反亞流神學文集 第 1 章

PROLOGUE OF ST. FULGENTIUS, BISHOP OF RUSPE, TO THE THREE BOOKS ADDRESSED TO MONIMUS. 1. I give thanks to the Lord that you do not cease to bring forth good things out of the good treasure of your heart (Matt. xii, 35). And the gracious tongue that abounds in a good man discloses the purity of your heart. Though it overflows with the streams of eloquence divinely granted, yet I believe that not so much is expressed by words as I know to be contained in the inmost recesses of your heart. For, kindled with divine fire, you so continually share our sufferings that even those tribulations which, though they befell us, were nevertheless overcome with the Lord's help—these too you almost always so suffer on our behalf, that as often as you revolve them in your heart, so often are you in a manner compelled to suffer them.

See how great a good charity possesses, see how great a praise it holds before God and men, that while it grieves over what befalls the one it loves, by frequent remembrance it itself endures the more. This therefore remains, that what charity is wont to do, you may do continually for us. And what else is this than that you should always pray for us to Him in whom you purely love us? For charity ever prays for those it loves, since it fears even those things that are safe. Yet it fears not with that fear which it casts out—for perfect charity casts out fear (1 John iv, 18)—but with that fear which it is wont to have not unto fear, but unto love. It fears therefore not with a timid fear, but with a chaste one.

For it fears not with dread of crime, but with the strength of purity and the firmness of virtue. You further exact of me a debt, which, with the Lord's help, I promise to repay speedily. For I do not profess this debt in the way that your Maro recounts of a certain man, who confessed himself indeed to owe it, but denied that he could repay it; rather, I confess myself to owe that which I do not deny I am able to repay, but promise to do so. For He Himself gives me that whence I may repay, who gave that I should owe. For unless we had received from Him, we could not only not repay, but not even owe at all. For what do we owe one another except charity? Which indeed blessed Paul, speaking these things to the faithful, plainly shows: 'Owe no man anything, but to love one another' (Rom.

xiii, 8). But who would confess a debt, if he denied having received? Therefore, in the very thing which we say we owe, we assuredly show that we have received. For the blessed Apostle says: 'For what have you that you did not receive? And if you received, why do you glory, as though you had not received?' (1 Cor. iv, 7). For in another place too he testifies: 'Because the charity of God is poured forth in our hearts by the Holy Spirit who is given to us' (Rom. v, 5). He therefore who gave us what by repaying we should owe, will Himself grant us the power by which we may repay what we owe. He then is the author of the debt, who is the author of the gift. For He deigned by His own bounty even to make Himself a debtor—not because, being in need, He received from anyone, but because, abounding, He bestowed liberally.

For, entrusting the half-dead man, set upon his own beast, to the innkeeper to be cared for, and giving two denarii, He so professes Himself a debtor as to say, 'Whatever you spend over and above, when I return, I will repay you' (Luke x, 35). But what is 'whatever you spend over and above,' except 'whatever more you receive from me'? For he too who spent over and above, in that he had received no precept but was giving counsel out of charity, professed that he had indeed obtained mercy. For he says: 'Concerning virgins I have no commandment of the Lord, but I give counsel, as one that has obtained mercy of the Lord to be faithful' (1 Cor. vii, 25). He therefore obtained mercy, not only that he might receive what to spend, but also that he might spend yet more.

Behold what manner of Lord is ours, that by giving He becomes a debtor, and the more He gives, the more it does not irk Him to be a debtor. For insofar as He bestows freely, so far is He found a debtor. For no one can have Him as a debtor except in that which He Himself has deigned to confer by free bounty. Therefore ask Him continually on my behalf, that He may bestow on me the power of repaying the debt—He who granted that in Him I should owe you the free servitude of charity. For that I may truly confess to your heart—which is my own heart—the whole matter, since I can hide nothing from your heart any more than from my own: it was this consideration that procured for me the slowness in repaying the debt.

Since I was compelled to reply to the empty babblings of a certain heretic, who not only did not hesitate to assail my name under the brand of the Photinian error, but even wished to turn against me the sayings of Saints Augustine and Jerome, as though contrary to my profession. Whose name I have for now deferred to disclose in this letter, but you can doubtless yourself recall it. For while you were staying with us there at Carthage, his sayings were brought to me, and, if I recall rightly, they came also to your knowledge; for nothing could I read while you were there, which I could not offer to you to be reviewed. Those same little books, therefore, if the Lord will, I shall speedily send to your charity.

And I do not doubt that you will deign patiently to bear my slowness in your debt. For I know how greatly you are delighted, and how greatly you yourself ever urge us, that we, with the Lord's help, should not be loath to reply to heretics. BOOK ONE, ON THE TWOFOLD PREDESTINATION OF GOD, THE ONE OF THE GOOD UNTO GLORY, THE OTHER OF THE WICKED UNTO PUNISHMENT. CHAPTER ONE. God inspires us to seek Him, and is found by those who seek. 3. Your letter, dearest son Monimus, as much as it displays the delightful sincerity of your mind and the praiseworthy ardor of your spiritual zeal, so much does it seem, with querulous kindness, to reproach the slowness of my response.

As though I seem to love you less than I ought, in that I have not taken care to respond speedily to your inquiries. But believe me, that just as in the charity of Christ your person is by no means despised in my heart, so my response was delayed not by will, but by the diversity of occupations. Yet nonetheless, amid the very occupations which I am compelled unwillingly to endure, I rejoice with your zeal as much as I am delighted by your charity.

All the more do I embrace the holy purpose of your eagerness, in that, like a truly spiritual merchant pursuing the gains of the inner man and desiring more and more to enlarge the profits of heavenly wares, you first add to the debt you demand of me a further heaping-up through the interest of your questions—so that this very necessity of my slowness may serve the increase of your advantages. Accordingly, I trust in the mercy of our God, that if anything of this inquiry and disputation is not granted me by the work, according to my merit, it will be granted me for the sake of your desire.

For God will in no way allow your inquiry to be defrauded of the effect of discovery—He who kindled you spiritually to inquire—since His faithful promise can by no reasoning be made void, saying: 'Ask, and you shall receive; seek, and you shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you' (Luke xi, 9). The inward Master, therefore, from whom we receive the aid of heavenly teaching, not only opens the secrets of His discourses to us as we inquire, but that we may even inquire, He Himself freely inspires the affection. For neither can we hunger for that bread which came down from heaven (John vi, 33), unless the hunger be given by Him to us who are without appetite—He who deigns to give Himself for the filling of the hungry.

From Him also comes it that we thirsty ones run to the fountain, who gives Himself to us that we may drink. He therefore is to be praised in the grace of both gifts: both when He rouses us, sleeping, to seek Him, and when He grants Himself to be found by us who seek. And He is assuredly in no way found, unless He Himself awakens us that He may be sought. CHAPTER II. On the same argument. Turning over your writings, therefore, as though they were my own bonds, that I might learn from them of how many, or of what, questions I was your debtor, I was able to find, for the present, two letters. One containing the words of Saint Augustine, which he is known to have set down, among other things, in his book on the Perfection of Man's Righteousness, concerning those who are predestined to destruction.

To which I seem to have found immediately subjoined a question—that is, concerning the sacrifice which some think is offered to the Father alone. But in the other letter I found an inquiry placed: What is it that the Apostle was able to spend over and above the two denarii which he received? Since, then, I found only these two letters, I straightway remembered also a third, which was not presented to me by the notary, in which I recall one question is contained concerning the Holy Spirit—namely, why He is asked to be sent by the Father to consecrate the sacrifice of the Body and Blood of the Lord. These, then, for the present, are four questions, of which three are from your two letters, but one I have recalled at the prompting of memory. And if perchance there are others,

which you sent us to be resolved, and you do not find them set down or resolved in this work, I beg that you may not reduce it to contempt or disdain, but patiently pardon it as forgetfulness; especially since that concerning the Holy Spirit, which I recalled even though the letter was not found, I could not pass over in silence. But since you without doubt remember all of them (if perchance there are any), let it not irk you that I be reminded by your writing back. And I hope that, insofar as the Lord shall help, our response will follow, if it be supported by the aid of your preceding prayer. CHAPTER III. The first question, on predestination. The words of Monimus on the twin predestination.

About to seek understanding of the first question, therefore, in the name of Him of whom it is written that 'the Lord gives wisdom, and from His face come knowledge and understanding' (Prov. ii, 6), I have judged it more fitting and convenient to turn over both your own words and those of the blessed Augustine which you set down in your letter: so that, these being reread, both the intention and the solution of the question may more easily be recognized. 'As I was reading,' you say, 'the book on the Perfection of Man's Righteousness, on reconsidering the testimony of the prophet in its order, I with cautious hearing little by little went slowly back over the place where he says: There is none that does good, no, not up to one' (Ps. xiii, 3).

And without any cloud, without any doubt, that most truthful interpreter himself expressed that there is such a kind of men, which does not do good—that kind assuredly predestined to destruction. And, that your discourse might be supported by the eloquence of the aforesaid holy man, subjoining the same words which were spoken by the blessed Augustine (On the Perfection of Righteousness, ch. 13): 'For,' you say, 'the same most glorious Augustine says: We ought here to understand this said of that good of which he there says: God looked down from heaven upon the sons of men, to see if there be any that understands, or seeks after God' (Ps. xiii, 2).

'This good, therefore, which is to seek God, there was none that did it, there was none up to one, but in that kind of men which is predestined to destruction.' Here, determining the sayings of Saint Augustine, and directing the intention of your letter to me, you say that I already understand why you again inculcate these things—namely, that when I often resisted you, saying that predestination is spoken not only in the good, but also in the evil, while you said you had read predestination even unto evil, I myself, teaching, would say that another predestination can be spoken unto the due penalty, not unto the doing of evil. Which you also, as you wrote, confirm. Yet you assert that you know what I would here reply, to defend my opinion—that is, that 'destruction' is spoken of nothing but death.

And you add that meanwhile you had read this, and had even asserted that the people were predestined to destruction. Then you admonish me to consider the discourse of that very passage, and that, as a teacher of my disciples, not as an asserter of my own propositions, I should make you know what is to be followed. CHAPTER IV. The author's modest and theological invocation. I indeed, dearest one, insofar as, by the Lord bestowing His free grace, I am able to recognize the measure of my own littleness, set under that one Lord and Master, in His school, do not aspire to be called the master or teacher of my brethren, whose fellow-disciple in the truth I ever desire to be.

Wherefore I do not cease to ask of that true Lord and Master of ours, that He would deign to teach me those things—whether through the utterances of His Scriptures, or through the discourse of my brethren and fellow-disciples, or even through the inward and sweeter teaching of His inspiration (where, without the sounds of words and without the elements of letters, truth speaks the more sweetly the more secretly)—that He would deign to teach me those things, so that I may so propound them, so assert them, that in my propositions and assertions I may ever cleave to the truth (which neither deceives nor is deceived), and ever be found obedient and consenting.

For that I may be able to obey and consent to the truth, the truth itself illumines, itself helps, itself confirms; from it I ask to be taught the many things I do not know, from which I have received the few things I do know. I beseech it that, by mercy going before and following after, it may teach me whatever things salutary to be known I do not know; may keep me in those things which I truly know; may correct me in those in which, as a man, I am deceived; may confirm me in those true things in which I waver; and may snatch me from things false and harmful—that in my thoughts and words it may find what it salutarily grants, and may cause those things to proceed from my mouth which are first of all pleasing before itself, and so become acceptable to all the faithful. CHAPTER V.

Response to the first question, how some are predestined to destruction. The death of sinners is not predestined by God. Insofar, therefore, as, by the truth itself (which is the true light) illumining my darkness (Ps. xvii, 29), the faculty of understanding has thus far been granted me in the scrutiny of this question, I think that nothing else is to be understood in that discourse of Saint Augustine, in which he affirms that certain persons are predestined to destruction, except unto the destruction of punishment, not of fault; nor unto the evil which they unjustly commit, but unto the torment which they will most justly suffer;

nor unto the sin by which they either do not receive, or lose, the benefit of the first resurrection, but unto the torment which their own iniquity wickedly begets for them and the divine equity rightly requites; nor unto the first death of the soul, in which little children are born, or into which (as the blessed James says) the criminous fall, drawn away and enticed by their own concupiscence (James i, 14), but unto the second death, which they must needs suffer, the most just Judge requiting—whether those who depart from the world before receiving the grace of baptism, or those who, receiving the grace of God in vain (2 Cor.

vi, 1) after receiving baptism, who prefer, unto the end of the present life, to be slaves of sin, and are unwilling, while it is the acceptable time and the day of salvation, to be converted from their evil way, that they may live; and, ignorant that the goodness of God leads them to repentance, they themselves, according to their hardness and impenitent heart, treasure up to themselves wrath in the day of wrath and of the revelation of the just judgment of God (Rom. ii, 4, 5). Of that death, therefore, which sinners have summoned to themselves by hands and words, and, deeming it a friend, have wasted away toward it, it is said: 'Do not court death in the error of your life, neither procure the destruction of your souls, for God made not death, neither has He pleasure in the destruction of the living' (Wis. i, 12-13).

And in another place it is said of this death: 'But by the envy of the devil death entered into the world. And they follow him that are of his portion' (Wis. ii, 24-25). That we might recognize this death to be alien from the work and predestination of God, God Himself thus speaks through the prophet: 'Turn, and turn yourselves away from all your impieties, and they shall not be to you unto the punishment of iniquity. Cast away from you all your iniquities, which you have wickedly done against me, and make yourselves a new heart and a new spirit. And why will you die, O house of Israel? For I desire not the death of him that dies, but that he should turn from his evil way, and his soul should live' (Ezek. xviii, 30-32).

This is the death of impiety, which God did not make, which entered into the world through the devil. In this they follow him who are of his portion. CHAPTER VI. God requites this death with a twofold death. The death of the soul in hell. To this one death, which the sinner summoned to himself unjustly by longing, through contempt of the divine command, God, judging justly, requites a twofold death; that is, the first in the separation of soul and body, the second in the eternal torturing of soul and body. And through this the first, whereby, the soul departing, the flesh alone dies; but the second, when the soul, returning into the flesh, is tortured in the same and with the same flesh in which it sinned;

so that with that with which it shared the death of sin, which the goodness of God forbade to man, it may share the death of punishment, which the divine justice prepared for the sinner. Of this death our Savior says: 'Fear not those who kill the body, but cannot kill the soul; but rather fear Him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell' (Matt. x, 28). That the wicked, therefore, perish before hell, is not of the divine work, but of the human. But that they are to perish in hell, this the equity of God brings about, to whom no iniquity of the sinner is pleasing. For 'he who loves iniquity hates his own soul' (Ps. x, 6). And John says: 'Because everyone who commits sin commits also iniquity;

and sin is iniquity' (1 John iii, 4). And God says through the prophet: 'For the soul that sins, the same shall die' (Ezek. xviii, 4). But concerning the Son of God, John says: 'We know that He appeared to take away sins, and in Him there is no sin' (1 John iii, 5). As, therefore, sin is not in Him, so sin is not from Him. But what is not from Him is assuredly not His work. And what is never in His work was never in His predestination. CHAPTER VII. How the wicked are predestined by God, not unto guilt, but unto punishment. God forestalls those to be saved, and finds those to be damned.

The wicked, therefore, are not predestined to this, that they do evil, drawn away and enticed by their own concupiscence, but to this, that they justly suffer against their will. For by the name of predestination there is not expressed some coercive necessity of the human will, but the merciful and just everlasting disposition of the future divine work is proclaimed. 'Unto God,' therefore, 'mercy and judgment sing' (Ps. c, 1), O Church, whose work this is in man: that by the hidden—yet not unjust—counsel of His will, He may either bestow gratuitous mercy on the wretched, or repay due justice to the unjust. Nay, either mercifully to remit to the debtor what He could justly exact if He willed, or justly to exact His own with interest (Matt.

xxv, 27), and repay to the wicked debtor what is owed to his iniquities. And thus, either He forestalls the one utterly unworthy of mercy, or He finds the other worthy of wrath. For He Himself freely gives grace to the unworthy, by which the ungodly, being justified, may be enlightened with the gift of a good will and the capacity for good action, so that by preceding mercy he may begin to will the good, and by following mercy he may be able to do the good which he wills. And both of these, by predestining, God prepared in that unchangeable will, in which He so disposed the future effect of the man to be renewed, that His will in the new work cannot be new. CHAPTER VIII. The grace of God both initiates man's merit unto righteousness and consummates it unto glory.

How the will is prepared by the Lord. He also gives grace to the worthy in the requital of the eternal reward: namely, that whether when the just One piously justifies the ungodly (since concerning Him the Apostle says, 'That He might be just, and the justifier of him who is of the faith of Jesus,' Rom. iii, 26), or when the merciful One justly glorifies the just (since 'whom He justified, them He also glorified,' Rom. viii, 30), it may be the same operation of grace, which both initiates man's good merit unto righteousness and consummates it unto glory.

First He begins the good will in man; then He assists that same will once begun, so that the same will may both be good by the divine gift and be able, by the divine help, to overcome evil concupiscence, and so that, with God bringing it to perfection, that will may afterward become such that it can no longer harbor evil concupiscence. And thus in the present life, by the help of grace, it does not yield to its weakness, while in the life to come, by the benefit of grace, it will have no weakness at all. Now it is continually restored by the succor of the remedy, but then it will truly enjoy the eternal fullness of health. And these things God does, just as He has always held them in predestination, so by grace He accomplishes them exactly as He had predestined.

And so the acknowledgment of that very predestination is conveyed when Scripture says: And the will is prepared by the Lord (Prov. VIII, 35, according to the Septuagint). Now it is called prepared for no other reason than that it is foretold as something to be given. For by Him from whom it is prepared through His everlasting goodness, by that same One it is given through undeserved grace. This the Lord Himself attests through the prophecy of Ezekiel, saying: I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit will I put within you, and I will take away the heart of stone from your flesh, and I will give you a heart of flesh, and my Spirit I will put within you. And I will cause you to walk in my justifications and to observe my judgments and to do them (Ezek. XXXVI, 26).

God therefore gives a new heart, that we may walk in His justifications, which pertains to the beginning of a good will. He also gives that we may observe and do His judgments, which pertains to the effect of good working. CHAPTER IX. Both the will and the capacity for good work are from God. In God we shall do valor, that is, the work of virtue. He who does the truth comes to the light. God Himself works every good work in us. Whence we recognize that it is of God both that we should will to do good and that we should be able to do good. With this understanding David wholly agrees, thus showing that the grace of willing well is bestowed by the directing of the divine bounty: By the Lord shall the steps of a man be directed, and He shall will his way (Ps. XXXVI, 23).

He testifies also that good work is done only by God in us, and in God by us, saying: Confirm this, O God, which Thou hast wrought in us (Ps. LXVII, 29). And in another place: In God we shall do valor (Ps. LIX, 14), that is, the work of virtue. Here he said 'valor is done' in place of the work of virtue, just as John said 'righteousness is done' in place of the work of righteousness. For he says: He who does righteousness is righteous, even as He is righteous (1 John III, 7). Paul too declares that God's will is wrought in us as our desire, saying: Now the God of peace, who brought again from the dead the great shepherd of the sheep, in the blood of the eternal testament, our Lord Jesus, fit you in every good thing, that you may do His will (Heb. XIII, 20).

But what is it to do His will, except to do the works which His will inspires in us and works within us? We find something of this kind also in the sayings of our very Redeemer, when He speaks of truth being done, in place of the work of truth. For thus He speaks: Everyone who does evil hates the light, and does not come to the light, lest his works be reproved. But he who does the truth comes to the light, that his works may be made manifest, because they are wrought in God (John III, 20). Now this we do in God: that which, when God works it in us, is granted to us to do. This is plainly shown in the Epistle to the Hebrews, where, when it had been said of God: Fit you in every good thing, that you may do His will, there immediately follows:

Working in you what is pleasing in His sight (Heb. XIII, 21). Every work, therefore, which is done by us in God, God works in us. For from Him, and through Him, and in Him are all things (Rom. XI, 36). From Him, therefore, is both the good will and the good working. This the Teacher of the Gentiles affirms in these words: For it is God who works in you both to will and to accomplish, according to His good will (Phil. II, 13). Therefore, just as Solomon says that the will is prepared by the Lord, so too Paul asserts that our good works have been prepared by the Lord, that is, arranged in predestination. And so he says: By grace you have been saved through faith, and this not of yourselves, but it is the gift of God. Not of works, that no one may boast;

for we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God has prepared that we should walk in them (Eph. II, 8). Just as, therefore, the will by which we would will the good has been prepared by the Lord through predestination, so also God has prepared good works, that we should walk in them. CHAPTER X. Not only the will, but also good work and eternal life, are prepared by God through predestination. Let us also consider eternal life and the kingdom of heaven, divinely prepared by faith for the faithful. For Christ Himself shows that He will say to those on His right: Come, you blessed of my Father, receive the kingdom which has been prepared for you from the foundation of the world (Matt. XXV, 34). But this too is a work of grace.

For out of grace is given not only a good life to the justified, but also eternal life to the glorified. This we hold as ascertained by Paul's preaching, when he says: For the wages of sin is death. But the grace of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord (Rom. VI, 23). But why is death called wages, while eternal life is called grace, except that the one is repaid, the other is bestowed? Yet when God repays that death, He punishes the evil work of sinful man, which man would by no means have done had he not departed from God. But when God bestows eternal life, He brings to perfection His own work, which He began by justifying the ungodly, by glorifying the just. And both of these—that is, both the good life and eternal life—are in Christ Jesus our Lord.

For of His fullness we have all received, and grace for grace (John I, 16), namely the grace of eternal glorification for the grace of undeserved justification, so that the grace of justification may blot out all evil merit by an undeserved benefit, and may strengthen good merit with unceasing help—the merit to which the grace of just glorification is repaid as a reward. Yet even this grace is not unjustly called grace, because God not only repays His own gifts with His own gifts, but because there too the grace of divine recompense so overflows that it incomparably and ineffably surpasses all merit—however good and given by God—of human will and working.

For although the blessed Apostle Paul shows that God gives us not only the light of believing in Christ, but also the virtue of suffering for Him, saying: For to you it has been granted for Christ's sake, not only to believe in Him, but also to suffer for Him (Phil. I, 29)—both of which pertain to the grace of the present good life—yet he sets that grace of the future life before all the sufferings of the present time, saying: The sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the future glory that shall be revealed in us (Rom. VIII, 18). And in another place: For that which is at present momentary and light in our tribulation works for us above measure exceedingly an eternal weight of glory (2 Cor. IV, 17). CHAPTER XI.

Grace begins by going before, and by following after it guards the good work. In predestination is contained all the grace of calling, of justification, and of glorification. He says that this grace abides not only in the justification of the present life, but also in the recompense of the age to come, and he asserts that it abounds upon us, that is, above all the good merits of any man whatsoever, in the goodness of God, saying: That He might show in the ages to come the exceeding riches of His grace, in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus (Eph. II, 7). Grace, therefore, is a merciful recompense, by which God in the present time repays good things for evils—namely to those ungodly whom He justifies, so that faith may be reckoned unto righteousness.

Of this recompense David says: What shall I render to the Lord for all the things that He has rendered to me (Ps. CXV, 12)? Grace is also that just recompense by which God, repaying better things for His own good things, will glorify the just. And this too will be a work of grace. For in order that they may merit this, grace itself, going before, mercifully begins it; grace itself, following after, guards it. This grace is also called mercy in the Scriptures. Of it David says: My God, His mercy shall go before me (Ps. LVIII, 11). And in another place: Thy mercy shall follow me all the days of my life (Ps. XXII, 6). It goes before the ungodly, that he may become just; it follows after the just, that he may not become ungodly. It goes before the blind man, to give him the light he has not found;

it follows after the seeing man, to preserve the light it has conferred. It goes before the fallen, that he may rise; it follows after the raised, that he may not fall. It goes before, granting to man a good will; it follows after the well-willing, working in him the capacity for good work. This, therefore, is what this mercy of God follows after in man: what it, going before, itself bestows. And so it not only recalls the erring to the way by justifying him, but also guards and helps the one who walks well, that it may lead him to the gift of eternal glorification. And all these—that is, both the beginnings of our calling, the increases of justification, and the rewards of glorification—God has always held in predestination:

because in the calling, in the justification, and in the glorification of the saints, He foreknew the future works of His grace. On this account the Apostle assigns the whole to God, saying: For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brethren. And whom He predestined, these He also called; and whom He called, these He also justified; and whom He justified, these He also glorified (Rom. VIII, 29). Nevertheless, when we hear the justified and the glorified named together, let us not attribute both the work of justification and of glorification to the present time. For the grace of justification is given in the present, but that of glorification is reserved for the future. The one belongs to faith, the other to hope.

And Paul says: For now we walk by faith, not by sight (2 Cor. V, 7). For what the saints now believe, they shall then see. Wherefore it is said to the Church: Hearken, O daughter, and see; because faith comes by hearing—whence the just man, living by faith, says with confidence: I believe I shall see the good things of the Lord in the land of the living (Ps. XXVI, 13). This, then, is the order of divine redemption and recompense in man: that being now justified he should believe what, being then glorified, he shall receive. Wherefore Paul says: Not that I have already attained, or am already perfect (Phil. III, 12). CHAPTER XII. God is said to have done what He predestined to be done. God's promises are certain from His omnipotence.

In this justification, therefore, the saints as they go, go forth and weep, casting their seed; but in that glorification, coming they shall come with exultation, bearing their sheaves. In this the laborers of the householder work in the vineyard; but in that they shall without doubt enjoy the reward of the denarius. This God now bestows, that one who is unworthy may freely receive the beginning of good merit; but that other He keeps reserved for the future, whereby he who received the beginning of good merit while unworthy may become worthy to receive the reward of good merit. Therefore, when Paul says: Because whom God justified, these He also glorified (Rom.

VIII, 30), he does not attribute both to the present life, but by that faith whereby he holds what is future as already done, he confirms it—the faith by which the prophet says of God: Who has made the things that are to come. For in that immovability of His counsel, according to His good pleasure, which He purposed in Him, in the dispensation of the fullness of times, to gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven and which are on earth (Eph. I, 9-10)—in Him, from the eternity of His disposing, in predestination He has already done whatsoever, by the effect of His own work, He arranged to be done at the fitting time. For just as no work of the Creator could be, nor can be, made without a beginning:

so that everlasting will of His is never subject to mutability, because it has no beginning of existence. And that which always is, in such a way that it did not begin to be, is without doubt in such a way that what it is cannot fail to be. True immutability, therefore, is worthily called true eternity; and in that eternity of His unchangeable will the Creator is said already to have done what, in the mutable creature, according as He disposed it to be done opportunely, He duly brings about when it has been thus disposed. And therefore whatsoever He has promised, we say is already done, because we ought not to doubt concerning the things to be done.

For our father Abraham (as the Apostle says) did not waver at God's promise through distrust, but was strengthened in faith, giving glory to God, being most fully assured that whatsoever He has promised, He is able also to perform (Rom. IV, 20-21). Therefore in God's promises there is no falsehood, because in the things to be done there is no difficulty for the Almighty. And for that reason the effect of His will is never lacking there, because that will itself is found to be nothing other than power. Whatever He wills, He can do—He who can do as much as He wills. Therefore of Him alone it is worthily said: Whatsoever He willed, He did (Ps. CXIII, 11). And again: For it is in Thy power, when Thou wilt, to be able (Wis. XII, 18).

Therefore we said that the power of His will is as great as is that very will of power. Because in Him for whom to be able is always at hand when He wills, to will is nothing other than to be able. CHAPTER XIII. God's just predestination to punishment for sins. God shows grace to the saints, justice to the ungodly. The future wrath of God is condemnation unto punishment. Since, therefore, God is compelled by no necessity to promise anything unwillingly, He is surely hindered by the obstacle of no adversity from doing what He has promised either less than He wills or more slowly. Accordingly He was able, just as He willed, to predestine some to glory, some to punishment. But those whom He predestined to glory, He predestined to righteousness.

But those whom He predestined to punishment, He did not predestine to guilt. For some sin could be from God's predestination, if any man could sin justly. But no man sins justly, although God justly permits him to sin. For he is justly forsaken by God who forsakes God. And because man, forsaking God, sins, God, forsaking the sinner, keeps justice. And what is more just than that he who already sins by the desire of sinning should, for the very reason that, desiring to sin, he makes himself hurtful to himself, be permitted to wound himself by his own sin? In the saints, therefore, God crowns the righteousness which He Himself freely bestowed on them, freely preserved, and freely perfected.

But the wicked He will condemn for the impiety or injustice which He Himself did not work in them. For in the former He glorifies His own works, but in the latter He condemns works not His own. This, therefore, God predestined: what He Himself was going to do, or what He was going to bestow. But that He by no means predestined which He Himself was not going to do, whether through grace or through justice. Accordingly it seems that it must be inquired most diligently what God works in those whom He freely justifies, and what also in those whom He justly condemns. For the excellent Teacher of the Gentiles says: But if our iniquity commend the justice of God, what shall we say? Is God unjust, who inflicts wrath? (I speak as a man.) God forbid! (Rom. III, 5).

Here he put wrath in place of condemnation, just as elsewhere John the Baptist says: He who is unbelieving to the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abides upon him (John III, 36). This wrath he announces with rebuke to the Pharisees and Sadducees, saying: Brood of vipers, who has shown you to flee from the wrath to come? (Matt. III, 7; Luke III, 7). From this wrath the Lord Christ has rescued us, which Paul confirmed by truthful preaching, saying to the Thessalonians: How you turned to God from idols, to serve the living and true God, and to await His Son from heaven, whom He raised from the dead, Jesus, who has rescued us from the wrath to come (1 Thess. I, 9-10).

This wrath, that is, the punishment which is prepared for the wicked, he calls destruction in another place, saying: For when they shall say peace and security, then sudden destruction shall come upon them, as travail upon her that is with child, and they shall not escape (1 Thess. V, 3). CHAPTER XIV. Whether the works of the damned are predestined like the works of the just. The beginning of good will is predestined by God. God causes us to do good. Let us therefore inquire whether God is to be believed to have predestined the works of the wicked, for which He condemns them, just as He is said to have predestined in the saints what He crowns. But when we inquire into the cause of the condemnation of the wicked and the glorification of the saints, we do not deny that they are predestined, either the former to punishment or the latter to glory.

But whether, just as the good works are believed to be divinely predestined, for which the just shall be glorified, so too the evil works are to be believed divinely predestined, for which the unjust shall be punished forever. For it is said in the book of Psalms: The unjust shall be punished, and the seed of the ungodly shall perish; but the salvation of the just is from the Lord (Ps. XXXVI, 28). Of both our Savior also says: Then those shall go into everlasting burning, but the just into life eternal (Matt. XXV, 46). In both, therefore, that is, in the just and the unjust, I judge that three things must be considered: the beginning of the will, the progress of the work, the end of recompense. So that whatever just and good things we see in these, we may attribute to the just and good God;

but those things we may know to be unworthy of God, in which we find neither goodness nor justice. And having considered the quality of the works, let us believe those to have been predestined by God which are found worthy of and fitting to the divine mercy or equity: For the Lord is merciful and compassionate and just (Ps. CXI, 4). And first of all we confess that the beginning of every good will has been both predestined and given by that everlasting Trinity, which is the one, only, and true God. For He has bestowed on man, prepared by free justification, that which He had prepared to be bestowed in the eternal predestination. This preparation of the will I have shown above by the testimony of Holy Scripture, where it was said: The will is prepared by the Lord.

By Him, therefore, the will is prepared, who mercifully works in us both to will and to accomplish. For the Apostle says: For it is God who works in us both to will and to accomplish, according to His good will (Phil. II, 13). God also, speaking through the prophet, affirms that He Himself does what He grants to the faithful to do, according to that oracle which we have already set down above, where He says: And I will cause you to walk in my justifications, and to observe my judgments and to do them (Ezek. XXXVI, 27). But what is 'I will cause you to do,' except 'every good that you shall have wrought shall be of my working'? He Himself, therefore, causes us to do, so that, with Him working in us, every good that we do comes to pass. Of which it is said to the Hebrews:

Fit you in every good thing, working in you what is pleasing in His sight (Heb. XIII, 21). And so, God's grace having been demonstrated in the good will and working of man, who would contend that the glory of the future recompense also, which shall be given to the saints, is not of the divine grace? Since whether we believe or work—though the faith be ours, and the works be ours, as the Lord Himself says: According to your faith be it unto you, and blessed John proclaims: This is the victory that overcomes the world, our faith (1 John V, 4), and Paul also thus writes: I thank my God through Jesus Christ for you all, because your faith is announced in all the world (Rom. I, 8)—our works too the Lord Himself attests, saying:

So let your light shine before men, that seeing your good works they may glorify your Father who is in heaven (Matt. V, 16). Yet because these things, when we have them, we do not have as born of ourselves, but as given by God—as the Apostle says: Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit which is from God, that we may know the things that are given to us by God (1 Cor. II, 12); and because whatsoever He grants us to do, just as we cannot have unless He bestows it on us, so we cannot do unless He Himself works in us what He has bestowed. CHAPTER XV. We ought not to ascribe to ourselves any good work as our own. In this life no one is perfect except in the hope of future glory. Paul both perfect and imperfect.

Therefore we are by no means permitted—indeed we are wholesomely forbidden—to claim anything for ourselves as our own, either in our faith or in our work. For the Vessel of election says: What have you that you did not receive? And if you received it, why do you boast, as if you had not received it (1 Cor. IV, 7)? And in the holy Gospel the voice of the Lord's forerunner is: A man can receive nothing, unless it be given him from heaven (John III, 27). The apostle James also testifies: That every best gift, and every perfect gift, is from above, coming down from the Father of lights (James I, 17). And what is a more perfect gift than the future glorification of the saints?

For now (so to speak) the perfection of the divine gifts is not yet a perfect perfection, seeing that here everyone who is perfect is still in need of perfection. For that same one who said: As many as, therefore, are perfect, let us be thus minded (Phil. III, 15), the same one says: Not that I have already attained, or am already perfect (Ibid. 12). He was, therefore, perfect in the hope of future glorification; but he was imperfect under the burden of corruption and mortality. For the body which is corrupted weighs down the soul, and the earthly habitation presses down the mind that muses on many things (Wis. IX, 15). He was perfect in the expectation of the reward; he was imperfect in the weariness of the struggle. He was perfect, in that with his mind he served the law of God;

he was imperfect, in that with his flesh he served the law of sin. He was perfect, having a desire to be dissolved and to be with Christ (Phil. I, 23); but he was imperfect, because as long as he was in the body, he was absent from the Lord. He was perfect, being most fully assured that God, whatsoever He has promised, is able also to perform (Rom. IV, 21); but he was imperfect, because God has not yet done in His saints certain things out of all that He promised. Wherefore also all the ancient just (as the same Apostle says), being approved by the testimony of faith, did not receive the promise, God providing something better for us, that they should not be made perfect without us (Heb. XI, 39-40).

Just as, therefore, the preceding saints, approved by the testimony of faith, are not made perfect without the perfection of those who follow, so those who follow cannot be perfected without those who precede. And so the perfect gift shall then be given to all when eternal glorification shall be bestowed on the saints. Then, as Truth says: The just shall shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father (Matt. XIII, 43). This perfect gift, therefore, is also His, from whom is the beginning of every gift. And it would certainly not be called a gift, if this too were not bestowed out of grace. CHAPTER XVI. God freely works our salvation. True glory is from God alone. Now there is one God, who freely both calls the predestined, and justifies the called, and glorifies the justified.

And just as to justify is nothing other than to make just, so to glorify is nothing other than to make glorious. Accordingly, since God both justifies and glorifies His own, just as it is a work of His grace when He makes them just, so it will be a work of His grace when He makes them glorious. For just as no one can have true righteousness unless he has been justified, so no one can have true glory unless he has been glorified. And whence true glory comes, our Savior showed when He rebuked the Jews, saying: How can you believe, who receive glory from one another, and the glory which is from God alone you do not seek (John V, 44)? Having this same understanding and truthfully saying:

But we have the mind of Christ (1 Cor. II, 16); just as he knew that true glory is from God, so he confirms that true righteousness is from God, saying: That I may be found in Him not having my own righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is of the faith of Christ, which is of God, the righteousness in faith (Phil. III, 9). And although abundant proofs abound by which it may be clear that not only the grace of good will and good working, but also the very glorification of the saints, is both begun and perfected wholly by God, yet I judge that even these things which have been set down by us suffice, such as they are. CHAPTER XVII. The beginning of all sin is pride. The fall and punishment of Lucifer. The fall of the first man.

And so now, that the course of the little book may be duly ordered, we ought also to consider the will, the working, and the recompense of the wicked. So that we may recognize whether the just God predestined the wicked to do that which He is going to punish as done in them; or whether He justly predestined the unjust to punishment, because, although He foreknew their evil works as future, He did not Himself predestine them to be future, since He Himself did not cause them to come to pass. And so, if the beginning of sin is sought, nothing else but pride is found. For Scripture says: The beginning of all sin is pride (Ecclus. X, 15).

This indeed took its beginning when the angel, lifted up against God, and by that very lifting-up cast down, through concupiscence (which is the root of all evils) willing to usurp what had not been given him by God, departed from God and fell; in which if he had stood, he would not have fallen. But through evil concupiscence, because he coveted more outside himself, he was made less within himself. This concupiscence, although he could not fulfill it in deed, he yet retained in will. Thus he himself became already a punishment to himself, so that his evil will was ever a torment to the evil one, just as his very blindness is to the blind man.

And the concupiscence of sinning became a torment to the sinner; and the rebel and deserter, who had fled that undisturbed rest, thenceforth served disturbance, and was justly abandoned by his good Lord, whom he himself unjustly abandoned. Thus it came to pass that, persevering as disordered of himself, he was ordered in himself; and in him who lost order within himself, the reason of the divine order did not perish. This also befell man, whom the devil himself cast down by his serpentine cunning. For dissenting from the good Lord, and consenting to the evil servant, he could not attain the full effect of an evil will: because that very malice of the will was not from God. For he would not have had it, if he had not departed from God. CHAPTER XVIII.

The rational creature cannot be blessed unless it loves the Creator more than itself. The rational will, if it subjects itself to God, is exalted; if it lifts itself up, it is cast down. God makes the humble; He does not find them. God, therefore, being good, is the founder of good natures. For God saw (as it is written) all the things that He had made, and behold they were very good (Gen. I, 31). Among all the things which He made, He made the rational creature better than the rest. Yet He willed the greater good to be present in the higher creature in such a way that no evil was substantially present even in the lowest creature.

And through this, the created good superior to the lowest good would be better, over which the highest good (which is not created, and by which every mutable created good is created) would justly rule; and by whose participation it would also be blessed, if with humble love it served the highest good. For to the rational creature there neither could, nor can, nor shall be any beatitude other than this: that, acknowledging Him by whom it was not only made, but also by whom it was made rational, it should render greater love to its good Creator than to itself.

For reason could in no way be present in it, unless the love of its Creator could be present in it; for there is no other thing that would be the true wisdom or understanding of a rational creature except the love of the Creator, in which its self-love is the greater or the less in proportion as it shows the greater or the less love to its Creator. Moreover, the will of a rational creature cannot exist without some kind of love; nor can it love in such a way that it does not wish to bind its love to something. Placed as it is in a kind of middle position between the highest good, by which it was created, and the lowest good, over which it was set, it must of necessity either lie wretchedly in the lowest good, or rest truly and blessedly in the highest good.

For it is carried along by a certain love: either when by obedience it is lifted up, and rightly subjects itself to the good Creator; or when by pride it is cast down, so that it wickedly seeks to lord it over the good creature. For just as it becomes lowly through self-exaltation, so it becomes exalted through humility. For our Lord and Master says: Everyone who exalts himself shall be humbled, and he who humbles himself shall be exalted (Luke XIV, 11). On account of which it is likewise written: God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble (James IV, 6; 1 Peter V, 5). Nor indeed does God find the humble already humble, to whom He gives grace, before it is given; but by giving grace He makes them humble. For this very thing God bestows through grace: that whoever receives it becomes humble.

On account of which the Only-begotten Himself, the teacher and bestower of holy humility, says: Learn of me, for I am meek and humble of heart, and you shall find rest for your souls (Matthew XI, 29). This rest they have lost who, having cast off humility, swelled up against their own life and fell back into death through pride. For of such it is said: You cast them down while they were lifting themselves up (Psalm LXXII, 18). And to such God therefore resists, because He Himself did not make the pride in them, through which they unjustly choose to fall into sin, and through which they justly deserve to remain in sin. CHAPTER XIX. Ruin is not from God, but from pride. God is the avenger of sin, not its author.

Accordingly, since the beginning of an evil will is pride, which is not from God, it is plainly clear that the ruin of evil action does not come to men from God, but that the ruin of retribution is repaid to the wicked by the just Judge. For an evil will does not pertain to the best Creator; but the just condemnation of an unjust angel or man pertains to the most equitable Judge. To an evil will, therefore, God did not predestine man, because He Himself was not going to give it to man. For how could God predestine to an evil will the man whom He made to His own image—a will which He Himself did not make? And so man began to sin in that very act by which he departed from God. For it is written: The beginning of pride is to apostatize from God (Ecclesiasticus X, 14).

And in another place: Behold, all who remove themselves far from you shall perish; you have destroyed all who commit fornication against you (Psalm LXXII, 27). Those, therefore, who remove themselves far and commit fornication against God, surely perish by sinning through their own evil will, which is not from God. But God will destroy them by judging justly, which befits God. For God would not destroy them by judgment, unless they had first perished through their own iniquities. For it is written: They have failed, they have perished because of their own iniquity (ibidem). The falling away, therefore, from the highest good to the lowest good—this is the sinner's own and voluntary evil, by which evil the unjust man destroys himself.

And since God is not the author of this evil, but rather perverse man is, it is therefore fitting that to the man who has destroyed himself by sin, eternal perdition in torments should be repaid: so that he who willed to perish should indeed perish, yet should not perish in the manner in which he willed. For he who so perished, enticed by the delight of his sins, that, were it possible to come about, he would remain forever in the work of sin, is indeed justly abandoned in the perdition of sin, into which he fell by his own will. But he was not there to be dismissed with impunity, lest the faithful God, in whom there is no iniquity, who is just and holy, if He were to leave the sinner forever unpunished in his sin, should be thought to be pleased with the sin. This opinion God rebukes in certain persons through the prophet Malachi, who say:

Everyone who does evil is good in the sight of the Lord, and He is pleased with him; and where is the God of justice? (Malachi II, 17). Justly, therefore, the severity of the Judge has followed, where the iniquity of the sinner went before; for God is the avenger of that thing of which He is not the author, that is, of iniquity, which God can punish but not make. For it is written: Everyone who commits sin also commits iniquity, and sin is iniquity. And you know that He appeared to take away sins, and in Him there is no sin. Everyone who abides in Him does not sin (1 John III, 4–6). And again: A faithful God, in whom there is no iniquity, just and holy is the Lord (Deuteronomy XXXII, 4). Iniquity therefore, since it is not in God, is surely not from God.

CHAPTER XX. Iniquity comes from the disordered love of the world. The beginning of sin is disordered love. But what is iniquity except evil concupiscence? That this is not from God the apostle John makes plain, saying: If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him; for all that is in the world is the concupiscence of the flesh, and the concupiscence of the eyes, and the pride of life, which is not from the Father but is from the world (1 John II, 15, 16). Here, however, by the name of the world he signifies men who are lovers of this world: