Chapter 18.--The Opinion of the Saints Themselves About Themselves.
It is to be confessed that "the Holy Spirit, even in the old times," not only "aided good dispositions," which even they allow, but that it even made them good, which they will not have. "That all, also, of the prophets and apostles or saints, both evangelical and ancient, to whom God gives His witness, were righteous, not in comparison with the wicked, but by the rule of virtue," is not doubtful. And this is opposed to the Manicheans, who blaspheme the patriarchs and prophets; but what is opposed to the Pelagians is, that all of these, when interrogated concerning themselves while they lived in the body, with one most accordant voice would answer, "If we should say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us." [2839] "But in the future time," it is not to be denied "that there will be a reward as well of good works as of evil, and that no one will be commanded to do the commandments there which here he has contemned," but that a sufficiency of perfect righteousness where sin cannot be, a righteousness which is here hungered and thirsted after by the saints, is here hoped for in precept, is there received as a reward, on the entreaty of alms and prayers; so that what here may have been wanting in fulfilment of the commandments may become unpunished for the forgiveness of sin. [2840]
[2839] 1 John i. 8.
[2840] See above, Book iii. 17.
Chapter 19.--The Craft of the Pelagians.
And if these things be so, let the Pelagians cease by their most insidious praises of these five things--that is, the praise of the creature, the praise of marriage, the praise of the law, the praise of free will, the praise of the saints--from feigning that they desire to pluck men, as it were, from the little snares of the Manicheans, in order that they may entangle them in their own nets--that is, that they may deny original sin; may begrudge to infants the aid of Christ the physician; may say that the grace of God is given according to our merits, and thus that grace is no more grace; and may say that the saints in this life had not sin, and thus make the prayer of none effect which He gave to the saints who had no sin, and by which all sin is pardoned to the saints that pray unto Him. To these three evil doctrines, they by their deceitful praise of these five good things seduce careless and unlearned men. Concerning all which things, I think I have sufficiently censured their most cruel and wicked and proud vanity.
Chapter 20 [VIII.]--The Testimonies of the Ancients Against the Pelagians.
But since they say "that their enemies have taken up our words for hatred of the truth," and complained that "throughout nearly the whole of the West a dogma not less foolish than impious is taken up, and from simple bishops sitting in their places without a Synodal congregation a subscription is extorted to confirm this dogma,"--although the Church of Christ, both Western and Eastern shuddered at the profane novelties of their words--I think it belongs to my care not only to avail myself of the sacred canonical Scriptures as witnesses against them, which I have already sufficiently done, but, moreover, to bring forward some proofs from the writings of the holy men who before us have treated upon those Scriptures with the most widespread reputation and great glory. Not that I would put the authority of any controversialist on a level with the canonical books, as if there were nothing which is better or more truly thought by one catholic than by another who likewise is a catholic; but that those may be admonished who think that these men say anything as it used to be said, before their empty talk on these subjects, by catholic teachers following the divine oracles, and may know that the true and anciently established catholic faith is by us defended against the receding presumption and mischief of the Pelagian heretics.
Chapter 21.--Pelagius, in Imitation of Cyprian, Wrote a Book of Testimonies.
Even that heresiarch of these men, Pelagius himself, mentions with the honour that is certainly due to him, the most blessed Cyprian, most glorious with even the crown of martyrdom, not only in the African and the Western, but also in the Eastern Churches, well known by the report of fame, and by the diffusion far and wide of his writings,--when, writing a book of testimonies, [2841] he asserts that he is imitating him, saying that "he was doing to Romanus what Cypria had done to Quirinus." Let us, then, see what Cyprian thought concerning original sin, which entered by one man into the world. In the epistle on "Works and Alms" [2842] he thus speaks: "When the Lord at His advent had cured these wounds which Adam had introduced, and had healed the old poisons of the serpent, He gave a law to the sound man, and bade him sin no more, lest a worse thing should happen to him if he sinned. We had been limited and shut up into a narrow space by the commandment of innocence; nor would the infirmity and weakness of human frailty have any resource unless the divine mercy coming once more in aid should open some way of securing salvation by pointing out works of justice and mercy, so that by alms-giving we may wash away whatever foulness we subsequently contract." By this testimony this witness refutes two falsehoods of theirs,--the one, wherein they say that the human race draws no sin from Adam which needs cure and healing through Christ; the other, in which they say that the saints have no sin after baptism. Again, in the same epistle [2843] he says, "Let each one place before his eyes the devil with his servants,--that is, with the people of perdition and death,--as springing forth into the midst and provoking the people of Christ,--Himself being present and judging,--with the trial of comparison in these words: I, on behalf of those whom thou seest with me, neither received buffets, nor bore scourgings, nor endured the cross, nor shed my blood, nor redeemed my family at the price of my suffering and blood; but neither do I promise them a celestial kingdom, nor do I recall them to Paradise, having again restored to them immortality.'" Let the Pelagians answer and say when we could have been in the immortality of Paradise, and how we could have been expelled thence so as to be recalled thither by the grace of Christ. And, although they may be unable to find what they can answer in this case on behalf of their own perversity, let them observe in what manner Cyprian understood what the apostle says, "In whom all have sinned." And let not the Pelagian heretics, freed from the old Manichean heretics, dare to suggest any calumny against a catholic, lest they should be convicted of doing so wicked a wrong even to the ancient martyr Cyprian.
[2841] That is, his Capitula. See On the Proceedings of Pelagius, 6.
[2842] Work cited, ch. 1; see The Ante-Nicene Fathers, vol. v. p. 476.
[2843] Work cited, ch. 22; in The Ante-Nicene Fathers, vol. v. p. 482.