Chapter 50.--Ambrose Teaches that All Men Need God's Help.
In the same book the same St. Ambrose says again: [1905] "Now if Peter fell, who said, Though all men shall be offended, yet will I never be offended,' who else shall rightly presume concerning himself? David, indeed, because he had said, In my prosperity I said, I shall never be moved,' confesses how injurious his confidence had proved to himself: Thou didst turn away Thy face,' he says, and I was troubled.'" [1906] Pelagius ought to listen to the teaching of so eminent a man, and should follow his faith, since he has commended his teaching and faith. Let him listen humbly; let him follow with fidelity; let him indulge no longer in obstinate presumption, lest he perish. Why does Pelagius choose to be sunk in that sea whence Peter was rescued by the Rock?
[1905] Book x. c. 89.
[1906] Ps. xxx. 7.
[1907] It is impossible to preserve the paronomasia of the original, which plays on the meaning of the names Pelagius (pelago, sea) and Petrus (petra, rock).
Chapter 51 [XLVI.]--Ambrose Teaches that It is God that Does for Man What Pelagius Attributes to Free Will.
Let him lend an ear also to the same godly bishop, who says, in the sixth book of this same book: [1908] "The reason why they would not receive Him is mentioned by the evangelist himself in these words, Because His face was as though He would go to Jerusalem.' [1909] But His disciples had a strong wish that He should be received into the Samaritan town. God, however, calls whomsoever He deigns, and whom He wills He makes religious." What wise insight of the man of God, drawn from the very fountain of God's grace! "God," says he, "calls whomsoever He deigns, and whom He wills He makes religious." See whether this is not the prophet's own declaration: "I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and will show pity on whom I will be pitiful;" [1910] and the apostle's deduction therefrom: "So then," says he, "it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that showeth mercy." [1911] Now, when even his model man of our own times says, that "whomsoever God deigns He calls, and whom He wills He makes religious," will any one be bold enough to contend that that man is not yet religious "who hastens to the Lord, and desires to be directed by Him, and makes his own will depend upon God's; who, moreover, cleaves so closely to the Lord, that he becomes (as the apostle says) one spirit' with Him?" [1912] Great, however, as is this entire work of a "religious man," Pelagius maintains that "it is effected only by the freedom of the will." But his own blessed Ambrose, whom he so highly commends in word, is against him, saying, "The Lord God calls whomsoever He deigns, and whom He wills He makes religious." It is God, then, who makes religious whomsoever He pleases, in order that he may "hasten to the Lord, and desire to be directed by Him, and make his own will depend upon God's, and cleave so closely to the Lord as to become (as the apostle says) one spirit' with Him;" and all this none but a religious man does. Who, then, ever does so much, unless he be made by God to do it?
[1908] It is the seventh book in the editions, c. 27, on Luke ix. 53.
[1909] Luke ix. 53.
[1910] Ex. xxxiii. 19.
[1911] Rom. ix. 16.
[1912] 1 Cor. vi. 17. These are the words of Pelagius, which have been already quoted above, in ch. 24.
Chapter 52 [XLVII.]--If Pelagius Agrees with Ambrose, Augustin Has No Controversy with Him.
Inasmuch, however, as the discussion about free will and God's grace has such difficulty in its distinctions, that when free will is maintained, God's grace is apparently denied; whilst when God's grace is asserted, free will is supposed to be done away with,--Pelagius can so involve himself in the shades of this obscurity as to profess agreement with all that we have quoted from St. Ambrose, and declare that such is, and always has been, his opinion also; and endeavour so to explain each, that men may suppose his opinion, to be in fair accord with Ambrose's. So far therefore, as concerns the questions of God's help and grace, you are requested to observe the three things which he has distinguished so very plainly, under the terms "ability," "will," and "actuality," that is, "capacity," "volition," and "action." [1913] If, then, he has come round to an agreement with us, then not the "capacity" alone in man, even if he neither wills nor performs the good, but the volition and the action also,--in other words, our willing well and doing well,--things which have no existence in man, except when he has a good will and acts rightly:--if, I repeat, he thus consents to hold with us that even the volition and the action are assisted by God, and so assisted that we can neither will nor do any good thing without such help; if, too, he believes that this is that very grace of God through our Lord Jesus Christ which makes us righteous through His righteousness, and not our own, so that our true righteousness is that which we have of Him,--then, so far as I can judge, there will remain no further controversy between us concerning the assistance we have from the grace of God.
[1913] See above, ch. 4.