§ 159. SEMI-rELAGIANISM. S6J
Cassian are the following: the presbyter-monk Yi.toentius of Lerinum, author of the Commonitoriian^ in which he developed the true catholic test of doctrine, the threefold consensus, in covert antagonism to the novel doctrines of Augustiuianisra (about 484) ; ' Fadstus, bishop of Rhegium (Riez), who at the council of Aries (475) refuted the hyper-Augnstinian presbyter Lucidiis, and was commissioned by the council to write a work upon the grace Of God and human freedom;' Gen^tadius, presbyter at Marseilles (died after 495), who continued the biograjihical work of Jerome, De mris illustrihus^ dowTi to 495, and attributed Augustine's doctrine of predestination to his itch for writing ; ^ Aenobius the younger ; * and the much discussed anonymous tract Pt'cedesiiiiatus (about 460),^ which, by gross exaggeration, and by an unwarranted imputation of logical results which Augustine had expressly forestalled, placed the doctrine of predestination in an odious light, and then refuted it."
' Comp. aboTe, § US; also Wiggers, ii. p. 208 ff., and Baur, 1, c. p. 185 fF., who likewise impute to the Commonitorium a Semi-Pelagian tendency. This is beyond doubt, if Vincentius was the author of the above-mentioned Objectiones Vincentiauae. Perhaps the second part of the Commonitorium, which, except the last chapters, has been lost, was specially directed against the Augustiuian doctrine of predestination, and was on this account destfoyed, while the first part acquired almost canonical autliority in the Catholic church.
^ De gratia Dei et humanse mentis libero arbitrio (in the Biblioth. maxima Patrum, torn. viii.). This work is regarded as the ablest defence of Semi-Pelagianism written in that age. Comp. upon it Wiggers, ii. p. 224 ff.
* De viris iilustr. c. 38, where he speaks in other respects eulogistically of Augustine. He refers to the passage in Prov. x. 19: "In multiloquio non fugiea peccattmi." Comp. respecting him Wiggers, ii. 350 ff. and Ncander, Dogmengeschichte, i. p. 406. His works are found in Migne's Patrol, vol. 58.
* In his Commentarius in Psahnos, written about 460, especially upon Ps. cxxvii. : "Nisi Dominus ffidificaverit doraum." Some, following Sirniond, consider him as the author of the next-mentioned treatise FrcEdestinaius, but without good ground. Comp. Wiggers, ii. p. 348 f.
" " Praedestinatus, seu Prredestinatorum hacresis, et hbri S. Augustino temere adscript! refutatio." The h^resis Prasdestinatorum is the last of ninety heresies, and consists in the assertion : " Dei prajdestinatione peccata committi." This work was first discovered by J. Sirmond and published at Paris in 1643 (also in Gallandi, Biblioth. tom. x. p. 359 sqq., and in Migne's Patrol, torn. liii. p. 587 sqq together with Sirmond's Historia Pra3de8tina1iana). It cccasioned in the seventetUth 03ntury a lively controversy between the Jesuits and the Jansenists, as to whether L\erc had existed a distinct sect of Prcedestinarians. Thf author, however, mere'y
864 THIRD PERIOD. A.D. 311-590.
The author of the PrcBdestlnatus says, tliat a treatise had fallen into his hands, whicli fraudulently bore upon its face the name of tlie orthodox teacher Augustine, in order to smuggle in, under a Catholic name, a blasphemous dogma, pernicious to the faitli. On this account he had undertaken to transcribe and to refute this work. The treatise itself consists of three books; the first, following Augustine's book. Do hceresihus, gives a description of ninety lieresies from Simon Magus down to the time of the author, and brings up, as the last of them, the doctrine of a double predestination, as a doctrine which makes God the author of evil, and renders all the moral endeavors of men fruitless;' the second book is the pseudo-Augustinian treatise upon this ninetieth heresy, but is apparently merely a Serai-Pelagian caricature by the same author;'' the third book contains the refutation of the thu3 travestied pseudo-Augustinian doctrine of predestination, employing the usual Semi-Pelagian arguments.
A counterpart to this treatise is found in the also anonymous work, De vocatione omnium gentium^ which endeavors to commend Augustinianism by mitigation, in the same degree that \\\Q PrtQdestlnatus endeavors to stultify it by exaggeration.' It has been ascribed to pope Leo I. (f 461), of whom it would not be unworthy ; but it cannot be supposed that the work of 80 distingaished a man could have remained anonymous. The
feigned such a sect to exist, in order to avoid the appearance of attacking Augustine's autliority. See details in Wiggers, ii. p. 329 If. ; Neander, Dogmengeschichte, i. 399 if. ; and Baur, p. 190 ff. The latter says: "The treatise [more accurately the second book of it ; the whole consists of three books] is ascribed to Augustine, but as the ascription is immediately after declared fiilse, both assertions are evidently made with the purpose of condemning Augustine's doctrine with its consequences (only not directly in his name), as one morally most worthy of reprobation." Neander ascribes only the first and the third book, Baur also the second book, to a Semi-Pelagian.
' The first book has also been reprinted in llie Corpus hiercscolog. ed. F. Oehler, torn. i. Berol. 1856, pp. 233-268.
^ Just as the Capitula Gallorum and the Objcctiones YincentianjE e.T;aggerat9 Augustinianism, in order the more easily to refute it.
^ It is found jLmong the works of Leo I. and also of Prosper Aquitanus, but d mates from the views of the latter. Comp. Quesnel's learned Dissei-taiiones d* auclore lihri de vocatione gentium, in the second part of his clition of Leo's worka and also Wiggers, il. p. 218 If.