that the grace of a merciful God was not to be denied to any one born of men; for, as the Lord says in His gospel, ' the Son of man is not come to destroy men's hves, but to save them.'"* As far as we can, we must strive that, if possible, no soul be lost." 5 And a little afterwards he says: " Nor ought any of us to shudder at what God hath condescended to make. For although the infant is still fresh from its birth, yet it is not such that any one should shudder at kissing it in giving grace and in making peace, since in the kiss of an infant every one of us ought for his very religion's sake to consider the still recent hands of God themselves, which in some sort we are kissing in the man just formed and newly born, when we are embracing that which God has made."^ A little after, also, he says: "But if anything could hinder men from obtaining grace, their more heinous sins might rather hinder those who are mature and grown up and older. But again, if even to the greatest sinners, and to those who have before sinned much against God, when they have subsequently believed, remission of sins is granted, and nobody is hindered from baptism and from grace; how much rather ought we to shrink from hindering an infant, who, being lately born, has not sinned, except that, being bom after the flesh according to Adam, he has contracted the contagion of the ancient death at his earliest birth; who approaches more easily on this very account to ■* Luke ix. 56.
the reception of the forgiveness of sins, in that to him are remitted not his own sins, but tiie sins of another! " ' CHAP. 24. THE DILEMMA PROPOSED TO THE • PELAGIANS.
\Miat will be said to such things as these, by those who are not only the forsakers, but also ' the persecutors of God's grace? What will they say to such things as these? On what ground 'is the " possession of Paradise " restored to us? How are we restored to Paradise if we have never been there? Or how have we been there, except because, we were there in Adam? And how do we belong to that "judgment" which w^as spoken against the transgressor, if we do not inherit injury from the transgressor? Finally, he thinks that infants are to be baptized, even before the eighth day; lest " by the contagion of the ancient death, contracted in the first birth," the souls of the infants should perish. How do they perish if they who are born even of believing men are not held by the devil until they are born again in Christ, and plucked out from the power of darkness, and transferred into His kingdom? And who says that the souls of those who are born will perish 1 unless they are born again? No other than he j who so praises the Creator and the creature, the!
workman and the work, as to restrain and correct the horror of human feeling with which men refuse to kiss infants fresh from the womb, by interposing the veneration of the Creator Himself, saying that in the kiss of infants of that age the recent hands of God were to be considered! Did he, then, in confessing original sin, condemn either nature or marriage? Did he, because he applied to the infant born guilty from Adam, the cleansing of regeneration, therefore denv God as the Creator of those that were born? Because, in his dread that souls of any age whatever should perish, he, with his council of colleagues, decided that even before the eighth day they were to be delivered by the sacrament of baptism, did he therefore accuse marriage, when, indeed, in the case of an infant, — whether born of marriage or of adultery, yet because it was born a man, — he declared that the recent hands of God were worthy even of the kiss of peace? If, then, the holy bishop and most glorious martyr Cyprian could think that original sin in infants must be healed by the medicine of Christ, without denying the praise of the creature, without denying the praise of marriage, why does a novel pestilence, although it does not dare to call such an one as him a Manichean, think that another person's fault is to be objected against catholics who maintain these things, in order to conceal its own? So the most lauded commentator on the divine declarations, before even the slightest taint of the Manichean plague had touched our lands, without any reproach of the divine work and of marriage, confesses original sin, — not saying that Christ was stained with any spot of sin, nor yet comparing with Him the flesh of sin in others that were born, to whom by means of the likeness of sinful flesh He might afford the aid of cleansing; neither is he deterred by the obscure question of the origin of souls, from confessing that those who are made free by the grace of Christ return into Paradise. Does he say that the condition of death passed upon men from Adam without the contagion of sin? For it is not on account of avoiding the death of the body, but on account of the sin which entered by one man into the world,^ that he says that help is to be afforded by baptism to infants, however fresh they may be from the womb.
CHAP. 25 [iX.] CYPRIAN'S TESTIMONIES CON- CERNING god's GRACE.
But now it plainly appears in what way Cyprian proclaims the grace of God against such as these, when he is arguing about the Lord's Prayer. For he says: " We say, ' May Thy name be made holy,' 3 not that we w-ish for God that He may be made holy by our prayers, but that we beseech of Him that His name may be made holy in us. But by whom is God made holy, since He Himself makes holy? But, because He says, ' Be ye holy, because I also am holy,' we ask and entreat this, that we who were made holy in baptism may continue in that which we have begun to be." ■* And in another place in the same epistle he says: " We add also, and say, ' Thy will be done in heaven, and in earth,' not in order that God ma)' do what He wills, but that we may be able to do what God wills. For who resists God that He may not do what He wills? But, since we are hindered by the devil from obeying God with our thought and deed in all things, we pray and ask that God's will may be done in us. And that it may I be done in us, we have need of God's will, that is, of His help and protection; since no one is strong in his own strength, but he is safe by the I indulgence and mercy of God." 5 In another place also: " Moreover, we ask that the will of God may be done both in heaven and in earth, each of which things pertains to the fulfilment of our safety and salvation. For since we possess the body from the earth, and the spirit from hea\'en, we are ourselves earth and hea\en; and ' Cyprian, as died.
' Cyprian, as died.
4 Cyprian, On the Lord's Prayer, ch. 9 (xil.), see The Ante Niccnc Fathers, v. p. 450.
5 Ibid. ch. 13 (XVI.); see The Ante-Nkcne Fathers, v. 451.
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in both, that is, both in body and in spirit, we pray that God's will be done. For between the flesh and the spirit there is a struggle, and there is a daily strife as they disagree one with the other; so that we cannot do the very things that we would, in that the spirit seeks heavenly and divine things, while the flesh lusts after earthly and temporal things. And, therefore, we ask that, by the help and assistance of God, agreement may be made between these two natures; so that while the will of God is done both in the spirit and in the flesh, the soul which is newborn by Him may be preserved. And this the Apostle Paul openly and manifestly declares by his words. * The flesh,' says he, ' lusteth against the spirit, and the spirit against the flesh; for these are contrary the one to the other, so that ye cannot do tlie things that ye would.' " ' And a little after he says: " And it may be thus understood, most beloved brethren, that since the Lord commands and teaches us even to love our enemies, and to pray even for those who persecute us, we should ask even for those who are still earth, and have not yet begun to be heavenly, that even in respect of these God's will may be done, which Christ accomplished in preserving and renewing humanity." ^ And again, in another place he says: " But we ask that this bread should be given to us daily, that we who are in Christ, and daily receive the Eucharist for the food of salvation, may not, by the interposition of some more heinous sin, — by being prevented, as those abstaining and not communicating, from partaking of the heavenly bread, — be separated from Christ's body." ^ And a little afterwards, in the same treatise he says: " But when we ask that we may not come into temptation, we are reminded of our infirmity and weakness, while we so ask as that no one should insolently vaunt himself; that none should proudly and arrogantly assume anything to himself; that none should take to himself the glory either of confession or of suffering as his own, when the Lord Himself teaching humility said, ' Watch and pray, that ye come not into temptation: the spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak; ' •♦ so that while a humble and submissive confession comes first, and all is attributed to God, whatever is sought for suppliantly, mth fear and honour of God, may be granted by His own loving-kindness." 5 j\loreover, in his treatise addressed to Quirinus, in respect to which work Pelagius wishes himself to appear as his imitator, he says in the Third Book " that we must boast in nothing, since ■ Cyprian, On the Lord's Prayer, ch. ii (xiv.); see TheAnte-Nicene Fathers, v. 451.
4 Matt. xxvi. 41, or Mark xiv. 38.
-^ Cyprian, work cited, ch. 19 (xxvi.); see The Ante-Nicene Fathers, v. 454.
nothing is our own."^ And subjoining the divine testimonies to this proposition, he added among others that apostolic word with which especially the mouths of such as these must be closed: " For what hast thou, which thou hast not received? But if thou hast received it, why boastest thou as if thou hadst not received it? " Also in the epistle concerning Patience he says: " For we have this virtue in common with God. From Him patience begins; from Him its glory and its dignity take their rise. The origin and greatness of patience proceed from God as its Author." ^ CHAP. 26. FURTHER APPE.\LS TO C\TRIAN'S TEACHING.
Does that holy and so memorable instructor of the Churches in the word of truth, deny that there is free will in men, because he attributes to God the whole of your righteous living? Does he reproach God's law, because he intimates that man is not justified by it, seeing that he declares that what that law commands must be obtained from the Lord God by prayers? Does he assert fate under the name of grace, by saying that we must boast in nothing, since nothing is our own? Does he, like these, believe that the Holy Spirit is in such wise the aider of virtue, as if that very virtue which it assists springs from ourselves, when, asserting that nothing is our own, he mentions in this respect that the apostle said, " For what hast thou that thou hast not received?"
and says that the most excellent virtue, that is, patience, does not begin from us, and afterwards receive aid by the Spirit of God, but from Him Himself takes its source, from Him takes its origin? Finally, he confesses that neither good purpose, nor desire of virtue, nor good dispositions, begin to be in men without God's grace, when he says that " we must boast in nothing, since nothing is our own." What is so established in free will as what the law says, that we must not worship an idol, must not commit adultery, must do no murder? Nay, these crimes, and such like, are of such a kind that, if any one should commit them, he is removed from the communion of the body of Christ. And yet, if the blessed Cyprian thought that our own will was sufficient for not committing these crimes, he would not in such wise understand what we say in the Lord's Prayer, " Give us this day our daily bread," as that he should assert that we ask " that we may not by the interposition of some heinous sin — by being prevented as abstaining, and not communicating, from partaking of the heavenly bread — be separated from Christ's body." Let these new heretics answer of a surety what good merit precedes, in men who are enemies of the name of Christ? For not only have they no good merit, but they have, moreover, the very worst merit. And yet, Cyprian even thus understands what we say in the prayer, " Thy will be done in heaven, and in earth: " that we pray also for those very persons who in this respect are called earth. We pray, therefore, not only for the unwilling, but also for the objecting and resisting. What, then, do we ask, but that from unwilling they may be made willing; from objecting, consenting; from resisting, loving? And by whom, but by Him of whom it is written, "The will is prepared by God"?' Let them, then, who disdain, if they do not do any evil and if they do any good, to glory, not in themselves, but in the Lord, learn to be catholics.
CHAP. 27 [x.] — Cyprian's TESTIMONIES CONCERN- ING THE IMPERFECTION OF OUR OWN RIGHT- EOUSNESS.
Let us, then, see that third point, which in these men is not less shocking to every member of Christ and to His whole body, — that they contend that there are in this life, or that there have been, righteous men having absolutely no sin.- In which presumption they most manifestly contradict the Lord's Prayer, wherein, with truthful heart and with daily words, all the members of Christ cry aloud, " Forgive us our debts." Let us see, then, what Cyprian, most glorious in the Lord, thought of this, — what he not only said for the instruction of the Churches, not, of course, of the Manicheans, but of the catholics, but also committed to letters and to memory. In the epistle on " Works and Alms," he says: " Let us then acknowledge, beloved brethren, the wholesome gift of the divine mercy, and let us who cannot be without some wound of conscience heal our wounds by the spiritual remedies for the cleansing and purging of our sins. Nor let any one so flatter himself with the notion of a pure and immaculate heart, as, in dependence on his own innocence, to think that the medicine needs not to be applied to his wounds; since it is written, ' Who shall boast that he hath a clean heart, or who shall boast that he is pure from sins? ' 5 And again, in his epistle, John lays it down and says, ' If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.' ■♦ But if no one can be without sin, and whoever should say that he is without fault is either proud or foolish, how needful, how kind is the divine mercy, which, knowing that there are still found some wounds in those that have been healed, has given even after their healing wholesome ' Prov. viii. 36.
2 This assertion of the Pelagians was condemned in an African Council in 418.
remedies for the curing and healing of their wounds anew! " 5 Again, in the same treatise he says: " And since there cannot fail daily to be sins committed in the sight of God, there fiiiled not daily sacrifices wherewith the sins might be cleansed away."^ Also, in the treatise on the Mortality, he says: " Our warfare is with avarice, with immodesty, with anger, with ambition; our trying and toilsome wrestling with carnal vices, with the enticements of the world. The mind of man besieged, and on every hand invested with the onsets of the devil, scarcely meets the repeated attacks, scarcely resists them. If avarice is prostrated, lust springs up. If lust is overcome, ambition takes its place. If ambition is despised, anger exasperates, pride puffs up, wine-bibbing entices; envy breaks concord: jealousy cuts friendship; you are constrained to curse, which the divine law forbids; you are compelled to swear, which is not lawful. So many persecutions the soul suffers daily, with so many risks is the heart wearied; and yet it delights to abide, here long among the devil's weapons, although it should rather be our craving and wish to hasten to Christ by the aid of a quicker death." 7 Again, in the same treatise he says: "The blessed Aposde Paul in his epistle lays It down, saying, 'To me to live is Christ, and to die is gain; ' ^ counting it the greatest gain no longer to be held by the snares of this world, no longer to be liable to the sins and vices of the flesh." '^ Moreover, on the Lord's Prayer, explaining what it is we ask when we say, " Hallowed be thy name," he says, among other matters: " For we have need of daily sanctification, that we, who daily fall away, may wash out our sins by continual sanctification." '° Again, in the same treatise, when he would explain our saying, " Forgive us our debts," he says: " And how necessarily, how providently and salutarily, are we admonished that we are sinners, since we are compelled to entreat for our sins; and while pardon is asked for from God, the soul recalls its own consciousness of guilt. Lest any one ' should flatter himself as being innocent, and by I exalung himself should more deeply perish, he is instructed and taught that he sins daily, in that he is bidden to entreat daily for his sins. Thus, moreover, John also in his epistle warns us, and says: 'If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. But if we confess our sins. He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins.' " " Rightly, also, he proposed in his letter to Quirinus his own most absolute judgment on this subject, to which he subjoined the 5 Cyprian, work cited, ch. 2; The Antc-Nicene Fathers, vol. v. p. 476.
'" Cyprian, work cited, ch. g, p. 450. " Cyprian, iiiJ. ch. 16 (XXII.), p. 453.
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divine testimonies, " That no one is without filth and without sin." ' There also he set down those testimonies by which original sin is confirmed, which these men endeavour to twist into I know not what new and evil meanings, whether what the holy Job says, " No one is pure from filth, not one even if his life be of one day upon the earth,"- or what is read in the Psalm, " Behold, I was conceived in iniquity; and in sins hath my mother nourished me in the womb." ^ To which testimonies, on account of those also who are already holy in mature age, since even they are not without filth and sin, he added also that word of the most blessed John, which he often mentions in many other places besides, " If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves; "■* and other passages of the same sentiment, which are asserted by all catholics, by way of opposing those " who deceive themselves, and the truth is not in them."
CHAP. 2S. — Cyprian's orthodoxy undoubted.
Let the Pelagians say, if they dare, that this man of God was perverted by the error of the Manicheans, in so praising the saints as yet to confess that no one in this life had attained to such a perfection of righteousness as to have no sin at all, confirming his judgment by the clear truth and divine authority of the canonical testimonies. For does he deny that in baptism all sins are forgiven, because he confesses that there remain frailty and infirmity, whence he says that we sin after baptisni and even to the end of this life, having unceasing conflict with the vices of the flesh? Or did he not remember what the apostle said about the Church without spot, that he prescribed that no one ought so to flatter himself in respect of a pure and spotless heart as to trust in his own innocence, and think that no medicine needed to be applied to his wounds? I think that these new heretics may concede to this catholic man that he knew " that the Holy Spirit even in the old times aided good dispositions; " nay, even, what they themselves will not allow, that they could not have possessed good dispositions except through the Holy Spirit. I think that Cyprian knew that all the prophets and apostles or saints of any kind soever who pleased the Lord at any time were righteous — " not in comparison with the wicked," as they folsely assert that we say, " but by the rule of virtue," as they boast that they say; although Cyprian says, nevertheless, no one can be without sin, and whoever should assert that he is blameless is either proud or a fool. Nor is it with reference to anything else that he understands the Scripture, " Who shall boast that he has a pure heart? or who shall boast that he is pure from sins? " 5 \ think that Cyprian would not have needed to be taught by such as these, what he very well knew, " that, in the time to come, there would be a reward of good works and a punishment of evil works, but that no one could then perform the commands which here he might have despised; " and yet he does not understand and assert the Aposde Paul, who was assuredly not a contemner of the divine commands, to have said, " To me to live is Christ, and to die is gain," ^ on any other account, except that he reckoned it the greatest gain after this life no longer to be held in worldly entanglements, no longer to be obnoxious to the sins and vices of the flesh. Therefore the most blessed Cyprian felt, and in the truth of the divine Scriptures saw, that even the life of the apostles themselves, however good, holy, and righteous, suffered some involvements of worldly entanglements, was obnoxious to some sins and vices of the flesh; and that they desired death that they might be free from those evils, and that they might attain to that perfect righteousness which would not suffer such things, and which would no more have to be achieved in the way of command merely, but to l)e received in the way of reward. For not even when that shall have come for which we pray when we say, " Thy kingdom come," will there be in that kingdom of God no righteousness; since the apostle says, " The kingdom of God is not meat and drink, but righteousness, and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost." ^ Certainly these three things are commanded among other divine precepts. Here righteousness is prescribed to us when it is said, " Do righteousness; "^ peace is prescribed when it is said, " Have peace among yourselves; "^ joy is prescribed when it is said, " Rejoice in the Lord always." '° Let, then, the Pelagians deny that these things shall be in the kingdom of God, where we shall live without end; or let them be so mad, if it appears good, as to contend that righteousness, peace, and joy, will be such there as they are here to the righteous.
But if they both shall be, and yet shall not be the same, assuredly here, in respect of the commandment of them, the doing is to be cared for, — there the perfection is to be hoped for in the way of reward; when, not being withheld by any earthly entanglements, and being liable to no sins and vices of the flesh (on account of which the apostle, as Cyprian received this testimony, said that to die would be to him gain), we may perfectly love God, the contemplation of whom will be face to face; we may also perfectly love our neighbour, since, 'When the thoughts of the heart are made manifest, no suspicion of any evil can disturb any one concerning any one.
S Prov. XX. g. ^ Ita. Ivi I.
6 Phil. ii. 21. 9 jNIark ix. 49.
7 Rom. xiv. 17. '^ Pliii. iv. 4.
CHAP. 29 [Xl.] THF, TESTIMO>nES OF AMHROSF, AGAINST THE PELAGIANS, AND FIRST OF ALL CONCERNING ORIGINAL SIN.
But now also to the most glorious martyr Cyprian, let me add, for the sake of more amply confuting these men, the most blessed Ambrose; because even Pelagius praised him so much as to say that in his writings could be found nothing to be blamed even by his enemies.' Since, then, the Pelagians say that there is no original sin with which infants are born, and object to the catholics the guilt of the ]\Ianichean heresy, who withstand them on behalf of the most ancient faith of the Church, let this catholic man of God, Ambrose, praised even by Pelagius himself in the truth of the faith, answer them concerning this matter. ^Vhen he was expounding the prophet Isaiah, he says: " Christ was, therefore, without spot, because He was not stained even in the usual condition itself of birth." ^ And in another place in the same | work, speaking of the Apostle Peter, he says: " He offered himself, which he thought before to be sin, asking for himself that not only his feet but his head also should be washed, because he had directly understood that by the washing of the feet, for those who fell in the first man, the filth of the obnoxious succession was abolished." ^ Also in the same work he says: " It was preserved, therefore, that of a man and woman, that is, by that mingling of bodies, no one could be seen to be free from sin; but He who is free from sin is free also from this kind of conception." Also writing against the Novatians he says: " All of us men are born under sin. And our very origin is in corruption, as you have it read in the words of David,^ ' For lo, I was conceived in iniquities; and in sins hath my mother brought me forth.' " + Also in the apology of the prophet David, he says: " Before we are born we are spotted with contagion, and before the use of light we receive the mischief of that origin. We are conceived in iniquity." 5 Also speaking of the Lord, he says: " It was certainly fitting that He who was not to have the sin of a bodily fall, should feel no natural contagion of generation. Rightly, therefore, David with weeping deplored in himself these defilements of nature, and the fact that the stain had begun in nwsji before his life." *' Again, in the Ark of Noah he says: " Therefore by one Lord Jesus the coming salvation is declared to the nations; for He only could be righteous, although every generation should go astray, nor for any other reason than that,