1. a But yet they have pointed out too that there are many of you who do not share these opinions, but confess that our free-will is aided by the grace of God so that we may think and do what is right, and that, when the Lord comes to render to every man according to his deeds, he will find our deeds good—deeds “which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them.” b Those who hold these opinions, hold right opinions.
1. Venerunt ad nos duo iuvenes, Cresconius et Felix, de vestra congregatione se esse dicentes, qui nobis rettulerunt monasterium vestrum nonnulla dissensione turbatum eo, quod quidam in vobis sic gratiam praedicent, ut negent hominis esse liberum arbitrium et, quod est gravius, dicant quod in die iudicii non sit redditurus deus unicuique secundum opera eius. Etiam hoc tamen indicaverunt, quod plures vestrum non ita sentiant, sed liberum arbitrium adiuvari fateantur per dei gratiam, ut recta sapiamus atque faciamus et, eum venerit dominus reddere unicuique secundum opera eius, inveniat opera nostra bona, quae praeparavit deus, ut in illis ambulemus. Hoc qui sentiunt, bene sentiunt.
2. “I beseech you,” therefore, “brethren,” as the apostle besought the Corinthians, “by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye all speak the same thing and that there be no divisions among you.”c For in the first place, the Lord Jesus, as is written in the Gospel of John the apostle, did not come “to condemn the world, but that the world through him might be saved” d; secondly, as the apostle Paul writes, “God shall judge the world,”e when He has come, as the whole Church confesses in the Creed, “to judge the quick and the dead.” f If then there is no grace of God, how does He save the world? And if there is no free-will, how does He judge the world? Wherefore, the treatise or letter of mine, which the afore-mentioned brethren brought with them to us, you are to understand in the light of that confession of faith, so that you neither deny the grace of God nor defend free-will in such a way as to sunder it from God's grace, as if without it we could by any means think or do anything well-pleasing to God—a thing which is utterly impossible. That is why the Lord, speaking about the fruits of righteousness, says to His disciples, “Without me ye can do nothing.” g So you must know that the letter I have mentioned was written to Sixtus, a priest of the Roman Church, against the new heretics, the Pelagians, who declare that the grace of God is bestowed according to our merits; so that he who glories has to glory, not in the Lord, but in himself, that is, in man, not in the Lord.
2. Obsecro itaque vos, fratres, sicut Corinthios obsecravit apostolus, per nomen domini nostri Iesu Christi, ut id ipsum dicatis omnes et non sint in vobis schismata. Primo enim dominus Iesus, sicut scriptum est in evangelio Iohannis apostoli, non venit, ut iudicaret mundum, sed id salvaretur mundus per ipsum; postea vero, sicut scribit apostolus Paulus, iudicabit deus mundum, quando “venturus est,” sicut tota ecclesia in symbolo confitetur, “iudicare vivos et mortuos.” Si ergo non est dei gratia, quo modo salvat mundum? Et si non est liberum arbitrium, quo modo iudicat mundum? Proinde librum vel epistulam meam, quam secum ad nos supra dicti adtulerunt, secundum hanc fidem intellegite, ut neque negetis dei gratiam neque liberum arbitrium sic defendatis, ut a dei gratia separetis, tamquam sine illa vel cogitare aliquid vel agere secundum deum ulla ratione possimus, quod omnino non possumus. Propter hoc enim dominus, cum de fructu iustitiae loqueretur, ait discipulis suis: Sine me nihil potestis facere.
3. Now this is forbidden by the apostle, in the words, “Let no man glory in man,” and in another place he says, “He that glorieth let him glory in the Lord.”a But these heretics, imagining that they become righteous of themselves, as if it was they themselves and not God who granted this to them, consistently enough glory in themselves and not in the Lord. To such the apostle says, “Who maketh thee, to differ from another?”, b saying this on the ground that what makes a man to differ from that mass of perdition which had its origin in Adam and makes him a vessel unto honour and not unto dishonour, c is God alone. But since carnal man, swollen with empty pride, might, on hearing the question “Who maketh thee to differ from another?”, make answer either in thought or in word and say, “It is my faith that makes me to differ; my prayers that make me to differ; my righteousness that makes me to differ,” the apostle at once met these thoughts half-way and said, “For what hast thou that thou didst not receive? Now, if thou didst receive it, why dost thou glory, as if thou didst not receive it?” d For they glory just as if they did not receive it, those who imagine they are justified of themselves; they glory therefore in themselves and not in the Lord.
3. Unde supra dictam epistulam ad Sixtum, presbyterum ecclesiae Romanae, contra novos haereticos Pelagianos noveritis esse conscriptam, qui dicunt gratiam dei secundum merita nostra dari, ut qui gloriatur, non in domino sed in se ipso glorietur, hoc est in homine, non in domino. Quod prohibet apostolus dicens: Nemo glorietur in homine, et alio loco: Qui gloriatur, inquit, in domino glorietur. Illi vero haeretici se ipsos a se ipsis iustos fieri putantes, quasi hoc eis non deus dederit sed ipsi sibi, non utique in domino sed in semet ipsis gloriantur. Talibus dicit apostolus: Quis enim te discernit £ Quod ideo dicit, quia de massa illius perditionis quae facta est ex Adam, non discernit hominem, ut eum faciat vas in honorem non in contumeliam, nisi deus. Sed quoniam homo carnalis et inaniter inflatus, cum audisset: Quis enim te discernit?, posset respondere vel voce vel cogitatione et dicere: “Discernit me fides mea. discernit me oratio mea, discernit me iustitia mea,” mox apostolus occurrit cogitationibus eius et dixit: Quid enim habes, quod non accepisti? Si autem et accepisti, quid gloriaris, quasi non acceperis? Sic enim gloriantur quasi non acceperint, qui se a se ipsis iustificari putant ac per hoc in se ipsis non in domino gloriantur.
4. That is the reason why, in that letter that has come into your hands, I, the author of it, e have proved from passages of Holy Scripture, which you can examine in it, that our good works and our holy prayers and our right faith could certainly not have come into being within us, unless we had received them from Him of Whom the apostle James says, “Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above and cometh down from the Father of lights.”a This makes it impossible for anyone to say that it is for the merit of his own works or the merit of his own prayers or the merit of his own faith that the grace of God was bestowed upon him, and to imagine that what these heretics say is true, that the grace of God is bestowed according to our merits. This is utterly untrue; not because there are no merits—either good merits in the righteous, or evil merits in the unrighteous—otherwise how will God judge the world?—but because a man is converted by the mercy and grace of God. of which the Psalm says, “As for my God. His mercy shall prevent me,”b so that the unrighteous may be justified, that is, be made just instead of unrighteous, and begin to possess that good merit which the Lord will crown when He comes to judge the world.
4. Propter quod ego in hac epistula, quae ad vos pervenit, probavi per testimonia scripturarum sanctarum, quae ibi potestis inspicere, et bona opera nostra et pias orationes et rectam fidem nullo modo in nobis esse potuisse, nisi haec acciperemus ab illo de quo dicit apostolus Iacobus: Omne datum optimum et omne donum perfectum desursum est descendens a patre luminum, ne quisquam dicat meritis operum suorum vel meritis orationum suarum vel meritis fidei suae sibi traditam dei gratiam, et putetur verum esse quod illi haeretici dicunt, gratiam dei secundum merita nostra dari, quod omnino falsissimum est; non quia nullum est meritum vel bonum piorum vel malum impiorum—alioquin quo modo iudicabit deus mundum?—sed misericordia et gratia dei convertit hominem, de qua psalmus dicit: Deus meus, misericordia eius praeveniet me, ut iustificetur impius, hoc est ex impio fiat iustus, et incipiat habere meritum bonum, quod dominus coronabit quando iudicabitur mundus.
5. There are many communications I wished to send you for your perusal: you would then have had more exact and detailed knowledge of the whole action that was brought against these same Pelagians by the councils of bishops. But the brethren who came to us from your company had to hurry away. By them I am sending you this letter, which is not a reply to any of yours, for they brought none to us from your Charity. Yet we received them, as their straightforwardness was sufficient evidence that they were incapable of fabricating anything. Their purpose in hurrying away is to spend Easter with you, so that so holy a day may, with the Lord's help, find you in peace, rather than in strife.
5. Multa erant quae vobis mittere cupiebam, quibus lectis totam ipsam causam quae conciliis episcopalibus acta est adversus eosdem Pelagianos haereticos, diligentius et plenius nosse possetis, sed festinaverunt fratres qui ex numero vestro ad nos venerant, per quos vobis non rescripsimus ista, sed scripsimus. Nullas enim ad nos vestrae caritatis litteras ad-tulerant; tamen suscepimus eos, quoniam simplicitas eorum satis indicabat nihil illos nobis potuisse contingere. Ideo autem festinaverunt, ut apud vos agerent pascha, quo possit adiuvante domino tam sanctus dies vestram pacem quam dissensionem potius invenire.
6. It will, however, be better for you to do what I earnestly beg you will do; send to me, if it will not trouble you, the brother who is said to have caused this dissension, for either he has misunderstood my book, or perhaps he has made himself misunderstood, in his attempt to elucidate and unravel a question which is very difficult and intelligible to few. It is no other than the question about God's grace, which has caused men of small intelligence to imagine that the apostle Paul says, “Let us do evil that good may come.”a With reference to this the apostle Peter says in his second Epistle, “Wherefore, beloved, seeing that ye look for such things, be diligent, that ye may be found of Him in peace, without spot and blameless; and account that the long-suffering of our Lord is salvation; even as our beloved brother Paul also, according to the wisdom given unto him, hath written unto you; as also in all his epistles, speaking in them in these things; in which are some things hard to be understood, which they that are unlearned and unstable wrest, as they do also the other Scriptures, unto their own destruction.” b Take heed, then, to avoid what the great apostle describes so fearsomely, and when you realize that you do not understand, put your faith for the present in the inspired statements that in man there is both freewill and divine grace, without the aid of which freewill can neither be turned to God nor make any advance towards God; and pray that what you submissively put your faith in, you may come wisely to understand.
6. Melius autem facietis, quod multum rogo, si ipsum a quo dicunt se fuisse turbatos, ad me mittere non gravemini. Aut enim non intellegit librum meum aut forte ipse non intellegitur, quando difficillimam quaestionem et paucis intellegibilem solvere atque enodare conatur. Ipsa est enim quaestio de gratia dei, quae fecit ut homines non intellegentes putarent apostolum Paulum dicere: Faciamus mala, ut veniant bona. Unde apostolus Petrus in secunda epistula sua: Quapropter, inquit, carissimi, haec expectantes, satis agite inviolati et inmaculati apud eum reperiri in pace, et domini nostri patientiam salutem existimate, sicut et dilectis simus frater noster Paulus secundum eam quae data est ei sapientiam scripsit vobis ut et in omnibus epistulis loquens in eis de his, in quibus sunt quaedam difficilia intellectu, quae indocti et instabiles homines pervertunt sicut et ceteras scripturas ad proprium suum interitum.
7. And indeed it is for this very purpose that we have free-will, namely, that we may wisely understand, for unless we had freedom of will in understanding and practising wisdom, we should not be commanded in the words of Scripture, “Under- stand now, ye simple among the people; and ye fools, at length be wise.” a From the very fact, then, that we have been commanded and instructed to understand and be wise, it follows that our obedience is demanded, and it cannot exist unless through freewill. Yet if it were in our power of our own free-will to obey this precept to understand and be wise, without the assistance of grace, it would be useless to say to God, “Give me understanding, that I may learn Thy commandments,” b nor would it be written in the Gospel, “Then opened He their understanding, that they might understand the Scriptures” c; nor would the apostle James say, “If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, Who giveth to all men liberally and upbraideth not, and it shall be given him.” d But the Lord is able to grant both to you and to us, to rejoice in the speedy tidings of your peace and holy concord. I greet you, not only in my own name, but also in the name of the brethren who are with me, and I beseech you to pray for us with one heart and with all instancy. The Lord be with you! Amen.
7. Cavete ergo quod tantus apostolus tam terribiliter dicit, et, ubi sentitis non vos intellegere, interim credite divinis eloquiis quia et liberum hominis est arbitrium et gratia dei, sine cuius adiutorio liberum arbitrium nec converti potest ad deum nec proficere in deum, et, quod pie creditis, ut etiam sapienter intellegatis, orate. Et ad hoc ipsum enim, id est ut sapienter intellegamus, est utique liberum arbitrium. Nisi enim libero arbitrio intellegeremus atque saperemus, non nobis praeciperetur dicente scriptura: Intellegite ergo, qui insipientes estis in populo; et stulti, aliquando sapite. Eo ipso quippe, quo praeceptum atque imperatum est ut intellegamus atque sapiamus, oboedientiam nostram requirit, quae nulla potest esse sine libero arbitrio. Sed si posset hoc ipsum sine adiutorio gratiae fieri per liberum arbitrium, ut intellegeremus atque saperemus, non diceretur deo: Da mihi intellectum, ut discam mandata tua, neque in evangelio scriptum esset: Tunc aperuit illis sensum, ut intellegerent scripturas, nec Iacobus apostolus diceret: Si quis autem vestrum indiget sapientia, postulet a deo, qui dat omnibus affluenter et non inproperat, et dabitur ei. Potens est autem dominus, qui et vobis donet et nobis, ut de vestra pace et pia consensione nuntiis celerrimis gaudeamus. Saluto vos non solum meo nomine, sed etiam fratrum qui mecum sunt, et rogo ut pro nobis concorditer atque instanter oretis. Sit vobiscum dominus. Amen.