Now, being already baptized, when I was at Rome and could not bear in silence the boasting of the Manichees about their false and deceitful continence or abstinence, by which, to deceive the ignorant, they set themselves above true Christians, to whom they are not to be compared, I wrote two books, one On the Morals of the Catholic Church and the other On the Morals of the Manichees. In that one, then, which is On the Morals of the Catholic Church, where I set down a testimony in which is read, 'For Your sake we are afflicted all the day long; we are counted as sheep,' the faultiness of our codex misled me, being then less mindful of the Scriptures, in which I was not yet practiced. For other codices of the same version do not have:
'for Your sake we are afflicted,' but 'for Your sake we are put to death,' which others rendered by one word, 'we are mortified.' That this is truer, the Greek books show, from which language the translation of the ancient divine Scriptures was made into Latin according to the Septuagint translators. And yet, according to these words—that is, 'for Your sake we are afflicted'—I said many things in my discussion which I do not reprove as false in the matters themselves; but nonetheless that harmony of the Old and New Scriptures which I desired to demonstrate, I certainly did not demonstrate from these words at least. But whence the error crept upon me, I have said; from other testimonies, however, I sufficiently showed the same harmony.
And a little later I set down a testimony from the book of Wisdom according to our codex, in which was written: 'For wisdom teaches sobriety, and justice, and virtue'; and according to these words I discoursed on matters that were indeed true, but discovered by occasion of the faulty text. For what is truer than that wisdom teaches the truth of contemplation—which I supposed to be signified by the name of sobriety—and the uprightness of action, which I wished to be understood by the two others, by justice and virtue—when the more accurate codices of the same version have: 'For it teaches sobriety and wisdom and justice and virtue'?
For by all these the Latin translator named those four virtues which are especially wont to be on the lips of the philosophers, calling temperance 'sobriety,' imposing on prudence the name 'wisdom,' expressing fortitude by the word 'virtue,' and rendering justice alone by its own name. But these four virtues, named in the same book of Wisdom by their own names, as they are called by the Greeks, we long afterwards found in the Greek codices. Likewise, as to what I set down from the book of Solomon—'Vanity of vain things, said Ecclesiastes'—I did indeed read this in many codices, but the Greek does not have it; rather it has:
'Vanity of vanities,' which I afterwards saw, and I found those Latin texts to be truer which have 'of vanities,' not 'of vain things.' Yet whatever I discoursed on the occasion of this faulty text appears to be true in the matters themselves. But as to what I said—that Him whom we wish to know, that is God, we should first love with full charity—it would be better to say 'sincere' rather than 'full,' unless perhaps one supposes that the love of God will not be greater when we shall see face to face. Let it therefore be so taken as though 'full' were said in the sense that no greater can be, so long as we walk by faith; for it will be fuller—nay, fullest—but through vision.
Likewise, what I said about those who come to the aid of the needy, that they are called merciful, even if they are wise to such a degree that they are no longer disturbed by any grief of mind—this is not to be so taken as though I had determined that such wise men exist in this life; for I did not say 'when they are,' but I said 'even if they should be.' In another place, where I said: 'Now indeed, when this human love has nourished and strengthened the mind clinging to its own breasts, it has become fit to follow God';
'when His majesty, in so great a part as suffices for the mind while it is an inhabitant of this earth, has begun to open itself, so great an ardor of charity is born and so great a blaze of divine love arises, that, all vices being burned away in the sanctified and purified man, it sufficiently appears how divinely it was said, I am a consuming fire'—the Pelagians may think that I said this perfection can be attained in this mortal life. But let them not think so.
For the ardor of charity, made fit by following God and so great that it consumes all vices, can be born and grow in this life; but to accomplish that for which it is born—namely, that no vice remain in a man—it cannot consequently do here, although so great a thing is accomplished by that same ardor of charity where it can be accomplished and when it can be accomplished: that, just as the laver of regeneration purges from the guilt of all the sins which human birth drew in and iniquity contracted, so that perfection may purge from the stain of all vices, without which human weakness cannot be in this age. As is also to be understood what the Apostle said:
'Christ loved the Church and gave Himself up for her, cleansing her by the laver of water in the word, that He might present to Himself a glorious Church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing.' For this is the laver of water in the word by which the Church is cleansed. But since the whole Church, so long as it is here, says, 'Forgive us our debts,' it is certainly not here without spot or wrinkle or any such thing; yet from what it here receives, it is brought to that glory which is not here, and to perfection. In another book, whose title is On the Morals of the Manichees, there is that which I said:
'The goodness of God so orders all deficient things that they may be where they can most fittingly be, until by ordered movements they run back to that from which they fell'—this is not to be so taken as though all things run back to that from which they fell, as it seemed to Origen, but those things which do run back. For they will not run back to God from whom they fell, who shall be punished with everlasting fire, although all deficient things are so ordered that they may be where they can most fittingly be, because even those who do not run back are most fittingly in punishment. In another place: 'Hardly anyone,' I said, 'doubts concerning beetles that they arise from mud rolled into a ball by them and covered over'—although many doubt whether this example is true, and many have not even heard of it.
This work begins thus: 'In other books I think we have dealt sufficiently.' CHAPTER VII. ON THE GREATNESS OF THE SOUL, ONE BOOK. In the same city I wrote a dialogue in which many things are inquired into and discussed concerning the soul—that is, whence it is, of what quality it is, how great it is, why it was given to the body, of what quality it becomes when it comes to the body, of what quality when it departs. But because how great it is was very carefully and subtly discussed, that we might show, if we could, that it is not of bodily magnitude and yet is something great, from this one inquiry the whole book received its name, so that it was called On the Greatness of the Soul.
In that book, what I said—that all the arts seem to me to be brought along by the soul itself, and that what is called learning is nothing other than remembering and recalling—is not to be so taken as though it were thereby proved that the soul once lived either in another body or elsewhere, whether in a body or outside a body, and that the things which, when questioned, it answers, though it did not learn them here, it had learned before in another life.
For it can happen, as I have already said above in this work, that it can do this because it is of an intelligible nature, so that it is connected not only with intelligible but also with immutable things, having been made in such an order that, when it moves itself toward those things to which it is connected, or toward itself, in so far as it sees them, in so far it answers truly concerning them. Nor indeed did it bring along and hold with itself all the arts in that way; for concerning the arts which pertain to the bodily senses—such as much of medicine, such as all of astrology—it cannot speak except what it has learned here. But those things which the intelligence alone grasps, on account of what I said, it answers when it has been well questioned, either by itself or by another, and has recalled. In another place:
'I would wish,' I said, 'to say more on this and to bind myself, while as it were enjoining upon you that I should do nothing else than be restored to myself, to whom I most owe myself'—where I seem rather that I ought to have said, 'be restored to God, to whom I most owe myself.' But because a man must first be restored to himself, so that from there, having as it were made a step, he may rise from it and be lifted up to God, just as that younger son first returned to himself and then said, 'I will arise and go to my father,' I therefore spoke thus. Then presently I added: 'and thus to become a friendly servant to the Lord.' What I therefore said—'to whom I most owe myself'—I referred to men; for I owe myself more to myself than to other men, although to God more than to myself. This book begins thus:
'Since I see that you abound in leisure.' CHAPTER VIII. ON FREE WILL, THREE BOOKS. While we were still tarrying at Rome, we wished to inquire by discussion whence evil is, and we discussed in such a way that, if we could, that which concerning this matter we, subject to the divine authority, believed, might—so far as by discussing, with God's help, we could accomplish it—be brought by reason considered and thoroughly examined even to our own understanding. And since it was established among us, the reason having been carefully discussed, that evil did not arise except from the free choice of the will, the three books which that same discussion brought forth were called On Free Will. Of these I completed the second and third in Africa, when I had now been ordained a presbyter at Hippo Regius, as I was then able.
In these books so many things were discussed that certain incidental questions, which I either could not unravel or which required a long discourse for the present, were so deferred that, on either side, or on all sides of those same questions—in which it did not appear which better agreed with the truth—our reasoning was nonetheless concluded to this end: that, whichever of them should be true, God was to be believed, or even shown, worthy of praise.
For that discussion was undertaken on account of those who deny that the origin of evil is drawn from the free choice of the will, and who contend that God, if it is so, the creator of all natures, is to be blamed—wishing thereby, according to the error of their impiety (for they are Manichees), to introduce a certain immutable nature of evil, coeternal with God. But of the grace of God, by which He has so predestined His elect that He Himself also prepares the wills of those who already use free choice in them, nothing was discussed in these books, because the question proposed did not concern that. But where a place occurred for making mention of this grace, it was mentioned in passing, not defended by laborious reasoning as though the matter were there being treated.
For it is one thing to inquire whence evil is, and another to inquire whence one may return to the former good, or attain to a greater good. Wherefore let the new heretics, the Pelagians, who so assert the free choice of the will that they leave no place for the grace of God—since they assert that it is given according to our merits—not exalt themselves as though I had pleaded their cause, because I said many things in these books on behalf of free will which the cause of that discussion demanded. For I said in the first book that evil deeds are avenged by the justice of God, and I added: 'For they would not be justly avenged unless they were done by the will.' Likewise, when I was showing that the good will itself is so great a good that it is deservedly to be preferred to all bodily and external goods, I said:
'You see therefore now, as I think, that it is established in our will that we should either enjoy or lack so great and so true a good; for what is so situated in the will as the will itself?' And in another place: 'What reason, then, is there,' I said, 'why we should think it must be doubted that, even if we were never wise before, we nonetheless by our will merit and lead a praiseworthy and blessed life, and by our will a base and wretched one?' And likewise in another place: 'From which it is concluded,' I said, 'that whoever wishes to live rightly and honorably, if he wishes this in preference to fleeting things, attains so great a thing with such great ease that to have what he willed is for him nothing other than the very willing.' And likewise elsewhere I said:
'For that eternal law—to the consideration of which it is now time to return—has established this by immutable stability: that in the will there should be merit, but in blessedness and misery reward and punishment.' And in another place: 'What each one,' I said, 'chooses to pursue and embrace is established to be placed in the will.' And in the second book: 'For man himself,' I said, 'in so far as he is man, is some good, because he can, when he wills, live rightly.' And in another place I said: 'that right conduct cannot be done except by that same free choice of the will.' And in the third book:
'What need is there to inquire,' I said, 'whence arises that movement by which the will is turned away from the immutable good to the changeable good, since we confess that it is only of the mind, and voluntary, and on that account culpable; and every profitable teaching about this matter avails to this: that, this movement being reproved and restrained, we may turn our will from a temporal fall to enjoying the everlasting good?' And in another place: 'Obscurely,' I said, 'the truth cries out concerning you. For you could not perceive that anything is in our power except what we do when we will. Wherefore nothing is so much in our power as the will itself. For it, indeed, with no interval, is at hand as soon as we will.' Likewise in another place:
'For if you,' I said, 'are praised for seeing what you ought to do, when you do not see it except in Him who is the immutable truth, how much more He who both commanded the willing, and furnished the power, and did not permit unwilling refusal to go unpunished?' Then I subjoined, saying: 'For if each one owes what he has received, and man was so made that he necessarily sins, then he owes it that he should sin. But when he sins, he does what he owes; which, if it is wicked to say, no one is compelled by his own nature to sin.' And again: 'What at last can be,' I said, 'the cause of the will prior to the will? For either it too is a will, and one does not depart from this root of the will, or it is not a will and has no sin.
Either therefore the will is the first cause of sinning, or no sin is the first cause of sinning; nor is there anyone to whom sin may be imputed except the sinner. There is therefore no one to whom it may rightly be imputed except the will.' And a little later: 'Who,' I said, 'sins in that which he can in no way avoid? But sin is committed: therefore it can be avoided.' This testimony of mine Pelagius used in a certain book of his. When I had replied to that book, I wished the title of my book to be On Nature and Grace. In these and suchlike words of mine, because the grace of God is not mentioned—which was then not being treated of—the Pelagians think, or can think, that I held their opinion. But they think this in vain.
For the will, by which one both sins and lives rightly—which is what we here treated of by these words—that will, then, unless it be freed by the grace of God from the servitude by which it has become a slave to sin, and be aided that it may overcome vices, cannot be lived by mortals rightly and piously. And this divine benefit, by which it is freed, unless it went before it, would already be given to its merits and would not be grace, which indeed is given freely.
This we have dealt with sufficiently in our other little works, refuting those enemies of this grace, the new heretics; although in these books, which were written not at all against them—for they did not yet exist—but against the Manichees, On Free Will, we did not by any means keep silent about that grace of God which by abominable impiety they attempt to take away. For we said in the second book that not only great but also the least goods cannot be except from Him from whom are all goods, that is, God. And a little later: 'The virtues,' I said, 'by which one lives rightly are great goods; but the forms of any bodies whatsoever, without which one can live rightly, are the least goods; and the powers of the mind, without which one cannot live rightly, are intermediate goods.'
No one uses the virtues badly; but the other goods, that is, the intermediate and the least, anyone can use not only well but also badly. And therefore no one uses virtue badly, because the work of virtue is the good use of those things which we can also use not well; and no one, by using well, uses badly. Wherefore the abundance and greatness of God's goodness has provided not only the great but also the intermediate and the least goods to exist. His goodness is more to be praised in the great than in the intermediate, and more in the intermediate than in these least goods; but more in all of them, than if He had not bestowed all. And in another place:
'Do you only,' I said, 'hold fast an unshaken piety, so that no good may present itself to you—whether you perceive it, or understand it, or think of it in any way whatsoever—which is not from God.' And likewise in another place I said: 'But since man cannot rise of his own accord, just as he fell of his own accord, let us hold with firm faith the right hand of God stretched out to us from above—that is, our Lord Jesus Christ.' And in the third book, when I had said that which I mentioned Pelagius also to have used from my little works—'For who sins in that which he can in no way avoid? But sin is committed: therefore it can be avoided'—I immediately went on and added: 'And yet certain things done even through ignorance are disapproved and judged to be corrected, as we read in the divine authorities.'
For the Apostle says: 'I obtained mercy, because I did it ignorantly'; and the prophet says: 'The sins of my youth and my ignorances remember not.' There are also things done by necessity that are to be disapproved, where a man wills to do rightly and cannot. For whence are those voices: 'For the good that I would I do not, but the evil that I hate, that I do'; and that: 'To will is present with me, but to accomplish the good I find not'; and that: 'The flesh lusts against the spirit, and the spirit against the flesh. For these are contrary to one another, that you may not do the things that you would'? But all these belong to men coming from that condemnation of death. For if this is not the punishment of man, but his nature, these are no sins at all.
For if one does not depart from that mode in which he was naturally made, so that he cannot be better, he does what he owes when he does these things. But if he were a good man, he would be otherwise; as it is now, however, because it is so, he is not good, nor has he it in his power to be good—whether by not seeing what he ought to be, or by seeing and not being able to be what he sees he ought to be. Who can doubt that this is a punishment? But every punishment, if it is just, is the punishment of sin and is called a penalty. But if the punishment is unjust—since no one doubts that it is a punishment—it has been imposed on man by some unjust one holding dominion. But since it is the mark of a madman to doubt concerning the omnipotence and justice of God, this punishment is just and is paid for some sin.
For no unjust lord could either snatch man away as if from a God who was ignorant, or wrest him from an unwilling God as though from a weaker one, either by terrifying or by throwing Him into confusion, so as to torment man with an unjust punishment. It remains, therefore, that this just punishment comes from the condemnation of man. And in another place: 'To approve,' I said, 'false things for true, so that one errs unwillingly, and, with the pain of the carnal chain resisting and torturing, not to be able to abstain from lustful works—this is not the nature of man as instituted, but the punishment of one condemned. But when we speak of the right will of doing, we speak, namely, of that in which man was made.' Behold, so long before the Pelagian heresy had arisen, we discussed thus, as though we were now discussing against them.
For when goods were said to be from God—that is, both the great and the intermediate and the least—among the intermediate goods, indeed, free choice of the will is found, because we can use it also badly; but nevertheless it is such that without it we cannot live rightly. And the good use of it is already virtue, which is found among the great goods, which no one can use badly. And because all goods, as has been said—both the great and the intermediate and the least—are from God, it follows that from God is also the good use of free will, which is virtue and is numbered among the great goods. Then it was said from what misery—most justly inflicted on sinners—the grace of God delivers, because man could fall of his own accord, that is, by free choice, but could not also rise.
To which misery of just condemnation belong the ignorance and difficulty which every man suffers from the beginning of his birth; nor is anyone freed from this evil except by the grace of God. This misery the Pelagians refuse to derive from just condemnation, denying original sin—although, even if ignorance and difficulty were the natural first beginnings of man, God would not thus be to be blamed, but praised, as we discussed in that same third book.
This discussion is to be held against the Manichees, who do not accept the holy Scriptures of the Old Testament, in which original sin is narrated, and who contend that whatever is read on that subject in the apostolic letters was inserted with detestable impudence by corrupters of the Scriptures, as though it had not been said by the apostles. But against the Pelagians this is to be defended, which both Scriptures commend, which they profess to accept. This work begins thus: 'Tell me, I pray you, whether God is not the author of evil.' CHAPTER IX. ON GENESIS AGAINST THE MANICHEES, TWO BOOKS. Now, being established in Africa, I wrote two books on Genesis against the Manichees.
For although in the earlier books whatever I discussed—whereby I might show that God is the supremely good and immutable creator of all mutable natures, and that no nature is evil, whether it be substance, in so far as it is nature and substance—our attention was on guard against the Manichees; nevertheless these two books were published most openly against them, in defense of the old Law, which they attack with the vehement zeal of a raving error: in the first, from that which is written, 'In the beginning God made heaven and earth,' until the seven days are completed, where it is read that God rested on the seventh day; but in the second, from that which is written:
'This is the book of the creation of heaven and earth,' until Adam and his wife were sent away from paradise, and a guard was set over the tree of life. Then at the end of the book I opposed to the error of the Manichees the faith of catholic truth, briefly and clearly comprehending what they say and what we say. But as to what I said—'That light, however, does not feed the eyes of irrational birds, but the pure hearts of those who believe God and turn themselves from the love of visible and temporal things to fulfilling His precepts, which all men can do if they will'—let not the new heretics, the Pelagians, suppose that it was said in accordance with their view. For it is altogether true that all men can do this, if they will.
But the will is prepared by the Lord and is increased only by the gift of charity, so that men become able. This was not said here for the reason that it was not necessary to the question then before me. As for what is read there — namely, that the blessing of the Lord, of which it was said, 'Increase and multiply,' is to be believed to have been converted into carnal fecundity after sin, if it cannot be seen to have been said in any other way except that those men are supposed not to have been going to have children unless they had sinned — this I by no means approve.
Neither does it follow that, for this reason, it should be understood as to be taken only allegorically — namely, that in the books of Genesis the green herbs and fruit-bearing trees are given as food to every kind of beast and to all birds and to all serpents — merely because there are also quadrupeds and flying creatures that seem to live on flesh alone. For it could come to pass that they too should be nourished by men from the fruits of the earth, if, on account of the obedience by which men themselves served God without any iniquity, they deserved to have all beasts and birds serving them in every way. Likewise, what I said concerning the people of Israel may cause difficulty:
'That people, still serving the law with bodily circumcision and sacrifices as though amid the sea of the nations, since among the nations it could not sacrifice' — just as even now we see that they have remained without sacrifices, unless perhaps the fact that at Passover they slay a lamb should be reckoned as a sacrifice. In the second book also, what I set down — that by the name of 'fodder' (pabulum) life can be signified — the codices of a better reading do not have 'pabulum' but 'faenum' (hay); and this does not seem aptly said. For the name of hay does not fit the signification of life in the way that 'fodder' does. Likewise I do not seem to have rightly called those words 'prophetic' in which it is written, 'Why is earth and ashes proud?' — because it is not read in that book which we may be certain ought to be called a prophet.
Nor did I, when I was expounding what is written — 'God breathed into his face the breath of life, and man was made into a living soul' or 'into a living being' — understand that saying of the Apostle, where he brings forward a testimony from Genesis, saying, 'The first man Adam was made into a living soul,' in the way that he intended it to be expounded. For the Apostle brought forward that testimony in order to prove that there is an animal body; but I thought that from this it was to be shown that man was first made animal — not the body of man only. As to what I said, that sins harm no nature save their own, I said it because he who harms a just man does not truly harm him, since he increases his reward in the heavens;
but by sinning he truly harms himself, since on account of the very will to harm he shall receive that with which he did harm. The Pelagians can indeed drag this statement to their own dogma and thereby say that the sins of others have not harmed little children, because I said that sins harm no nature save their own — not observing that little children, who assuredly belong to human nature, contract original sin for this reason: because in the first men human nature sinned, and thus no sins harmed human nature save its own. For through one man, in whom all sinned, sin entered into the world; for I did not say that sins harm no man, but that they harm no nature save its own.