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.