II. ON THE PROCEEDINGS OF PELAGIUS. After the ecclesiastical proceedings came into our hands, holy pope Aurelius — those in which Pelagius was pronounced catholic by fourteen bishops of the province of Palestine — my hesitation reached its end, that hesitation by which I was doubtful whether to discuss anything more fully and more confidently concerning his very defence.
For I had already read this defence in a certain little paper which he himself had sent me; but because I had received from him no letter given by his own hand together with that paper, I feared lest something might be found otherwise in my words than was read in the episcopal proceedings, and so, if perchance Pelagius should deny that he himself had sent me that paper — since he could not easily be convicted by a single witness — I might rather be accused by those who favoured his denial either of a fabricated falsehood or, to put it more mildly, of a rash credulity.
Now therefore, since I treat those things which the proceedings attest, your holiness and everyone who shall read will judge more easily and more surely — with all doubt removed as far as it seemed to me whether he pleaded for himself in this manner — both concerning his defence and concerning this work of ours. First, then, to the Lord God, our ruler and keeper, I give unspeakable thanks that my opinion did not deceive me concerning our holy brethren and fellow-bishops who sat as judges in that case. For not without merit did they approve his responses, not caring how he had set down in his works the things that were objected, but what he answered concerning these in the present examination. For it is one thing to have an unsound faith, another to have incautious speech.
Finally, among those matters which were recited from the document that our holy brethren and fellow-bishops, the Gauls Heros and Lazarus, presented — who, on account of the grave sickness of one of them (as we afterwards learned with better probability), were unable to be present at all — objections were made to Pelagius. The first is this, that in a certain book of his he writes: 'None can be without sin except him who has knowledge of the law.' When this had been recited, the synod said: 'Did you publish these things, Pelagius?' And he answered: 'I did indeed say it, but not as they understand it. I did not say that he who has knowledge of the law cannot sin, but that he is helped through knowledge of the law not to sin, as it is written: He gave them the law for a help.' When this was heard, the synod said:
'The things spoken by Pelagius are not alien to the Church.' Plainly the things he answered are not alien; but that which was brought forward from his book sounds otherwise. Yet the bishops, being Greek men and hearing those words through an interpreter, did not take care to examine this, looking only at what he who was questioned said he had meant, not by what words the same opinion was said to be written in his book. But it is one thing that a man be helped to not sinning through knowledge of the law, and another that none can be without sin except him who has knowledge of the law. For since we see, for example, threshing-floors threshed even without threshing-sledges — although these help, if they are at hand;
and that boys can go to school without tutors, although the helps of tutors are not useless for this; and that many recover from sickness without physicians, although the aids of physicians are manifest; and that men live on other foods without bread, although the help of bread is not denied to be of very great avail; and many other things which readily occur to one who reflects even while we are silent — surely we are reminded that there are two kinds of helps.
For some are such that without them that for which they help cannot be brought about — as without a ship no one sails, no one speaks without a voice, no one walks without feet, no one sees without light, and many things of this kind (whence also is that: no one lives rightly without the grace of God); but others are helps by which we are so helped that, even if they be absent, that for which we seek them can be brought about in another way — as are those which I mentioned: the threshing-sledge for threshing crops, the tutor for leading the boy, the medicine compounded by human art for recovering health, and other such things. It must be asked, therefore, to which of these two kinds knowledge of the law belongs — that is, in what way it helps toward not sinning.
If in such a way that without it this cannot be fulfilled, then not only did Pelagius answer truly in the judgment, but he also wrote truly in the book;
but if in such a way that it does indeed help if it be present, yet that toward which it helps can be brought about in another way even if it be absent, then he did indeed answer truly in the judgment — which deservedly pleased the bishops, namely that a man is helped to not sinning by knowledge of the law — but he did not write truly in the book, 'that a man cannot be without sin except him who has knowledge of the law.' This the judges left undiscussed, being ignorant of the Latin tongue and content with the confession of him who was pleading his cause, especially where no one stood on the opposing side who might compel the interpreter to lay open by exposition the words of his book, and might show whence the brethren were not moved without cause. For very few are skilled in the law;
but the multitude of the members of Christ, spread everywhere and unskilled in a law so deep and manifold, is commended by the piety of a simple faith and a most firm hope in God and a sincere love — which multitude, endowed with these gifts of the grace of God, trusts that it can be cleansed from sins through Jesus Christ our Lord. To this, if perchance Pelagius should answer that he had meant this very knowledge of the law, without which a man cannot be free from sins — that knowledge which is handed down through the teaching of the faith to the newly enlightened and to little ones in Christ, by which also those to be baptized are catechized, so that they may know the creed — this is not indeed what is usually understood when anyone is said to have knowledge of the law, but rather that knowledge according to which men are called skilled in the law;
nevertheless, if he should call these words — few in number, but great in weight, and after the custom of all the churches faithfully imparted to those to be baptized — 'knowledge of the law,' asserting that it was of this that he had said 'None can be without sin except him who has knowledge of the law,' which must needs be handed down to believers before they come to the very remission of sins: even so there would surround him an innumerable multitude of the baptized — not of disputants, but of wailing infants — of little ones, who would cry out not with words but with the very truth of innocence: 'What is it, what is it that you have written, that none can be without sin except him who has knowledge of the law? Behold, we, a great flock of lambs, are without sin, and yet we do not have knowledge of the law!'
Surely these would compel him at least to be silent, even with tongue keeping silence; or perhaps even to confess either that he is now corrected from that perversity, or at least that he did indeed feel, even before, this which he now said in the ecclesiastical examination, but that he had not set down carefully considered words for that opinion, and that therefore his faith is to be approved, but his book to be amended. For there is, as it is written, one who slips with the tongue and not in the heart. But if he should say, or does say, this — who would not most readily pardon those same words written too incautiously and negligently, when he does not defend the opinion which those words contain, but says that his opinion is the one which the truth approves?
This too we must believe the devout judges considered — if indeed they were able sufficiently to understand this which is in his book in Latin, once it had been carefully interpreted — just as they judged his response, brought forth in Greek speech and therefore easily understood, not to be alien to the Church. But let us now see the rest. For the episcopal synod added and said: 'Let another chapter also be read'; and it was read that Pelagius had set down in that same book of his: 'All are ruled by their own will.' When this had been read, Pelagius answered: 'This too I said on account of free will, to which God is a helper of him who chooses good things; but the man who sins is himself in fault, as of free will.' When this was heard, the bishops said: 'Neither is this alien from ecclesiastical doctrine.'
For who would condemn free will or deny it, when it is together with it that the help of God is proclaimed? Wherefore the opinion of the respondent also deservedly pleased the bishops; and yet that which is set down in his book, 'All are ruled by their own will,' ought without doubt to have moved the brethren, who knew what these men are wont to argue against the grace of God. For it was said 'All are ruled by their own will' as though God rules no one, and it were written in vain: Save your people and bless your inheritance, and rule them and lift them up even unto everlasting — lest surely, if they are ruled by their own will without God, they remain as sheep having no shepherd, which be far from us. For beyond doubt it is more to be led than to be ruled;
for he who is ruled does something, and therefore is ruled, that he may act rightly; but he who is led is scarcely understood himself to do anything. And yet the grace of the Saviour so far avails our wills that the apostle does not hesitate to say: As many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are the sons of God. Nor can free will do anything better in us than to commit itself, to be led, to Him who cannot act ill; and when it has done this, let it not doubt that it has been helped by Him to do it — to whom it is said in the psalm: My God, His mercy shall go before me.
Finally, in that book where Pelagius wrote those chapters, to this proposition — in which he said 'All are ruled by their own will and each one is left to his own desire' — he added something from the testimony of the Scriptures, whereby it may sufficiently appear that a man ought not to entrust himself to himself to be ruled. For he says concerning this very matter, in the Wisdom of Solomon: I too indeed am a mortal man, like all others, of the earthly race of him who was first fashioned — and the rest, up to the end of that chapter, where one reads: There is therefore for all one entrance to life and a like departure. Because of this I prayed, and understanding was given to me; and I called upon God, and the spirit of wisdom came into me.
Does it not appear clearer than light how this man, having considered the misery of human frailty, dared not entrust himself to himself to be ruled, but prayed, and understanding was given to him — concerning which the apostle says: But we have the mind of the Lord — and he called upon God, and the spirit of wisdom came into him? For by this Spirit, not by the powers of their own will, are they ruled and led who are the sons of God. For that too which he set down from the Psalm in the same book of chapters, as though to prove that 'all are ruled by their own will' — He loved cursing, and it shall come to him; and he would not have blessing, and it shall be put far from him — who does not know that this is a vice not of nature, as God established it, but of the human will, which withdrew from God?
Nevertheless, if he had not loved cursing and had willed blessing, and in this very thing had denied that his will was helped by divine grace, then, ungrateful and impious, he would be left to himself to be ruled, so that, cast headlong without God his ruler, he might learn by punishments that he could not be ruled by himself. So too in that testimony which he subjoined to the same title in the same book: He has set before you water and fire; stretch out your hand to whichever you will; before man are good and evil, life and death; whatever shall please him shall be given him. It is manifest that, if he puts his hand to the fire and evil and death please him, the man's will works this; but if he loves good and life, not only does the will do this, but it is helped from on high.
For the eye suffices to itself for not seeing — that is, for darkness; but for seeing it does not suffice to itself by its own light, unless the aid of clear light be furnished to it from without. But far be it that those who are called according to the purpose — whom He foreknew and predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son — should be left to their own desire so as to perish. For this the vessels of wrath suffer, which are perfected unto destruction, in whose very destruction also God makes known the riches of His glory upon the vessels of His mercy. For on account of this, when He had said, My God, His mercy shall go before me, He straightway subjoined, My God shall show me among my enemies. To those therefore is done that which is written:
God delivered them up to the desires of their heart. But this is not done to the predestined, whom the Spirit of God rules, since not empty is their cry: Deliver me not, O Lord, to the sinner from my desire — inasmuch as it is thus prayed even against these very desires, that it is said: Take from me the greeds of the belly, and let not the desire of lust seize me. This God grants to those whom He rules as subjects, but not to those who think themselves fit to rule themselves and, with the presumptuous neck of their own will, disdain to have Him as their ruler.
Since these things are so, how could the sons of God, who know this and rejoice that they are ruled and led by the Spirit of God, be moved when they heard or read written by Pelagius, 'All are ruled by their own will and each one is left to his own desire'? And yet, because, being asked by the bishops what evil those words sounded, he perceived it and answered that he had said this on account of free will, straightway subjoining, 'to which God is a helper of him who chooses good things;
but the man who sins is himself in fault, as of free will' — the devout judges, approving this opinion also, were unwilling to consider or inquire how incautiously, or in what sense, those words were set down in his book, deeming it sufficient that he had thus confessed free will, namely that God is a helper to him who chooses good things, but that the one sinning is himself in fault, his own will sufficing him for this. And by this God rules those to whom He is a helper when they choose good things; and therefore they rule well whatever they rule, since they themselves are ruled by the Good. Likewise it was recited that Pelagius had set down in his book: 'In the day of judgment the unrighteous and sinners are not to be spared, but to be burned with eternal fires.'
This had moved the brethren, so that it was thought fit to be objected, because it was said in such a way as though all sinners were to be punished with eternal torment, not excepting those who have Christ for their foundation, even though they build upon it wood, hay, stubble — concerning whom the apostle says: If any man's work shall be burned up, he shall suffer loss; but he himself shall be saved, yet so as by fire. But when Pelagius had answered that 'he had said this according to the Gospel, where it is said concerning sinners:
These shall go into eternal punishment, but the righteous into life eternal' — the evangelical and dominical sentence could in no way displease Christian judges who did not know what in the words brought forth from Pelagius's book had moved the brethren, who had been accustomed to hear his disputations or those of his disciples; since, in the absence of those who had presented the document against Pelagius to the holy bishop Eulogius, no one pressed that he should distinguish, by some exception, sinners to be saved through fire from sinners to be punished with eternal torment, and so, with the judges thus understanding why that had been objected, if he were unwilling to distinguish, he might deservedly be blamed. But as for what Pelagius added:
'And if anyone believes otherwise, he is an Origenist' — this the judges understood in that sense which the Church most worthily detests in Origen: namely, that even those whom the Lord says are to be punished with eternal torment, and the devil himself and his angels, shall after a time — however long — be purged and freed from their punishments, and shall cleave to the saints reigning with God in the fellowship of blessedness.
This therefore the synod said 'is not alien to the Church' — not according to Pelagius, but rather according to the Gospel — namely, that such unrighteous and sinners are to be burned with eternal fires as the Gospel judges worthy of such torment, and that whoever should say that their punishment, which the Lord said to be eternal, can at some time be ended, holds a detestable opinion with Origen. But concerning those sinners whom the apostle says shall be saved, as by fire, their work being burned up, they judged nothing, since nothing was evidently objected to Pelagius about these. Wherefore, whoever says that the unrighteous and sinners, whom the Truth condemns to eternal punishment, can at some time be freed from it, Pelagius not unfittingly calls an Origenist;
but on the other hand, whoever reckons no sinner worthy of mercy in the judgment of God, let him impose upon such a one whatever name he will, provided only that he understands this error too is not received by ecclesiastical truth; for judgment shall be without mercy to him who has not shown mercy. But how this judgment shall be brought about can be comprehended in the holy Scriptures only with difficulty; for that which is to be in one way is signified in many ways. For sometimes the Lord says, against those whom He does not receive into His kingdom, that He will shut the door, and to them crying out and saying, Open to us; in your name we have eaten and drunk, and the rest which it is written that they say, He will answer, I know you not, you who work iniquity;
sometimes He recounts that He will command that those who would not have Him reign be brought to Him and slain before Him; sometimes He says He will come with His angels in His majesty, so that all the nations shall be gathered before Him, and He shall divide them and set some on the right hand, whose good works, recounting them, He shall carry back into life eternal, and others on the left, upon whom, imputing barrenness of good works, He shall condemn them to eternal fire; sometimes He commands that the wicked and slothful servant, who neglected to lay out His money, or even the man found at the feast not having a wedding garment, be cast, with hands and feet bound, into the outer darkness; sometimes, having received the five prudent ones, He shuts the door against the other five foolish virgins.
These things, and whatever else there may be which does not occur at present, are spoken concerning the judgment to come — which surely is to be exercised not upon one or five, but upon many. For if there were but one who, from the feast which he had entered not having a wedding garment, was commanded to be cast into the darkness, there would not straightway follow and be said: For many are called, but few are chosen — since rather, with one cast out and condemned, many would seem to have remained in the house. But to discuss all these things now, as much as would suffice, would be very long.
This much, however, I can say briefly, without prejudice — as is wont to be said in monetary reckonings — to a better examination: that there is some one mode of judgment, which is inscrutable to us, the diversity of merits being at least preserved in rewards and punishments, which is signified in many ways through the holy Scriptures. But as for what suffices for this cause of which we now treat: if Pelagius had said that absolutely all sinners are to be punished with eternal fire and eternal torment, whoever had approved that judgment would first of all have pronounced sentence against his very own self; for who shall boast that he is clean from sins?
But because he said neither 'all' nor 'certain ones,' but set it down indefinitely, and answered that he had said this according to the Gospel, a true opinion has indeed been confirmed by the episcopal judgment; but as yet whether Pelagius holds some other view does not appear, and even after this episcopal judgment it is not impudent to inquire. It was objected to Pelagius also that in his book he had written, 'that evil should not even come into thought.' But he answered: 'We did not set it down thus, but we said that a Christian ought to strive that he think no evil.' Which, as was fitting, the bishops approved. For who doubts that evil ought not to be thought? And indeed in his book, near the word 'evil,' 'more cautiously' it is read thus: 'nor is it to be thought.' Which in this is usually understood:
that evil ought not even to be thought. But he who denies this, what else does he say than that evil ought to be thought? And if this were true, it would not be said in praise of charity: It thinks no evil. Yet that it should come into the thought of the righteous and holy is for this reason not so improperly asserted, because thought is wont to be called even when something comes into the mind, though consent does not follow. But thought which contracts guilt and is deservedly forbidden does not lack consent. It could therefore have happened that those who judged this to be objected in such a way read a faulty codex, as though Pelagius had said 'that evil does not come into thought' — that is, that what is evil does not come into the mind of the righteous and holy. Which opinion is surely most absurd;
for when we reprove evils, we cannot express them in words unless they be thought. But that, as we have said, is called a culpable thought of evil, which draws in consent. When therefore the judges had approved this response of Pelagius also, another thing was recited, which he had written in his little book: 'the kingdom of heaven was promised even in the Old Testament.' To which Pelagius said: 'This too it is possible to prove through the Scriptures; but heretics, to the injury of the Old Testament, deny this. I, however, following the authority of the Scriptures, said it, since it is written in the prophet Daniel: And the saints shall receive the kingdom of the Most High.' When his response had been received, the synod said: 'Neither is this alien from the faith of the Church.'
Did our brethren, then, without cause raise these words, so as to bring this forward among the rest of the charges? By no means. But the name 'Old Testament' is customarily used in two ways: in one according to the authority of the divine Scriptures, in another according to the most common usage of ordinary speech. For the Apostle Paul says to the Galatians: 'Tell me,' he says, 'you who desire to be under the Law, have you not heard the Law? For it is written that Abraham had two sons, one by a bondwoman, the other by a free woman. These things are said by way of allegory. For these are the two testaments: the one indeed from Mount Sinai, bringing forth unto bondage, which is Hagar. For Sinai is a mountain in Arabia, which is joined to that Jerusalem which now is; for she serves in bondage with her children.'
'But the Jerusalem which is above is free, which is the mother of us all.' Since, therefore, the Old Testament pertains to bondage — whence also it was said, 'Cast out the bondwoman and her son, for the son of the bondwoman shall not be heir with my son Isaac' — while the kingdom of heaven pertains to freedom, how can the kingdom of heaven also pertain to the Old Testament?
But since, as I have said, we are also accustomed so to speak that we call by the name of the Old Testament all the Scriptures of the Law and the Prophets which were administered before the Lord's incarnation and are contained under canonical authority, who that is even moderately instructed in ecclesiastical letters does not know that the kingdom of heaven could be promised in those Scriptures just as also in that New Testament to which the kingdom of heaven pertains? For assuredly it is most plainly written in those writings: 'Behold, the days come, says the Lord, and I will make with the house of Israel and with the house of Jacob a new testament, not according to the testament which I made with their fathers in the day when I took hold of their hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt.' For this was done on Mount Sinai.
But at that time the prophet Daniel did not yet exist, who had said: 'The saints shall receive the kingdom of the Most High.' For by these words he was prophesying the reward not of the Old but of the New Testament, just as the same prophets did indeed proclaim that Christ himself would come, by whose blood the New Testament was consecrated, of which testament the apostles were made ministers, as most blessed Paul says: 'Who also has made us fit to be ministers of the New Testament, not of the letter, but of the spirit; for the letter kills, but the spirit gives life.' But in that testament which is properly called Old and was given on Mount Sinai, nothing is found most plainly promised save earthly happiness.
Whence that land, into which the people was brought after being led through the wilderness, is called the land of promise; in it peace and kingdom, and the winning of victories over enemies, and abundance of children and of earthly fruits, and whatever is of this kind — these are the promises of the Old Testament. And although by these are figured the spiritual things pertaining to the New Testament, nevertheless he who receives God's law for the sake of those earthly things is himself an heir of the Old Testament. For those things are promised and bestowed according to the Old Testament which are desired according to the old man; but the things which are there figured as pertaining to the New Testament seek out new men.
For that great apostle was not ignorant of what he was saying, who declared that the two testaments were distinguished in the bondwoman and the free woman by an allegorical signification, attributing to the Old the children of the flesh, to the New the children of promise. 'It is not the children of the flesh,' he says, 'who are the children of God, but the children of promise are counted for the seed.' The children of the flesh, therefore, pertain to the earthly Jerusalem, which is in bondage with her children; but the children of promise pertain to that which is above, the free woman, our eternal mother in the heavens. Whence it is perceived who belong to the earthly kingdom and who to the kingdom of heaven.
Those who even in that time, understanding this distinction through the grace of God, were made children of promise, were reckoned in God's hidden counsel as heirs of the New Testament, even though they fittingly administered the Old Testament, which by the distribution of the times had been divinely given to the ancient people. How, then, would the children of promise not rightly be moved — the children of the free Jerusalem, eternal in the heavens — when this apostolic and catholic distinction seemed by the words of Pelagius to be taken away, and Hagar was in a certain manner believed to be made equal to Sarah?
He, therefore, with heretical impiety does injury to the Scripture of the Old Testament, who with the effrontery of sacrilegious impiety denies it to be from the good, supreme, and true God — as Marcion did, as Manichaeus did, and whatever other pestilence holds this opinion. Wherefore, to embrace what I feel about this matter with what brevity I can: just as injury is done to the Old Testament if it is denied to be from the good and supreme God, so also injury is done to the New if the Old is made equal to it. But since Pelagius had answered why he had said that the kingdom of heaven is promised even in the Old Testament, citing the testimony of the prophet Daniel, who most plainly prophesied that the saints would receive the kingdom of the Most High, it was rightly judged that this was not foreign to the catholic faith:
not according to that distinction whereby the earthly things promised on Mount Sinai are shown properly to pertain to the Old Testament, yet not improperly according to this usage of speech whereby all the canonical Scriptures administered before the Lord's incarnation are reckoned under the appellation of the Old Testament. For the kingdom of the Most High is nothing other than the kingdom of God. Or will anyone dare to contend that the kingdom of God is one thing and the kingdom of heaven another? After this it was objected that Pelagius in that same book of his had said 'that a man is able, if he will, to be without sin,' and that, writing to a widow, he had flatteringly said: 'Let piety, which nowhere finds a place, find it with you; let justice, everywhere a stranger, find a seat in you;'
'let truth, which now no one acknowledges, become to you familiar and dear; and let the law of God, which is despised by almost all men, be honoured by you alone.' And again to the same woman: 'O happy and blessed are you, if that justice, which is to be believed to exist only in heaven, be found with you alone upon earth!' And in another book to the same woman, after the Lord and our Saviour's prayer, teaching how the saints ought to pray, he says: 'That man worthily lifts up his hands to God, that man pours out prayer with a good conscience, who is able to say:'
'You know, O Lord, how holy and innocent and clean from all annoyance and iniquity and rapine are these hands which I stretch out to you; how just and clean and free from all lying are the lips with which I offer to you supplication, that you may have mercy on me.' But to this Pelagius, answering, said: 'That a man is able to be without sin and to keep God's commandments, if he will, we have said; for God gave him this possibility. But we did not say that anyone is found who from infancy to old age has never sinned, but that, having been converted from his sins, by his own labour and by the grace of God he is able to be without sin — yet not thereby for the future unable to be changed.'
'But the remaining things which they have added are neither in our books, nor have we ever said such things.' When these had been heard, the synod said: 'Since you deny having written such things, do you anathematize those who so hold?' Pelagius answered: 'I anathematize them as fools, not as heretics, since indeed it is no doctrine.' Then the bishops gave judgment, saying: 'Now, since by his own voice Pelagius has anathematized the foolish talk inserted, rightly answering that a man with the aid and grace of God is able to be without sin, let him answer also to the other chapters.'
Could the judges here condemn things unknown and uncertain, or ought they to have done so, when no one was present against him who might convict Pelagius of having written those things said to have been reprehensibly written to the widow? Where indeed it would have been too little to produce the book and read these things from his writings, unless witnesses too were brought forward, in case he should deny, even when they were recited, that those writings were his. Nevertheless in these matters also the judges did what they could do, asking Pelagius whether he anathematized those who hold such opinions as he denied having written or said. And when he answered that he anathematized them as fools, what more concerning this matter ought the judges to have inquired, the adversaries being absent?
Or is perhaps this too to be discussed, whether it was rightly said that those who hold such opinions are to be anathematized not as heretics but as fools, since it was no doctrine? But from this no light question — where it is asked how far a heretic is to be defined — the judges rightly abstained for the present. For if anyone, for example's sake, should say that the young of eagles, held suspended in the parent's talon and offered to the rays of the sun, if they blink with their eyes, are as though adulterine let fall to the earth, the light in a certain manner convicting them — if this happens to be false, he is not on that account to be judged a heretic.
And this indeed, because it is found in the writings of learned men and has been spread abroad by report, is not to be thought foolishly said, even if it be not true; nor does it either harm or help our faith — that faith by which we are called faithful — whether it be believed or not. But if from this someone should contend that rational souls are present in birds, on the ground that human souls are transferred into them, then indeed, as a heretical pestilence, it is to be driven from the ears and mind, and it must be argued and demonstrated that, even if this concerning eagles be true — just as many wonderful things concerning bees are truly before our eyes — reason nevertheless is far removed from however marvellous a sense of such irrational animals; for reason is common not to men and cattle, but to men and angels.
But many foolish things too are said by the unskilled and vain, who are nevertheless not heretics — such as those things said by men who rashly judge concerning arts foreign to them, which they have not learned, or who, from immoderate and blind affection, either praise those whom they love or blame those whom they hate, and whatever else in the usage of human speech is uttered — not by any established doctrine, but at random, as it happens to occur at the time — through the levity of folly either brought out by the mouth or even committed to the pen and to letters. In short, many, being but a little admonished concerning these things, soon repent of having said such things. Thus they did not hold them fixed by any settled conviction, but had poured them out as though snatched up from anywhere and unconsidered. It is scarcely possible to be free from these evils; and who is there that does not slip with his tongue and offend in a word?
But it matters how greatly, it matters from what source, it matters finally whether, being admonished, one corrects it, or by obstinately defending it even makes into a doctrine what he had said out of levity, not out of doctrine. Since, therefore, every heretic is consequently also a fool, but not every fool is straightway to be called a heretic, the judges rightly said that by his own voice Pelagius had anathematized the foolish talk inserted, because even if it were a heresy, without doubt it is foolish talk. Accordingly, whatever it might be, they called it by the name of the general fault. But whether these things were said out of some doctrine, or rather not out of a fixed and settled opinion, but out of an easily corrigible vanity — since he who was heard denied that in whatever manner they had been said they were his —
they did not think it should be discussed for the present. We indeed, when we were reading this defence of Pelagius in that little document which we received earlier, there were present certain holy brethren, who said that they had Pelagius's books, exhortatory or consolatory, written to a certain widow whose name was not expressed, and they advised that inquiry be made whether perhaps those things which he denied to be his had been written there, since they too asserted that they were ignorant of this. But then, when those same books were read from the beginning, the things were sought and found. Moreover, those who had produced the book affirmed that nearly four years before they had begun to have these as Pelagius's books, and had never heard it doubted by anyone whether they were his.
Considering, therefore, that the faith of God's servants, most well known to us, could not lie about this matter, it seemed to remain that we should rather believe that Pelagius had lied in the episcopal judgment — unless we should reflect that it could have happened, even so many years before, that something under his name, yet not by him, had been written. For neither did these men say that they had received the same books from him, nor that they had heard from him that they were his. For to me also certain of our brethren said that some little works under my name had come into Spain, which indeed were not recognized by those who had read other works of ours, yet were believed by others to be ours. That, however, which Pelagius confessed to be his, is still obscure;
but I think it will come to light in the following portions of these proceedings. For he says: 'That a man is able to be without sin and to keep God's commandments, if he will, we have said; for God gave him this possibility. But we did not say that anyone is found who from infancy to old age has never sinned, but that, having been converted from his sins, by his own labour and by the grace of God he is able to be without sin — yet not thereby for the future unable to be turned.' In these words, what grace he means lies entirely hidden; and the catholic judges indeed could understand no other than that which the apostolic teaching most greatly commends to us.
For this is the grace by which we hope we can be delivered from the body of this death through Jesus Christ our Lord, and for the obtaining of which we pray that we may not enter into temptation. This grace is not nature, but that by which help is given to frail and corrupted nature; this grace is not the knowledge of the law, but is that of which the Apostle says: 'I do not make void the grace of God; for if righteousness be by the law, then Christ died in vain,' and therefore it is not the letter that kills, but the spirit that gives life. For the knowledge of the law without the grace of the spirit works in a man every concupiscence. 'For I had not known sin,' he says, 'but by the law; for I had not known concupiscence, unless the law had said: You shall not covet.'
'But sin, taking occasion by the commandment, wrought in me all manner of concupiscence.' Nor by saying these things does he disparage the law; nay rather he even praises it, when he says: 'The law indeed is holy, and the commandment holy and just and good. Was then that which is good made death unto me?' he says. 'God forbid! But sin, that it might appear sin, working death in me by that which is good.' And again he praises the law by saying: 'For we know that the law is spiritual; but I am carnal, sold under sin. For what I work I know not; for what I would, that I do not, but what I hate, that I do. If then I do that which I would not, I consent unto the law, that it is good.'
Behold, now he both knows the law and praises it and consents to it — that is, he consents that it is good, since what it commands he himself also wills, and what it forbids and condemns he himself also hates — and yet what he hates, that he does. There is therefore present the knowledge of the holy law, and yet the vicious concupiscence is not healed; there is present a good will, and an evil operation prevails. Hence it is that, when two laws strive against each other, while the law in the members resists the law of the mind and takes captive under the law of sin, it is cried out by the one confessing, and it is 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.'
It is not nature, therefore, which, sold under sin and wounded by vice, desires a redeemer and saviour, nor the knowledge of the law, through which comes the recognition of concupiscence, not its overcoming, that delivers from the body of this death, but the grace of the Lord through Jesus Christ our Lord. This is not dying nature nor the letter that kills, but the spirit that gives life. For this man already had nature with the choice of the will — for he said: 'To will is present with me' — but he did not have nature with soundness and without vice — for he said: 'I know that in me, that is, in my flesh, dwells no good thing' — he already had the knowledge of the holy law — for he said: 'I had not known sin but by the law' — but he did not have the strength to do and perfect righteousness;
for he said: 'What I would, that I do not, but what I hate, that I do,' and 'to perform that which is good I find not.' Therefore neither the choice of the will nor the precept of the law, whereby he might be delivered from the body of this death — since he already had both, the one in nature, the other in doctrine — but he was begging the aid of the grace of God through Jesus Christ our Lord. This grace, therefore, most well known in the catholic Church, the bishops believed Pelagius to confess, when they heard him say 'that a man converted from his sins, by his own labour and by the grace of God, is able to be without sin.' But I, on account of that book which the servants of God — who had been his disciples and
and who greatly loved that same Pelagius — gave me to refute, saying it was his; where, this question having been proposed to himself — because he had already offended very many in this, that he spoke against the grace of God — he most plainly expressed 'that he calls this the grace of God, that our nature, when it was created, received the possibility of not sinning, since it was created with free will' — on account of this book, therefore, I, and very many brethren on account of his disputations, which they say are most well known to them, are still anxious about the ambiguity of these his words, lest perhaps something lie hidden in it, and lest he should later expound that he said this without prejudice to his own doctrine, thus reasoning to his disciples:
'I did indeed say that a man is able, by his own labour and by the grace of God, to be without sin; but what grace I mean you know very well, and by reading you can recall, that it is that grace in which we were created by God with free will.' And so, while the bishops believe he meant that grace, not by which we men were created, but by which we are adopted into a new creature — for this grace the divine Scripture most plainly commends — being ignorant, they absolved a heretic as though catholic. For that too makes me suspect him, that whereas in the same book to which I replied he had most plainly said 'that Abel the just never at all sinned,' now he says:
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'But we did not say that anyone is found who from infancy to old age has never sinned, but that, having been converted from his sins, by his own labour and by the grace of God he is able to be without sin.' For he did not say that Abel the just, converted from his sins, was made without sin in the rest of his life, but 'that he never at any time committed any sin.' Whence, if that book is his, assuredly out of his very own answer it must be corrected. For I am unwilling to say that he lied just now, lest perhaps he should say that he had forgotten what he had written in that book. Accordingly, let us consider the rest.
For those things follow in the ecclesiastical proceedings by which, with the Lord's help, we can show that even for Pelagius — however much, as some think, he was cleared in that examination and certainly absolved, at least before human judges — this heresy of the kind which we are unwilling should advance further and prosper for the worse, has without doubt been condemned. For these things follow, objected to Pelagius, which are reported to have been found in the teaching of Caelestius his disciple: 'That Adam was made mortal, who whether he sinned or did not sin would have died. That Adam's sin harmed himself alone and not the human race. That the law sends to the kingdom just as the gospel does. That before the coming of Christ there were men without sin.'
'That infants newly born are in that state in which Adam was before the transgression. That neither through the death or transgression of Adam does the whole race of men die, nor through the resurrection of Christ does the whole race of men rise again.' These things were so objected that they were said to have been heard and condemned even at Carthage by your Holiness and by other bishops with you. Where indeed, as you recall, I myself was not present; but afterwards, when I had come to Carthage, I reviewed those same proceedings, of which I remember some things; but I know not whether all these are contained in them. But what does it matter whether perhaps some things are not there recorded and therefore not condemned, since it is agreed that they are to be condemned?
Then were objected also certain other chapters, with the mention of my name interposed, which had been sent to me from Sicily, when there the catholic brethren were disturbed by questions of this kind, to which, by a book written to Hilarius — who had sent them to me, consulting me in his letter — I replied, as it seems to me, quite sufficiently. These are they: 'That a man is able to be without sin, if he will. That infants, even if they be not baptized, have eternal life. That the baptized rich, unless they renounce all things, even if they be seen to do any good, have it not reckoned to them, nor can they possess the kingdom of God.' To these things objected to him, as the proceedings testify, Pelagius thus replied:
'That a man is indeed able to be without sin has been said,' he says, 'above; but concerning that, that there were men without sin before the coming of the Lord, we also say that before the coming of Christ certain persons lived holily and justly according to the tradition of the Holy Scriptures. But the rest, even according to their own testimony, were not said by me, for which I ought not to make satisfaction; yet, for the satisfaction of the holy synod, I anathematize those who so hold, or ever at any time held.' After this reply of his, the synod said: 'To the aforesaid chapters the present Pelagius has sufficiently and rightly made satisfaction, anathematizing those things which were not his.'
We see, therefore, and hold that not only by Pelagius but also by the holy bishops who presided over that judgment, the most pernicious evils of this kind of heresy were condemned: That Adam was made mortal — which, that it might be more fully expounded in what sense it was said, this was added: who whether he sinned or did not sin would have died. That his sin harmed himself alone and not the human race. That the law sends to the kingdom just as the gospel also does. That infants newly born are in that state in which Adam was before the transgression. That neither through the death or transgression of Adam does the whole race of men die, nor through the resurrection of Christ does the whole race of men rise again. That infants, even if they be not baptized,
have eternal life. That the baptized rich, unless they renounce all things, even if they be seen to do any good, have it not reckoned to them, nor can they possess the kingdom of God. All these things assuredly are agreed to have been condemned by that ecclesiastical judgment, Pelagius anathematizing and the bishops giving their several judgments. But by these questions and by the most contentious assertions of these opinions, now everywhere growing hot, the weakness of many brethren was being troubled.
Whence we were constrained, by the solicitude of that charity which it befits us to have toward the Church of Christ through the grace of Christ, to write also to Marcellinus of blessed memory — who daily endured those most troublesome disputants and consulted me by letters — concerning certain of these questions, and especially concerning the baptism of little ones; concerning which also afterwards, at your bidding, in the basilica of the Elders, bearing also in my hands the letter of the most glorious martyr Cyprian and reciting and handling his words on this matter, that this nefarious error might be taken away from the hearts of certain persons, who had been persuaded of those things which we see condemned in these proceedings, aided by your prayers, I laboured as much as I could.
These are the things which certain persons holding such opinions were trying so to persuade some of the brethren, that they threatened them with the churches of the East, saying that unless they held these things, they could be condemned by their judgment. Behold, fourteen prelates of the Eastern church, in that land to which the Lord displayed the presence of his incarnation, would not have absolved Pelagius, unless he had condemned these things as contrary to the catholic faith. Whence, if he was absolved for this reason, that he anathematized such things, without doubt those things were condemned — which will appear much more copiously and clearly in what follows.
Whence let us now look at those two things which Pelagius refused to anathematize, because he acknowledged them also to be his; but, in order to remove that which was offensive in them, he expounded how he held them. 'That a man is indeed able,' he says, 'to be without sin, was said above.' It was indeed said, and we too remember it; but it was on that account mitigated and approved by the judges, that the grace of God was added, which in those chapters was kept silent. But concerning that other point, how he replied must be more diligently considered. 'But concerning that,' he says, 'that there were men without sin before the coming of the Lord, we also say that before the coming of Christ certain persons lived holily and justly according to the tradition of the Holy Scriptures.' He did not dare to say:
'we also say that before the coming of Christ there were men without sin' — since this had been objected to him from Caelestius's sayings; for he perceived how perilous and troublesome it was — but he said: 'we also say that before the coming of Christ certain persons lived holily and justly.' Who would deny this? But it is one thing this, and another to have been without sin, since even those lived holily and justly who nevertheless truly said: 'If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.' And today many live justly and holily, nor yet do they lie in prayer, when they say: 'Forgive us our debts, as we also forgive our debtors.'
This, therefore, pleased the judges, in the manner in which Pelagius himself asserted that he said it, not in the manner in which it was objected that Caelestius had said it. Now let us handle those things which remain, as we can. It was objected to Pelagius that he said 'that the Church is here without spot or wrinkle.' Whence also the Donatists had a long-lasting conflict with us in our conference; but them we rather pressed concerning the intermingling of evil men — as chaff with the wheat — on account of the likeness of the threshing floor. By which likeness we can answer these men too, unless perhaps they should wish the Church to be understood as consisting of the good alone, whom they assert to have no sin at all, so that the Church can be here without spot or wrinkle.
But if it is so, I repeat the same things which I mentioned a little before: how are they members of the Church, of whom truthful humility cries out: 'If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us'? Or how will the Church pray that which the Lord taught her: 'Forgive us our debts,' if in this age the Church is without spot or wrinkle? Finally, they themselves must be questioned concerning themselves, whether or not they confess that they have any sins. And if they will deny it, it must be said to them that they deceive themselves and the truth is not in them; but if they will confess that they have sin, what else will they be confessing but concerning their own wrinkle or spot?
These, then, are not members of the Church, for she is without spot or wrinkle, whereas they are with spot and wrinkle. But to this objection he replied with vigilant circumspection, which the catholic judges without doubt approved. 'It was said', he declared, 'by us, but in this sense: that since by the laver the Church is cleansed from every spot and wrinkle, the Lord wills that she should so remain.' To which the synod said: 'This too is pleasing to us.' For which of us denies that in baptism the sins of all are forgiven, and that all the faithful ascend without spot or wrinkle from the laver of regeneration?
Or to what catholic Christian is it not pleasing—since it is pleasing to the Lord and shall come to pass—that the Church should remain without spot or wrinkle, seeing that this is now being wrought by God's mercy and truth, so that the holy Church may be brought to that perfection wherein she is to abide forever without spot or wrinkle? Yet between the laver, where all past spots and wrinkles are removed, and the kingdom, where the Church shall abide perpetually without spot or wrinkle, there lies this intervening time of prayer, in which she must needs say: Forgive us our debts.
For this reason it was objected against them that they said 'the Church is here without spot or wrinkle', to see whether by this opinion they would dare to forbid the prayer by which the already-baptized Church begs for herself, day and night, the pardon of sins. Concerning this middle time—between the remission of sins which takes place in the laver and the persistence without sins which shall be in the kingdom—nothing was transacted with Pelagius, nothing was pronounced by the bishops, but only this, which he thought must be briefly signified: that he had not spoken in the sense in which the objection seemed to imply. For when he says 'It was said by us, but thus', what did he wish to be understood except that it was not so as those who had objected believed him to have said?
Yet what the judges followed, so as to say that this was pleasing to them—namely, baptism, by which one is washed from sins, and the kingdom, where the holy Church, which is now being cleansed, shall abide without sins—appears, as I judge, sufficiently clear. Next, objections were raised from the book of Caelestius, as to what each chapter contained, more according to the sense than according to the words. These indeed he sets out at greater length, but those who had lodged the complaint against Pelagius said that they were not then able to append everything. Therefore, in the first chapter of Caelestius' book they set down that this was written: 'that we do more than is commanded in the law and the gospel.' To which Pelagius replied: 'They put this forward as though it were ours;
but it was said by us concerning virginity, according to the apostle, of whom Paul says: I have no commandment of the Lord.' The synod said: 'This too the Church receives.' I myself have read in what sense Caelestius put this in his book—if indeed he does not deny it to be his. For he said this in order, plainly, to persuade that we have by nature such great capacity of free will for not sinning, that we do even more than has been commanded, since perpetual virginity, which is not commanded, is preserved by very many—whereas to fulfill the commandments suffices for not sinning.
But that which was answered by Pelagius, so that the judges approved it, they did not take as though those who preserve virginity (which is not commanded) over and above thereby keep all the precepts of the law and the gospel, but only to this extent: that virginity, which is not commanded, is more than conjugal chastity, which is commanded, and to keep the former is assuredly more than to keep the latter—while yet neither of them is possessed without the grace of God, seeing that the apostle, speaking of this matter, says: I would that all men were even as I myself; but every man has his proper gift from God, one after this manner, another after that. And when the disciples had said to the Lord himself:
If the case of a man with his wife be so, it is not expedient to marry—or, as is better said in Latin, it is not expedient to take a wife—he said: Not all receive this word, but those to whom it is given. This, then, the bishops pronounced that the Church receives: that persevering virginity, which is not commanded, is more than the chastity of marriage, which is commanded. But in what sense Pelagius or Caelestius said that, the judges did not know. From here now other capital chapters of Caelestius are objected against Pelagius—chapters to be condemned without doubt, which, unless he had anathematized them, he would without doubt have been condemned along with them. That in the third chapter Caelestius had written:
'that the grace of God and his help are not given for individual acts, but consist in free will or in the law and doctrine'; and again: 'that the grace of God is given according to our merits, because if he gave it to sinners, he would seem to be unjust'; and that in these words he had inferred: 'therefore grace itself is placed in my will, whether I be worthy or unworthy. For if we do all things by grace, then, when we are overcome by sin, it is not we who are overcome, but the grace of God, which willed to help us in every way and could not.' And again he says: 'if it is the grace of God when we overcome sins, then he himself is at fault when we are overcome by sin, because he was either wholly unable or unwilling to keep us.' To these Pelagius replied:
'Whether these are Caelestius', let those see who say they are Caelestius'; but I myself never held so, and I anathematize whoever holds so.' The synod said: 'The holy synod receives you, as one thus condemning these reprobate words.' Concerning all these, certainly, there is both the plain response of Pelagius anathematizing them, and the most absolute judgment of the bishops condemning them. Whether Pelagius, or Caelestius, or both, or neither of them, or others—whether together with them or under their name—held these views, or still hold them, may be doubtful or hidden; yet it has been sufficiently declared by this judgment that they are condemned, and that Pelagius too was to be condemned, had he not himself also condemned these things.
Now certainly, after this judgment, when we dispute against opinions of this kind, we dispute against a condemned heresy. Let me also say something more at length. Earlier I was afraid, when Pelagius said 'that with the help of God's grace a man can be without sin,' lest perchance he should call this same grace the capacity of the nature founded by God together with free will—just as it is in that book which I received as his, to which I replied—and in that way deceive the unwitting judges.
But now, when he anathematizes those who say that the grace of God and his help are not given for individual acts, but consist in free will or in the law and doctrine, it appears sufficiently plain that he means that grace which is preached in the Church of Christ, which is given by the ministration of the Holy Spirit, that we may be helped in each of our acts. Whence also we ever pray for timely help, that we be not led into temptation. Nor do I any longer fear that, where he said 'a man cannot be without sin unless he has knowledge of the law,' and expounded it thus, so as to place in the knowledge of the law the help toward not sinning, he might wish that same knowledge of the law to be understood as the grace of God.
Behold, he anathematizes those who hold this; behold, he wills neither the nature of free will nor the law and doctrine to be understood as the grace by which we are helped in each of our acts. What then remains, save that he understand that grace which the apostle says is given by the ministration of the Holy Spirit? Of which the Lord says: Take no thought how or what you shall speak; for it shall be given you in that hour what you shall speak; for it is not you who speak, but the Spirit of your Father who speaks in you.
Nor is that to be feared, lest perhaps where he said 'that all are ruled by their own will,' and expounded this 'that he had said it on account of free will, to which God is a helper in one choosing good things,' here too he should call the nature of free will and the doctrine of the law a helper. For since he has rightly anathematized those who say that the grace of God and his help are not given for individual acts, but consist in free will or in the law and doctrine, assuredly the grace of God or his help is given for individual acts, apart from free will or the law and doctrine; and through this we are ruled by God in each act, when we act rightly; nor is it in vain that, praying, we say: Direct my steps according to your word, and let no iniquity have dominion over me.
But what follows this makes me anxious again. For when it had been objected against him, from the fifth chapter of Caelestius' book, that they affirm that each and every man can have all the virtues and graces, and take away the diversity of graces which the apostle teaches, Pelagius replied: 'It was said by us, but they have reprehended it maliciously and unskillfully. For we do not take away the diversity of graces, but we say that God grants to him who is worthy to receive all graces, just as he granted to the apostle Paul.' To this the synod said: 'Consistently, and in an ecclesiastical sense, you too have judged concerning the gift of graces which are contained in the holy apostle.' Here someone will say: what then makes you anxious?
Will you deny that all the virtues and graces were in the apostle? I indeed, if there be understood all those which the apostle himself commemorated in one certain place—which I think the bishops also understood, so that they approved this and pronounced it said in an ecclesiastical sense—do not doubt that the apostle Paul had them. For he says: And God has set some in the Church, first apostles, secondly prophets, thirdly teachers, then miracles, then gifts of healings, helps, governments, kinds of tongues. What then? Shall we say that the apostle Paul did not have all these? Who would dare to say this? For by the very fact that he was an apostle, he assuredly had the apostolate. But he had prophecy too. Or is this not his prophecy:
For the Spirit manifestly says, that in the last times some shall depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits, to doctrines of demons, and so forth? And he was a teacher of the Gentiles in faith and truth, and he worked miracles and healings; for he shook off unharmed the viper that bit his hand, and at his word a paralytic, his health at once restored, rose up. What 'helps' may denote is obscure, since the force of this word extends widely. Yet who would say that this grace too was lacking to him, by whose labor the salvation of men is so evidently assisted? And what is more illustrious than his governing, when both through him the Lord then governed so many churches, and through his epistles governs them now?
Now as for kinds of tongues, how could they have been lacking to him, when he himself says: I thank God that I speak with the tongue of you all? Since, therefore, it must be believed that none of all these was lacking to the apostle Paul, for that reason the judges approved the response of Pelagius saying that all graces were granted to him. But there are also other graces which are not here commemorated. For although the apostle Paul was a most excellent member of Christ's body, he did not receive graces more numerous and ampler than those which the very head of the whole body received—whom, whether in the flesh or in the soul of the man, the Word of God assumed as his own creature into the unity of his person, that he might be our head and we might be his body.
And in truth, if all things could be in each individual, the likeness given for this matter from the members of our body would seem to be in vain. For there are certain things common to all the members, such as health, such as life; but there are others also proper to individual members, whence neither does the ear perceive colors nor the eye sounds. On account of which it is said: If the whole body were an eye, where were the hearing? If the whole were hearing, where were the smelling? Which indeed is not so said as though it were impossible for God both to furnish the ears with the sense of seeing and the eyes with that of hearing. Yet it is certain what the apostle signified as to what he would do in the body of Christ, which is the Church, and what diversity of churches, as if through diverse members, that there might be gifts proper even to individuals.
Wherefore it is now clear both for what cause those who objected that thing were unwilling that the distinction of graces should be taken away, and for what cause the bishops, on account of the apostle Paul—in whom we recognize all the gifts which he commemorated in one place—were able to approve what Pelagius answered. What is it, then, on account of which I foretold that I had been made anxious concerning this chapter? This, namely, that Pelagius says 'God grants all graces to him who is worthy to receive, just as he granted to the apostle Paul.' I should be nothing anxious about this response of his, save as it pertains to this cause, of which care must most of all be taken, lest, that is, the grace of God be assailed while we keep silence and dissemble so great an evil.
Since, therefore, he did not say that God grants to whom he wills, but said 'God grants all graces to him who is worthy to receive,' I could not, when I read it, be free of suspicion. For the very name of grace and the understanding of that name is taken away, if it is not given freely but he who is worthy receives it. Or will someone perchance say that I do injury to the apostle, because I do not say that he was worthy of grace? Nay, then I do injury both to him and punishment to myself, if I do not believe what he himself says. Or did he not so define grace as to show that it is called grace for the very reason that it is freely given? Surely he himself said: But if it be by grace, then is it no more of works: otherwise grace is no more grace. Whence likewise he says:
But to him who works, the reward is not reckoned according to grace, but according to debt. Whoever, therefore, is worthy—it is a debt due to him. But if it is a debt, it is not grace; for grace is granted, a debt is repaid. Grace, therefore, is granted to the unworthy, that a debt may be repaid to the worthy; but he himself brings it about that they should have whatever he is to repay to the worthy, who granted to the unworthy those things which they did not have. Here perhaps he will say: I said the apostle was worthy—to whom those so great graces were granted—not from works, but from faith; for it was not works, which he did not have as good beforehand, but yet his faith that merited this. What then? Do we suppose that faith does not work? Nay, that very faith works truly, which works through love.
But however much the works of the unfaithful may be extolled, we know the sentence of the same apostle to be true and unconquerable: Everything which is not of faith is sin. For this reason indeed he often says that righteousness is imputed to us not from works but from faith—when rather faith works through love—lest anyone suppose that faith itself is arrived at by the merits of works, since it is itself the beginning whence good works take their rise; because, as has been said, whatever is not of it is sin. Hence also it is said to the Church in the Song of Songs: You shall come and pass over from the beginning of faith.
Wherefore, although faith obtains the grace of working well, yet as for having faith itself, we merited it by no faith; but in its being given to us—the faith in which we should follow the Lord—his mercy went before us. Or did we give it to ourselves, and make ourselves faithful by our own selves? By no means; here too I will cry out: he made us, and not we ourselves—unless indeed apostolic doctrine commends something other, where it says: For I say, through the grace of God which is given to me, to all who are among you, not to be more wise than one ought to be wise, but to be wise unto sobriety, according as God has dealt to every man the measure of faith. Hence too is that: For what have you that you did not receive?
Since we have received even this, whence begins also whatever of good we have in our acts. What is it, then, that the same apostle says: I have fought the good fight, I have finished the course, I have kept the faith; henceforth there remains for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge, shall render to me in that day—if these things are not rendered to the worthy, but granted to the unworthy? Whoever says this, considers too little that the crown could not have been rendered to the worthy man, unless grace had been granted to the unworthy. For he says: I have fought the good fight; but the same man himself says: Thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. He says: I have finished the course; but he himself says: It is not of him who wills, nor of him who runs, but of God who shows mercy. He says: I have kept the faith; but the same man himself says:
For I know whom I have believed, and I am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed to him against that day—that is, my entrusted deposit; for some manuscripts do not have 'deposit,' but what is plainer, 'that which I have committed.' But what do we commit to God, save the things we pray that he may keep? Among which is our very faith itself. For what else did the Lord commit to the apostle Peter by praying, whence he says to him: I have prayed for you, Peter, that your faith fail not—save that God should keep his faith, lest by yielding to temptation it should fail? Wherefore, O blessed Paul, great preacher of grace, I will say—and I will not fear (for who will be less angry with me for saying these things than you, who both said the things that were to be said and taught the things that were to be taught?)—I will say, I repeat, and I will not fear:
There is indeed rendered to your merits their crown, but your merits are the gifts of God. Therefore the due reward is rendered to the worthy apostle, but grace granted the apostolate itself, undue, to the unworthy. Or shall I repent of having said this? Far be it; for by his own testimony I shall be defended against this odium, nor will anyone call me audacious, save one who has dared to call him a liar. He himself cries out, he himself testifies, he himself—that he may commend in himself the gifts of God, and glory not in himself but in the Lord—says not only that he had no good merits to become an apostle, but even declares his evil merits, that he may manifest and proclaim the grace of God. I am not, he says, fit to be called an apostle. What else is this than: I am not worthy?
For thus most Latin manuscripts have it. This, indeed, is what we are seeking—namely, that in this one office of apostleship all those graces are contained. For it was not fitting nor proper that the apostle should not have prophecy, or not be a teacher, or not be renowned in miracles and gifts of healings, or not furnish helps, or not govern churches, or not excel in kinds of tongues: the one name of apostleship embraces all these. Let us therefore consult him, let us rather hear him; let us say to him: Holy Paul the apostle, Pelagius the monk says that you were worthy to receive all the graces of your apostleship; you yourself—what do you say? I am not, he says, worthy to be called an apostle.
Shall I then, in order to defer honor to Paul, dare to believe Pelagius about Paul rather than Paul himself? I will not do it; for I shall rather burden myself than honor him, if I do so. Let us hear also why he is not worthy to be called an apostle: because, he says, I persecuted the Church of God. If we followed the sense, who would not judge this man rather to be condemned by Christ than called? Who would so love the preacher as not to detest the persecutor? Most rightly, therefore, and truly, he says: I am not worthy to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the Church of God. Doing therefore so great an evil, whence did you merit so great a good? Let all nations hear him answering: But by the grace of God I am what I am. Is grace in any other way commended, save that it is given to the unworthy?
And his grace, he says, in me was not in vain. This he enjoins also on others, that he may show even the free choice of the will, where he says: We, working together with him, also beseech you that you receive not the grace of God in vain. But whence does he prove that his grace in him was not in vain, save from that which follows: But I labored more than all of them? Accordingly, he did not labor in order to receive grace, but received it in order to labor; and thus, whence he might become worthy to receive the due rewards, the unworthy man received grace freely. Nor indeed did he dare to arrogate to himself even the labor itself. For when he had said: I labored more than all of them, he immediately subjoined: yet not I, but the grace of God with me. O great teacher, confessor, and preacher of grace! What is this: I labored more?
Not I? Where the will exalted itself somewhat, there at once piety kept watch and humility trembled, because weakness recognized itself. Deservedly, as the proceedings indicate, holy John, prelate of the Church of Jerusalem, also made use of this testimony—as he himself related to our fellow bishops, who were together presiding at that judgment, when he was asked what had been done before him prior to the judgment. For he said that then, when certain men were whispering and saying that Pelagius said 'this could be accomplished without the grace of God'—that is, what he had said above, 'that a man can be without sin':
'Reproving him', he says, 'on this point, I also adduced that the apostle Paul too, laboring much, yet not according to his own strength but according to the grace of God, said: I labored more than all of them; yet not I, but the grace of God with me; and again: It is not of him who wills, nor of him who runs, but of God who shows mercy; and that: Except the Lord build the house, they have labored in vain who build it; and many other similar things', he says, 'we said from the holy Scriptures.' But when they would not accept the things that were said by us from the holy Scriptures, but were still whispering, Pelagius said: 'I too believe thus: anathema be he who says that without the help of God a man can come to the perfection of all the virtues.'
These things bishop John related in the hearing of Pelagius, who could certainly have said honorably: Your holiness is mistaken, you have not remembered well; I did not say to those testimonies which you have commemorated from the Scriptures 'I believe thus,' since I do not so understand them—namely, that the grace of God so labors with a man that his not sinning is not of him who wills, nor of him who runs, but of God who shows mercy. For there are certain expositions of the epistle of Paul which is written to the Romans, which are said to be Pelagius' own, where that which is written—It is not of him who wills, nor of him who runs, but of God who shows mercy—he asserts to have been said not in the person of Paul, but that Paul used the voice of one questioning and refuting, when he said this, as though this ought by no means to be said.
Therefore, since bishop John plainly acknowledged this sentence to be the apostle's, and for that reason commemorated it, lest Pelagius should think that anyone sins without the grace of God, and said that Pelagius answered 'I too believe thus,' and since Pelagius, hearing this present, did not answer 'I do not so believe,' it behooves that he either deny that perverse exposition, where he wished it to be understood that the apostle did not hold this view but rather refuted it, or not hesitate to correct and amend it. For whatever bishop John said about our absent brethren—whether our fellow bishops, namely Heros and Lazarus, or the presbyter Orosius, or others whose names are not there expressed—I believe he understands that it avails nothing to their prejudice.
For if they were present, they could perhaps—far be it that I should say it—convict him of falsehood, or perhaps remind him of what he had perhaps forgotten, or in what the Latin interpreter had misled him, even if not from any zeal for lying, yet from some difficulty of a foreign tongue insufficiently understood—especially because it was not conducted through recorded proceedings, which have been usefully instituted lest the wicked lie and lest the good forget anything. But if anyone raise any question from this against our aforesaid brethren and summon them to episcopal judgment, they will be present for themselves, as they can: what need is there for us to labor here, when not even the judges themselves, after the narration of our fellow bishop, wished to pronounce anything thereupon?
Since therefore Pelagius, being present, silently acknowledged that he said he believed thus at those testimonies of the Scriptures, how is it that, recalling a little above that testimony of the apostle and finding that he had said: I am not worthy to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the Church of God, but by the grace of God I am what I am—he did not see that he ought not to have said, when it was being treated of the abundance of graces which the same apostle received, that he was worthy to receive them, when the apostle not only said himself, but, rendering also another reason, proved himself unworthy, and by that very fact commended grace as truly grace?
But if perhaps he could not think of, or remember, that which had long since been related by holy John, let him look back upon his own most recent response, and let him attend to those things concerning Caelestius which, objected to him a little before, he anathematized. For among those things is this—that it was objected that Caelestius had said 'that the grace of God is given according to our merits.' If, therefore, Pelagius truly anathematized this, how is it that he says all graces were given to the apostle according to merit? Or is it one thing to be worthy to receive, another to receive according to merit? And can he by some subtlety of disputation show that someone is worthy, but does not merit?
Nevertheless, Caelestius, or whoever else it was whose earlier opinions he all anathematized, does not permit him to spread mists about even this word and to hide in them. For he presses on and says: 'and grace itself is placed in my will, whether I be worthy or unworthy.' If, therefore, this was rightly and truly condemned by Pelagius, where it is said 'that the grace of God is given according to merits and to the worthy,' with what heart did he think, or with what mouth did he utter, that which he says: 'we say that God grants all graces to him who is worthy to receive'? Who would not, if he attentively noted these things, become anxious about that man's response or defense? Why then, someone says, did the judges approve this? I confess it. For that reason I myself am now in doubt;
but doubtless either the brief saying easily escaped their hearing and attention, or, deeming that in some way it could rightly be accepted—since they seemed to have from him clear confessions concerning this matter—they thought that almost no controversy ought to be stirred against him over a single word. Which perhaps would have befallen us too, had we sat with them in that judgment. For if in place of what was set down, 'worthy,' there had been set 'predestined' or something of that kind, assuredly no scruple would touch and vex the mind. And yet, whether it can be said even with certainty, or with the least offense to understanding, that he who is justified through the election of grace—with no preceding good merits indeed—is called worthy by destination, just as he is called elect, is judged difficult.
but is called worthy by destination, just as one elect is called—whether this can be said even with certainty, or with the least offense to the understanding, is judged difficult. For as far as concerns me, I would easily pass over from this word, were it not that that book, to which I replied—where he says that there is absolutely no grace of God except our nature with free will, grace being a creature—renders me anxious about Pelagius' own meaning, lest perchance he took care to insert this word not out of carelessness of speech, but out of diligence of dogma. Now the things that remain, the very last, so moved the judges that they judged them to be condemned even before Pelagius' response.
For in the sixth chapter of Caelestius' book it was objected as set down 'that the sons of God cannot be called such, unless they have been made in every way without sin'; whence according to him it was said that not even the apostle Paul is a son of God, who said: Not that I have already attained, or am already perfect. In the seventh chapter, 'that forgetfulness and ignorance are not subject to sin, since they do not come about according to the will, but according to necessity'—whereas David says: Remember not the offenses of my youth, nor my ignorances; and whereas in the law sacrifices are offered for ignorance just as for sin.
In the tenth chapter, that 'there is no free will if it needs God's help, since everyone has it within his own will either to do something or not to do it'; in the twelfth chapter, that 'our victory comes not from God's assistance but from free will,' which he is said to introduce in these words: 'Ours is the victory, because we took up arms by our own will, just as, on the contrary, it is ours when we are conquered, because by our own will we scorned to be armed'; and he adduced a testimony from the Apostle Peter, 'that we are partakers of the divine nature,' and he is said to construct this syllogism: 'Since if the soul cannot be without sin, then God too is subject to sin, whose part—that is, the soul—is liable to sin.'
In the thirteenth chapter he says: 'that pardon is not granted to the penitent according to the grace and mercy of God, but according to their own merit and labour, in that through penance they have become worthy of mercy.' When these had been read out, the synod said: 'What does the monk Pelagius, here present, say to these chapters that have been read? For the holy synod and the holy catholic Church of God condemns this.' Pelagius answered: 'Again I say that, even by their own testimony, these are not mine. For these, as I have said, I owe no satisfaction. But those which I have confessed to be mine, these I affirm to be right;
but those which I have said are not mine, in accordance with the judgment of the holy Church I condemn, pronouncing anathema upon everyone who contravenes and contradicts the doctrines of the holy catholic Church. For I believe in a Trinity of one substance, and in all things according to the doctrine of the holy catholic Church; but if anyone holds views alien to this, let him be anathema.' The synod said: 'Now that we have been satisfied by the responses of the monk Pelagius here present, who indeed consents to the pious doctrines and condemns and anathematizes what is contrary to the faith of the Church, we confess that he belongs to the communion of the Church and is catholic.'
If these are the proceedings by which Pelagius's friends rejoice that he has been cleared, we, seeing that toward himself he has taken pains sufficiently to prove our friendship as well—by producing even our own personal letters, which were read out in this trial and which the proceedings include as inserted—we do indeed desire and wish his salvation in Christ; but concerning this acquittal of his, which is more believed than clearly demonstrated, we ought not rashly to rejoice. Nor in saying this do I charge the judges with either negligence, or connivance, or (what it is most certain is utterly far from them) complicity in impious dogmas; but although by their judgment he was approved and praised as deserving, Pelagius nevertheless, in the eyes of those to whom he is more fully and more surely known, does not seem to me to have been cleared.
For they, judging as it were about someone unknown—especially in the absence of those who had presented a document against him—were quite unable to examine the man more carefully; yet the heresy itself, if they follow the judgment of those who were contending on behalf of his perversity, they utterly destroyed. But those who know well what Pelagius was accustomed to teach—whether those who resisted his disputations, or those who congratulate themselves on being freed from that very error—how can they not hold him suspect, when they read not a straightforward confession of his condemning his past errors, but such a defence as if he had never held any view otherwise than what was approved in his responses by this judgment?
For, to speak above all of my own case: at first I came to know the name of Pelagius—while he was absent and settled at Rome—with much praise of him; afterward rumour began to bring to us the report that he was disputing against the grace of God. Though I grieved at this, and it was told me by those whom I could trust, I nevertheless desired to learn something of this kind from himself, or from some book of his, so that, if I should begin to refute it, he could not deny it. But after he came to Africa, in my absence he was received on our coast, that is, the shore of Hippo, where—as I have learned from our people—absolutely nothing of this sort was heard from him, because he departed thence sooner than was expected.
Afterward, as far as I recall, I saw his face at Carthage once or twice, at a time when I was fully occupied with the affair of the conference we were about to hold with the Donatist heretics; and he for his part hastened on from there to lands overseas. Meanwhile, through the mouths of those who were reputed to be his disciples, these dogmas were seething, so that Caelestius came before an ecclesiastical tribunal and carried off a sentence worthy of his perversity. We thought, indeed, that it was more wholesome to act against them by refuting and confuting the errors themselves while keeping men's names unspoken, so that men might be corrected rather by fear of ecclesiastical judgment than punished by the judgment itself. And so we ceased neither to argue against those evils in books nor in sermons to the people.
But when that book too was given to me by the servants of God, the good and honourable men Timasius and Iacobus—in which Pelagius, in answering the question about God's grace which he had raised against himself as though from an adversary (a question on account of which he was already labouring under great odium), was seen to resolve it for himself in no other way than by saying that God's grace was nature created together with free will, sometimes and only faintly and not openly joining to it either the aid of the law or even the remission of sins—then indeed it became clear to me beyond all doubt how great a poison to Christian salvation was that hostile perversity.
Yet not even so did I insert Pelagius's name into my work by which I refuted that same book, thinking I should more easily do good if, keeping our friendship intact, I still spared his sense of shame, though I ought no longer to spare his writings. Hence it is that I now take it ill that in this trial he said in a certain place: 'I anathematize those who so hold, or who at any time have held it.' It would have sufficed to say 'those who so hold,' for us to believe him corrected; but when he added 'or who at any time have held it,' first, how unjustly he dared to condemn men who did not deserve it, who were free of that error—which they had learned either from others or from him as their teacher?
Next, which of those who knew that he had not only at some time held these views but had even taught them, would not with good reason suspect that he anathematized in pretence those who hold these things, since he did not hesitate to anathematize in the same manner those who at any time held these things?—among whom they will remember that he himself was their master. Behold, to say nothing of others, with what eyes, with what countenance will he look upon Timasius and Iacobus, his admirers and once his disciples, to whom I wrote the book in which I answered his book? Their reply to me I did not think should be passed over in silence; rather I have appended below a copy of the letter. 'To the truly most blessed and deservedly venerable father, bishop Augustine, Timasius and Iacobus, greeting in the Lord.
So has the grace of God, ministered through your word, refreshed and revived us, that we may say quite fittingly: 'He sent his word and healed them,' most blessed and deservedly venerable father. Indeed, we have found that your holiness sifted the text of that same little book with such diligence that we are astonished at the answers rendered to each point—whether in those things which a Christian ought to refute, detest, and flee, or in those in which he is not sufficiently found to have erred, although by some cunning or other he believed that in these too the grace of God should be suppressed.
But there is one thing which affects us amid so great a benefit, namely that this so splendid gift of God's grace shone forth so late, since it has come to pass that certain persons have become absent—those to whose blindness this illumination of so clear a truth was owed; yet to them, even if more tardily, we do not doubt that by God's favour the same grace will reach, who wills all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth. As for us, although we, taught long ago by the spirit of charity which is in you, cast off subjection to that error, in this too we now give thanks, that what we formerly believed we have now learned to open to others, your holiness's more copious discourse laying open the way of ease. And in another hand:
'May the mercy of our God glorify your blessedness, unharmed and mindful of us, for ever.' If, then, this man too had confessed that he had once been in this error like a man taken off guard, but that he now anathematized those who hold these things, whoever did not congratulate him, now that he held the way of truth, would himself lose the bowels of charity. But as it is, it is little that he did not confess himself freed from that plague; rather he anathematized besides those who have been freed—men who love him so as even to desire that he himself be freed. Among these are also those who signified their goodwill toward him in these letters of theirs sent to me; for they were thinking especially of him too when they said they were affected by this, that I wrote that book so late.
'For it has come to pass,' they say, 'that certain persons have become absent, to whose blindness this illumination of so clear a truth was owed; yet to them, even if more tardily,' they say, 'we do not doubt that by God's favour the same grace will reach.' Indeed, they too thought that his name, or names, should still be kept silent, so that, while friendship lived on, the error of friends might rather die.
But now, if Pelagius thinks of God, if he is not ungrateful for the mercy of Him who for this reason brought him before the judgment of the bishops—that he might not afterward dare to defend these anathematized positions, and might now recognize them as things to be detested and cast away—he will receive our letter more gladly, now that we openly, by naming the name, lay bare the ulcer to be healed, than those in which, while we feared to cause pain, we were increasing the swelling, of which we repent. But if he is angry with me, let him consider how unjustly he is angry, and, in order to conquer his anger, let him at length beg the grace of God, which in this trial he confessed to be necessary for each of our acts, that he may attain true victory with His help.
For what do all those great praises of him in the letters of the bishops profit him, which he thought should be recalled on his own behalf, or even read out and alleged?—as if all who heard his exhortations to a good life, vehement and in a manner burning, could easily have known that he held these perverse opinions. And I indeed, in my letter which he produced, not only refrained from praising him, but even, as far as I could, admonished him—without stirring up any controversy—to be rightly minded about the grace of God. Indeed, in the greeting I called him 'lord,' which by epistolary custom we are wont to write even to certain non-Christians, and that not falsely, since to all we owe, for the attaining of salvation which is in Christ, a kind of free servitude.
I called him 'most beloved,' which I still say and, even if he be angry, will still say, since unless I keep love toward him, while he is angry I shall harm myself the more. I called him 'most longed-for,' since I greatly desired to converse about something with him in person; for I had already heard that, whenever any mention of it was made here, he strove with open contention against the grace by which we are justified. In short, the brief text of the letter itself indicates this; for when I had given thanks that he had gladdened me by his writings, assuring me of his welfare and that of his people—
whom, if we wish them corrected, we ought also to wish safe with bodily health—I then wished for him from the Lord good things bestowed, not those pertaining to the health of the body, but rather those which he thought were, or perhaps still thinks are, placed in the will's choice alone and in its own power, at the same time wishing on this account eternal life too. Then, because in his letter, to which I was replying, he had praised in me certain such good things much and very kindly, there too I asked of him that he pray for me, so that I might rather be made by the Lord such as he already believed me to be, in order that I might thus admonish him—against what he supposed—that righteousness itself, which he had thought praiseworthy in me, is not of him that wills nor of him that runs, but of God that shows mercy.
This is the whole of what that brief letter of mine contains, and it was dictated with this intention; for it runs thus: 'To the most beloved and most longed-for lord and brother Pelagius, Augustine, greeting in the Lord. I give you very great thanks that you have deigned to gladden me by your letter and to make me certain of your welfare. May the Lord repay you good things, by which you may always be good, and may you live with Him, the eternal one, for ever, most beloved and most longed-for lord and brother. As for me, although I do not recognize in myself the praises of me which your letter of kindness contains, yet I cannot be ungrateful for your kindly disposition toward my littleness; at the same time admonishing you that you rather pray for me, that I may be made by the Lord such as you already judge me to be.
And in another hand: mindful of us and unharmed, may you please the Lord, most beloved and most longed-for lord and brother.' In this subscription too, in that I wrote 'may he please the Lord,' I signified rather that this is in His grace than in the will of man alone, since I neither exhorted, nor commanded, nor taught it, but wished it. Just as, however, if I were exhorting or commanding or teaching, I should show that this pertains also to free will and yet should not derogate from the grace of God, so, because I wished it, I have indeed commended the grace of God, and yet have not extinguished the choice of the will.
To what end, then, did he produce this letter in this trial? For according to it, if he had been of sound mind from the beginning, he would perhaps in no way—though by good brothers, yet offended by the perversity of his disputations—have been summoned to episcopal judgment. Moreover, just as I have given account of this letter of mine, so of theirs, if it were necessary, those would give account whom he alleged, stating either what they supposed, or what they were ignorant of, or by what reasoning they wrote.
Accordingly, however much Pelagius may boast of the friendship of any saints whatever, whatever letters of praise about himself he may read, whatever proceedings of his own acquittal he may produce, unless he has confessed and anathematized the things which he is proved, by the testimony of suitable witnesses, to have set down in his books against the grace of God by which we are called and justified, and has thereafter written and disputed against these very things, he will by no means seem, to those to whom he is more fully known, to have been corrected. For I shall now not keep silent about what followed after this trial, things which increase this suspicion the more.
There came into our hands a certain letter, said to be written by Pelagius himself to a certain friend of his, a presbyter, who—as that same letter reports—had kindly admonished him by letter that no one should, on his account, separate himself from the body of the Church. There, among other things which it would be tedious and needless to insert, Pelagius says: 'Our definition, by which we said that a man can be without sin and easily keep the commandments of God if he wills, has been approved by the sentence of fourteen bishops. And this sentence,' he says, 'has drenched the mouth of contradiction with confusion, and has separated from one another every fellowship conspiring for evil.'
Whether, then, Pelagius truly wrote this letter, or whether it was fabricated by someone under his name, who would not see how this error glories, as it were over a victory, even about the judgment where it was convicted and condemned? For he set down these words just as they are read in his book which is called 'Of the Chapters,' not as they were objected in the trial, or as repeated even in his own response. For those too who made the objections, by some carelessness or other, omitted a word about which there is no small controversy. For they set down that he had said a man can, if he wills, be without sin and keep the commandments of God, if he wills; about 'ease' nothing was said. Then he himself, answering, says:
'That a man can indeed be without sin and keep the commandments of God if he wills, we said.' Neither did he himself say 'easily keep,' but only 'keep.' Likewise, in another place, among those matters about which Hilarius consulted me and I wrote back, the objection was thus made: that a man can be without sin, if he wills. To which he himself thus answered: 'That a man can be without sin has been said above.' Neither here, therefore, whether by those who objected or by him who answered, was 'easily' added. Above too, in the narrative of the holy bishop John, it was thus recorded: 'When they,' he says, 'were insisting and saying that he is a heretic;
for he says that a man can, if he will, be without sin—and when we questioned him about this, he answered: I did not say that human nature receives the power to be incapable of sin; but I said that whoever is willing to labour and strive for his own salvation, so as not to sin and to walk in the precepts of God, has this possibility from God. Then, when certain were whispering and saying that Pelagius was asserting that this could be accomplished without the grace of God, blaming this,' he says, 'I also adduced that the apostle Paul too, labouring much, yet not according to his own power but according to the grace of God, said: I laboured more than all of them, yet not I, but the grace of God with me,' and the rest which I have already recalled.
What, then, does it mean that in this letter they dared so to glory as to boast that they had persuaded the fourteen judging bishops—not only of the possibility of not sinning, but even of the ease, as it is set down in the book of chapters of the same Pelagius—when, though the same thing was so often added to the proceedings and repeated, they are nowhere found to have it? For how is this word not contrary even to Pelagius's own defence and response, since bishop John too said that he had thus answered before him, so as to have it understood that he can avoid sin who is willing to labour and strive for his own salvation, and since he himself, now acting in the proceedings and defending himself, said that by his own labour and the grace of God a man can be without sin?
How, then, does it come about easily, if it is a matter of labour that it should come about? For I think that the whole understanding of men agrees with us that where there is labour, there is no ease. And yet a letter of carnal windiness and vanity flits about, and, outstripping the tardiness of the proceedings by a procured swiftness, flies ahead into men's hands, so that it may be said to have pleased the fourteen eastern bishops that a man not only can be without sin and keep the commandments of God, but even keep them easily, and with no naming of God as helper, but only 'if he wills'—
so that, forsooth, the divine grace—for which the fiercest fight was being waged—being kept silent, should remain unmentioned, so that in the letter there should be read only unhappy human pride, deceiving itself, as though victorious; as though bishop John had not said that he had blamed this, and had, as it were, cast down the giant mountains built up against the pre-eminence of heavenly grace with three testimonies of divine authority, like thunderbolts' strokes; or as though the other bishops too, judges together with him, would have borne, whether in mind or in their very ears, Pelagius saying, 'That a man can indeed be without sin and keep the commandments of God, if he wills, we said,' unless there immediately followed:
'for this possibility God gave to him'—which they did not know he was saying of nature, not of that grace which they knew in the apostolic preaching—and then joined on: 'yet we did not say that anyone is found who from infancy to old age has never sinned, but that, being converted from sins, by his own labour and the grace of God he can be without sin.' This too they declared by their own sentence, saying that he had rightly answered that with the help of God and grace a man can be without sin—fearing what else, save lest by denying this they should seem to do injury not to man's possibility, but to the very grace of God?
Yet it was not defined when a man becomes without sin—which was judged to be possible with the help of God's grace; it was not, I say, defined whether, in this flesh that lusts against the spirit, there has been, or is, or will be anyone, already using reason and the choice of the will—whether in this throng of men or in the solitude of monks—for whom it is not already necessary, not on account of others but even on account of himself, to say in prayer: 'Forgive us our debts'; or whether rather this gift is perfected at the time when we shall be like Him, when we shall see Him as He is, when it shall be said, not by those still fighting: 'I see another law in my members warring against the law of my mind,' but by those triumphing: 'Where, O death, is thy victory?
Where, O death, is thy sting?'—a matter which perhaps is to be inquired into peaceably, not between catholics and heretics, but among catholics themselves.
How, then, can it be believed that Pelagius—if indeed this letter is his—truly confessed the grace of God (which is neither nature with free will, nor the knowledge of the law, nor merely the remission of sins, but that which is necessary in each of our acts) and truly anathematized whoever should hold views against these things, when in his letter he set down even the ease of not sinning—about which there was no question in this trial, as though the judges too had been pleased about this word—and did not set down the grace of God, by confessing and adding which he escaped the penalty of ecclesiastical condemnation? There is also another thing which I ought not to keep silent.
In the little document of his defence, which he sent to me through a certain Charus, a fellow citizen of ours from Hippo but an eastern deacon, he did something that stands otherwise than is contained in the episcopal proceedings. But what the proceedings have is far better and firmer and altogether more clearly unravelled for catholic truth against the plague of that heresy. For when I read that same document, before the proceedings had come to us, I did not know that he had set down those very words which, when they were of use to him, he employed in the trial; for they are few and do not stand much otherwise, about which I do not care too greatly. But I took it ill that he can be seen to have reserved to himself a defence of certain propositions of Caelestius, which it is clear he anathematized in the proceedings.
For some of them he denied to be his, saying only that he owed no satisfaction for them, but he refused in that same document to anathematize them. These are they: that Adam was made mortal, who whether he sinned or did not sin was going to die; that Adam's sin harmed himself alone and not the human race; that the law brings to the kingdom of heaven just as the gospel does; that infants newly born are in that state in which Adam was before the transgression; that neither through the death or transgression of Adam does the whole human race die, nor through the resurrection of Christ does the whole human race rise; that infants, even if they are not baptized, have eternal life;
that baptized rich men, unless they renounce all things, even if they seem to do some good, it is not reckoned to them, nor will they have the kingdom of heaven.' To these indeed in that document he thus answered: 'All these, according to their own testimony, were not said by me, nor do I owe satisfaction for them.' But in the proceedings he spoke thus about these very same things: 'According to their own testimony they were not said by me. For these I ought not to make satisfaction; but nevertheless, for the satisfaction of the holy synod, I anathematize those who so hold, or who at any time have held.' Why, then, was it not so written in that document also? Not much, I think—of ink, nor of letters, nor of delay, nor of the document itself—would have been expended, had it been so done.
But who would not believe that this was contrived, so that this document might circulate everywhere as though a summary of those proceedings?—where it might be thought that the liberty of defending any one of those propositions had not been taken away, in that they had only been objected to him and not proved against him, yet had not been anathematized and condemned. Afterward too, from the book of Caelestius, he heaped together in that same document many chapters objected to him, and did not, with those intervals which the proceedings contain, add two responses by which he anathematized those same chapters, but appended a single one to all of them at once. This I would think was done for the sake of brevity, did I not perceive that it makes very much difference to that which moves us. For thus he closed:
'Again I say that these things, even according to their own testimony, are not mine. For these, as I have said, I owe no satisfaction; but those which I have confessed to be mine, these I affirm that I rightly say; but those which I have said are not mine, according to the judgment of the holy Church I condemn, pronouncing anathema upon everyone who contravenes the doctrines of the holy and catholic Church, and likewise upon those who, feigning falsehoods, have stirred up calumny against us.' This last line the proceedings do not have; but it is nothing to the matter about which we ought to be concerned. For let those too be utterly anathema who, feigning falsehoods, have stirred up calumny against them. But when I first read:
'but those which I have said are not mine, according to the judgment of the holy Church I condemn'—not knowing that that judgment of the Church had already taken place, since here it is left unsaid and I had not read the proceedings—I supposed nothing else than that he had promised that he would think about these chapters what the Church had not yet judged, but should at some time judge, and that he would condemn those things which she had not yet condemned, but should at some time condemn; so that to this there should pertain also what he added: 'pronouncing anathema upon everyone who contravenes or contradicts the doctrines of the holy catholic Church.'
But in truth, as the proceedings testify, an ecclesiastical judgment concerning these things had already been made by the fourteen bishops, according to which judgment he said that he condemned all these things and pronounced anathema upon those who, by holding such views, go against the judgment which the proceedings indicate had already been made. For the judges had already said: 'What does the monk Pelagius, here present, say to these chapters that have been read? For the holy synod and the holy catholic Church of God condemns this.' But those who do not know this, and read that document, think that some of those propositions can lawfully be defended, as though it had not been judged that they were contrary to catholic doctrine, and as though Pelagius had declared himself ready to think about these matters what the Church had not judged, but should judge.
He did not, therefore, write in the little document with which we are now dealing in such a way that what the trustworthiness of the acts contains should be recognized—namely, all those doctrines by which the same heresy was creeping onward and gaining strength through its contentious boldness—that these had been condemned by ecclesiastical judgment, with fourteen bishops presiding. If he was afraid to make this matter known, as it truly stands, let him rather correct himself than be angry at our vigilance, however tardy and of whatever quality it may be. But if it is false that he feared this, and, as we men suppose, let him be pardoned—provided nevertheless that henceforth he attacks those things which by the acts, in which he was heard, were anathematized and reproved, lest by sparing them he should seem not only to have believed these things before, but to believe them still.
Accordingly, in so grave and great a cause, it was perhaps not in vain that I wished to write this book, though it be lengthy on this account, to your Reverence, so that, if it does not displease your judgment, it may by your authority rather—which is far greater than the diligence of our littleness—become known to those whom you deem it necessary, for the crushing of the vanities and contentions of those who think that, Pelagius having been acquitted by the Eastern bishops as judges, those doctrines were approved which the ever-Christian truth condemns as sprouting most perniciously against the Christian faith and the grace of God, by which we are called and justified; and which truth has condemned by the authority of these very fourteen bishops as well—an authority which would at the same time have condemned Pelagius too, had these doctrines not been anathematized by him.
Now then, since we have rendered to the man the care of brotherly charity, and have faithfully set forth our solicitude concerning him and on his behalf, let us see how it may briefly be observed that, although in the eyes of men he was acquitted, yet the heresy itself—ever damnable by divine judgment—was condemned also by the judgment of the fourteen Eastern bishops. This is the final sentence of that judgment. The synod said: «Now, since we have been satisfied by the declarations of the present monk Pelagius, who indeed assents to pious teachings, but reproves and anathematizes those contrary to the faith of the Church, we confess that he belongs to ecclesiastical and catholic communion.»
The holy bishops who were judges embraced, in the brevity of their sentence, two things sufficiently clear concerning the monk Pelagius: the one, that he assents to pious teachings; the other, that he reproves and anathematizes things contrary to the faith of the Church. On account of these two things Pelagius was pronounced to belong to ecclesiastical and catholic communion. Let us therefore see, by briefly recapitulating everything, by what words of his meanwhile—so far as men could judge in his presence about manifest matters—each of these became clear. For in these charges brought against him, which he answered were not his own, he was said to reprove and anathematize things contrary. Let us therefore briefly gather up this whole cause thus, if we can. Since it was necessary that what the apostle Paul foretold should be fulfilled:
«There must be heresies also, that those who are approved may be made manifest among you»—after the ancient heresies, in our own time also there was introduced a heresy, not by bishops or presbyters or any clerics, but by certain persons as it were monks; which heresy disputed against the grace of God that is ours through Jesus Christ our Lord, as though in defense of free will, and endeavored to overturn the foundation of the Christian faith, of which it is written: «By one man came death, and by one man the resurrection of the dead;»
«For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive»—and this heresy denied the help of God in our actions, saying that human nature, which was created with free will, can suffice of itself for us not to sin and to fulfill righteousness, and that this is the grace of God, because we were so created that we can do this by our own will; and that the help which God gave by his law and commandments, and the fact that he pardons past sins to those who turn to him—that in these alone the grace of God is to be reckoned, and not in the help given to our individual acts. For (it held) a man can be without sin and easily keep the commandments of God, if he will.
When this heresy had deceived very many, and was troubling the brethren whom it had not deceived, a certain Caelestius, holding such views, was brought to the judgment of the Church of Carthage, and by the sentence of the bishops was condemned.
Then, after some years, when this heresy had been laid to the charge of Pelagius, who was reported to be his teacher, he too came before an episcopal tribunal; and when all had been read out which the Gallic bishops Heros and Lazarus had set down in the document brought against him—they indeed being absent and excusing themselves on account of the sickness of one of them—as Pelagius answered to everything, fourteen bishops of the province of Palestine, in accordance with his answers, pronounced him free from the perversity of this heresy, yet condemning that heresy without any doubt. For they approved, according to what he answered to the charges: «that a man is helped by the knowledge of the law not to sin, as it is written:
'He gave the law for their help.'» They did not, however, on this account judge that this same knowledge of the law is that grace of God of which it is written: «Who shall deliver me from the body of this death? The grace of God through Jesus Christ our Lord;» nor that Pelagius had said 'that all are governed by their own will, so that God does not govern them'—for he answered that he had said this on account of free will, to which God is a helper for one choosing good things, but that the sinning man is himself in fault, as it were, of free will. They approved also 'that the unjust and sinners are not to be spared on the day of judgment, but are to be punished with eternal fires,' since he answered that he had said this according to the Gospel, where it is written:
«These shall go into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.» He had not, however, said that all sinners belong to eternal punishment, so that he might seem rightly to have spoken against the apostle, who says that certain persons shall be saved, yet so as by fire. They approved 'that the kingdom of heaven was promised even in the Old Testament,' since he gave testimony from the prophet Daniel, where it is said: «And the saints shall receive the kingdom of the Most High»—understanding in this place that by him the Old Testament was called not that alone which was made on Mount Sinai, but all the canonical Scriptures ministered before the coming of the Lord.
But 'that a man can be without sin, if he will' was not approved in the way it seemed to be set down by him in his book—as though this were in the sole power of a man through free will (for he was charged with having thought this by saying 'if he will')—but in the way in which he himself now answered, or rather in the way in which the bishops as judges more briefly and openly noted it by their own interlocution: that a man, with the help of God and grace, can be without sin. Nor yet was it defined when the saints shall attain this perfection—whether in the body of this death, or when death shall be swallowed up in victory.
From those things also which Caelestius was charged with having said or written—as doctrines of his disciple laid to the charge of Pelagius—Pelagius acknowledged some as his own, yet answered that he had understood them otherwise than they were charged. Hence is that saying, 'that before the coming of Christ certain persons lived holily and justly;' Caelestius, however, was reported to have said 'that they were without sin.' Likewise it was charged that Caelestius had said 'that the Church is without spot or wrinkle;' but Pelagius said 'that this was indeed said by him, but in this sense: that by the laver the Church is cleansed from every spot and wrinkle, and that the Lord wills her so to remain.' Likewise that saying of Caelestius, 'that we do more than is commanded in the law and the Gospel;'
Pelagius answered 'that he had said this concerning virginity,' of which Paul says: «I have no commandment of the Lord.» Likewise it was charged that Caelestius affirmed 'that each single man can have all the virtues and graces,' and thus that the diversity of graces which the apostle teaches is taken away; but Pelagius answered 'that he did not take away the diversity of graces, but said that God bestows all the graces on him who shall be worthy to receive them, just as he bestowed them on the apostle Paul.' These four opinions from the name of Caelestius the bishops as judges did not approve in the way Caelestius was said to have held them, but in the way Pelagius answered concerning them.
For they saw that it is one thing to be without sin, another to live holily and justly, as Scripture testifies that certain persons lived even before the coming of Christ; and that, although the Church is not here without spot or wrinkle, yet she is both cleansed by the laver of regeneration from every spot and wrinkle, and the Lord wills her so to remain—for she will indeed so remain, since without spot or wrinkle she will assuredly reign in eternal blessedness; and that perpetual virginity, which was not commanded, is without doubt more than conjugal chastity, which was commanded, although in many virginity perseveres who nevertheless are not without sin; and that all those graces which he mentions in one place the apostle Paul possessed.
Yet that he was worthy to receive them they could understand in some way as being not according to merits, but rather according to predestination—for he himself says: «I am not worthy,» or: «I am not fit to be called an apostle»—or else the word by which Pelagius, in whatever manner he set it down, escaped their intention; let him himself see to that. These are the matters in which the bishops pronounced that Pelagius assents to pious teachings. Now let us likewise, by recapitulating, look a little more attentively at those things which they said he reproves and anathematizes as contrary. For in this rather does that whole heresy consist.
Setting aside, therefore, those things which he was said to have set down in his books in flattery of I know not what widow—things which he answered were neither in his books nor had he ever said anything of the sort, and which he anathematized those who held them, not as heretics but as fools—these are the things by which we grieved that the thickets of that heresy sprouted daily, nay were already growing into a wood: 'that Adam was made mortal, who whether he sinned or did not sin was going to die; that Adam's sin injured himself alone and not the human race; that the law sends to the kingdom just as the Gospel does; that infants newly born are in that state in which Adam was before the transgression.'
'that neither through the death or transgression of Adam does the whole race of men die, nor through the resurrection of Christ does the whole race of men rise; that infants, even if they are not baptized, have eternal life; that the baptized rich, unless they renounce all things, even if they are seen to do any good, it is not reckoned to them, nor can they have the kingdom of God; that the grace of God and his help are not given for individual acts, but consist in free will and in the law and teaching; that the grace of God is given according to our merits, and therefore that grace itself is placed in the will of man, whether he become worthy or unworthy; that the sons of God cannot be called such unless they have been made altogether without sin.'
'that forgetfulness and ignorance are not subject to sin, since they do not happen according to the will, but according to necessity; that there is no free will if it needs the help of God, since each one has his own will either to do something or not to do it; that our victory is not from the help of God, but from free will; that from what Peter says, that we are «partakers of the divine nature,» it follows that the soul can be as much without sin as God is.' For this I myself read set down in these words in the eleventh chapter of a book which indeed does not bear the title of its author, but is reported to be by Caelestius:
'How,' he says, 'does anyone take up partnership in that thing from whose state and power he is defined to be a stranger?' Therefore the brethren who brought these charges understood him thus: as though he had said that the soul is of the same nature as God, and a part of God; for they took it in this way, that he held it to be of the same state and power as God. But in the last place among the charges was set: 'that pardon is not granted to the penitent according to the grace and mercy of God, but according to the merit and labor of those who through penitence shall have been worthy of mercy.'
All these things, and any arguments interposed for their confirmation, the judges approved that Pelagius denied and anathematized, and therefore pronounced that, by reproving and anathematizing things contrary to the ecclesiastical faith, he had condemned them. And by this, in whatever manner Caelestius may have set them down or not set them down, or Pelagius may have held them or not held them, let us rejoice that such great evils of this so new heresy were condemned by that ecclesiastical judgment, and let us give thanks to God and utter his praises.
But concerning those things which are said to have been perpetrated there after this judgment, with incredible boldness, by I know not what band of lost men who are reported to favor Pelagius most perversely—so that the men-servants and maid-servants belonging to the care of the holy presbyter Jerome were afflicted with a most wicked slaughter, a deacon was killed, the buildings of the monasteries were burned, and scarcely was he himself protected from this onset and assault of the impious, by the mercy of God, by a more fortified tower—concerning these things I judge it rather better for us to be silent, and to await what our brother bishops there think ought to be done about such great evils, which who would believe they could dissemble?
For the impious doctrines of men of this sort must be refuted by any catholics whatsoever, even those who are far distant from those lands, lest they should be able to do harm wherever they may reach; but impious deeds, whose restraint belongs to episcopal discipline, must be punished especially where they are committed, by those present or established nearby, with pastoral diligence and pious severity. We therefore, placed so far away, ought to desire that such an end be given there to these matters that it may not be necessary to judge of them any further anywhere, but such an end as it may rather befit us to proclaim, so that the minds of all who have been grievously wounded by the fame of those crimes flying about everywhere may be healed by the ensuing mercy of God.
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undeiamhuiuslibriterminusistesit, qui, utspero, sisensibustuisplaceremeruerit, adiuuantedominoutiliseritlegentibustuoquammeonominecommendatiorettuadiligentiaplurimisnotior.
Wherefore let this now be the end of this book, which, as I hope, if it shall have merited to please your judgment, will by the Lord's help be useful to its readers—more commended under your name than under mine, and by your diligence made known to very many.