, 'I consent to the law that it is good: I consent, because I will not what it wills not.' Then he says: now then it is no more I that work it, but sin that dwells in me.

What is 'now then' but 'now already under grace, which has freed the delight of the will from consent to desire'? For 'it is no more I that work it' is best understood only in the sense that he does not consent to present his members as weapons of iniquity to sin. For if he both desires and consents and acts, how is it not he himself who works it, even though he grieves that he acts and groans heavily at being overcome? Now what follows—does it not most plainly show from what standpoint he speaks? 'For I know that in me, that is, in my flesh, there dwells no good thing.' For if he did not explain it by adding 'that is, in my flesh,' perhaps what he said, 'in me,' might be taken otherwise. And by this he turns over and repeats and drives home the same point: 'for to will is present with me, but to accomplish the good, no.'

For this is to accomplish the good, that a man should not even desire; but the good is imperfect when he desires, even if he does not consent to the desire unto evil. 'For the good that I would I do not,' he says, 'but the evil which I would not, that I do. Now if I do that which I would not, it is no more I that work it, but sin that dwells in me.' He repeated this, driving it home and as it were rousing the exceedingly sluggish from sleep: 'I find then a law,' he says, 'to me who would do good, since evil is present with me.' The law then is good to him who would do it, but evil is present through concupiscence, to which he does not consent who says, 'it is no more I that work it.' And what follows declares both more plainly:

'For I delight in the law of God after the inward man; but I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin, which is in my members.' But his saying 'bringing me into captivity' may cause difficulty, if there is no consent. Wherefore, on account of these three things—two of them, namely, about which we have already argued, where he says 'but I am carnal' and 'sold under sin,' and this third, 'bringing me into captivity to the law of sin, which is in my members'—the apostle may seem to be describing one who still lives under the law, not yet under grace.

But just as we explained those two as said on account of the flesh still corruptible, so this too can be understood, namely that by 'bringing me into captivity' he meant 'in flesh,' not in mind, 'by motion,' not by consent; and therefore 'bringing me into captivity' because even in the flesh itself there is no alien nature, but our own. As therefore he himself explained what he said, 'for I know that in me, that is, in my flesh, dwells no good thing,' so from his explanation we ought to take this passage also, as though he had said: bringing me into captivity—that is, 'my flesh'—to the law of sin, which is in my members. Then he adds, on account of which all these things were said: O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?

'The grace of God through Jesus Christ our Lord.' And thence he concludes: so then I myself with the mind serve the law of God, but with the flesh the law of sin—that is, with the flesh serving the law of sin by desiring, but with the mind serving the law of God by not consenting to that same desire. 'There is therefore now no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus.' For he is not condemned save he who consents to the concupiscence of the flesh unto evil. 'For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has freed you from the law of sin and death,' namely, that the concupiscence of the flesh may not claim your consent for itself. And the things that follow demonstrate the same sense more and more; but a limit must be set.

Now it had at one time seemed even to me that 'a man under the law' was being described by this discourse of the apostle; but afterward these words compelled me otherwise, where he says: now then it is no more I that work it. For to this pertains what he also says afterward: there is therefore now no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus; and because I do not see how a man under the law could say: I delight in the law of God after the inward man, since that very delight in the good, whereby one does not consent to evil—not from fear of punishment, but from love of righteousness (for this is to delight together)—must be attributed to nothing but grace. For also that where he says: who shall deliver me from the body of this death?—who would deny that the apostle, when he said these things, was still in the body of this death?

From which body the ungodly are certainly not delivered, to whom the same bodies are restored for eternal torments. To be delivered from the body of this death, therefore, is—with every languor of the concupiscence of the flesh healed—to receive the body not for punishment, but for glory. To this passage that other also sufficiently accords: even we ourselves, having the firstfruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, awaiting the adoption, the redemption of our body. For assuredly we groan with that very groaning in which we say: O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death? Also that where he says: for what I work, I do not know—what is it but 'I will not,' 'I approve not,' 'I consent not,' 'I do not'? Otherwise it is contrary to what he said above:

'Through the law is the knowledge of sin,' and: 'I had not known sin but by the law,' and: 'sin, that it might appear sin, worked death in me by that which is good.' For how did he know sin through the law, which he does not know? How does sin appear which is not known? So then 'I do not know,' 'I do not,' was said because I myself commit it by no consent—just as the Lord will say to the ungodly: 'I never knew you,' from whom without doubt nothing can lie hidden; and just as it was said: 'him who knew no sin,' which is 'had done no sin'; for it was not that he did not know what he reproved.

When these and such things in this context of apostolic Scripture are diligently considered, the apostle is rightly understood to have signified not indeed himself alone in his own person, but also others established under grace—yet others not yet established with himself in that perfect peace, in which death shall be swallowed up in victory. Concerning which he says afterward: but if Christ is in you, the body indeed is dead because of sin, but the spirit is life because of righteousness. If then the Spirit of him who raised up Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised up Christ Jesus from the dead shall quicken also your mortal bodies through his Spirit that dwells in you.

When therefore our mortal bodies are quickened, not only will there be no consent to sinning, but not even will there remain that very concupiscence of the flesh which is not consented to. This concupiscence, resisting the spirit, only that Man could have not present in mortal flesh, who did not come to men through it. And therefore, as for the apostles—because they were men and bore in the mortality of this life a body which is corrupted and weighs down the soul—far be it that we should say, as this man slanderously alleges, that they were always defiled by unbridled lust; rather, we say that they were free from consent to depraved lusts, yet that concerning the concupiscence of the flesh, which they curbed by moderating it, they groaned with such great humility and piety that they wished rather not to have it than to master it.

Accordingly, as to what this man added, that we say 'Christ was not free from sins, but by the necessity of the flesh lied and was stained with other faults'—let him see from whom he heard it, or in whose writings he read it; this indeed perhaps he did not understand and, deceived by malice, turned into slanderous meanings. 'They say also,' he says, 'that baptism does not grant full pardon of sins nor take away crimes, but shaves them, so that the roots of all sins are retained in the evil flesh.' Who but an unbeliever would assert this against the Pelagians?

We say therefore that baptism grants pardon of all sins and takes away crimes—it does not shave them, nor so that the roots of all sins are retained in the evil flesh, like the hair of those shorn on the head, from which they grow again, the sins being cut back. For I have found that they apply even this comparison to their slander, as though we thought and said this. But concerning this concupiscence of the flesh I believe them to be deceived or to be deceiving—that concupiscence with which even the baptized must, of necessity, contend with a pious mind (and this if he makes progress most diligently and is led by the Spirit of God). But this, even if it is called sin, is so called not indeed because it is sin, but because it was made by sin—just as a writing is called anyone's 'hand,' because the hand made it.

But those are sins which are done, spoken, or thought unlawfully according to the concupiscence of the flesh or according to ignorance; and these, even when past, hold men guilty, if they be not remitted. And this very concupiscence of the flesh is in baptism so remitted that, although it is drawn from those being born, it does no harm to those being reborn.

Yet from these, if they beget children carnally, it is again drawn and will again be harmful to those being born, unless it be remitted to those being reborn by the same form, and be present as something that will do no harm to the future life—since its guilt, drawn by generation, has been dismissed by regeneration; and therefore it is now no longer sin, but is so called, either because it was made by sin, or because it is moved by the delight of sinning, even if, when the delight of righteousness prevails, it is not consented to. Nor on account of it, whose guilt has already been consumed by the laver of regeneration, do the baptized say in prayer:

'Forgive us our debts, as we also forgive our debtors'—but rather on account of the sins which are committed, either in consents to it, when by it something that pleases is overcome (i.e. yielded to), or when through ignorance an evil pleases as though good. And these are committed either by doing, or by speaking, or—what is easiest and quickest—by thinking. From all of which who even among the faithful will boast that he keeps his heart chaste, or who will boast that he is pure from sin? That indeed which follows in the prayer is said on account of it: 'Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.' For everyone, as it is written, is tempted, being drawn away and enticed by his own concupiscence; then concupiscence, when it has conceived, brings forth sin.

All these offspring of concupiscence, and the ancient guilt of concupiscence itself, have been dismissed by the washing of baptism; and whatever this concupiscence now brings forth—provided they be not those offspring which are called not only sins but even crimes—is cleansed by that pact of the daily prayer, where we say: 'forgive as we forgive,' and by the sincerity of almsgiving. For no one is so senseless as to say that the Lord's precept does not pertain to the baptized: 'Forgive, and it shall be forgiven you; give, and it shall be given to you.' And no one could rightly be ordained a minister in the Church, if the apostle had said 'if any be without sin' where he says 'if any be without crime,' or if he had said 'having no sin' where he says:

'having no crime.' For indeed many baptized faithful are without crime; but without sin in this life I would say no one is—however much the Pelagians, because we say this, swell up and burst against us in madness—not because any sin remains that is not remitted in baptism, but because, while we remain in the infirmity of this life, those things do not cease to be committed daily which are daily remitted to those who pray faithfully and act mercifully. This is the soundness of the catholic faith, which the Holy Spirit sows everywhere; not the vanity of heretical depravity and the presumption of a spirit.

Now for the rest, therefore, let us see how, after he thought that things we believe should be slanderously charged against us and things we do not believe should be fabricated, he himself professes his own faith or that of the Pelagians. 'Against these things,' he says, 'we argue daily, and therefore we are unwilling to give consent to transgressors, because we say that free will exists naturally in all, and could not have perished through Adam's sin, which is confirmed by the authority of all the Scriptures.' If you said this as you ought—not against the grace of God—you would not be giving consent to transgressors, but would be correcting your own opinion. But on this matter we have argued above as far as we could and as far as seemed sufficient.

'We say,' he says, 'that these marriages which are now contracted throughout the world were instituted by God, and that spouses are not guilty, but fornicators and adulterers are to be condemned.' This is true and catholic; but what you want to make of it—that from the union of male and female those being born draw no sin which is expiated by the laver of regeneration—this is false and heretical. 'The evil of the genitals,' he says, 'that is, virility itself, without which there can be no union, we say was instituted by God.' To this we reply: the motion of the genitals and—to use his word—virility, without which there can be no union, God so instituted that it had nothing shameful. For it was not right that the creature should blush at the work of its Creator concerning itself;

but the disobedience of the members was rendered as a just punishment to the first human beings when they were disobedient—that disobedience at which they blushed when they covered their shameful parts with fig leaves, parts which before were not shameful. For they did not sew together tunics for themselves to cover the whole body after sin, but girdles, which some of our translators, less diligently, rendered as 'coverings.' This indeed is true; but 'covering' is a general term, by which every garment and covering may be understood.

And therefore the ambiguity ought to have been avoided, so that just as the Greek put 'perizōmata' (girdles), by which nothing is covered except the shameful parts of the body, so also the Latin should either put the Greek word itself—since custom now uses it in place of Latin—or, as some named them 'succinctoria' (girdles), or, as others better named them, 'campestria' (loincloths). For this name comes from that: the loincloths with which young men used to cover their shameful parts by ancient Roman custom, when they exercised naked on the field (campus); whence even today those who cover those same members by girding are called 'campestrati.' And yet, if the parts by which the sin was committed had to be covered after sin, they ought not even to have been clothed in tunics, but to have covered hand and mouth, because they sinned by taking and eating.

What then does it mean that, when the forbidden food had been taken, once the transgression of the precept had been committed, the gaze is directed to those members? What unknown novelty is there felt, and compels itself to be noticed? This is signified by the opening of the eyes. For neither when he was imposing names on the beasts and birds, nor when she saw that the tree was beautiful and good, were their eyes not open; but they were made open—that is, intent on looking. As it is written of Hagar the handmaid of Sarah, that she opened her eyes and saw a well—eyes which of course she did not have closed.

So then, that they should suddenly be so ashamed of their nakedness—which they had assuredly been beholding daily without being confounded—that they could no longer bear those members bare, but at once took care to cover them: did not both he in the open motion and she in the hidden one feel those members disobedient against the choice of their own will—members over which of course they ought to have had dominion at the nod of their will, like the rest? This they justly suffered, because they themselves also had not been obedient to their Lord. They blushed therefore that they had so failed to render service to their Creator, that in those members from which children were to be procreated they deserved to lose their dominion.

This kind of shame, this necessity of blushing, is certainly born with every human being and is in a manner imposed by the very laws of nature, so that in this matter even chaste marriages feel shame, and no one profits so wickedly and basely that, because he has come to know that God is the founder of nature and the author of marriage, he therefore, when about to lie with his wife, does not, if anyone should see him, blush at these motions and seek out privacy, where he may avoid the sight not only of strangers but even of all his own household. And so let human nature be permitted to acknowledge as an evil befalling it by its own fault, lest it be forced either—what is most shameless—not to blush at these its own motions, or—what is most ungrateful—to blush at the works of its Creator.

Yet this evil, for the good of the generation of children, chaste marriages use well; but to consent to lust for the sake of carnal pleasure alone is sin, although it is granted to the married by way of pardon. But settle it, Pelagians: with the honor and fecundity of marriage preserved, if no one had sinned, imagine what kind of life you would wish those human beings to have had in paradise, and choose one of these four things. For without doubt, either they would have had intercourse as often as it pleased them; or they would have curbed lust when intercourse was not necessary; or lust would then have risen at the nod of the will, when chaste prudence had foreseen that intercourse was necessary;

or, with no lust at all existing there, the genitals too—like all the other members that serve their own works—would have served their proper work at the command of those willing, without any difficulty. Of these four, choose which you will. But I think you will reject the first two, where lust is either served or resisted. For that first, so glorious an honesty does not wish; and this second, so great a felicity does not wish. Far be it that the glory of that great blessedness should either, by always following lust that goes before, act out a most base servitude, or, by resisting it, not have the fullest peace.

Far be it, I say, that the concupiscence of the flesh, rising not opportunely for begetting but by an inordinate commotion, should either please that mind to satisfy by consenting, or be necessary for that repose to restrain by dissenting. But whichever you please of the remaining two, we need not labor against you in any contention.

For even if you should be unwilling to choose the fourth, where there is the highest tranquility of all the members obedient without any lust—since the vehemence of your disputations has now made you its enemies—at least that which we placed in the third position will please you: namely, that that carnal concupiscence, whose motion arrives at the last pleasure that greatly delights you, would never in paradise, except when it was necessary for begetting, have risen at the nod of the will. If it pleases you to place this in paradise, and it seems to you that through such a concupiscence of the flesh—which would neither anticipate nor delay nor exceed the command of the will—children could have been begotten in that felicity, we do not object.

For to the point we are making it suffices us that now there is not in men such a concupiscence as you grant could have existed in that place of felicity. For what it now is, assuredly the perception of all mortals confesses, even if with shame, because it disquiets even the chaste—even against their will—and those who chastise it by temperance, with a disordered and importunate restlessness, and for the most part withdraws itself from the willing and forces itself upon the unwilling: so that by its own disobedience it testifies that it is nothing other than the punishment of that ancient disobedience.

Whence, deservedly concerning it both then the first human beings—when they covered their shameful parts—and now whoever considers himself to be in any way a human being, every modest and immodest person, is confounded—far be it from us to say concerning the work of God, but rather concerning the punishment of the first and ancient sin. But you, not from a religious reason, but from a contentious spiritedness, and not from human modesty, but from your own fury, lest either concupiscence of the flesh itself be believed to be vitiated and original sin be drawn from it, try by disputing to recall into paradise such a concupiscence, exactly as it now is, and to contend that it could have been there—that concupiscence which either a dishonorable consent would always follow or a pitiable dissent would sometimes restrain. But we do not much care what it delights you to think about it.

Yet whatever of mankind is born through it, if it be not reborn, is without doubt condemned, and must needs be under the devil, if it be not thence delivered by Christ. 'We defend,' he says, 'that men are the work of God, and that no one is compelled by his power either to evil or to good unwillingly, but by his own will either does good or evil; that in a good work he is always aided by the grace of God, but to evil is incited by the suggestions of the devil.'

To this we reply that men are the work of God insofar as they are men, but are under the devil insofar as they are sinners, unless they be rescued thence through him who was made mediator between God and men for no other reason than that from men he could not be a sinner; and that no one is compelled by God's power either to evil or to good unwillingly, but that, God deserting according to merits, one goes into evil, and, God aiding without merits, one is converted to good. For a man is not good if he be unwilling, but by the grace of God he is aided even to this, that he may will—since it is not written in vain: for it is God who works in you both to will and to work of his good pleasure; and: the will is prepared by the Lord.

But you think that a man is so aided by the grace of God in a good work, that in arousing his will toward that good work itself you believe grace effects nothing. Which your own words sufficiently declare. For why did you not say that a man is aroused by the grace of God to a good work, just as you said he is 'incited to evil by the suggestions of the devil,' but said: 'in a good work he is always aided by the grace of God'?—as though a man, having entered upon a good work by his own will, with no grace of God, is then in the work itself aided divinely, in accordance, that is, with the merits of the good will, so that grace due may be repaid, not grace undue bestowed; and thus grace is now no longer grace, but is that which Pelagius, with a feigned heart, condemned in the Palestinian judgment—'that the grace of God is given according to our merits.'

Tell me, I beseech you, what good was Paul, while still Saul, willing—and not rather great evils, when breathing out the same threats he was going on to lay waste the Christians with the horrible blindness and fury of his mind? By what merits of a good will did God convert him from these evils to good things, by a marvelous and sudden calling? What shall I say of merits, when he himself cries out: not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us? What of that which I have already recalled the Lord said: no one can come to me—which is understood 'to believe in me'—unless it be given him by my Father?

Is this given to one already willing to believe, on account of the merits of a good will—or rather is the very will, that he may believe, aroused from above, as in Saul's case, even if he be so averse from faith that he even persecutes believers? For why does the Lord bid us pray for those who persecute us? Do we by this pray that God's grace be repaid to them on account of their good will—and not rather that their evil be changed into good will? Just as we believe that then the saints, whom he was persecuting, prayed not in vain for Saul, that his will might be converted to the faith which he was laying waste. And his conversion, wrought from above, appeared even by a manifest miracle;

how many enemies of Christ are daily drawn to Christ suddenly by the hidden grace of God! Which word, if I had not set it down from the Gospel, how much would this man have said about me on this account—since even now he struggles not against me, but against him who cries out: no one can come to me, unless the Father, who sent me, draw him! For he does not say 'lead him,' so that we might there in some way understand the will to go before. Who is drawn, if he was already willing? And yet no one comes unless he wills. He is therefore drawn in wondrous ways to will, by him who knows how to work within, in the very hearts of men—not that men should believe unwilling, which cannot be, but that from unwilling they should be made willing.

That this is true we do not surmise by human conjecture, but recognize by the most evident authority of the divine Scriptures. We read in the books of Paralipomenon: 'And indeed in Judah the hand of the Lord was at work, to give them one heart, that they might carry out the command of the king and of the princes according to the word of the Lord.' Likewise through the prophet Ezekiel the Lord says: 'I will give them another heart, and a new spirit I will give them; and I will take away the stony heart out of their flesh, and give them a heart of flesh, that they may walk in my precepts and keep my ordinances and do them.' And what is it that Queen Esther prays, saying: 'Give a well-ordered speech in my mouth, and make my words clear in the sight of the lion, and turn his heart to the hatred of him who assails us'?

To what purpose does she say these things to God in prayer, if God does not work the will in the hearts of men? But perhaps this woman prayed foolishly. Let us see, then, whether the affection of the one praying was sent up in vain and whether the effect of the One who hears did not follow. Behold, she enters in to the king — to be brief — and because she was entering out of her turn, compelled by great necessity, he looked upon her, as it is written, like a bull in the onrush of his indignation. And the queen was afraid, and her colour changed with faintness, and she leaned upon the head of her delicate maid who went before her. And God turned and transferred his indignation into gentleness.

What need is there now to recall what follows, where the divine Scripture testifies that God fulfilled what she had asked, working in the king's heart what else but the will by which he commanded, and that was done which the queen had requested of him? This God had already heard, so that it might come to pass, He who, before He had heard the words of the woman making her request, by a most hidden and most effective power turned and transferred the king's heart from indignation to gentleness — that is, from the will to harm to the will to favour — according to that word of the Apostle: 'It is God who works in you both to will.' Did the men of God who wrote these things — nay rather, the very Spirit of God, by whose authorship these things were composed through them — assail the free will of man?

By no means; but it commended both the most just judgment and the most merciful help of the Almighty in all things. For it is enough for man to know that there is no unrighteousness with God. But as to how He dispenses these things, making some vessels of wrath according to desert, others vessels of mercy according to grace — 'who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who has been His counsellor?' If, then, we belong to the honour of grace, let us not be ungrateful by attributing to ourselves what we have received. For what have we that we have not received? 'We say,' he says, 'that the saints of the Old Testament passed over hence to eternal life by a perfected righteousness, that is, that by zeal for virtue they withdrew from all sins; for even those whom we read to have sinned in some respect, we afterward learn to have amended themselves.'

However great the virtue he may proclaim the ancient righteous to have had, nothing saved them save the faith of the Mediator, who shed His blood for the remission of sins. For theirs is the voice: 'I believed, therefore have I spoken.' Whence the Apostle Paul also says: 'Having the same spirit of faith, according to that which is written, I believed, therefore have I spoken; we also believe, and therefore we also speak.' What is 'the same spirit' but the one which those righteous men also had, who said these things? The Apostle Peter also says: 'Why do you wish to lay upon the Gentiles a yoke which neither we nor our fathers were able to bear? But by the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ we believe we shall be saved, even as they.' This you do not want.