Letters 213.1–215.8

In the consulship of the most glorious Theodosius for the twelfth time and Valentinian Augustus for the second, on the sixth day before the Kalends of October, when Bishop Augustine had taken his seat together with his fellow bishops Religianus and Martinianus in the Church of Peace at Hippo Regius, in the presence of the presbyters Saturninus, Leporius, Barnabas, Fortunatianus, Rusticus, Lazarus, and Eraclius, with the clergy standing by and a large crowd of people, Bishop Augustine said: “What I promised Your Charity yesterday, the reason I wished you to assemble in larger numbers, and I see that you have assembled in larger numbers, must be done without any delay. For if I wished to speak of something else, you would listen less well, being in suspense about that. In this life we are all mortal, and the last day of this life is always uncertain for every human being. Yet in infancy childhood is hoped for, and in childhood adolescence, and in adolescence youth, and in youth mature age, and in mature age old age. Whether it will come is uncertain; still, there is something to be hoped for. But old age has no other age to hope for. For it is uncertain how long old age itself will last for a man; but this is certain, that no age remains that can succeed old age. As God willed, I came to this city in the vigor of my age; but I was young and I have grown old. I know that after the deaths of bishops churches are often disturbed by ambitious or contentious men, and what I have often experienced and grieved over, I ought, as far as it concerns me, to provide against happening to this city. As Your Charity knows, I was recently in the church of Milevis; for the brothers, and especially the servants of God who are there, asked me to come, because after the death of my brother and fellow bishop Severus, of blessed memory, some disturbance there was feared. I came, and, as he willed, God helped us by his mercy: they accepted the bishop whom their bishop had designated while alive. For when this became known to them, they willingly embraced the wish of their previous bishop. Yet something had been done short of what was needed, at which some were saddened, because brother Severus thought it could suffice to designate his successor before the clergy; he did not speak to the people about it. And there was some sadness among some people because of this. What more? It pleased God; the sadness was put to flight, joy followed, and the bishop whom the previous bishop had designated was ordained. So, lest anyone should complain about me, I bring to the knowledge of you all my wish, which I believe is God's: I want the presbyter Eraclius as my successor.” The people acclaimed: “Thanks be to God! Praise to Christ!” (said twenty-three times). “Hear us, Christ! Long life to Augustine!” (said sixteen times). “You our father, you our bishop!” (said eight times).

When there was silence, Bishop Augustine said: “There is no need for me to say anything in his praise; I respect his wisdom and spare his modesty; it is enough that you know him. And I say that I want what I know you want, and if I had not known it before, I would have proved it today. This, then, is what I want, this I ask of the Lord our God with fervent prayers even in my cold old age; this I exhort, admonish, and ask you to pray for with me: that God may confirm what he has wrought in us, with the minds of all brought together and fused in the peace of Christ. May he who sent him to me keep him, keep him safe, keep him without crime, so that he who gives me joy while I live may fill my place when I die. As you see, what we say is being taken down by the church's secretaries, and what you say is being taken down; neither my words nor your acclamations fall to the ground. To speak more plainly, we are now drawing up official church records; for I want this to be confirmed in this way, as far as human beings are concerned.” The people acclaimed: “Thanks be to God! Praise to Christ!” (said thirty-six times). “Hear us, Christ! Long life to Augustine!” (said thirteen times). “You our father, you our bishop!” (said eight times). “It is worthy and just!” (said twenty times). “Well deserving, well worthy!” (said five times). “It is worthy and just!” (said six times).

When there was silence, Bishop Augustine said: “So, as I was saying, I want my will and your will confirmed by the church records, as far as human beings are concerned; but as for the hidden will of the Almighty, let us all pray, as I said, that God may confirm what he is working in us.” The people acclaimed: “We give thanks for your judgment!” (said sixteen times). “So be it, so be it!” (said twelve times). “You our father, Eraclius our bishop!” (said six times).

When there was silence, Bishop Augustine said: “I know what you also know, but I do not want done in his case what was done in mine. Many of you know what was done; only those do not know who then either were not yet born or were not yet old enough to know. While my father and bishop, the aged Valerius of blessed memory, was still in the body, I was ordained bishop and sat with him, which I did not know had been forbidden by the Council of Nicaea, nor did he know it. So what was found fault with in me I do not want found fault with in my son.” The people acclaimed: “Thanks be to God! Praise to Christ!” (said thirteen times).

When there was silence, Bishop Augustine said: “He will be a presbyter, as he is, and when God wills, he will be bishop. But now, with the help of God's mercy, I am certainly going to do what I have not done until now. You know what I wished to do some years ago, and you did not allow it. It was agreed by me and by you, because of the care of the Scriptures which my brothers and fathers, my fellow bishops, were good enough to lay on me at two councils, of Numidia and of Carthage, that no one should trouble me for five days. And records were drawn up; it was agreed; you acclaimed it; your agreement and your acclamations were read out. It was observed toward me for a short time; then it was violently broken in upon, and I am not allowed to have leisure for what I want. Before noon and after noon I am entangled in people's affairs. I beg you and adjure you by Christ to allow me to transfer the burdens of my affairs to this young man, that is, to the presbyter Eraclius, whom today in the name of Christ I designate as bishop, my successor.” The people acclaimed: “We give thanks for your judgment!” (said twenty-six times).

When there was silence, Bishop Augustine said: “I thank Your Charity and goodwill before the Lord our God; or rather, I give thanks for it. So, brothers, whatever used to be brought to me, let it be brought to him. Where my counsel is needed, I will not refuse it; far be it from me to withdraw my help. Still, whatever used to be brought to me, let it be brought to him. Let him consult me, if perhaps he does not find what he ought to do, or ask for help from one whom he knows as a father; so that nothing may be lacking to you, and I at last, if God grants me some little space of life, may not give that little life of mine to sloth or surrender it to idleness, but exercise it in the holy Scriptures, as far as he permits and grants. This will benefit him too, and through him you as well. So let no one begrudge me my leisure, for my leisure has great business. I see that I have done with you everything I ought on this matter for which I invited you. Finally, I ask that those of you who can be good enough to sign these records. Here your response is needed; let me have your response; acclaim something about this assent.” The people acclaimed: “So be it, so be it!” (said twenty-five times). “It is worthy and just!” (said twenty-eight times). “So be it, so be it!” (said fourteen times). “Long worthy, long deserving!” (said twenty-five times). “We give thanks for your judgment!” (said thirteen times). “Hear us, Christ! Keep Eraclius!” (said eighteen times).

When there was silence, Bishop Augustine said: “It is well, so that we may be able to do the things of God concerning his sacrifice. In this hour of our supplication I especially commend to Your Charity that you set aside all your cases and business and pour out prayer to the Lord for this church, for me, and for the presbyter Eraclius.”

Two young men, Cresconius and Felix, came to us, saying that they were of your community, and they reported to us that your monastery was disturbed by some dissension, because some among you preach grace in such a way as to deny that man has free will, and, what is worse, say that on the day of judgment God will not render to each according to his works. Yet they also indicated that most of you do not think so, but confess that free will is helped by the grace of God, so that we may think and do what is right, and that when the Lord comes to render to each according to his works, he may find our works good, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them. Those who think this think rightly.

So I beg you, brothers, as the apostle begged the Corinthians, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you all say the same thing and that there be no schisms among you. For first the Lord Jesus, as is written in the gospel of the apostle John, did not come to judge the world, but that the world might be saved through him; but afterward, as the apostle Paul writes, God will judge the world, when he comes, as the whole Church confesses in the creed, to judge the living and the dead. If, then, there is no grace of God, how does he save the world? And if there is no free will, how does he judge the world? Therefore understand my book or letter, which those mentioned above brought with them to us, according to this faith, so that you neither deny the grace of God nor so defend free will as to separate it from the grace of God, as though without it we could in any way think or do anything according to God, which we cannot do at all. For this is why the Lord, when he was speaking of the fruit of righteousness, said to his disciples: “Without me you can do nothing.”

Know, then, that the letter mentioned above, to Sixtus, presbyter of the Roman church, was written against the new heretics, the Pelagians, who say that the grace of God is given according to our merits, so that he who boasts may boast not in the Lord but in himself, that is, in man, not in the Lord. This the apostle forbids, saying, “Let no one boast in man,” and in another place, “Let him who boasts boast in the Lord.” But those heretics, thinking that they are made righteous by themselves, as though God had not given this to them but they to themselves, certainly boast not in the Lord but in themselves. To such the apostle says, “For who makes you different?” He says this because no one but God distinguishes a person from the mass of perdition that was made from Adam, so as to make him a vessel for honor and not for dishonor. But since a carnal man, vainly puffed up, on hearing, “For who makes you different?” could answer in speech or in thought and say, “My faith makes me different, my prayer makes me different, my righteousness makes me different,” the apostle at once meets his thoughts and says: “What do you have that you did not receive? And if you received it, why do you boast as though you had not received it?” For those boast as though they had not received who think they are justified by themselves, and so boast in themselves and not in the Lord.

For this reason, in this letter that has come to you, I proved by testimonies of the holy Scriptures, which you can examine there, that neither our good works nor our devout prayers nor our right faith could in any way be in us unless we received them from him of whom the apostle James says, “Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights,” so that no one may say that the grace of God was given him for the merits of his works, or the merits of his prayers, or the merits of his faith, and what those heretics say be thought true, that the grace of God is given according to our merits, which is altogether most false. Not that there is no merit, either good of the godly or evil of the ungodly (otherwise how will God judge the world?), but the mercy and grace of God converts a person, of which the psalm says, “My God, his mercy will go before me,” so that the ungodly may be justified, that is, from ungodly may become righteous and begin to have good merit, which the Lord will crown when the world is judged.

There were many things I wanted to send you, by reading which you could learn more carefully and fully the whole case that was conducted in councils of bishops against these same Pelagian heretics; but the brothers of your number who had come to us were in a hurry, and by them we have not written this in reply, but simply written, for they had brought us no letter from Your Charity. Yet we received them, since their simplicity showed clearly enough that they could not have invented anything to us. And they hurried so as to celebrate Easter with you, so that with the Lord's help so holy a day might find your peace rather than your dissension.

But you will do better, and I ask it earnestly, if you do not mind sending to me the man by whom they say they were disturbed. For either he does not understand my book, or perhaps he is not understood himself when he tries to solve and unravel a most difficult question, understood by few. For it is the very question of the grace of God that made people who did not understand think that the apostle Paul was saying, “Let us do evil that good may come.” Hence the apostle Peter in his second letter says: “Therefore, beloved, since you are waiting for these things, be diligent to be found by him unblemished and spotless in peace; and count the patience of our Lord as salvation, as also our most beloved brother Paul wrote to you according to the wisdom given him, as also in all his letters, speaking in them of these things, in which there are some things hard to understand, which the ignorant and unstable twist, as they do the other Scriptures, to their own destruction.”

Beware, then, of what so great an apostle says so terribly; and where you perceive that you do not understand, meanwhile believe the divine words: that there is both free will in man and the grace of God, without whose help free will can neither be turned to God nor make progress toward God; and pray that what you devoutly believe you may also wisely understand. For free will certainly exists for this very thing too, that we may understand wisely. For unless we understood and were wise by free will, we would not be commanded, as Scripture says, “Understand, then, you who are foolish among the people; and you fools, be wise at last.” By the very fact that it is commanded and enjoined that we understand and be wise, it requires our obedience, which cannot exist without free will. But if this very thing, that we understand and be wise, could be done by free will without the help of grace, it would not be said to God, “Give me understanding, that I may learn your commandments”; nor would it be written in the gospel, “Then he opened their minds to understand the Scriptures”; nor would the apostle James say, “But if any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God, who gives to all generously and without reproach, and it will be given him.” The Lord is able to grant to you, and to us, that we may rejoice at the speediest news of your peace and devout agreement. I greet you not only in my own name but also in that of the brothers who are with me, and I ask you to pray for us in concord and earnestly. The Lord be with you. Amen.

Your Charity should know that Cresconius, Felix, and another Felix, servants of God, who came to us from your community, celebrated Easter with us. We kept them somewhat longer so that they might return to you better instructed against the new heretics, the Pelagians, into whose error falls anyone who thinks that the grace of God, which alone frees man through our Lord Jesus Christ, is given according to some human merits. But again, anyone who thinks that, when the Lord comes to judgment, a person who was already old enough to use the free choice of the will is not judged according to his works is no less in error. For only little children, who do not yet have works of their own, either good or bad, will be condemned on account of original sin alone, if the grace of the Savior has not come to their aid through the bath of regeneration. But all the rest, who, already using free will, have added their own sins to original sin, if they are not rescued from the power of darkness by the grace of God and transferred to the kingdom of Christ, will receive judgment according to the merits not only of their origin but also of their own will. The good, for their part, will indeed obtain the reward according to the merits of their good will, but they obtained that very good will through the grace of God. And so what is written is fulfilled: “Wrath and indignation, tribulation and distress for every human soul that does evil, the Jew first and also the Greek; but glory and honor and peace for everyone who does good, the Jew first and also the Greek.”

On this most difficult question, that is, of the will and grace, I had no need to argue at length in this letter too, since I had already given them another, as though they were to return sooner. And I have also written you a book, which, if with the Lord's help you read it carefully and understand it keenly, I think there will be no further dissensions among you on this matter. They also carry with them other documents that we believed should be sent, by which you may learn how the Catholic Church, in God's mercy, has repelled the poisons of the Pelagian heresy: namely, what was written to Pope Innocent, bishop of the city of Rome, from the council of the province of Carthage and from the council of Numidia, and somewhat more fully by five bishops, and what he himself wrote in reply to these three; likewise what was written to Pope Zosimus from the African council, and his reply sent to all the bishops of the whole world; and what we briefly decreed against that error at the later plenary council of all Africa; and the book of mine mentioned above, which I have just written to you. All these we both read with them in person and sent to you by them.

We also read to them the book of the most blessed martyr Cyprian on the Lord's Prayer, and showed how he taught that everything belonging to our conduct, by which we live rightly, is to be asked of our Father who is in heaven, lest, presuming on free will, we fall from divine grace. There we also showed how the same most glorious martyr admonished us that we ought to pray even for our enemies who have not yet believed in Christ, that they may believe; which would certainly be done in vain unless the Church believed that even the evil and unbelieving wills of men can be turned to good by the grace of God. But we did not send this book of holy Cyprian, because they said that you have it there too. We also read with them my letter to Sixtus, presbyter of the Roman church, which they brought with them to us, and showed that it was written against those who say that the grace of God is given according to our merits, that is, against these same Pelagians.

As far as we could, then, we dealt with these brothers, both yours and ours, that they might persevere in the sound Catholic faith, which neither denies free will, whether for an evil life or a good one, nor attributes so much to it that it can do anything without the grace of God, whether to be converted from evil to good, or to make persevering progress in good, or to attain the everlasting good, where it no longer fears that it may fail. You too, dearest ones, I exhort in this letter as the apostle exhorts us all: not to think more highly than one ought to think, but to think with sober judgment, as God has assigned to each the measure of faith.

Attend to what the Holy Spirit warns through Solomon: “Make straight paths for your feet,” he says, “and direct your ways; do not turn aside to the right or to the left; turn your foot away from the evil way. For God knows the ways that are on the right, but those on the left are perverse. But he will make your paths straight, and will lead your journeys forward in peace.” In these words of holy Scripture, brothers, consider that, if there were no free will, it would not be said, “Make straight paths for your feet and direct your ways; do not turn aside to the right or to the left.” And yet, if this could be done without the grace of God, it would not be said afterward, “But he will make your paths straight and will lead your journeys forward in peace.”

Do not, then, turn aside to the right or to the left, although the ways on the right are praised and those on the left are blamed. For this is why he added, “Turn your foot away from the evil way,” that is, from the left, as he makes plain in what follows, saying, “For God knows the ways that are on the right, but those on the left are perverse.” We ought, then, to walk in those ways which God knows, of which we read in the psalm, “The Lord knows the way of the righteous, and the way of the ungodly will perish.” For this way the Lord does not know, because it is on the left, as he will also say to those set on the left, “I do not know you.” But what is it that he does not know, who certainly knows all things, both the good and the evil of men? What, then, does “I do not know you” mean, if not “I did not make you such”? Just as what was said of the Lord Jesus Christ himself, that he did not know sin, what does it mean if not that he had not committed it? And so how is the saying, “The Lord knows the ways that are on the right,” to be understood, if not that he himself made the right ways, that is, the ways of the righteous, which are certainly the good works which God prepared beforehand, as the apostle says, that we should walk in them? But the perverse left ways, that is, the ways of the ungodly, he certainly does not know, because he did not make them for man, but man made them for himself. Hence he says, “But I hate the perverse ways of the wicked; they are on the left.”

But we are answered: “Why, then, did he say, ‘Do not turn aside to the right or to the left,’ when he seems rather to have had to say, ‘Keep to the right and do not turn aside to the left,’ if the ways on the right are good?” Why, do we think, if not because the ways on the right are good in such a way that it is nevertheless not good to turn aside to the right? For he must be understood to turn aside to the right who wishes to ascribe to himself and not to God the very good works that belong to the right ways. And therefore, when he had said, “For God knows the ways that are on the right, but those on the left are perverse,” as though it were said to him, “How, then, do you not want us to turn aside to the right?” he went on to add, “But he will make your paths straight and will lead your journeys forward in peace.” So understand what was commanded you, “Make straight paths for your feet and direct your ways,” in such a way that you know that, when you do this, it is granted you by the Lord God to do it. And you will not turn aside to the right, although you walk in the right ways, not trusting in your own strength; and he will be your strength, who will make your paths straight and lead your journeys forward in peace.

Therefore, dearly beloved, whoever says, “My will is sufficient for me to do good works,” turns aside to the right. But again, those who think a good life should be abandoned when they hear the grace of God preached in such a way that it is believed and understood that grace itself makes men's wills good from evil, and itself keeps those it has made good, and who therefore say, “Let us do evil that good may come,” turn aside to the left. This is why I said to you, “Do not turn aside to the right or to the left”; that is, do not so defend free will as to attribute good works to it without the grace of God, nor so defend grace as to love evil works as though secure because of it; may the grace of God itself turn this away from you. For the apostle, setting before himself the words of such people, says: “What then shall we say? Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound?” And he answered these words of men who were in error and did not understand the grace of God as he ought, saying, “By no means! For if we have died to sin, how shall we live in it?” Nothing could be said more briefly or better. For what more useful thing does the grace of God confer on us in this present evil age than that we die to sin? And so he will be found ungrateful to grace itself who wishes to live in sin because of that grace by which we die to sin. But may God, who is rich in mercy, grant you both to think soundly and to remain to the end, making progress, in your good purpose. Pray for this, for yourselves, for us, for all who love you and for those who hate you, earnestly and watchfully in brotherly peace. May you live to God. If I deserve anything from you, let brother Florus come to me.