it would be of no advantage to those who die in I a state of lapse if they should die before. And | this no Christian will venture to say. Wherefore our brethren, who with us on behalf of the catholic faith assail the pest of the Pelagian error, ought not to such an extent to favour the Pelagian opinion, wherein they conceive that God's grace is given according to our merits, as to endeavour (which they cannot dare) to invalidate a true sentiment, plainly and from ancient times Christian, — " He was taken away, lest wickedness should alter his understanding; " and to build up that which we should think, I do not say, no one would beUeve, but no one would dream, — to wit, that any deceased person would be judged according to those things which he would have done if he had lived for a more lengthened period. Surely thus what we say manifests itself clearly to be incontestable, — that the grace of God is not given according to our merits; so that ingenious men who contradict this truth are constrained to say things which must be rejected from the ears and from the thoughts of all men.
CHAP. 30 [XV.] THE MOST ILLUSTRIOUS IN- STANCE OF PREDESTINATION IS CHRIST JESUS.
Moreover, the most illustrious Light of predestination and grace is the Saviour Himself, — the Mediator Himself between God and men, the man Christ Jesus. And, pray, by what preceding merits of its own, whether of works or of faith, did the human nature which is in Him procure for itself that it should be this? Let this have an answer, I beg. That man, whence did He deserve this, — to be assumed by the Word co-eternal with the Father into unity of person, and be the only-begotten Son of God? Was it because any kind of goodness in Him preceded? What did He do before? What did He believe? What did He ask, that He should attain to this unspeakable excellence?
Was it not by the act and the assumption of the Word that that man, from the time He began to be, began to be the only Son of God? Did not that woman, full of grace, conceive the only Son of God? Was He not born the only Son of God, of the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, — not of the lust of the flesh, but by God's peculiar gift? Was it to be feared that as age matured this man. He would sin of free will? Or was the will in Him not free on that account? and was it not so much the more free in proportion to the greater impossibility of His becoming the servant of sin? Certainly, in Him human nature — that is to say, our nature — specially received all those specially admirable gifts, and any others that may most truly be said to be peculiar to Him, by virtue of no preceding merits of its own. Let a man here answer to God if he dare, and say. Why was it not I also? And if he should hear, " O man, who art thou that repliest against God? " ' let him not at this point restrain himself, but increase his impudence and say, " How is it that I hear, ^V'ho art thou, O man?
since I am what I hear, — that is, a man, and He of whom I speak is but the same? Why should not I also be what He is? For it is by grace that He is such and so great; why is grace different when nature is common? Assuredly, there is no respect of persons with God." I say, not what Christian man, but what madman will say this?
CHAP. 31. CHRIST PREDESTINATED TO BE THE SON OF GOD.
Therefore in Him who is our Head let there appear to be the very fountain of grace, whence, according to the measure of every man. He diffuses Himself through all His members. It is by that grace that every man from the beginning of his faith becomes a Christian, by which grace that one man from His beginning became ' Rom. ix. 10.
Chap. 33.]
Christ. Of the same Spirit also the former is born again of which the latter was born. By the same Spirit is effected in us the remission of sins, by which Spirit it was effected that He should have no sin. God certainly foreknew that He would do these things. This, therefore, is that same predestination of the saints which most especially shone forth in the Saint of saints; and who is there of those who rightly understand the declarations of the truth that can deny this predestination? For we have learned that the Lord of glory Himself was predestinated in so far as the man was made the Son of God. The teacher of the Gentiles exclaims, in the beginning of his epistles, " Paul, a sen-ant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, separated unto the gospel of God (which He had promised afore by His prophets in the Holy Scriptures) concerning His Son, which was made of the seed of David according to the flesh, who was predestinated the Son of God in power, according to the Spirit of sanctification by the resurrection of the dead." ' Therefore Jesus was predestinated, so that He who was to be the Son of David according to the flesh should yet be in power the Son of God, according to the Spirit of sanctification, because He was born of the Holy Spirit and of the Virgin Mary. This is that ineffably accomplished sole taking up of man by God the Word, so that He might truly and properly be called at the same time the Son of God and the Son of man, — Son of man on account of the man taken up, and the Son of God on account of the God only-begotten who took Him up, so that a Trinity and not a Quaternity might be believed in. Such a transporting of human nature was predestinated, so great, so lofty, and so sublime that there was no exalting it more highly, — just as on our behalf that divinity had no possibility of more humbly putting itself off, than by the assumption of man's nature with the weakness of the flesh, even to the death of the cross. As, therefore, that one man was predestinated to be our Head, so we being many are predestinated to be His members. Here let human merits which have perished through Adam keep silence, and let that grace of God reign which reigns through Jesus Christ our Lord, the only Son of God, the one Lord. Let whoever can find in our Head the merits wliich preceded that peculiar generation, seek in us His members for those merits which preceded our manifold regeneration. For that generation was not recompensed to Christ, but given; that He should be born, namely, of the Spirit and the Virgin, separate from all entanglement of sin. Thus also our being born again of water and the Spirit is not recompensed to us ' Rom. i. I ff.
for any merit, but freely given; and if faith has brought us to the laver of regeneration, we ought not therefore to suppose that we have first given anything, so that the regeneration of salvation should be recompensed to us again; because He made us to believe in Christ, who made for us a Christ on whom we believe. He makes in men the beginning and the completion of the faith in Jesus who made the man Jesus the beginner and finisher of faith; ^ for thus, as you know, He is called in the epistle which is addressed to the Hebrews.
CHAP. 32 [XVI.] — THE TWOFOLD CALLING.
God indeed calls many predestinated children of His, to make them members of His only predestinated Son, — not with that calling with which they were called who would not come to the marriage, since with that calling were called also the Jews, to whom Christ crucified is an offence, and the Gentiles, to whom Christ crucified is foolishness; but with that calling He calls the predestinated which the apostle distinguished when he said that he preached Christ, the wisdom of God and the power of God, to them that were called, Jews as well as Greeks. For thus he says, " But unto them which are called," ^ in order to show that there were some who were not called; knowing that there is a certain sure calling of those who are called according to God's purpose, whom He has foreknown and predestinated before to be conformed to the image of His Son. And it was this calling he meant when he said, " Not of works, but of Him that calleth; it was said unto her. That the elder shall serve the younger."'* Did he say, "Not of works, but of him that believeth "? Rather, he actually took this away from man, that he might give the whole to God. Therefore he said, "But of Him that calleth," — not with any sort of calling whatever, but with that calling wherewith a man is made a believer.
CHAP, 33. — IT IS IN THE POWER OF EVIL MEN TO SIN; BUT TO DO THIS OR THAT BY MEANS OF THAT WICKEDNESS IS IN GOD'S POWER ALONE.
Moreover, it was this that he had in view when he said, "The gifts and calling of God are without repentance." 5 And in that saying also consider for a little what was its purport. For when he had said, " For I would not, brethren, that ye should be ignorant of this m)stery, that ye may not be wise in yourselves, that blindness in part is happened to Israel, until the fulness of the Gentiles be come in, and so all Israel should be saved; as it is wTitten, There shall come out of Sion one who shall deliver, and turn away impiety from Jacob: and this is the 2 Heb. xii. 2. s Rom. xi. 29.
Cor.
1. 24.
* Rom. ix. 12.
THE WORKS OF. ST. AUGUSTIN.
[Chap. 34.
covenant to them from me, when I shall take away their sins; " ' he immediately added, what is to be very carefully understood, " As concerning the gospel, indeed, they are enemies for your sakes: but as concerning the election, they are beloved for their fathers' sakes." ^ What is the meaning of, " as concerning the gospel, indeed, they are enemies for your sakes," but that their enmity wherewith they put Christ to death was, without doubt, as we see, an advantage to the gospel? And he shows thsrt this came about by God's ordering, who knew how to make a good use even of evil things; not that the vessels of wrath might be of advantage to Him, but that by His own good use of them they might be of advantage to the vessels of mercy. For what could be said more plainly than what is actually said, " As concerning the gospel, indeed, they are enemies for your sakes "? It is, therefore, in the power of the wicked to sin; but that in sinning they should do this or that by that wickedness is not in their power, but in God's, who divides the darkness and regulates it; so that hence even what they do contrary to God's will is not fulfilled except it be God's will. We read in the Acts of the Apostles that when the apostles had been sent away by the Jews, and had come to their own friends, and shown them what great things the priests and elders said to them, they all with one consent lifted up their voices to the Lord, and said, " Lord, thou art God, which hast made heaven, and earth, and the sea, and all things thai are therein; who, by the mouth of our father David, tliy holy servant, hast said, Why did the heathen rage, and the peoples imagine vain things? The kings of the earth stood up, and the princes were gathered together against the Lord, and against His Christ. For in truth, there have assembled together in this city against Thy holy child Jesus, whom Thou hast anointed, Herod and Pilate, and the people of Israel, to do whatever Thy hand and counsel predestinated to be done." ^ See what is said: " As concern-1 ig the gospel, indeed, they are enemies for your sakes." Because God's hand and counsel predestinated such things to be done by the hostile Jews as were necessary for the gospel, for our sakes. But what is it that follows?
" But as concerning the election, they are beloved for their fathers' sakes." For are those enemies who perished in their enmity, and those of the same people who still perish in their opposition to Christ, — are those chosen and beloved? Away with the thought! Who is so utterly foolish as to say this? But both expressions, although contrary to one another — that is, " enemies " and " beloved " — are appropri- ' Rom. xi. 25 ff.
2 Rom xi 28 3 Acts iv. 24 ff.
ate, though not to the same men, yet to the same Jewish people, and to the same carnal seed of Israel, of whom some belonged to the falling away, and some to the blessing of Isfcel himself. For the aposde previously explained this meaning more clearly when he said, "That which Israel wrought for, he hath not obtained; but the election hath obtained it, and the rest were blinded." * Yet in both cases it was the very same Israel. Where, therefore, we hear, i " Israel hath not obtained," or, " The rest were blinded," there are to be understood the enemies for our sakes; but where we hear, " that the election hath obtained it," there are to be understood the beloved for their fathers' sakes, to which fathers those things were assuredly promised; because " the promises were made to Abraham and his seed," 5 whence also in that olive-tree is grafted the wild olive-tree of the Gentiles. Now subsequently we certainly ought to fall in with the election, of which he says that it is according to grace, not according to debt, because " there was made a remnant by the election of grace. "^ This election obtained it, the rest being blinded. As concerning this election, the Israelites were beloved for the sake of their fathers. For they were not called with that calling of which it is said, " Many are called," but with that whereby the chosen are called. Whence also after he had said, " But as concerning the election, they are beloved for the fathers' sakes," he went on to add those words whence this discussion arose: " For the gifts and calling of God are without repentance," — that is, they are firmly established without change. Those who belong to this calling are all teachable by God; nor can any of them say, " I believed in order to being thus called," because the mercy of God anticipated him, because he was so called in order that he might believe. For all who are teachable of God come to the Son because they have heard and learned from the Father through the Son, who most clearly says, " Every one who has heard of the Father, and has learned, cometh unto me." ' But of such as these none perishes, because " of all that the Father hath given Him, He will lose none." ^ Whoever, therefore, is of these does not perish at all; nor was any who perishes ever of these. For which reason it is said, " They went out from among us, but they were not of us; for, if they had been of us, they would certainly have continued with us." 9 CHAP. 34 [XVII.] THE SPECIAL CALLING OF THE ELECT IS NOT BECAUSE THEY HAVE BELIEVED, BUT IN ORDER THAT THEY MAY BELIEVE.
Let US, then, understand the calling whereby * Rom. xi. 7. ' John VI, 45.
5 GaL lii. i6. 8 John vi. 39, Chap. 36.]
they become elected, — not those who are elected because they have beheved, but who are elected that they may belie\'e. For the Lord Himself also sufficiently explains this calling when He says, " Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you." ' For if they had been elected because they had believed, they themselves would certainly have first chosen Him by believing in Him, so that they should deserve to be elected. But He takes away this supposition altogether when He says, " Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you." And yet they themselves, beyond a doubt, chose Him when they believed on Him. Whence it is not for any other reason that He says, " Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you," than because they did not choose Him that He should choose them, but He chose them that they might choose Him; because His mercy preceded them according to grace, not according to debt. Therefore He chose them out of the world while He was wearing flesh, but as those who were already chosen in Himself before the foundation of the world. This is the changeless truth concerning predestination and grace. For what is it that the apostle says, "As He hath chosen us in Himself before the foundation of the world "? -And assuredly, if this were said because God foreknew that they would believe, not because He Himself would make them believers, the Son is speaking against such a foreknowledge as that when He says, " Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen vou; " when God should rather have foreknown this very thing, that they themselves would have chosen Him, so that they might deserve to be chosen by Him. Therefore they were elected before the foundation of the world with that predestination in which God foreknew what He Himself would do; but they were elected out of the world with that calling whereby God fulfilled that which He predestinated. For whom He predestinated, them He also called, with that calling, to wit, which is according to the purpose. Not others, therefore, but those whom He predestinated, them He also called; nor others, but those whom He so called, them He also justified; nor others, but those whom He predestinated, called, and justified, them He also glorified; assuredly to that end which has no end. Therefore God elected believers; but He chose them that they might be.so, not because they were already so.
The.-Vpostle James says: " Has not God chosen the poor in this world, rich in faith, and heirs of the kingdom which God hath promised to them that love Him?"^ By choosing them, therefore. He makes them rich in faith, as He makes them heirs of the kmgdom; because He ' John XV 16 » Eph. i. 4.
3 Jas. ii. 5.
is rightly said to choose that in them, in order to make which in them He chose them. I ask, who can hear the Lord saying, " Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you," and can dare to say that men believe in order to be elected, when they are rather elected to believe; lest against the judgment of truth they be found to have first chosen Christ to wliom Christ says, " Ye have not chosen me, but I have chosen you"?'^ CHAP. 35 [XVIII.] ELECTION IS FOR THE PUR- POSE OF HOLINESS.
Wlio can hear the apostle saying, " Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us in all spiritual blessing in the heavens in Christ; as He has chosen us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without spot in His sight; in love predestinating us to the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to Himself according to the good pleasure of His will, wherein He hath shown us favour in His beloved Son; in whom we have redemption through His blood, the remission of sins according to the riches of His grace, which hath abounded to us in all wisdom and prudence; that He might show to us the mystery of His will according to His good pleasure, which He hath purposed in Himself, in the dispensation of the fulness of times, to restore all things in Christ, which are in heaven, and in the earth, in Him: in whom also we have obtained a share, being predestinated according to the purpose; who worketh all things according to the counsel of His will, that we should be to the praise of his glory;" 5 — who, I say, can hear these words with attention and intelligence, and can venture to have any doubt concerning a truth so clear as this wjiich \Ve are defending? God chose Christ's members in Him before the foundation of the world; and how should He choose those who as yet did not exist, except by predestinating them? Therefore He chose us by predestinating us. ^^'ould he choose the unholy and the unclean? Now if the question be proposed, whether He would choose such, or rather the holy and unstained, who can ask which of these he may answer, and not give his opinion at once in favour of the holy and pure?
CHAP. 36. — GOD CHOSE THE RIGHTEOUS; NOT THOSE WHOM HE FORESAW AS BEING OF THEM- SELVES, BUT THOSE WHOM HE PREDESTINATED FOR THE PURPOSE OF MAKING SO.
"Therefore," says the Pelagian, " He foreknew who would be holy and immaculate by the choice of free will, and on that account elected them * John xvi. 16.
5 Eph. i. 3 ff.
[Chap. 37.
before the foundation of the world in that same foreknowledge of His in which He foreknew that they would be such. Therefore He elected them," says he, " before they existed, predestinating them to be children whom He foreknew to be holy and immaculate. Certainly He did not make them so; nor did He foresee that He would make them so, but that they would be so." Let us, then, look into the words of the apostle and see whether He chose us before the foundation of the world because we were going to be holy and immaculate, or in order that we might be so. '* Blessed," says he, " be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us in all spiritual blessing in the heavens in Christ; even as He hath chosen us in Himself before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and unspotted." ' Not, then, because we were to be so, but that we might be so. Assuredly it is certain, — assuredly it is manifest. Certainly we were to be such for the reason that He has chosen us, predestinating us to be such by His grace. Therefore " He blessed us with spiritual blessing in the heavens in Christ Jesus, even as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and immaculate in His sight, predestinating us in love to the adoption of children through Jesus Christ to Himself." Attend to what he then adds: " According to the good pleasure," he says, " of His will; " in order that we might not in so great a benefit of grace glory concerning the good pleasure of our will. " In which," says he, " He hath shown us favour in His beloved Son," — in which, certainly, His own will, He hath shown us favour.