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AUGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY.
THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE DOCTRINE
OF INFANT SALVATION.
BY
BENJAMIN B. 'WARFIELD
NEW YORK
THE CHRISTIAN LITERATURE COMPANY
1897
Copyright, 1897, by The Christian Literature Company
PREFACE.
The papers contained in this volume, neither of
which is here printed for the first time, are reprinted
to render them more accessible than they have come
to be in the lapse of time. Some of their peculiarities
are explained by the circumstances of their original pub-
lication. The former one was prepared as prolegome-
na to a translation of Augustine's Anti-Pelagian trea-
tises, and owes it to this fact that those treatises are
described and abstracted and not extracted in it, while
incidental passages bearing on the subject from others
of Augustine's writings are illustratively quoted. It
is reprinted here practically unaltered. The latter
paper, which originally appeared in a monthly maga-
zine, has, on the contrary, been considerably enlarged
and in some parts rewritten for this reissue.
Princeton, September, 1897.
CONTENTS.
PAGE
AUGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY. . .1-139
The Origin and Nature of Pelagianism .3-12
The first task of the Church, 3 ; inevitableness of this here-
sy, 4 ; the author of it, 4 ; its novelty, 4 ; its anti-Chris-
tian basis, 4 ; its roots, 5 ; its central and formative prin-
ciple, 6 ; its three chief contentions, 7 ; its attitude to
grace, 8 ; to sin, 9 ; its crass individualism, 10 ; five claims
made for it, 12.
The External History of the Pelagian Controversy 13-22
Pelagius' work in Rome, 13 ; Pelagius and Ccelestius in
Africa, 13 ; Ccelestius' condemnation at Corinth, 14 ;
Pelagius' examination before John of Jerusalem, 15 ; his
trial at Diospolis, 15 ; his condemnation at Carthage and
Mileve, 16 ; Innocent's acquiescence, 17 ; wavering policy
of Zosimus, 17 ; the interference of the State, 18 ; final
action of the Africans, 18 ; stringent action of Zosimus,
19 ; Julian of Eclanum, 20 ; rise of semi-Pelagianism, 20 ;
condemnation of semi-Pelagianism, 21.
Augustine's Part in the Controversy 23-126
Augustine's readiness for the controversy, 23 ; first oral
stage of it, early anti-Pelagian sermons, 24 ; occasion, ob-
ject, and contents of the first two books of the treatise,
On the Merits and Forgiveness of Sins, 28 ; of the
third book, 31 ; of On the Spirit and the Letter, 32 ; the
letter to Anastasius, 36 ; the note to Pelagius, 37 ; the
first letter to Paulinus of Nola, 38 ; controversial sermons
of this period, 39 ; the progress of the controversy, 43 ;
Sicilian Pelagianism and the letter to Hilary, 43 ; Tima-
sius and James, 46 ; occasion, object, and contents of the
treatise On Nature and Grace, 46 ; Paulus Orosius, 51 ;
letter to Jerome on the Origin of Souls, 51 ; Ccelestius*
Definitions, 53 ; occasion, object, and contents of On the
Perfection of Man's Righteousness, 53 ; news of the
doings in Palestine, 55 ; Pelagian view of " Forgive us
our debts," 55 ; councils in Africa and letters to Inno-
cent, 57 ; letter to Hilary of Norbonne, 58 ; letter to John
of Jerusalem, 59 ; letter to Julianna, 60 ; occasion, object,
l CONTENTS.
PAGB
and contents of On the Proceedings in Palestine, 62 ;
second letter to Paulinus of Nola, 63 ; the sharpest period
of controversy, 65 ; Augustine's policy, 66 ; Zosimus' dis-
comfiture, 6S ; occasion and object of On the Grace of
Christ and On Original Sin, 69 : contents of On the
Grace of Christ, 70 ; of On Original Sin, 72 ; Augus-
tine's sermons of this period, 73 ; letter to Optatus on the
soul, 80 ; correspondence with Sixtus, 83 ; letter to Mer-
cator, 86 ; letter to Asellicus, 8S ; occasion, object, and
contents of the first book On Marriage and Concupi-
scence, 89 ; second letter to Optatus, 92 ; occasion, ob-
ject, and contents of On the Soul and its Origin, 93 ;
advent of Julian, 95 ; his first controversial writings, 96 ;
occasion, object, and contents of the second book of On
Marriage and Concupiscence, 98 ; and of Against Two
Letters of the Pelagians, 99 ; and of Against Julian,
103 ; the Enchiridion on sin and grace, 106 ; occasion of
On Grace and Free Will, 108 ; object and contents of this
treatise, no; occasion, object, and contents of On Re-
buke and Grace, m ; the letter to Vitalis, 113 ; Julian's
reply to the second book of On Marriage and Concupi-
scence, 117 ; occasion of On Heresies, 117 ; its account of
Pelagianism, 118 ; rise of semi-Pelagianism in Gaul, 120 ;
occasion, object, and contents of On the Perseverance
of the Saints and On the Gift of Perseverance, 120 ;
contents of the Unfinished Work, 124 ; Augustine's
crowning anti-Pelagian work, 126.
The Theology of Grace 127-139
Roots and formative principles of Augustine's theology,
127 ; grace its central idea, 127 ; the Necessity of Grace,
12S ; the fall, 128 ; free-will, 129 ; the Nature of Grace,
130; prevenient grace, 132; gratuitous grace, 132 ; sov-
ereignty of grace, 132 ; the Effects of Grace, 133 ; ir-
resistible grace, 133 ; indefectible grace, 133 ; Predes-
tination, 134 ; the Means of Grace, 135 ; infant damna-
tion, 137 ; Scriptural basis of Augustine's theology, 138.
THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT
SALVATION 141-239
Introductory 143-144
The Patristic Doctrine 144-151
Infants' need of and capacity for salvation recognized, 144 ;
prevalence of legalistic conception, 145 ; Gregory of Nys-
sa's views. 146 ; externalism of conception, 147 ; bap-
tism held necessary to salvation, 148; teachings of Au-
gustine, 148 ; outcome of patristic thought, 150.
The Mediaeval Mitigation 151-154
The inherited doctrine, 151 ; the scholastic doctrine of
CONTENTS.
poena damni, 152 ; abortive attempt to apply to infants
baptism of intention, 153 ; John Wycliffe, 154.
The Drift in the Church of Romb 154-165
Four opinions held in post- Reformation Romanism, 154 ;
the Tridentine doctrine, 155 ; popular teaching on its
basis, 155 ; baptism of intention rejected for infants, 15G ;
discrimination in favor of heathen infants, 158 ; protests
of the heart, 161; "happiness in hell," 163; modern
Pelagianizing views, 164.
The Lutheran Teaching 165-174
Protestant doctrine of the Church, 166 ; assertion of the
necessity of baptism, 167 ; baptism of intention applied
to infants, 168 ; Gerhard's teaching, 169 ; fate of heathen
infants, 170 ; four opinions, 171 ; agnosticism the histori-
cal Lutheran position, 172 ; modern Lutheran opinion,
172 ; difficulties of Lutheranism, 173.
The Anglican Position 174-194
Romanizing teaching of early formularies, 175 ; salvation
of baptized children affirmed, 177 ; implication of bap-
tismal regeneration, 178 ; unsuccessful efforts to revise,
181 ; implied loss of unbaptized, 183 ; at least no hope ex-
tended for unbaptized, 185 ; pure agnosticism as to un-
baptized children, 186 ; opinions of English Reformers,
187 ; Cranmer, 187 : Becon, 188 ; Hooper, 190 ; variety
of seventeenth century opinions, 191 ; Hooker, 192 ; Low
Church opinions, 193 ; recent High Church drift, 193.
The Reformed Doctrine 195-220
Consistent application of Protestant doctrine of the Church,
195 ; High Church views of Jurieu, 195 ; free-grace and
electing love, 196 ; Zwingli's teaching, 197 ; doctrine of
the covenant fundamental, 199 ; Calvin and Bullinger,
199 ; essential Reformed postulates, 202 ; five distin-
guishable opinions, 202 ; 1. All dying infants saved, 203 ;
2. Fate of all infants uncertain to us, 205 ; condemned
by Dort, 205 ; Gataker, 205 ; Baxter, 206 ; why neither
view acceptable to earlier Calvinists, 208 ; 3. All cove-
nanted infants saved and uncovenanted lost, 209 ; 4. All
covenanted infants and some uncovenanted saved, 210 ;
5. All covenanted infants saved, agnostic as to uncove-
nanted, 211 ; Jonathan Dickinson, 211 ; the Reformed
Confessions, 213 ; the Synod of Dort, 213 ; the Westmin-
ster Confession, 214 ; implications of " elect infants dying
in infancy," 215 ; drift in late eighteenth and early nine-
teenth centuries, 217 ; Lyman Beecher, 218 ; modern Cal-
vinistic opinion, 219.
Ethical Tendencies 220-236
The most serious peril to the orderly development of the
doctrine, 220 ; early Pelagianizing conceptions, 221 ; in-
in CONTENTS.
PAGE
dividual Pelagianizing assaults on the Reformed doctrine,
221 ; the Remonstrant contention and its inconsequence,
222 ; Wesleyan Arminianism, 223 ; its difficulty, 223 ; Dr.
James Strong's solution, 224 ; original Wesleyanism, 225 :
minor differences, 226 ; Pelagianizing Arminianism, 228 ;
its consequences, 229 ; post-mortem probation, 230 ; Dr.
Kedney's construction, 232 ; Dr. Emory Miller's, 234.
Conclusion 236-239
Three generic views, 236 ; their relations, 237 ; steps in the
development of the doctrine, 237 ; the doctrine a test of
systems, 238 ; consonant with the Reformed system
alone, 238.
AUGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN
CONTROVERSY.
AUGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CON-
TROVERSY.
The Origin and Nature of Pelagianism.
It was natural that the energy of the Church in in-
tellectually realizing and defining its doctrines in rela-
tion to one another, should first be directed towards
the objective side of Christian truth. The chief con-
troversies of the first four centuries and the resulting
definitions of doctrine, concerned the nature of God
and the Person of Christ. It was not until these Theo-
logical and Christological questions were well upon
their way to final settlement, that the Church could
turn its attention to the more subjective side of truth.
Meanwhile she bore in her bosom a full recognition,
side by side, of the freedom of the will, the evil con-
sequences of the fall, and the necessity of divine grace
for salvation. Individual writers, or even entire sec-
tions of the Church, might exhibit a special tendency
to emphasize one or another of the elements that made
up this deposit of faith that was the common inheri-
tance of all. The East, for instance, laid especial stress
on free will. The West dwelt more pointedly on the
ruin of the human race and the absolute need of God's
grace for salvation. But the Eastern theologians did not
forget the universal sinfulness and need of redemption,
or the necessity, for the realization of that redemp-
4 A UGUSTINE AND THE PELA GIAN CONTRO VERSY.
tion, of God's gracious influences. Nor did those of
the West deny the self-determination or accountability
of men. All the elements of the composite doctrine ol
man were everywhere confessed. But they were vari-
ously emphasized, according to the temper of the writ-
ers or the controversial demands of the times. Such a
state of affairs, however, was an invitation to heresy,
and a prophecy of controversy ; just as the simul-
taneous confession of the Unity of God and the Deity
of Christ, or of the Deity and the Humanity of Christ,
inevitably carried in its train a series of heresies and
controversies, until the definitions of the doctrines of
the Trinity and of the Person of Christ were complete.
In like manner, it was inevitable that sooner or later
some one should arise who would throw so one-sided
a stress upon one element or the other of the Church's
teaching as to salvation, as to betray himself into
heresy, and drive the Church, through controversy
with him, into a more precise definition of the doctrines
of free will and grace in their mutual relations.
This new heresiarch came, at the opening of the fifth
century, in the person of the British monk, Pelagius.
The novelty of the doctrine which he taught is repeat-
edly asserted by Augustine,1 and is evident to the his-
torian. But it consisted less in the emphasis that he
laid on free will, than in the fact that, in order to em-
phasize free will, he denied the ruin of the race and
the necessity of grace. This was not only new in
Christianity ; it was even anti-Christian. Jerome, as
well as Augustine, saw this at the time, and spoke of
Pelagianism as the " heresy of Pythagoras and Zeno. "2
Modern writers of various schools have more or
less fully recognized it. Thus Dean Milman thinks
that " the greater part" of Pelagius' letter to Demetrias
" might have been written by an ancient academic." 3
1 On the Merits and Remission of Sins, iii. 6, n, 12 ; Against
Two Letters of the Pelagians, iv. 32 ; Against Julian, i. 4 ; On
Heresies, 88 ; and often elsewhere. Jerome found roots for the theory
in Origen and Rufinus {Letter 133, 3), but this is a different matter :
compare Augustine, On Original Sin, 25.
8 Preface to Book iv. of his work on Jeremiah.
8 Latin Christianity, i. 166, note 2.
ORIGIN AND NATURE OF PELAGIANISM. 5
Dr. De Pressense identifies the Pelagian idea of liberty
with that of Paganism.1 And Bishop Hefele openly
declares that the fundamental doctrine of Pelagianism,
" that man is virtuous entirely of his own merit, not of
the gift of grace," seems to him " to be a rehabilitation
of the general heathen view of the world," and com-
pares with it Cicero's words,2 " For gold, lands, and
all the blessings of life, we have to return thanks to the
Gods ; but no one ever returned thanks to the Gods
for virtues."3 The struggle with Pelagianism was
thus in reality a struggle for the very foundations of
Christianity. Quite as dangerously as in the pre-
vious Theological and Christological controversies,
here the practical substance of Christianity was in
jeopardy. The real question at issue was whether
there was any need for Christianity at all ; whether by
his own power man might not attain eternal felicity ;
whether the function of Christianity was to save, or
only to render an eternity of happiness more easily at-
tainable by man.4
Genetically speaking, Pelagianism was the daughter
of legalism ; but when it itself conceived, it brought
forth an essential deism. It is not without significance
that its originators were "a certain sort of monks,"
that is, laymen of ascetic life. From that point of view
the Divine law appears as a collection of separate com-
mandments, moral perfection as a mere complex of
separate virtues, and a distinct value as a meritorious
demand on Divine approbation is ascribed to each good
work or attainment in the exercises of piety, ft was
because this was essentially his point of view that
Pelagius could regard man's powers as sufficient to the
attainment of sanctity, and could even assert it to be
possible for man to do more than is required of him.
But this involves an essentially deistic conception of
man's relations to his Maker. God has endowed His
creature with a capacity {possibilitas) or ability {posse)
1 Trots Prem. Siecles, ii. 375."^, & De Natura Deorum, iii. 36.
3 History of the Councils of the Church (E. T.), ii. 446, note 3.
4 Compare the excellent statement in Thomasius' Dogtnenge-
schichte, i. 483.
6 AUG USTINE AND THE PELA GIAN CONTRO VERS Y.
for action ; and it is for him to use it. Man is thus a
machine, which, just because it is well made, needs no
Divine interference for its right working ; and the
Creator, having once framed him and endowed him
with the posse, henceforth leaves the velle and the esse
to him.
At this point we have touched the central and forma-
tive principle of Pelagianism. It lies in the assump-
tion of the plenary ability of man ; his ability to do all
that righteousness can demand — to work out not only
his own salvation, but also his own perfection. This
is the core of the whole theory ; and all the other pos-
tulates not only depend upon it, but arise out of it.
Both chronologically and logically this is the root of
the system.
When we first hear of Pelagius he is already ad-
vanced in years, living in Rome in the odour of sanc-
tity,1 and in the enjoyment of a well-deserved reputa-
tion for zeal in exhorting others to a good life. This
zeal grew especially warm against those who, when
charged with their sins, endeavoured to shelter them-
selves behind the weakness of nature.2 He was out-
raged by the excuses which were commonly made on
such occasions, — " It is hard !" " It is difficult !"
" We are not able !" " We are men !" " O blind
madness !" he cried : "we accuse God of a twofold
ignorance, — that He does not seem to know what He
has made, nor what He has commanded, — as if forget-
ting the human weakness of which He is Himself the
author, He has imposed laws on man which he cannot
endure."3 He himself tells us4 that it was his cus-
tom, therefore, whenever he had to speak on moral
improvement and the conduct of a holy life, to begin
by pointing out the power and quality of human na-
ture, and by showing what it is capable of accom-
plishing. For (he says) he esteemed it of little use to
exhort men to do what they deem impossible : hope
1 On the Proceedings of Pelagius, 46 ; On the Merits and Re-
mission of Sins, iii. 1 ; Epistle 186, etc.
2 On Nature and Grace, 1. 3 Epistle to Demetrias, 16.
4 Do. 2 and 19.
ORIGIN AND NATURE OF PELAGIANISM. J
must rather be our companion, and all longing and
effort die when we despair of attaining. So exceed-
ingly ardent an advocate was he of man's unaided abil-
ity to do all that God commanded, that when there
was repeated in his hearing Augustine's noble and en-
tirely scriptural prayer — ' ' Give what Thou command-
est, and command what Thou wilt" — he was unable to
endure it. With such violence did he contradict it
that he almost became embroiled in a quarrel.1 * The 7
powers of man were gifts of God ; and it was, there-
fore (he held), a reproach against God, as if He had
made man ill or evil, to believe that they were insuffi-
cient for the keeping of His law. Nay, do what we
will, we cannot rid ourselves of their sufficiency :
" whether we will, or whether ^we will not, we have /
the capacity of not sinning."2 "I say," he says,
" that man is able to be without sin, and that he is able
to keep the commandments of God." This sufficiently
direct statement of human ability is in reality the hinge
of his whole system.
There were three specially important corollaries
which flowed from so unmeasured an assertion of
human ability, and Augustine himself recognized these
as the chief elements of the Pelagian system.3 It
would be inexplicable on such an assumption, it no man
had ever used his ability in keeping God's law ; and
Pelagius therefore consistently asserted not only that
all might be sinless if they chose, but also that many
saints, even before Christ, had actually lived free from
sin. Again, it would follow from man's inalienable
ability to be free from sin, that each man comes into
the world without entailment of sin or moral weakness
from the past acts of men ; and Pelagius consistently
denied the whole doctrine of original sin. And still
again, it would follow from the assumption of so per-
fect a natural ability, that man has no need of super-
natural assistance in his striving to obey righteous-
ness ; and Pelagius consistently denied both the need
1 On the Gift of Persevera?ice, 53. 2 On Nature and Grace, 49.
3 On the Gift of Perseverance, 4 ; Against Two Letters of the
Petagians, iii. 24 ; iv. 2 sq.
8 AUG US TINE A ND THE PEL A GIA N CON TR 0 VER S Y.
and the reality of divine grace in the sense of an inward
help (and especially of a prevenient help) to man's
weakness.
It was upon this last point that the greatest stress
was laid in the controversy. Augustine was most of
all disturbed that God's grace was denied and opposed.
No doubt the Pelagians spoke constantly of " grace."
But they meant by grace" the primal endowment of
man with free will, and the subsequent aid given him in
order to its proper use by the revelation of the law and
the teaching of the gospel, and, above all, by the for-
giveness of past sins in Christ and by Christ's holy
example.1 Anything beyond this external help they
utterly denied. And they denied that this external
help itself was absolutely necessary, affirming that it
only rendered it easier for man to do what otherwise
he had plenary ability for doing. Chronologically,
this contention seems to have preceded the assertion
which must logically lie at its base— of the freedom of
man from any taint, corruption, or weakness due to
sin. It was in order that they might deny that man
needed help, that they denied that Adam's sin had any
further effect on his posterity than might arise from
his bad example. " Before the action of his own
proper will," said Pelagius roundly, " that only is in
man which God made."2 "As we are procreated
without virtue," he said, " so also without vice."3 In
a word, " nothing that is good or evil, on account of
which we are either praiseworthy or blameworthy, is
born with us, — it is rather done by us ; for we are born
with capacity for either, but provided with neither." 4
So his follower, Julian, plainly asserts his " faith that
God creates men obnoxious to no sin, but full of natu-
ral innocence, and with capacity for voluntary vir-
tues."6 So intrenched is free will in nature, that, ac-
1 On the Spirit and Letter, 4 ; On Nature and Grace, 53 ; On the
Proceedings of Pelagius, 20, 22, 38 ; On the Grace of Christ, 2, 3, 8,
31,42,45 ; Against Two Letters of the Pelagians, iv. 11 ; On Grace
and Free Will, 23-26, and often.
4 On Original Sin, 14. 3 Ibid. * Ibid.
5 The Unfinished Work, iii. 82.
ORIGIN AND NATURE OF PELAGIAN1SM. 9
cording to Julian, it is " just as complete after sins as
it was before sins ;" ' and what this means may be
gathered from Pelagius' definition in the Confession
of Faith that he sent to Innocent : " We say that man
is always able both to sin and not to sin, so that we
may confess that we have tree will."
That sin in such circumstances was so common as to
be well-nigh universal, was accounted for by the bad
example of Adam and the power of habit, the latter
being conceived as simply the result of imitation of the
former. " Nothing makes well-doing so hard," writes
Pelagius to Demetrias, "as the long custom of sins
which begins from childhood and gradually brings us
more and more under its power until it seems to have
in some degree the force of nature {vim natures)." He
is even ready to allow for the force of habit, in a broad
way, on the world at large ; and so divides all history
into progressive periods, marked by God's (external)
grace. At first the light of nature was so strong that
men by it alone could live in holiness. And it was
only when men's manners became corrupt and tar-
nished nature began to be insufficient for holy living,
that by God's grace the law was given as an addition
to mere nature ; and by it " the original lustre was re-
stored to nature after its blush had been impaired."
And so again, after the habit of sinning once more pre-
vailed among men, and " the law became unequal to
the task of curing it,"2 Christ was given, furnishing
men with forgiveness of sins, exhortations to imitation
of His example and the holy example itself.3 Thus a
progressive deterioration was confessed, and such a
deterioration as rendered desirable at least two super-
natural interpositions — in the giving .of the law and the
coming of Christ. Yet no corruption of nature, even
by growing habit, was really allowed. It was only an
ever-increasing facility in imitating vice which arose
from so long a schooling in evil. And all that was
1 Do. i. 91 ; compare do. i. 48, 60 ; ii. 20. " There is nothing of
sin in man, if there is nothing of his own will." " There is no origi-
nal sin in infants at all."
8 On Original Sin, 30. s On the Grace of Christ, 43.
IO A UGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTRO VERS Y.
needed to rescue men from it was a new explanation of
what was right (in the law), or, at the most, the encour-
agement of forgiveness for what was already done, and
a holy example (in Christ) for imitation. Pelagius still
asserted our continuous possession of " a free will
which is unimpaired for sinning and for not sinning ;"
and Julian, that " our free will is just as full after sins
as it was before sins" — although Augustine does not
fail to twit him with a charge ot inconsistency.1
The peculiar individualism of the Pelagian view of
the world comes out strongly in their failure to per-
ceive the effect of habit on nature itself. Just as they
conceived of virtue as an agglomeration of virtuous acts,
so they conceived of sin exclusively as an act, or mass ot
disconnected acts. They appear not to have risen above
the essentially heathen view which had no notion of
holiness except as a series of acts of holiness, or of sin
except as a like series of sinful acts.2 Thus the will was
isolated from its acts, and the acts from each other, and
all organic connection or continuity of life was not only
overlooked but denied.3 After each act of the will,
man stood exactly where he did before : indeed, this
conception scarcely allows for the existence of a " man"
— only a willing machine is left, at each click of the
action of which the spring regains its original position,
and is equally ready as before to perform its function.
In such a conception there was no place for character :
freedom of will was all. Thus it was not an unnatural
mistake which they made, when they forgot the man
altogether, and attributed to the faculty of free will,
under the name of " possibilitas" or "posse" the ability
that belongs rather to the man whose faculty it is and
who is properly responsible for the use he makes of it.
Here lies the essential error of their doctrine of tree
1 The Unfinished Work, i. 91 ; compare 69.
2 Dr. Matheson finely says {Expositor, i. ix. 21), "There is the
same difference between the Christian and Pagan idea of prayer as
there is between the Christian and Pagan idea of sin. Paganism
knows nothing of sin, it knows only sins : it has no conception of the
principle of evil.it comprehends only a succession of sinful acts."
This is Pelagianism too.
3 Compare Schaff, Church History, iii. 804 ; and Thomasius, Dog-
mengeschichte, i. 487-8.
ORIGIN AND NATURE OF PELAGIANISM. II
will. They looked upon freedom in its form only, and
not in its matter ; and, keeping- man in perpetual and
hopeless equilibrium between good and evil, they al-
lowed for no growth of character and permitted no
advantage to accrue to the man himself from his suc-
cessive choices of good. It need not surprise us that the
type of thought which thus dissolved the organism of
the man into an aggregation of disconnected voluntary
acts, failed to comprehend the solidarity of the race.
To the Pelagian, Adam was a man, nothing more ; and
it was simply unthinkable that any act of his that left
his own subsequent acts uncommitted, could entail sin
and guilt upon other men. The same alembic that dis-
solved the individual into a succession of voluntary
acts, could not fail to separate the race into a heap of
unconnected units. If sin, as Julian declared, is noth-
ing but will, and the will itself remained intact after
each act, how could the individual act of an individual
will condition the acts of men as yet unborn ? By
" imitation" of his act alone could, under such a con-
ception, other men be affected. And this carried with
it the corresponding view of man's relation to Christ.
Christ could forgive us the sins we had committed ;
He could teach us the true way ; He could set us a
holy example ; and He could exhort us to its imitation.
But He could not touch us to enable us to will the
good, without destroying the absolute equilibrium of
the will between good and evil. And to destroy this
was to destroy the freedom of the will, which was the
crowning good of our divinely created nature. Surely
the Pelagians forgot that man was not made for will,
but will for man.
In defending their theory, as we are told by Augus-
tine, there were five claims that they especially made
for it.1 It allowed them to praise as was their due,
the creature that God had made, the marriage that He
had instituted, the law that He had given, the free will
which was His greatest endowment to man, and the
saints who had followed His counsels. By this they
meant that they proclaimed the sinless perfection of
1 Against Two Letters of the Pelagians, iii. 25, and iv. at the be-
ginning.
12 AUG US TINE A ND THE PEL A GIA N CON TRO VERS Y.
human nature in every man as he was brought into the
world, and opposed this to the doctrine of original sin ;
the purity and holiness of marriage and the sexual ap-
petites, and opposed this to the doctrine of the trans-
mission of sin ; the ability of the law, as well as and
apart from the gospel, to bring men into eternal life,
and opposed this to the necessity of inner grace ; the ad-
equacy of free will to choose the good, and opposed this
to the necessity of divine aid ; and the perfection of the
lives of the saints, and opposed this to the doctrine of
universal sinfulness. Other questions, concerning the
origin of souls, the necessity of baptism for infants, the
original immortality of Adam, lay more upon the skirts
of the controversy. As it was an obvious fact that all
men died, they could not admit that Adam's death was
a consequence of sin lest they should be forced to con-
fess that his sin had injured all men ; they therefore
asserted that physical death belonged to the very na-
ture of man, and that Adam would have died even had
he not sinned.1 So, as it was impossible to deny that
the Church everywhere baptized infants, they could
not refuse them baptism without confessing themselves
innovators in doctrine ; and therefore they contended
that infants were not baptized for forgiveness of sin,
but in order to attain a higher state of bliss than that
which naturally belongs to innocence. Finally, they
conceived that if it were admitted that souls are direct-
ly created by God for each birth, it could not be as-
serted that they come into the world soiled by sin and
under condemnation ; and therefore they loudly cham-
pioned the creationist theory of the origin of souls.
The teachings of the Pelagians, it will be readily
seen, easily welded themselves into a system, the es-
sential and formative elements of which were entirely
new in the Christian Church. It was this startlingly
new reading of man's condition, powers, and depend-
ence for salvation that broke like a thunderbolt upon
the Western Church at the opening of the fifth cen-
tury, and forced her to reconsider, from the founda-
tions, her whole teaching as to man and his salvation.
1 This belongs to the earlier Pelagianism ; Julian was ready to
admit that death came from Adam, but not that sin did.
EXTERNAL HISTORY OF PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY. 13
The External History of the Pelagian Con-
troversy.
Pelagius seems to have been already somewhat soft-
ened by increasing age when he came to Rome about
the opening ol the fifth century. He was also consti-
tutionally averse to controversy. In his zeal for Chris-
tian morals, and in his conviction that no man would
attempt to do what he was not persuaded he had nat-
ural power to perform, he diligently propagated his
doctrines privately. But he was careful to arouse no
opposition, and was content to make what progress he
could quietly and without open discussion. His meth-
ods of work sufficiently appear in the pages of his Com-
mentary on the Epistles of Saint Paul, which was written
and published during these years, and which exhibits
learning and a sober and correct but somewhat shallow
exegetical skill. In this work, he manages to give ex-
pression to all the main elements of his system. But
he always introduces them indirectly, not as the true
exegesis but by way of objections to the ordinary
teaching which were in need of discussion. The most
important fruit of his residence in Rome was the con-
version to his views of the Advocate Ccelestius, who
brought the courage of youth and the argumentative
training of a lawyer to the propagation of the new
teaching. It was through him that it first broke out
into public controversy, and received its first ecclesias-
tical examination and rejection. Fleeing from Alaric's
second raid on Rome, the two friends landed together
in Africa (A.D. 411), whence Pelagius soon afterwards
departed for Palestine, leaving the bolder and more
contentious ' Ccelestius behind at Carthage. Here
Ccelestius sought ordination as a presbyter. But the
Milanese deacon Paulinus stood forward in accusation
1 On Original Sin, 13.
14 A UGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTRO VERSY.
of him as a heretic, and the matter was brought before
a synod under the presidency of Bishop Aurelius.1
Paulinus' charge consisted of seven items,3 which
asserted that Ccelestius taught the following heresies :
that Adam was made mortal, and would have died
whether he sinned or did not sin ; that the sin of Adam
injured himself alone, not the human race ; that new-
born children are in that state in which Adam was be-
fore his sin ; that the whole human race does not, on
the one hand, die on account of the death or the fall
of Adam, nor, on the other, rise again on account of
the resurrection of Christ ; that infants, even though
not baptized, have eternal life ; that the law leads to
the kingdom of heaven in the same way as the gospel ;.
and that, even before the Lord's coming, there had
been men without sin. Only two fragments of the pro-
ceedings of the synod in investigating this charge have
come down to us.3 But it is easy to see that Coelestius
was contumacious and refused to reject any of the
propositions charged against him, except the one which
had reference to the salvation of infants that die unbap-
tized,— the sole one that admitted of sound defence.
As touching the transmission of sin, he would only say
that it was an open question in the Church, and that
he had heard both opinions from Church dignitaries ;
so that the subject needed investigation, and should
not be made the ground for a charge of heresy. The
natural result was, that, on refusing to condemn the
propositions charged against him, he was himself con-
demned and excommunicated by the synod. Soon
afterwards he sailed to Ephesus, where he obtained
the ordination which he sought.
Meanwhile Pelagius was living quietly in Palestine,
whither in the summer of 415 a young Spanish pres-
byter, Paulus Orosius by name, came with letters from
1 Early in 412, or, less probably, according to the Ballerini and
Hefele, 411.
2 See On Original Sin, 2, 3, 12 ; On the Proceedings of Pelagius,
23. They are also given by Marius Mercator (Migne, xlviii. 69, 70),
by whom the fifth item (on the salvation ot unbaptized infants) is
omitted, — though apparently by an error.
3 Preserved by Augustine, On Original Sin, 3, 4.
EXTERNAL HISTORY OF PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY. 15
Augustine to Jerome, and was invited, near the end of
July in that year, to a diocesan synod presided over
by John of Jerusalem. There he was asked about
Pelagius and Coelestius, and proceeded to give an ac-
count of the condemnation of the latter at the synod
of Carthage, and of Augustine's literary refutation of
the former. Pelagius was sent for, and the proceedings
became an examination into his teachings. The chief
matter brought up was his assertion of the possibility
of men living sinlessly in this world. But the favour
of the bishop towards him, the intemperance of Orosius,
and the difficulty of communication between the par-
ties arising from difference of language, combined so
to clog proceedings that nothing was done ; and the
whole matter, as Western in its origin, was referred
to the Bishop of Rome for examination and decision.1
Soon afterwards two Gallic bishops, — Heros of Aries
and Lazarus of Aix, — who were then in Palestine,
lodged a formal accusation against Pelagius with the
metropolitan, Eulogius of Caesarea. He convened a
synod of fourteen bishops which met at Lydda (Dios-
polis), in December of the same year (415), for the
trial of the case. Perhaps no greater ecclesiastical
farce was ever enacted than this synod exhibited.2
When the time arrived, the accusers were prevented
from being present by illness, and Pelagius was con-
fronted only by the written accusation. This was unskil-
fully drawn, and was, moreover, written in Latin which
the synod did not understand. It was, therefore, not
even consecutively read, and was only head by head
rendered into Greek by an interpreter. Pelagius began
by reading aloud several letters to himself from various
men of reputation in the episcopate, —among them a
friendly note from Augustine. Thoroughly acquainted
with both Latin and Greek, he was enabled skillfully
to thread every difficulty, and pass safely through the
ordeal. Jerome called this a " miserable synod," and
1 An account of this synod is given by Orosius himself in his Apol-
ogy for the Freedom of the Will.
2 A full account and criticism of the proceedings are given by Au-
gustine in his On the Proceedings of Pelagius.
l6 A UGUSTINE AND THE PELA GIAN CONTRO VERS Y.
not unjustly. At the same time it is sufficient to vindi-
cate the honesty and earnestness of the bishops inten-
tions, that, even in such circumstances and despite the
more undeveloped opinions of the East on the ques-
tionsinvolved, Pelagius escaped condemnation only by
a course of most ingenious disingenuousness,- and only
at the cost both of disowning Ccelestius and his teach-
ings, of which he had been the real father, and of lead-
ing the synod to believe that he was anathematizing
the very doctrines which he was himself proclaiming.
There is really no possibility of doubting, as any one
will see who reads the proceedings of the synod, that
Pelagius obtained his acquittal here either by a " lying
condemnation or a tricky interpretation" ' of his own
teachings ; and Augustine is perfectly justified in as-
serting that the "heresy was not acquitted, but the
man who denied the heresy,"2 and who would himself
have been anathematized had he not anathematized the
heresy.
But, however obtained, the acquittal of Pelagius was
an accomplished fact. Neither he nor his friends de-
layed to make the most widely extended use of their
good fortune. Pelagius himself was jubilant. Ac-
counts of the synodal proceedings were sent to the
West, not altogether free from uncandid alterations ;
and Pelagius soon put forth a work, /// Defence of Free-
Will, in which he triumphed in his acquittal and ' ' ex-
plained his explanations" at the synod. Nor were the
champions of the opposite opinion idle. As soon as
the news arrived in North Africa, and before the
authentic records of the synod had reached that region,
the condemnation of Pelagius and Ccelestius was re-
affirmed in two provincial synods — one, consisting ot
sixty-eight bishops, met at Carthage about midsummer
of 416 ; and the other, consisting of about sixty bish-
ops, met soon afterwards at Mileve (Mila). Thus Pal-
estine and North Africa were arrayed against each
other, and it became of great importance to obtain the
support of the Patriarchal See of Rome. Both sides
1 On Original Sin, 13, at the end.
2 Augustine's Sermons (Migne, v. 1511).
EXTERNAL HISTORY OF PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY. 17
made the attempt, but fortune favored the Africans.
Each of the North- African synods sent a synodal letter
to Innocent I., then Bishop of Rome, engaging his as-
sent to their action. To these, five bishops, Aurelius
of Carthage and Augustine among them, added a third
" familiar" letter of their own, in which they urged
upon Innocent to examine into Pelagius' teaching, and
provided him with the material on which he might
base a decision. The letters reached Innocent in time
for him to take advice of his clergy and send favor-
able replies on Jan. 27, 417. In these he expressed his
agreement with the African decisions, asserted the
necessity of inward grace, rejected the Pelagian theory
of infant baptism, and declared Pelagius and Ccelestius
excommunicated until they should return to orthodoxy.
In about six weeks more Innocent was dead.
Zosimus, his successor, was scarcely installed in his
place before Ccelestius appeared at Rome in person to
plead his cause ; while shortly afterwards letters ar-
rived from Pelagius, addressed to Innocent, and by an
artful statement of his belief and a recommendation
from Praylus, lately become bishop of Jerusalem in
John's stead, attempting to enlist Rome in his favor.
Zosimus, who appears to have been a Greek and there-
fore inclined to make little of the merits of this West-
ern controversy, went over to Ccelestius at once, upon
his profession of willingness to anathematize all doc-
trines which the pontifical see had condemned or should
condemn ; and wrote a sharp and arrogant letter to
Africa, proclaiming Ccelestius " catholic," and requir-
ing the Africans to appear within two months at Rome
to prosecute their charges, or else to abandon them.
On the arrival of Pelagius' papers, this letter was fol-
lowed by another (September, 417), in which Zosimus,
with the approbation of his clergy, declared both Pela-
gius and Ccelestius to be orthodox, and severely re-
buked the Africans for their hasty judgment.
It is difficult to understand Zosimus' action in this
matter. Neither of the Confessions presented by the
accused teachers ought to have deceived him. And if
he was seizing the occasion to magnify the Roman see,
1 8 AUG US TINE A ND THE PEL A GIA N CON TR 0 VERS Y.
his mistake was dreadful. Late in 417, or early in 418,
the African bishops assembled at Carthage, in number
more than two hundred, and replied to Zosimus that
they had decided that the sentence pronounced against
Pelagius and Ccelestius should remain in force until
those heretics should unequivocally acknowledge that
44 we are aided by the grace of God, through Christ,
not only to know, but also to do what is right, in each
single act, so that without grace we are unable to have,
think, speak, or do anything pertaining to piety."
This firmness made Zosimus waver. He answered
swellingly but timidly, declaring that he had maturely
examined the matter, but it had not been his intention
finally to acquit Ccelestius ; and now he had left all
things in the condition in which they were belore, but
he claimed the right of final judgment to himself. Mat-
ters were hastening to a conclusion, however, that
would leave him no opportunity to escape from the
mortification of an entire change of front. This letter
was written on the 21st of March, 418 ; it was received
in Africa on the 29th of April ; and on the very next
day an imperial decree was issued from Ravenna order-
ing Pelagius and Ccelestius to be banished from Rome,
with all who held their opinions ; while on the next
day, May 1, a plenary council of about two hundred
bishops met at Carthage, and in nine canons condemned
all the essential features of Pelagianism. Whether this
simultaneous action was the result of skilful arrange-
ment, can only be conjectured. Its effect was in any
case necessarily crushing. There could be no appeal
from the civil decision, and it played directly into the
hands of the African definition of the faith.
The synod's nine canons part naturally into three tri-
ads.1 The first of these deals with the relation of man-
kind to original sin, and anathematizes in turn those who
assert that physical death is a necessity of nature, and
not a result of Adam's sin ; those who assert that new-
born children derive nothing of original sin from Adam
to be expiated by the laver of regeneration ; and those
1 Compare Canon Bright's Introduction to his Select Anti-Pela-
gian Treatises, p. xli.
EXTERNAL HISTORY OF PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY. 19
who assert a distinction between the kingdom of heaven
and eternal life, for entrance into the former of which
alone baptism is necessary. The second triad deals
with the nature of grace, and anathematizes those who
assert that grace brings only remission of past sins, not
aid in avoiding future ones ; those who assert that
grace aids us not to sin, only by teaching us what is
sinful, not by enabling us to will and do what we know
to be right ; and those who assert that grace only en-
ables us to do more easily what we should without it
still be able to do. The third triad- deals with the uni-
versal sinfulness of the race, and anathematizes those
who assert that the apostles' confession of sin (1 John
i. 8) is due only to their humility ; those who say that
" Forgive us our trespasses" in the Lord's Prayer, is
pronounced by the saints, not for themselves, but for the
sinners in/their company ; and those who say that the
saints use these words of themselves only out of humil-
ity and not truly. /Here we see a careful traversing of
the whole ground of the controversy, with a conscious
reference to the three chief contentions of the Pelagian
teachers.1
The appeal to the civil power, by whomsoever made,
was, of course, indefensible, although it accorded with
the opinions of the day and was entirely approved by
Augustine. But it was the ruin of the Pelagian cause.
Zosimus found himself forced either to go into banish-
ment with his wards, or to desert their cause. He ap-
pears never to have had any personal convictions on
the dogmatic points involved in the controversy, and
so, all the more readily, yielded to the necessity of the
moment. He cited Ccelestius to appear before a coun-
cil for a new examination. But that heresiarch con-
sulted prudence and withdrew from the city. Zosi-
mus, possibly in the effort to appear a leader in the
cause he had opposed, not only condemned and excom-
municated the men whom less than six months before he
had pronounced " orthodox" after a " mature consid-
eration of the matters involved," but, in obedience to
the imperial decree, issued a stringent paper which
1 See above, p. 7, and the passages in Augustine cited in note 3.
2o A UGUSTINE AND THE PELA GIAN CONTRO VERS V.
condemned Pelagius and the Pelagians, and affirmed
the African doctrines as to corruption of nature, true
grace, and the necessity of baptism. To this he re-
quired subscription from all bishops as a test of ortho-
doxy. Eighteen Italian bishops refused their signa-
tures, with Julian of Eclanum, henceforth to be the
champion of the Pelagian party, at their head, and
were therefore deposed, although several of them after-
wards recanted and were restored. In Julian, the
heresy obtained an advocate who, if aught could have
been done for its re-instatement, would surely have
proved successful. He was the boldest, the strongest,
at once the most acute and the most weighty, of all the
disputants of his party. But the ecclesiastical stand-
ing of this heresy was already determined. The policy
of Zosimus' test act was imposed by imperial authority
on North Africa in 419. The exiled bishops were
driven from Constantinople by Atticus in 424 ; and
they are said to have been condemned at a Cilician
synod in 423, and at an Antiochian one in 424. Thus
the East itself was preparing for the final act in the
drama. The exiled bishops were with Nestorius at
Constantinople in 429 ; and that patriarch unsuccess-
fully interceded for them with Coelestine, then Bishop
of Rome. The conjunction was ominous. And at the
ecumenical synod at Ephesus in 431, we again find the
" Coelestians" side by side with Nestorius, sharers in
his condemnation.
But Pelagianism did not so die as not to leave a
legacy behind it. " Remainders of Pelagianism" !
soon showed themselves especially in Southern Gaul,
where a body of monastic leaders attempted to find a
middle ground on which they could stand, by allowing
the Augustinian doctrine of assisting grace but retain-
ing the Pelagian conception of man's self-determination
to good. We first hear of them in 428, through letters
from two laymen, Prosper and Hilary, to Augustine.
They are described as men who accepte'd original sin
and the necessity of grace, but asserted that men began
their turning to God, and God helped their beginning.
1 Prosper's phrase.
EXTERNAL HISTORY OF PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY. 2 1
They taught l that all men are sinners, and that they
derive their sin from Adam ; that they can by no means
save themselves, but need God's assisting grace ; and
that this grace is gratuitous in the sense that men can-
not really deserve it, and yet that it is not irresistible,
nor given always without the occasion of its gift hav-
ing been determined by men's attitude towards God ;
so that, though not given on account of the merits of
men, it is given according to those merits, actual or
foreseen. The recognized head of this new, semi-
Pelagian movement was John Cassian, a pupil of
Chrysostom — to whom he attributed all that was good
in his life and will — and the fountain-head of Gallic
monasticism ; by his side stood Vincent of Lerins.
The treatise which Augustine wrote upon the appeal
of Hilary and Prosper, so far from ending the contro-
versy, gave additional offence. The middle ground
which the semi-Pelagians assumed was supported by
appeals to doctrinal tradition, and not only commended
itself to the ruling monastic consciousness, but was
easily given the appearance of well-balanced modera-
tion. The tide of Gallic thought set strongly in its
channels and departed ever more widely from Augus-
tinianism until it found in Faustus of Rhegium a philo-
sophical thinker who compacted it into something like
a unitary system. There was an appearance that Gal-
lic theology had broken out a path of its own which
was destined to produce a permanent breach between
it and the rest of the Church, and especially with
Rome, where the torch of Augustinianism was burning
brightly.2
The Augustinian opposition was at first led by the
vigorous controversialist Prosper ol Aquitaine, " the
Troubadour of Augustinianism," who in prose and
verse alike, but to little apparent effect, assaulted the
" ingrates" who would not give its full rights to the
1 Augustine gives their teaching carefully in his On the Predestina-
tion of the Saints, 2.
2 An admirable account of the development of semi-Pelagianism in
Gaul is given by Dr. C. F. Arnold, in his Ccesarius von Ar elate und
die gallische Kirche seiner Zeit, p. 314. Cf. Harnack's Dogmen-
geschichte, iii. 219 sq. (ed. 1 and 2) ; Hoch's Lehre des Johannes
Cassianns von Natur u?id Gnade ; and Koch's Der heilige Faustus.
22 A VGUSTINE AND THE PELA GIAN CONTRO VERS Y.
grace of God. Already in 431 he obtained a letter from
Pope Ccelestine, addressed to the Gallican bishops and
designed to close the controversy in lavor of Augus-
tinianism ; and from that time the whole influence of
the Roman see was freely used to this end. It was
not, however, until nearly a century later that the con-
test was brought to a conclusion in a victory for a weak-
ened Augustinianism, under the leadership of the wise
and good Csesarius of Aries. As a nurseling of Lerins,
Caesarius came himself out of the centre of the semi-
Pelagian circle, and owed his Augustinianism appar-
ently to a certain Pomerius, a rhetorician by profession,
whom he met at Aries. Under the influence of Caesa-
rius the second Council of Orange, which convened
at that ancient town on the third day of July, 529, drew
up a series of articles which condemned the distinctive
features of semi-Pelagianism, and affirmed an anxious-
ly guarded and somewhat attenuated Augustinianism.
These articles were framed with the aid of Felix IV.
and received the ratification of Boniface II. in the fol-
lowing year. So far as a formal condemnation could
reach, distinctive semi-Pelagianism was suppressed by
them in the whole Western Church. This result could
not have been attained by leadership less great than
that of Caesarius. But the serious consequence at-
tended the method of compromise by which he secured
this great achievement, that a weakened Augustinian-
ism thus became the norm of church-doctrine for the
future. Crass Gallic synergism was forever excluded
from Western church-teaching ; but equally a pure
and complete Augustinianism was put henceforth be-
yond its reach. Distinctive semi-Pelagianism must
hereafter rank as heresy ; the Augustinian doctrine of
" prevenient grace" became an essential element of
the Church's system. But consistent Augustinianism
might easily also come to be looked upon as heresy,
and the very terms " predestination" and ' ' particular
redemption" might fall under the ban. In a word, the
decrees of Trent are the natural sequence of the canons
of Orange ; and we must trace it back to these canons
that Thomism has proved the supreme height of
doctrine attainable in the Latin Church.
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 23
Augustine's Part in the Controversy.
Both by nature and by grace, Augustine was very
specially fitted to be the champion of truth in this con-
troversy. Of a naturally philosophical temperament,
he saw into the springs ol life with a vividness of
perception to which most men are strangers. And
his own experiences in his long resistance and final
yielding to the drawings of grace gave him a clear ap-
prehension of the great evangelic principle that God
seeks men, not men God, such as no sophistry could
cloud. Whatever change his philosophy or theol-
ogy might undergo in other particulars, there was
one conviction too deeply imprinted upon his heart
ever to fade or alter, — the conviction of the ineffable-
ness of God's grace. Grace, — man's absolute depend-
ence on God as the source of all good, — this was the
common and even the formative element in all stages
of his doctrinal development, which was marked only
by the ever growing consistency with which he built
his theology around this central principle. Already in
397, — the year after he became bishop, — we find him
enunciating with admirable clearness all the essential
elements of his teaching, as he afterwards opposed
them to Pelagius.1 It was inevitable, therefore, that
although he was rejoiced when he heard, some years
later, of the zealous labours of this pious monk in
Rome towards stemming the tide of luxury and sin,
and although he esteemed him for his devout life and
loved him for his Christian activity, he yet was deeply
troubled when subsequent rumours reached him that
Pelagius was " disputing against the grace of God."
He tells us over and over again, that this was a thing
no devout heart could endure. And we perceive that,
1 Compare his work written this year, On Several Questio7is to
Simplicianus. For the development of Augustine's theology, see the
admirable statement in Neander's Church History, E. T., ii. 625 sq.
24 A UGUSTINE AND THE PELA GIAN CONTRO VERS Y.
from this moment, Augustine was only biding his time,
and awaiting a fitting opportunity to join issue with
the denier of the holy of holies ol his whole, we need
not say theology merely, but life. " Although 1 was
grieved by this," he says, " and it was told me by men
whom I believed, I yet desired to have something of
such sort from his own lips or in some book of his, so
that, if I began to refute it, he would not be able to
deny it." ' Thus he actually apologises for not enter-
ing into the controversy earlier. When Pelagius came
to Africa, then, it was almost as if he had deliberately
sought his fate. Circumstances secured a lull before
the storm. He visited Hippo ; but Augustine was
absent, though he did not fail to inform himself on
his return that Pelagius while there had not been heard
to say " anything at all of this kind." The contro-
versy against the Donatists was now occupying all the
energies of the African Church, and Augustine himself
was a ruling spirit in the great conference now holding
at Carthage with them. While there, he was so im-
mersed in this business that, although he once or twice
saw the face of Pelagius, he had no conversation with
him. His ears were wounded by a casual remark
which he heard, to the effect " that infants were not
baptized for remission of sins but for consecration to
Christ," but he allowed himself to pass the matter
over, " because there was no opportunity to contradict
it and those who said it were not such men as could
cause him solicitude for their influence."2
Early Anti-Pelagian Sermons.
It appears from these facts, given us by himself, that
Augustine was not only ready but was looking for
the coming controversy. It can scarcely have been a
surprise to him when Paulinus accused Coelestius (412).
He was not a member of the council which condemned
him, but it was inevitable that he should at once take
the leading part in the consequent controversy.
1 On the Proceedings of Pelagius, 46.
* On the Merits and Remission 0/ Sins, iii. 12.
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 25
Ccelestius and his friends did not silently submit to the
judgment that had been passed upon their teaching.
They could not openly propagate their heresy, but
they were diligent in spreading their plaints privately
and by subterraneous whispers among the people.1
This was' met by the Catholics in public sermons and
familiar colloquies held everywhere. But this wise
rule was observed, — to contend against the erroneous
teachings but to keep silence as to the teachers, that
so (as Augustine explains2) " the men might rather be
brought to see and acknowledge their error through
fear of ecclesiastical judgment than be punished by the
actual judgment." Augustine was abundant in these
oral labours. Many of his sermons directed against
Pelagian error have come down to us, though it is
often impossible to be sure as to their dates. For one
of them (170) he took his text from Phil. iii. 6-16, " As
touching the righteousness which is by the law blame-
less ; howbeit what things were gain to me, those have
I counted loss for Christ." He begins by asking how
the apostle could count his blameless conversation ac-
cording to the righteousness which is from the law as
dung and loss, and then proceeds to explain the pur-
pose for which the law was given, our state by nature
and under law, and the kind of blamelessness that the
law is able to produce, ending by showing that man
can have no righteousness except from God, and no
perfect righteousness except in heaven.
Three other sermons (174, 175, 176) had as their text
1 Tim. i. 15, 16, and developed its teaching, that the
universal sin of the world and its helplessness in sin
constituted the necessity of the incarnation ; and espe-
cially that the necessity of Christ's grace for salvation
is just as great tor infants as for adults. Much is very
forcibly said in these sermons which was afterwards
incorporated in Augustine's treatises. ' ' There was
no reason," he insists, " for the coming of Christ the
Lord except to save sinners. Take away diseases,
take away wounds, and there is no reason for medi-
1 Epistle 157, 22.
2 On the Proceedings of Pelagius, 46.
26 A UGUSTJNE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY.
cine. If the great Physician came from heaven, a
great sick man was lying ill through the whole world.
That sick man is the human race" (175, 1). " He who
says, ' I am not a sinner,' or ' I was not,' is ungrateful
to the Saviour. No one of men in that mass of mor-
tals which flows down from Adam, no one at all of
men is not sick : no one is healed without the grace of
Christ. Why do you ask whether infants are sick from
Adam ? For they, too, are brought to the church ;
and, if they cannot run thither on their own feet, they
run on the feet of others that they may be healed.
Mother Church accommodates others' feet to them so
that they may come, others' heart so that they may
believe, others' tongue so that they may confess ; and,
since they are sick by another's sin, so when they are
healed they are saved by another's confession in their
behalf. Let, then, no one buzz strange doctrines to
you. This the Church has always had, has always
held ; this she has received from the faith of the elders ;
this she will perseveringly guard until the end. Since
the whole have no need of a physician, but only the
sick, what need, then, has the infant of Christ, if he is
not sick ? If he is well, why does he seek the physi-
cian through those who love him ? If, when infants
are brought, they are said to have no sin of inheritance
(peccatum propaginis) at all, and yet come to Christ,
why is it not said in the church to those that bring
them, ' Take these innocents hence ; the physician is
not needed by the well, but by the sick ; Christ came
not to call the just, but sinners ' ? It never has been
said, and it never will be said. Let each one therefore,
brethren, speak for him who cannot speak for himself.
It is much the custom to intrust the inheritance of
orphans to the bishops ; how much more the grace of
infants ! The bishop protects the orphan lest he should
be oppressed by strangers, his parents being dead.
Let him cry out more for the infant who, he fears, will
be slain by his parents. Who comes to Christ has
something in him to be healed ; and he who has not,
has no reason for seeking the physician. Let parents
choose one of two things : let them either confess that
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 27
there is sin to be healed in their infants, or let them
cease bringing them to the physician. This is nothing
else than to wish to bring a well person to the physi-
cian. Why do you bring him ? To be baptized.
Whom ? The infant. To whom do you bring him ?
To Christ. To Him, of course, who came into the
world ? Certainly, it is said. Why did He come into
the world ? To save sinners. Then he whom you
bring has in him that which needs saving ?'' '
So again : " He who says that the age of infancy does
not need Jesus' salvation, says nothing else than that the
Lord Christ is not Jesus to faithful infants ; i.e., to in-
fants baptized in Christ. For what is Jesus ? Jesus
means saviour. He is not Jesus to those whom He
does not save, who do not need to be saved. Now, if
your hearts can bear that Christ is not Jesus to any of
the baptized, I do not know how you can be acknowl-
edged to have sound faith. They are infants, but they
are made members of Him. They are infants, but they
receive His sacraments. They are infants, but they
become partakers of His table, so that they may have
life." 3 The preveniency of grace is explicitly asserted
in these sermons. In one he says, " Zaccheus was
seen, and saw ; but unless he had been seen, he would
not have seen. For ' whom He predestinated, them
also He called.' In order that we may see, we are
seen ; that we may love, we are loved. ' My God,
may His pity prevent me ! ' " 3 And in another, at
more length : " His calling has prevented you, so that
you may have a good will. Cry out, ' My God, let
Thy mercy prevent me ' (Ps. lviii. 11). That you may
be, that you may feel, that you may hear, that you
may consent, His mercy prevents you. It prevents
you in all things ; and do you too prevent His judg-
ment in something. In what, do you say ? In what ?
In confessing that you have all these things from God,
whatever you have of good ; and from yourself what-
ever you have of evil" (176, 5). " We owe therefore
to Him that we are, that we are alive, that we under-
1 Sermon 176, 2. 2 Ibid. 174. 3 Ibid. 174.
28 A UGUSTINE AND THE PELA GIAN CONTRO VERSY.
stand : that we are men, that we live well, that we
understand aright, we owe to Him. Nothing is ours
except the sin that we have. For what have we that
we did not receive?" (i Cor. ix. 7) (176, 6).
The Treatise on " The Merits and Remission of Sins."
It was not long, however, before the controversy
was driven out of the region of sermons into that of
regular treatises. The occasion for Augustine's first
appearance in a written document bearing on the con-
troversy, was given by certain questions which were
sent to him for answer by " the tribune and notary"
Marcellinus, with whom he had cemented his intimacy
at Carthage the previous year, when this notable offi-
cial was presiding, by the emperor's orders, over the
great conference between the Catholics and Donatists.1
The mere fact that Marcellinus, still at Carthage where
Coelestius had been brought to trial, appealed to Au-
gustine at Hippo for written answers to important
questions connected with the Pelagian heresy, speaks
volumes for the prominent position he had already as-
sumed in the controversy. The questions that were
sent concerned the connection of death with sin, the
transmission of sin, the possibility of a sinless life, and
especially infants' need of baptism.2 Augustine was
immersed in abundant labours when they reached him.3
But he could not resist this appeal, and that the less
1 Flavius Marcellinus was a Christian man of high character and
devout mind. Honorius mentions him as a " man of conspicuous re-
nown," in a law enacted August 30th, 414 {Cod. Thcod. xvi., 5, line 55).
He was appointed by Honorius to preside over the commission of in-
quiry into the disputes between the Catholics and Donatists in 411,
and held the famous conference between the parties that met in
Carthage on the 1st, 3d, and 8th of June, 411. He discharged this
whole business with singular patience, moderation, and good judg-
ment ; which appears to have cemented the intimate friendship be-
tween him and Augustine. Augustine's treatise on The Spirit and
Letter is also addressed to him, and the City of God was undertaken on
his suggestion. He was put to death in September, 413, "having,
though innocent, fallen a victim to the cruel hatred of the tyrant
Heraclius," as Jerome writes in his book iii. against the Pelagians.
8 On the Merits and Remission of Sins, iii. 1.
3 Ibid. i. 1. Compare Epistle 139.
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 29
since the Pelagian controversy had already grown to a
place of the first importance in his eyes. The result
was his treatise, On the Merits and Remission of Sins
mid on the Baptism of Infants, which consisted of two
books, and was written in 412.
The first book of this work is an argument for origi-
nal sin, drawn from the universal reign of death in the
world (2-8), from the teaching of Rom. v. 12-21 (9-20),
and chiefly from the baptism of infants (2 1-70). ' It
opens by exploding the Pelagian contention that death
is of nature and that Adam would have died even had
he not sinned, by showing that the penalty threatened
to Adam included physical death (Gen. iii. 19), and
that it is due to him that we all die (Rom. viii. 10, 11 ;
1 Cor. xv. 21) (2-8). Then the Pelagian assertion that
we are injured in Adam's sin only by its bad example,
which we imitate, not by any propagation from it, is
tested by an exposition ot Rom. v. 12 sq. (9-20). And
then the main subject of the book is reached, and the
writer sharply presses the Pelagians with the universal
and primitive fact of the baptism of infants, as a proof
of original sin (21-70). He tracks out all their subter-
fuges,— showing the absurdity of the assertion that in-
fants are baptized for the remission of sins that they
have themselves committed since birth (22), or in order
to obtain a higher stage of salvation (23-28), or because
of sin committed in some previous state of existence
(3 1— 33)- Then turning to the positive side, he shows
at length that the Scriptures teach that Christ came to
save sinners, that baptism is for the remission of sins,
and that all that partake of it are confessedly sinners
(34 sq.) ; then he points out that John ii. 7, 8, on which
the Pelagians relied, cannot be held to distinguish be-
tween ordinary salvation and a higher form, under the
name of " the kingdom of God" (58 sq.) ; and he closes
1 On the prominence of infant baptism in the controversy, and why
it was so, see Sermon 165, 7 sq. " What do you say ? ' Just this,' he
says, ' that God creates every man immortal.' Why, then, dc infant
children die ? For if I say, ' Why do adult men die ? ' you would say
to me, ' They have sinned. ' Therefore I do not argue about the
adults : I cite infancy as a witness against you," and so on, eloquent-
ly developing the argument.
So A UGUSTINE AND THE PELA GIAN CONTRO VERS Y.
by showing that the very manner in which baptism
was administered, with its exorcism and exsufflation,
implied the infant to be a sinner (63), and by suggest-
ing that the peculiar helplessness of infancy, so differ-
ent not only from the earliest age of Adam, but also
from that of many young animals, may possibly be
itself penal (64-69).
The second book treats, with similar fulness, the
question of the perfection of human righteousness in
this life. After an exordium which speaks of the will
and its limitations and of the need of God's assisting
grace (1-6), the writer raises four questions. First, he
asks whether it may be said to be possible for a man,
by God's grace, to attain a condition of entire sinless-
ness in this life (7). This he answers in the affirmative.
Secondly, he asks whether any one has ever done this,
or may ever be expected to do it. This he answers in
the negative on the testimony of Scripture (8-25).
Thirdly, he asks why not, and replies briefly because
men are unwilling, explaining at length what he means
by this (26-33). Finally, he inquires whether any man
has ever existed, exists now, or will ever exist, entirely
without sin. This question differs from the second
inasmuch as that inquired after the attainment in this
life of a state in which sinning should cease, while this
seeks a man who has never been sinful, implying
the absence of original as well as of actual sin. After
answering this in the negative (34), Augustine discusses
anew the question of original sin. Here he first ex-
pounds from the positive side (35-38) the condition of
man in paradise, the nature of his probation, and of the
fall and its effects both on him and his posterity, and
the kind of redemption that has been provided in the
incarnation. He then proceeds to reply to certain
cavils (39 sq.), such as, " Why should children of bap-
tized people need baptism ?" — " How can a sin be re-
mitted to the father and held against the child ?" — " If
physical death comes from Adam, ought we not to be
released from it on believing in Christ?" He con-
cludes with an exhortation to hold fast to the exact
truth, turning neither to the right nor left,— neither
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 31
saying that we have no sin, nor surrendering ourselves
to our sin (57 sq.).
After these books were completed, Augustine came
into possession of Pelagius' Commentary on Paul's Epis-
tles, which was written while he was living in Rome
(before 410). He found it to contain some arguments
that he had not treated, — such arguments, he tells us,
as he had not imagined could be propounded by any
one.1 Unwilling to re-open his finished treatise, he
began a long supplementary letter to Marcellinus,
which he intended to serve as a third and concluding
book to his work. He was some time in completing
this letter. He had asked to have the former two
books returned to him ; and it is a curious indication of
his overworked state, that he forgot what he wanted
with them.2 He visited Carthage while the letter was
in hand, and saw Marcellinus personally. Even after
his return to Hippo, it dragged along, amid many dis-
tractions, slowly towards completion.3 Meanwhile, a
long letter was written to Honoratus, in which a sec-
tion on the grace of the New Testament was incor-
porated. At length the promised supplement was com-
pleted. It was professedly a criticism of Pelagius'
Commentary, and therefore naturally mentioned his
name. But Augustine even goes out of his way to
speak as highly of his opponent as he can.4 It is never-
theless apparent that his esteem for the strength of
Pelagius' mind was not very high, and that he had even
less patience with the moral quality that led to Pelagius'
odd, oblique way of expressing his opinions. There is
even a half sarcasm in the way he speaks of Pelagius'
care and circumspection, which was certainly justified
by the event.
The letter opens by stating and criticising in a very
acute and telling dialectic, the new arguments of Pela-
gius. These were such as the following : " If Adam's
sin injured even those who do not sin, Christ's right-
eousness ought likewise to profit even those who do
1 On the Merits and Remission of Sins, iii. 1.
2 Letter, 139, 3. a_3 Letter, 140. 4 See chaps. 1 and 5.
32 AUG US TINE A ND THE PEL A GIA N CON TR OVERS Y.
not believe" (2-4) ; " No man can transmit what he
has not ; and hence, if baptism cleanses from sin, the
children of baptized parents ought to be free from
sin ;" " God remits one's own sins, and can scarcely,
therefore, impute another's to us ; and if the soul is
created, it would certainly be unjust to impute
Adam's alien sin to it" (5). The stress of the letter,
however, is laid upon two contentions : 1. That what-
ever else may be ambiguous in the Scriptures, they are
perfectly clear that no man can have eternal life except
in Christ, who came to call sinners to repentance (7) ;
and 2. That original sin in infants has always been, in
the Church, one of the fixed facts, to be used as a basis
of argument in order to reach the truth in other mat-
ters, and has never itself been called in question before
(10-14). At this point, the writer returns to the second
and third of the new arguments of Pelagius mentioned
above, and discusses them more fully (15-20). He
closes with a recapitulation of the three great points
that had been raised : viz., that both death and sin are
derived from Adam's sin by all his posterity ; that in-
fants need salvation, and hence baptism ; and that no
man ever attains in this life such a state of holiness that
he cannot truly pray, " Forgive us our trespasses."
The Treatise on " The Spirit and the Letter."
Augustine was now to learn that one service often
entails another. Marcellinus wrote to say that he was
puzzled by what had been said in the second book of
this work, as to the possibility of man's attaining to
sinlessness in this life, while yet it was asserted that no
man ever had attained or ever would attain, it. How,
he asked, can that be said to be possible which is,
and which will remain, unexampled ? In reply, Au-
gustine wrote, during this same year (412), and sent to
his noble friend, another work, which he calls On the
Spirit and the Letter, from the prominence which he
gives in it to the words of 2 Cor. iii. 6.1 He did not
1 Sermon 163 treats the text similarly.
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 33
content himself with a simple, direct answer to Mar-
cellinus' question. He goes at length into a profound
disquisition into the roots of the doctrine. Thus he
gives us, not a mere explanation of a former conten-
tion, but a new treatise on a new subject,— the absolute
necessity of the grace of God for any good living.
He begins by explaining to Marcellinus that he has
affirmed the possibility while denying the actuality of
a sinless life, on the ground that all things are possible
to God, — even the passage of a camel through the eye
of a needle, which nevertheless has never occurred
(1, 2). For, in speaking of man's perfection, we are
speaking really of a work of God, — and one which is
none the less His work because it is wrought through
the instrumentality of man and in the use of his free
will. The Scriptures, indeed, teach that no man lives
without sin. But this is only the proclamation of a
matter of fact ; and although it is thus contrary to
fact and Scripture to assert that men may be found
that live sinlessly, yet such an assertion would not be
fatal heresy. VVhat is unbearable, is that men should
assert it to be possible for man, unaided by God, to
attain this perfection. This is to speak against the
grace of God. It is to put in man's power what is only
possible to the almighty grace of God (3, 4). No
doubt, even these men do not, in so many words, ex-
clude the aid of grace in perfecting human life. They
affirm God's help ; but they make it consist in His gift
to man of a perfectly free will, and in His addition to
this of commandments and teachings which make
known to him what he is to seek and what to avoid,
and so enable him to direct his free will to what is
good. What, however, does such a " grace" amount
to ? (5). Man needs something more than to know the
right way. He needs to love it, or he will not walk in
it. And all mere teaching, which can do nothing more
than bring us knowledge of what we ought to do, is
but the letter that killeth. What we need is some in-
ward, Spirit-given aid to the keeping of what by the
law we know ought to be kept. Mere knowledge
slays ; while to lead a holy life is the gift of God, — not
34 A UG US TINE A ND THE PEL A GIA N CONTRO VERS Y.
only because He has given us will, nor only because
He has taught us the right way, but because by the
Holy Spirit He sheds love abroad in the hearts of all
those whom He has predestinated and will call and
justify and glorify (Rom. viii. 29, 30).
To prove this, Augustine states to be the object of
the present treatise ; and, after investigating the mean-
ing of 2 Cor. iii. 6 and showing that ' ' the letter" there
means the law as a system of precepts, which reveals
sin rather than takes it away, points out the way rather
than gives strength to walk in it and therefore slays
the soul by shutting it up under sin, — while " the
Spirit" is God's Holy Ghost who is shed abroad in our
hearts to give us strength to walk aright, —he under-
takes to prove this position from the teachings of the
Epistle to the Romans at large. This contention, it
will be seen, cut at the very roots of Pelagianism. If
all mere teaching slays the soul, as Paul asserts, then
all that what they called " grace" could, when alone,
do, was to destroy ; and the upshot of " helping" man
by simply giving him free will and pointing out the
way to him, would be the loss of the whole race. Not
that the law is sin : Augustine teaches that it is holy
and good and God's instrument in salvation. Not
that free will is done away : it is by free will that men
are led into holiness. But the purpose of the law (he
teaches) is to make men so feel their lost estate as to
seek the help by which alone they may be saved ; and
will is only then liberated to do good when grace has
made it free. " What the law of works enjoins by
menace, that the law of faith secures by faith. What
the law of works does is to say, ' Do what I command
thee ; ' but by the law of faith we say to God, ' Give
me what thou commandest.' " (22V
In the midst of this argument, Augustine is led to dis-
cuss the differentiating characteristics of the Old and
New Testaments. He expounds at length (33-42) the
passage in Jer. xxxi. 31-34, showing that, in the
1 See this prayer beautifully illustrated from Scripture in On the
Merits and Remission of Sins, ii. 5.
AUGUSTINE' S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 35
prophet's view, the difference between the two cove-
nants is that in the Old, the law is an external thing
written on stones ; while in the New, it is written in-
ternally on the heart, so that men now wish to do what
the law prescribes. This writing on the heart is noth-
ing else, he explains, than the shedding abroad by the
Holy Spirit of love in our hearts, so that we love God's
will, and therefore freely do it. Towards the end of
the treatise (50-61), he treats in an absorbingly interest-
ing way of the mutual relations of free will, faith, and
grace, contending that all co-exist without the voiding
of any. It is by free will that we believe ; but it is
only as grace moves us, that we are able to use our
free will for believing ; and it is only after we are thus
led by grace to believe, that we obtain all other goods.
In prosecuting this analysis, Augustine is led to distin-
guish very sharply between the faculty and use of ree
will (58), as well as between ability and volition (53).
Faith is an act of the man himself ; but only as he is
given the power from on high to will to believe, will
he believe (57, 60).
By this work, Augustine completed, in his treatment
of Pelagianism, the circle of that triad of doctrines
which he himself looked upon as most endangered by
this heresy,1- original sin, the imperfection of human
righteousness, the necessity of grace. In his mind,
the last was the kernel of the whole controversy ; and
this was a subject which he could never approach with-
out some heightened fervour. This accounts for the
great attractiveness of the present work, — through the
whole fabric of which runs the golden thread of the
praise of God's ineffable grace. In Canon Bright's
opinion, it " perhaps, next to the Confessions, tells us
most of the thoughts of that ' rich, profound, and affec-
tionate mind ' on the soul's relations to its God." *
1 See above, p. 7. 5 As quoted above, p. 18.
36 AUGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY.
The Letters to A nastasins and Paulinus.
After the publication of these treatises, the con-
troversy certainly did not lull. But it relapsed for
nearly three years, again, into less public courses.
Meanwhile, Augustine was busy, among other most
distracting cares (Ep. 145, 1), still defending the grace
of God by letters and sermons. A fair illustration of
his state of mind at this time may be obtained fiom
his letter to Anastasius (145), which assuredly must
have been written soon after the treatise On the Spirit
and the Letter. Throughout this letter, there are
adumbrations of the same train of thought that filled
that treatise ; and there is one passage which may
almost be taken as a summary of it. Augustine is weary
of the vexatious cares that oppressed his life. He is
ready to long for the everlasting rest. Yet he bewails
the weakness which allowed the sweetness of external
things still to insinuate itself into his heait. Victory
over, and emancipation from, this, he asserts, " can-
not, without God's grace, be achieved by the human
will, which is by no means to be called free so long as
it is subject to enslaving lusts." Then he proceeds as
follows : " The law, therefore, by teaching and com-
manding what cannot be fulfilled without grace, dem-
onstrates to man his weakness, in order that the weak-
ness, thus proved, may resort to the Saviour, by whose
healing the will may be able to do what it found im-
possible in its weakness. So, then, the law brings us
to faith, faith obtains the Spirit in fuller measure, the
Spirit sheds love abroad in us, and love fulfils the
law. For this reason the law is called a schoolmaster,
under whose threatening and severity ' whosoever shall
call on the name of the Lord shall be delivered.' But
' how shall they call on Him in whom they have not
believed ? ' Wherefore, that the letter without the
Spirit may not kill, the life-giving Spirit is given to
those that believe and call upon Him ; but the love of
God is poured out into our hearts by the Holy Spirit
who is given to us, so that the words of the same
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 37
apostle, ' Love is the fulfilling of the law,' may be re-
alized. Thus the law is good to him that uses it law-
fully ; and he uses it lawfully, who, understanding
wherefore it was given, betakes himself, under the
pressure of its threatening, to liberating grace. Who-
ever ungratefully despises this grace by which the un-
godly is justified, and trusts in his own strength for
fulfilling the law, being ignorant of God's righteous-
ness and going about to establish his own righteous-
ness, is not submitting himself to the righteousness of
God ; and therefore the law is made to him not a help
to pardon, but the bond of guilt ; not because the law
is evil, but because ' sin,' as it is written, ' works death
to such persons by that which is good.' For by the
commandment he sins more grievously, who, by the
commandment, knows how evil are the sins which he
commits."
Although Augustine states clearly that this letter is
written against those " who arrogate too much to the
human will, imagining that, the law being given, the
will is of its own strength sufficient to fulfil the law,
though not assisted by any grace imparted by the Holy
Ghost, in addition to instruction in the law," — he re-
frains still from mentioning the names ot the authors
of this teaching, evidently out of a lingering tender-
ness in his treatment of them. This will help us to ex-
plain the courtesy of a note which he sent to Pelagius
himself at about this time, in reply to a letter he had
received from him some time before, and of which
Pelagius afterward (at the Synod of Diospolis) made,
to say the least of it, an ungenerous use. This note,''
Augustine tells us, was written with ' ' tempered
praises" (wherefrom we see his lessening respect for
the man), and in such a manner as to admonish Pela-
gius to think rightly concerning grace, — so far as could
be done without raising the dregs of the controversy
in a formal note. He sought to accomplish this by
praying from the Lord for Pelagius, those good things
by which he might be good forever, and might live
1 Epistle 146. See On the Proceedings of Pelagius, 50, 51, 52.
38 AUGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY.
eternally with Him who is eternal ; and by asking his
prayers in return, that he, Augustine, too, might be
made by the Lord such as Pelagius seemed to suppose
he already was. How Augustine could really intend
these prayers to be understood as an admonition to
Pelagius to look to God for what he was seeking to
work out lor himself, is fully illustrated by the closing
words of this almost contemporary letter to Anastasius.
" Pray, therefore, for us," he writes, " that we may
be righteous, — an attainment wholly beyond a man's
reach, unless he know righteousness and be willing to
practise it. but one which is immediately realized when
he is perfectly willing ; but this cannot be in him un-
less he is healed by the grace of the Spirit, and aided
to be able." The point had already been made in the
controversy that so much power was attributed to
the human will by the Pelagian doctrine that no one
ought to pray, " Lead us not into temptation, but de-
liver us from evil."
If he was anxious to avoid personal controversy with
Pelagius himself in the hope that he might even yet be
reclaimed, Augustine was equally anxious to teach the
truth on all possible occasions. Pelagius had been
intimate, when at Rome, with the pious Paulinus,
bishop of Nola ; and it was understood that there was
some tendency at Nola to follow the new teachings.
It was, perhaps, as late as 414, when Augustine made
reply in a long letter,1 to a request which Paulinus had
sent him about 4102 for an exposition of certain difficult
passages of Scripture. Among these passages was
Rom. xi. 28 ; and, in explaining it, Augustine did not
withhold a tolerably complete account of his doctrine
of predestination, involving the essence of his whole
teaching as to grace. " For when he had said," he re-
marks, 'according to the election they are beloved
for their father's sake,' he added, ' for the gifts and
calling of God are without repentance.' You sec that
those are certainly meant who belong to the number
of the predestinated. ... ' Many indeed are called
1 Epistle 149. See especially 18 sq. 2 Ibid. 121.
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 39
but few chosen ; ' but those who are elect, these are
' called according to His purpose ; ' and it is beyond
doubt that in them God's foreknowledge cannot be de-
ceived. These He foreknew and predestinated to be
conformed to the image of His Son, in order that He
might be the first born among many brethren. But
' whom He predestinated, them He also called.' This
calling is 'according to His purpose,' this calling is
' without repentance,' " etc., quoting Rom. v. 28-31.
Then continuing, he says : " Those are not in this voca-
tion who do not persevere unto the end in the faith
that worketh by love, although they walk in it a little
while. . . . But the reason why some belong to it
and some do not, can easily be hidden, but cannot be
unjust. For is there injustice with God ? God forbid !
For this belongs to those high judgments which, so to
say, terrified the wondering apostle to look upon."
Controversial Sermons.
Among the most remarkable of the controversial
sermons that were preached about this time, especial
mention is due to two that were delivered at Carthage
in the midsummer of 413. The former of these1 was
preached on the festival of John the Baptist's birth
(June 24), and naturally took the forerunner for its sub-
ject. The nativity of John suggesting the nativity of
Christ, the preacher spoke of the marvel of the incar-
nation. He who was in the beginning, and was the
Word of God, and was Himself God, and who made
all things, and in whom was life, even this one " came
to us. To whom ? To the worthy ? Nay, but to the
unworthy ! For Christ died for the ungodly and the
unworthy, though He was worthy. We indeed were
unworthy whom He pitied ; but He was worthy who
pitied us, to whom we say, ' For Thy pity's sake,
Lord, deliver us ! ' Not for the sake of our preceding
merits, but ' for Thy pity's sake, Lord, deliver us ;'
and 'for Thy name's sake be propitious to our sins,'
not for our merit's sake. . . . For the merit of sins is,
1 Sermon 293.
40 AUGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY.
of course, not reward, but punishment. ' ' The preacher
then dwelt upon the necessity of the incarnation, and
the necessity of a mediator between God and " the
whole mass of the human race alienated from Him by
Adam." Then, quoting i Cor. iv. 7, he asserts that it
is not our varying merits but God's grace alone that
makes us differ, and that we are all alike, great and
small, old and young, saved by one and the same
Saviour. " ' What then,' some one says," he con-
tinues, " ' even the infant needs a liberator ? ' Cer-
tainly he needs one. And the witness to it is the
mother that faithfully runs to church with the child to
be baptized. The witness is Mother Church herself,
who receives the child for washing, and either for dis-
missing him [from this life] delivered, or nurturing him
in piety. . . . Last of all, the tears of his own misery
are witness in the child himself. . . . Recognize the
misery, extend the help. Let all put on bowels of mer-
cy. By as much as they cannot speak for themselves,
by so much more pityingly let us speak for the little
ones." Then follows a passage calling on the Church
to take the grace of infants in their charge as orphans
committed to their care, which is in substance repeated
from a former sermon.1 The speaker proceeded to
quote Matt. i. 21, and apply it. If Jesus came to save
from sins, and infants are brought to Him, it is to con-
fess that they, too, are sinners. Then, shall they be
withheld from baptism ? ' ' Certainly, if the child could
speak for himself, he would repel the voice of opposi-
tion, and cry out, ' Give me Christ's life ! In Adam I
died : give me Christ's life ; in whose sight 1 am not
clean, even if I am an infant whose life has been but
one day in the earth.' " "No way can be found,"
adds the preacher, " of coming into the life of this
world except by Adam ; no way can be found of escap-
ing punishment in the next world except by Christ.
Why do you shut up the one door ?" Even John the
Baptist himself was born in sin ; and absolutely no one
can be found who was born apart from sin, unless we
1 Sermon 176, 2.
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. \\
can find one who has been born apart from Adam.
" ' By one man sin entered into the world, and by sin,
death ; and so it passed through upon all men.' If
these were my words, could this sentiment be ex-
pressed more expressly, more clearly, more fully ?"
Three days afterwards,1 on the invitation of the
Bishop of Carthage, Augustine preached a sermon pro-
fessedly directed against the Pelagians,2 which took up
the threads hinted at in the former discourse, and de-
veloped a full polemic with reference to the baptism
of infants. He began, formally enough, with the de-
termination of the question in dispute. The Pelagians
concede that infants should be baptized. The only
question is, For what are they baptized ? We say that
they would not otherwise have salvation and eternal
life ; but they say it is not for salvation, not for eternal
life, but for the kingdom of God. " The child, they
say, although not baptized, by the desert of his inno-
cence, in that he has no sin at all, either actual or orig-
inal, either from himself or contracted from Adam,
necessarily has salvation and eternal life even if not
baptized ; but is to be baptized for this reason,— that
he may enter into the kingdom of God, i.e., into the
kingdom of heaven." He then showed that there is
no eternal life outside the kingdom of heaven, no mid-
dle place between the right and left hand of the judge
at the last day, and that, therefore, to exclude one
from the kingdom of God is to consign him to the
pains of eternal fire ; while, on the other side, no one
ascends into heaven unless he has been made a mem-
ber of Christ, and this can only be by faith, — which,
in an infant's case, is professed by another in his stead.
He next treated, at length, some of the puzzling ques-
tions with which the Pelagians were wont to try the
catholics ; and then, breaking off suddenly, he took a
1 The inscription says, " V Calendas Julii," i.e., June 27. But it
also says, " In natalis martyr is Gttddenfzs," whose day appears to
have been July 18. Some of the martyrologies assign the 28th of
June to Gaudentius (which some copies read here), but possibly none
to Guddene.
5 Sermon 294.
42 AUGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY.
volume in his hands. " I ask you," he said, " to bear
with me a little : I will read somewhat. It is St.
Cyprian whom I hold in my hand, the ancient bishop
of this see. What he thought of the baptism of infants,
— nay, what he has shown that the Church always
thought, — learn in brief. For it is not enough for
them to dispute and argue I know not what impious
novelties : they even try to charge us with asserting
novelties. It is on this account that I read here St.
Cyprian, in order that you may perceive that the or-
thodox understanding and catholic sense reside in the
words which I have been just now speaking to you.
He was asked whether an infant ought to be baptized
before he was eight days old, seeing that by the an-
cient law no infant was allowed to be circumcised until
he was eight days old. A question arose from this as
to the day of baptism, — for concerning the origin of
sin there was no question ; and therefore from this
thing of which there was no question, that question
that had arisen was settled." Whereupon he read to
them the passage out of Cyprian's letter to Fidus,
which declares that he, and all the council with him,
unanimously thought that infants should be baptized at
the earliest possible age, lest they should die in their
inherited sin and so pass into eternal punishment.1 The
sermon closed with a tender warning to the teachers
of these strange doctrines. He might call them her-
etics with truth, but he will not ; let the Church seek
still their salvation, and not mourn them as dead ; let
them be exhorted as friends, not striven with as ene-
mies. " They disparage us," he says, " we will bear
it ; let them not disparage the rule [of faith], let them
not disparage the truth ; let them not contradict the
Church, which labours every day for the remission of
infants' original sin. This thing is settled. The errant
disputer may be borne with in other questions that
have not been thoroughly canvassed, that are not yet
settled by the full authority of the Church, — their
1 The passage is quoted at length in On the Merits and Remission
of Sins, iii. 10. Compare Against Two Letters of the Pelagians
iv. 23.
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 43
error should be borne with : it ought not to extend so
far that they endeavour to shake even the very founda-
tions of the Church !" He hints that although the
patience hitherto exhibited towards them is ' ' perhaps
not blameworthy," yet patience may cease to be a
virtue, and become culpable negligence. In the mean
time, however, he begs that the catholics should con-
tinue amicable, fraternal, placid, loving, long suffering.
Letter to Hilary of Sicily.
Augustine himself gives us a view of the progress of
the controversy at this time, in a letter written in 414.1
The Pelagians had everywhere scattered the seeds of
their new error. Some of them, by his ministry and
that of his brother workers, had, " by God's mercy,"
been cured of their pest. Yet they still existed in
Africa, especially about Carthage, and were every-
where propagating their opinions in subterraneous
whispers, lor fear of the judgment of the Church.
Wherever they were not refuted they were seducing
others to their following ; and they were so spread
abroad that he did not know where they would break
out next. Nevertheless, he was still unwilling to
brand them as heretics, and was more desirous of heal-
ing them as sick members of the Church than of cutting
them off finally as too diseased for cure. Jerome also
tells us that the poison was spreading in both the East
and the West, and mentions particularly as seats where
it showed itself the islands of Rhodes and Sicily. Of
Rhodes we know nothing further ; but from Sicily an
appeal came to Augustine in 414 from one Hilary,2 set-
ting forth that there were certain Christians about
Syracuse who taught strange doctrines, and beseech-
ing Augustine to help him in dealing with them. The
doctrines were enumerated as follows : ' ' They say
(1) that man can be without sin, (2) and can easily keep
the commandments of God if he will ; (3) that an un-
baptized infant, if he is cut off by death, cannot justly
1 Epistle 157, 22. 2 Epistle 156 among Augustine's Letters.
44 AUGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY.
perish, since he is born without sin ; (4) that a rich
man that remains in his riches cannot enter the king-
dom of God, except he sell all that he has ; . . . (5) that
we ought not to swear at all ;" and (6) apparently,
that the Church is to be in this world without spot or
blemish. Augustine suspected that these Sicilian dis-
turbances were in some way the work of Ccelestius,
and therefore in his answer1 informs his correspondent
of what had been done at the Synod of Carthage (412)
against that heretic.
The long letter that was thus called forth follows the
inquiries in the order they were put by Hilary. To
the first of these Augustine replies substantially as he
had treated the same matter in the second book of the
treatise, On the Merits and Forgiveness of Sins, — that it
is opposed to Scripture to hold that man can live sin-
lessly in this life, but that it is less a heresy than the
wholly unbearable opinion that this state of sinlessness
can be attained without God's help. " But when they
say that free will suffices to man for fulfilling the pre-
cepts of the Lord, even though unaided to good works
by God's grace and the gift of the Holy Spirit, it is to
be altogether anathematized and detested with all exe-
cration. For those who assert this are inwardly alien
from God's grace, because being ignorant of God's
righteousness, like the Jews of whom the apostle speaks,
and wishing to establish their own, they are not sub-
ject to God's righteousness, since there is no fulfilment
of the law except love ; and of course the love of God
is shed abroad in our hearts, not by ourselves, nor by
the force of our own will, but by the Holy Ghost who
is given to us." Dealing next with the second point,
he drifts into the matter he had more fully developed
in his work On the Spirit a?id the Letter. " Free will
avails for God's works," he says, "if it be divinely
aided, and this comes by humble seeking and doing ;
but when deserted by divine aid, no matter how excel-
lent may be its knowledge of the law, it will by no
means possess solidity of righteousness, but only the
1 Epistle 157, 22.
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 45
inflation of ungodly pride and deadly arrogance. This
is taught us by that same Lord's Prayer ; for it would
be an empty thing for us to ask God ' Lead us not into
temptation,' if the matter was so placed in our power
that we would avail for fulfilling it without any aid
from Him. For this free will is free in proportion as
it is sound, but it is sound in proportion as it is subject
to divine pity and grace. For it faithfully prays, say-
ing, ' Direct my ways according to Thy word, and let
no iniquity reign over me.' For how is that free over
which iniquity reigns ? But see who it is that is in-
voked by it, in order that it may not reign over it.
For it says not, ' Direct my ways according to free will
because no iniquity shall rule over me,' but ' Direct
my ways according to Thy zuord, and let no iniquity rule
over me.' It is a prayer, not a promise ; it is a confes-
sion, not a profession ; it is a wish for full freedom, not
a boast of personal power. For it is not ' every one
who confides in his own power,' but ' every one who
calls on the name of God,' that ' shall be saved.' 'But
how shall they call upon Him,' he says, ' in whom they
have not believed ? ' Accordingly, then, they who
rightly believe, believe in order to call on Him in
whom they have believed, and to avail for doing what
they receive in the precepts of the law ; since what the
law commands, faith prays for." " God, therefore,
commands continence, and gives continence ; He com-
mands by the law, He give by grace ; He commands
by the letter, He gives by the spirit : for the law with-
out grace makes the transgression to abound, and the
letter without the Spirit kills. He commands for this
reason, — that we who have endeavoured to do what
He commands and are worn out in our weakness under
the law, may know how to ask for the aid of grace ;
and, if we have been able to do any good work, that
we may not be ungrateful to Him who aids us." The
answer to the third point traverses the ground that
was fully covered in the first book of the treatise On
the Merits and Forgiveness of Sins, beginning by oppos-
ing the Pelagians to Paul in Rom. v. 12-19 : " But
when they say that an infant, cut off by death unbap-
46 AUGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY.
tized, cannot perish since he is born without sin, — it is
not this that the apostle says ; and I think that it is
better to believe the apostle than them." The fourth
and fifth questions were new in this controversy ; and
it is not certain that they belong properly to it, though
the legalistic asceticism of the Pelagian leaders may
well have given rise to a demand on all Christians to
sell what they had and give to the poor. This one of
the points, Augustine treats at length, pointing out
that many of the saints of old were rich, and that the
Lord and His apostles always so speak that their coun-
sels avail to the right use, not the destruction of wealth.
Christians ought so to hold their wealth that they are
not held by it and by no means prefer it to Christ.
Equal good sense and mildness are shown in his treat-
ment of the question concerning oaths ; he points out
that they were used by the Lord and His apostles, but
advises that they be used as little as possible, lest by
the custom of frequent oaths we learn to swear lightly.
The question as to the Church, he passes over as hav-
ing been sufficiently treated in the course of his previ-
ous remarks.
The Treatise on ' ' Nature and Grace. ' '
To the number of those who had been rescued from
Pelagianism by his efforts, Augustine was now to have
the pleasure of adding two others, in whom he seems
to have taken much delight. Timasius and James
were two young men of honourable birth and liberal
education, who had been moved by the exhortations of
Pelagius to give up the hope that they had in this
world and to enter upon the service of God in an as-
cetic life.1 Naturally, they had turned to him for in-
struction, and had received from him a book to which
they had given their study. They met somewhere
with some of Augustine's writings, however, and were
deeply affected by what he said as to grace, and now
began to see that the teaching of Pelagius opposed the
grace of God by which man becomes a Christian.
1 Epistles 177, 6 ; and 179, 2.
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 47
They gave their book, therefore, to Augustine, saying
that it was Pelagius', and asking him for Pelagius'
sake, and for the sake of the truth, to answer it. This
was done ; the resulting book, On Nature and Grace,
was sent to the young men ; and they returned a letter
of thanks1 in which they professed their conversion
from their error. In this book, too, which was written
in 415, Augustine refrained from mentioning Pelagius
by name,3 still feeling it better to spare the man while
not sparing his errors. But he tells us, that, on read-
ing the book of Pelagius' to which it was an answer, it
became clear to him beyond any doubt that Pelagius'
teaching was distinctly anti-Christian ;3 and when
speaking of his own book privately to a friend, he
allows himself to call it " a considerable book against
the heresy of Pelagius, which he had been constrained
to write by some brethren whom Pelagius had per-
suaded to adopt his fatal error, denying the grace of
Christ."4 Thus his attitude towards the persons of
the new teachers was becoming ever more and more
strained, despite his recognition of the excellent mo-
tives that might lie behind their ' ' zeal not according
to knowledge."
The treatise which was thus called out opens with a
recognition of the zeal of Pelagius. As it burned most
ardently against those who, when reproved for sin,
take refuge in censuring their nature, Augustine com-
pares it with the heathen view as expressed in Sallust's
saying, " The human race falsely complains of its own
nature."6 He charges it therefore with not being ac-
cording to knowledge, and proposes to oppose it by
an equal zeal against all attempts to render the cross
of Christ of none effect. He then gives a brief but
excellent summary of the more important features of
the catholic doctrine concerning nature and grace (2-7).
Opening the work of Pelagius which had been placed
1 Epistle 168. On the Proceedings of Pelagius, 48.
2 On the Proceedings of Pelagius, 47 ; and Epistle 186, 1.
3 Compare On Nature and Grace, 7 ; and Epistle 186, 1.
4 Epistle 169, 13.
5 On Nature and Grace, 1 ; Sallust's Jugurtha, prologue.
48 AUGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY.
in his hands, he examines his doctrine of sin, its nature
and effects. Pelagius, he points out, draws a distinc-
tion, sound enough in itself, between what is " possi-
ble" and what is " actual," but applies it unsoundly to
sin, when he says that every man has the possibility of
being without sin (8-9), and therefore without con-
demnation. Not so, says Augustine : an infant who
dies unbaptized has no possibility of salvation open to
him ; and the man who has lived and died in a land
where it was impossible for him to hear the name of
Christ has had no possibility open to him of becoming
righteous by nature and free will. If this be not so,
Christ is dead in vain, since all men in that case might
have accomplished their salvation, even if Christ had
never died (10). Pelagius, moreover, he shows, ex-
hibits a tendency to deny the sinful character of all
sins which are impossible to avoid, and so treats of
sins of ignorance as to imply that he entirely excuses
them (13-19). When he argues that no sin, because it
is not a substance, can change nature, which is a sub-
stance, Augustine replies that this destroys the Sa-
viour's work, — for how can He save from sins if sins
do not corrupt ? And, again, if an act cannot injure a
substance, how can abstention from food, which is a
mere act, kill the body ? In the same way sin is not a
substance ; but God is a substance, — yea, the height
of substance and only true sustenance of the reason-
able creature ; and the consequence of departure from
Him is to the soul what refusal of food is to the body
(22). To Pelagius' assertion that sin cannot be pun-
ished by more sin, Augustine replies that the apostle
thinks differently (Rom. i. 21-31). Then putting his
finger on the main point in controversy, he quotes the
Scriptures as declaring the present condition of man
to be that of spiritual death. " The Truth then desig-
nates as dead those whom this man declares to be un-
able to be damaged or corrupted by sin, — because, for-
sooth, he has discovered sin to be no substance !" (25).
It was by free will that man passed into this state of
death ; but a dead man needs something else to revive
him, — he needs nothing less than a Vivifier. But of
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 49
vivifying grace, Pelagius knows nothing ; and by know-
ing nothing of a Vivifier, he knows nothing of a Sa-
viour ; but rather by making nature of itself able to be
sinless, he glorifies the Creator at the expense of the
Saviour (39). Next is examined Pelagius' contention
that many saints are enumerated in the Scriptures as
having lived sinlessly in this world. While declining
to discuss the question of fact as to the Virgin Maty
(42), Augustine opposes to the rest the declaration of
John in 1 John i. 8 as final, but still pauses to explain
why the Scriptures do not mention the sins of all, and
to contend that all who ever were saved, under the
Old Testament or under the New, were saved by the
sacrificial death of Christ and by faith in Him (40-50).
Thus we are brought, as Augustine says, to the core
of the question, which concerns, not the fact of sinless-
ness in any man, but man's ability to be sinless. This
ability Pelagius affirms of all men, and Augustine de-
nies of all " unless they are justified by the grace of
God through our Lord Jesus Christ and Him cruci-
fied" (51). Accordingly, the whole discussion con-
cerns grace, which Pelagius does not admit in any true
sense, but places only in the nature that God has made
We are next invited to attend to another distinction
of Pelagius', in which he discriminates sharply between
the nature that God has made, the crown of which is
free will, and the use that man makes of this free will.
The endowment of free will is a "capacity;" it is,
because given by God in our making, a necessity ot
nature, and not in man's power to have or not have.
It is the right use of it only, which man has in his
power. This analysis Pelagius illustrates at length by
appealing to the difference between the possession and
use of the various bodily senses. The ability to see,
for instance, he says, is a necessity of our nature : we
do not make it ; we cannot help having it ; it is ours
only to use it. Augustine criticises this presentation
of the matter with great acuteness (although he is not
averse to the analysis itself), with a view to showing
the inapplicability of the illustrations used. For, he
50 AUGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY.
asks, is it not possible for us to blind ourselves, and so
no longer have the ability to see ? And would not
man}7 a man like to control the " use" of his " capacity"
to hear when a screechy saw is in the neighbourhood ?
(55). The falsity of the contention illustrated, he
argues, is evident from the fact that Pelagius has
ignored the fall, and, even were that not so, has so
ignored the need of God's aid for all good, in any state
of being, as to deny it (56). Moreover, it is altogether
a fallacy, Augustine argues, to contend that men have
the " ability" to make every use we can conceive of
our faculties. We cannot wish for unhappiness ; God
cannot deny Himself (57) : and just so, in a corrupt
nature, the mere possession of a faculty of choice does
not imply the ability to use that faculty for not sinning.
" Of a man, indeed, who has his legs strong and sound,
it may be said admissibly enough, ' whether he will or
not, he has the capacity of walking- ; ' but if his legs
be broken, however much he may wish to walk, he has
not the ' capacity ' to do so. The nature of which our
author speaks is corrupted" (57). What, then, can he
mean by saying that, whether we will or not, we have
the capacity of not sinning, — a statement so opposite
to Paul's in Rom. vii. 15? Some space is next given
to an attempted rebuttal by Pelagius of the testimony
of Gal. v. 17, on the ground that the " flesh" there
does not refer to the baptized (60-70). Then the pas-
sages are examined which Pelagius had quoted against
Augustine out of earlier writers, — Lactantius (71),
Hilary (72), Ambrose (75), John of Constantinople (76),
Xystus, — a blunder of Pelagius', who quoted from a
Pythagorean philosopher, mistaking him for the Ro-
man bishop Sixtus (57), Jerome (78), and Augustine
himself (80). All these writers, Augustine shows, ad-
mitted the universal sinfulness of man, — and especially
he himself had confessed the necessity of grace in the
immediate context of the passage quoted by Pelagius.
The treatise closes (82 sq.) with a noble panegyric on
that love which God sheds abroad in the heart by the
Holy Ghost, and by which alone we can be made
keepers of the law.
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY.
Letter to Jerome on the Origin of Souls.
The treatise On Nature and Grace was as yet unfin-
ished when the over-busy1 scriptorium at Hippo was
invaded by another young man seeking instruction.
This time it was a zealous young presbyter from the
remotest parts of Spain, — " from the shore of the
ocean," — Paul us Orosius by name. His pious soul
had been afflicted with grievous wounds by the Pris-
cillianist and Origenist heresies that had broken out in
his country, and he had come with eager haste to Au-
gustine on hearing that he could get from him the in-
struction which he needed for confuting them. Au-
gustine seems to have given him his heart at once.
But feeling too little informed as to the special heresies
which Orosius wished to be prepared to controvert, he
persuaded him to go on to Palestine to be taught by
Jerome, and gave him introductions which described
him as one ' ' who is in the bond of catholic peace a
brother, in point of age a son, and in dignity a fellow-
presbyter, — a man of quick understanding, ready
speech and burning zeal." His departure to Palestine
gave Augustine an opportunity to consult with Jerome
on the one point that had been raised in the Pelagian
controversy on which he had not been able to see
light. The Pelagians had early argued 2 that, if souls
are created new for men at their birth, it would be un-
just in God to impute Adam's sin to them. And Au-
gustine found himself unable either to prove that souls
are transmitted ("traduced, ' ' as the phrase is), or to show
that it would not involve God in injustice to create a
soul only to make it subject to a sin committed by an-
other. Jerome had already put himseli on record as a
believer in both original sin and the creation of souls at
the time of birth. Augustine feared the logical conse-
quences of this assertion, and yet was unable to refute
1 For Augustine's press of work just now, see Epistle 169, 1 and 13.
2 The argument occurs in Pelagius' Commentary on Paul, written
before 410, and is already before Augustine in On the Merits and
Forgiveness of Sins, etc., iii. 5.
52 AUGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY.
it. He therefore seized this occasion to send a long
treatise on the origin of the soul to his friend, with the
request that he would consider the subject afresh, and
answer his doubts.1
In this treatise he stated that he was fully persuaded
that the soul had fallen into sin by no fault of God or
of nature, but of its own free will ; and asked when
could the soul of an infant have contracted the guilt
which, unless the grace of Christ should come to its
rescue by baptism, would involve it in condemnation,
if God (as Jerome held, and as he was willing to hold
with him, if this difficulty could be cleared up) makes
each soul for each individual at the time of birth ? He
professed himself embarrassed on such a supposition
by the penal sufferings of infants, by the pains they en-
dure in this life, and much more by the danger they
are in of eternal damnation, into which they actually
go unless saved by baptism. God is good, just, om-
nipotent : how, then, can we account for the fact that
" in Adam all die," if souls are created afresh for each
birth ? "If new souls are made for men individually
at their birth," he affirms, "1 do not see, on the one
hand, that they could have any sin while yet in in-
fancy ; nor do I believe, on the other hand, that God
condemns any soul which He sees to have no sin."
" And yet, whoever says that those children who de-
part out of this life without partaking of the sacrament
of baptism, shall be made alive in Christ, certainly con-
tradicts the apostolic declaration," and " he that is not
made alive in Christ must necessarily remain under the
condemnation of which the apostle says that by the
offence of one judgment came upon all men to con-
demnation." " Wherefore," he adds to his corre-
spondent, " if that opinion of yours does not contradict
this firmly grounded article of faith, let it be mine
also; but if it does, let it no longer be yours." a So
' Epistle 1 66.
8 An almost contemporary letter to Oceanus {Epistle 180, written
in 416) adverts to the same subject and in the same spirit, showing
how much it was in Augustine's thoughts. Compare Epistle 180,
2 and 5.
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 53
far as obtaining- light was concerned, Augustine might
have spared himself the trouble of this composition.
Jerome simply answered ' that he had no leisure to
reply to the questions submitted to him. But Orosius'
mission to Palestine was big with consequences. Once
there, he became the accuser of Pelagius before John
of Jerusalem, and the occasion, at least, of the trials of
Pelagius in Palestine during the summer and winter of
415, which issued so disastrously and ushered in a new
phase of the conflict.
The Treatise on " The Perfection of Man s Righteousness."
Meanwhile, however, Augustine was ignorant of
what was going on in the East, and had his mind
directed again to Sicily. About a year had passed
since he had sent thither his long letter to Hilary.
Now his conjecture that Coelestius was in some way at
the bottom of the Sicilian outbreak, received confirma-
tion from a paper which certain Catholic brethren
brought out of Sicily, and which was handed to Augus-
tine by two exiled Spanish bishops, Eutropius and
Paul. This paper bore the title, Definitions Ascribed to
Ccelestins, and presented internal evidence, in style and
thought, of being correctly so ascribed.2 It consisted
of three parts. In the first of these were collected a
series of brief and compressed ' ' definitions, " or " ratio-
cinations" as Augustine calls them, in which the author
tries to place the Catholics in a logical dilemma, and to
force them to admit that man can live in this world
without sin. In the second part, there were adduced
certain passages of Scripture in defence of Pelagian
doctrine. In the third part, an attempt was made to
deal with the texts that had been quoted against the
Pelagian contention, not, however, by examining into
their meaning, or seeking to explain them in the sense
of the new theory, but simply by matching them with
others which might be thought to make for it. In
answer to this paper, Augustine at once (about the
1 Epistle 172.
2 See On the Perfection of Man's Righteousness, 1.
54 AUGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY.
end of 415) wrote a treatise which bears the title of
On the Perfection of Man's Righteousness.
The distribution of the matter in this work follows
that of the paper to which it is a reply. First of
all (1-16), the " ratiocinations" are taken up one by
one and briefly answered. As they all concern sin and
have for their object to prove that man cannot be ac-
counted a sinner unless he is able, in his own power,
wholly to avoid sin — that is, to prove that a plenary
natural ability is the necessary basis of responsibility —
Augustine argues per contra that man can entail a sin-
fulness on himself for which and for the deeds of which
he remains responsible, though he be no longer able to
avoid sin ; he thus allows that, for the race, plenary
ability must stand at the root of sinfulness. Next
(17-22), he discusses the passages of Scripture which
Coelestius had advanced in defence of his teachings.
These include two classes of texts. There were (1)
passages in which God commands men to be without
sin. These Augustine meets by saying that the point
is, whether these commands are to be fulfilled without
God's aid, in the body of this death, while absent from
the Lord (17-20). There were also (2) passages in which
God declares that His commandments are not grievous.
These Augustine meets by explaining that all God's
commandments are fulfilled only by love, which finds
nothing grievous ; and that this love is shed abroad in
our hearts only by the Holy Ghost, without whom we
have only fear, to which the commandments are not only
grievous but impossible. Lastly, Augustine patiently
follows Coelestius through his odd " oppositions of
texts," carefully explaining, in an orthodox sense, all
that he had adduced (23-42). In closing, he takes up
Coelestius' statement that " it is quite possible for man
not to sin even in word, if God so will," pointing out
how he avoids saying "if God give him His aid,"
and then proceeds to distinguish carefully between the
differing assertions of sinlessness that may be made.
To say that any man ever lived, or will live, without
needing forgiveness, is to contradict Rom. v. 12, and
must imply that he does not need a Saviour, against
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 55
Matt. ix. 12. 13. To say that, after his sins have been
forgiven, any one has ever remained without sin, con-
tradicts 1 John i. 8 and Matt. vi. 12. Vet, if God's
help be allowed, this contention is not so wicked as the
other ; the great heresy is to den)- the necessity of
God's constant grace, for which we pray when we say,
" Lead us not into temptation."
Activity Subsequent to the Palestinian Acquittal.
Tidings were now (416) beginning to reach Africa ot
what was doing in the East. ,. There was diligently cir-
culated everywhere and finally came into Augustine's
hands, an epistle of Pelagius' own " filled with van-
ity." In it he boasted that fourteen bishops had ap-
proved his assertion that " man can live without sin,
and easily keep the commandments if he wishes," and
had thus ' 4 shut the mouth of opposition in confusion"
and " broken up the whole band of wicked conspir-
ators against him." Soon afterwards a copy of an
" apologetical paper," in which Pelagius used the
authority of the Palestinian bishops against his adver-
saries, not altogether without disingenuousness, was
sent by him to Augustine through the hands of a com-
mon acquaintance, Charus by name. It was not ac-
companied, however, by any letter from Pelagius ; and
Augustine wisely refrained from making public use of
it. Towards midsummer Orosius came with more
authentic information, and bearing letters from Jerome
and Heros and Lazarus.
It was apparently before Orosius came that a contro-
versial sermon was preached, only a fragment of which
has come down to us.' So far as we can learn from
the extant part, its subject seems to have been the re-
lation of prayer to Pelagianism ; and what we have
opens with a striking anecdote. " When these two
petitions — ' Porgive us our debts as we also forgive
our debtors,' and ' Lead us not into temptation' — are
objected to the Pelagians, what do you think they re-
1 Migne's Edition of Augustine's Works, vol. v. pp. 1719-1723.
56 AUGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY.
ply ? I was horrified, my brethren, when 1 heard it.
I did not, indeed, hear it with my own ears ; but my
holy brother and fellow-bishop Lrbanus, who used to
be presbyter here and now is bishop of Sicca," when
he was in Rome and was arguing with one who held
these opinions, pressed him with the weight of the
Lord's Prayer, and " what do you think he replied to
him? ' We ask God,' he said, 'not to lead us into
temptation lest we should suffer something that is not
in our power — lest 1 should be thrown from my horse,
lest 1 should break my leg, lest a robber should slay
me, and the like. For these things,' he said, ' are not
in my power ; but for overcoming the temptations of
my sins, I both have ability if 1 wish to use it, and am
not able to receive God's help.' ' You see, brethren,"
the good bishop adds, " how malignant this heresy is :
you see how it horrifies all of you. Have a care that
you be not taken by it." He then presses the general
doctrine of prayer as proving that all good things come
from God, whose aid is always necessary to us and is
always attainable by prayer ; and closes as follows :
" Consider, then, these things, my brethren, when any
one comes to you and says to you, ' What, then, are we
to do if we have nothing in our power, unless God gives
all things ? God will not then crown us, but He will
crown Himself.' You already see that this comes from
that vein : it is a vein, but it has poison in it ; it is
stricken by the serpent ; it is not sound. For what
Satan is doing to-day is seeking to cast out from the
Church by the poison of heretics, just as he once cast
out from Paradise by the poison of the serpent. Let
no one tell you that this one was acquitted by the bish-
ops : there was an acquittal, but it was his confession,
so to speak, his amendment, that was acquitted. For
what he said before the bishops seemed catholic ; but
what he has written in his books, the bishops who pro-
nounced the acquittal were ignorant of. And per-
chance he was really convinced and amended. For
we ought not to despair of the man who perchance
' Compare the words of Cicero quoted above, vol. xiv., p. 467.
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 57
preferred to be united to the catholic faith and fled to
its grace and aid. Perchance this was what happened.
But, in any event, it was not the heresy that was ac-
quitted, but the man who denied the heresy." '
The coming- of Orosius must have dispelled any lin-
gering hope that the meaning of the council's finding
was that Pelagius had really recanted. Councils were
immediately assembled at Carthage and Mileve, and
the documents which Orosius had brought were read
before them. We know nothing of their proceedings
except what we can gather from the letters2 which they
sent to Innocent at Rome, seeking his aid in their con-
demnation of the heresy now so nearly approved in
Palestine. To these two official letters, Augustine, in
company with four other bishops, added a private let-
ter,3 in which care was taken that Innocent should be
informed on all the points necessary to his decision.
This important letter begins almost abruptly with a
characterization of Pelagianism as inimical to the grace
of God, and has grace for its subject throughout. It
accounts for the action of the Palestinian synod as
growing out of a misunderstanding of Pelagius' words,
in which he seemed to acknowledge grace. Those
catholic bishops naturally would understand this to
mean that grace of which they read in the Scriptures,
and which they were accustomed to preach to their
people, — the grace by wnich we are justified from
iniquity, and saved from weakness. While Pelagius
really meant nothing more than that " grace" by which
we are given free will at our creation. " For if these
bishops had understood that he meant only that grace
which we have in common with the ungodly and with
all along with whom we are men, while he denied that
by which we are Christians and the sons of God, they
not only could not have patiently listened to him, — they
1 Compare the similar words in Epistle 177, 3, which was written,
not only after what had occurred in Palestine was known, but also
after the condemnatory decisions of the African synods.
5 Epistles 175 and 176 in Augustine's Letters.
3 Epistle 177. The other bishops were Aurelius, Alypius, Evodius,
and Possidius.
5 8 AUGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY.
could not even have borne him before their eyes."
The letter then proceeds to point out the difference be-
tween grace and natural gifts, and between grace and
the law, and to trace out Pelagius' meaning when he
speaks of grace and when he contends that man can
be sinless without any really inward aid. It suggests
that Pelagius be sent for and thoroughly examined by
Innocent ; or that he should be examined by letter or in
his writings ; and that he be not cleared until he should
unequivocally confess the grace of God in the cath-
olic sense, and anathematize the false teachings in the
books attributed to him. The book of Pelagius which
was answered in the treatise On Nature and Grace was
enclosed with this letter, with the most important pas-
sages marked : and it was suggested that more was in-
volved in the matter than the fate of one single man,
Pelagius, who, perhaps, was already brought to a bet-
ter mind ; the fate of multitudes already led astray, or
yet to be deceived by these false views, was in danger.
At about this same time (417), the tireless bishop sent
a short letter ' to a Hilary who seems to be "Hilary of
Norbonne, which is interesting from the attempt made
in it to convey a characterization of Pelagianism to one
who was as yet ignorant of it. It thus brings out what
Augustine conceived to be its essential features. " An
effort has been made," we read, " to raise a certain
new heresy, inimical to the grace of Christ, against the
Church of Christ. It is not yet openly separated from
the Church. It is the heresy of men who dare to at-
tribute so much power to human weakness that they
contend that this only belongs to God's grace, — that
we are created with free will and the possibility of not
sinning, and that we receive God's commandments,
which are to be fulfilled by us ; while, for keeping and
fulfilling these commandments, we do not need any
divine aid. No doubt, the remission of sins is neces-
sary for us ; for we have no power to right what
we have done wrong in the past. But for avoiding
and overcoming sins in the future, for conquering
1 Epistle 178.
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 59
all temptations with virtue, the human will is suffi-
cient by its natural capacity without any aid of God's
grace. And neither do infants need the grace of the
Saviour, so as to be delivered from perdition by it
through His baptism, seeing that they have contract-
ed no contagion of damnation from Adam." ! He en-
gages Hilary in the destruction of this heresy, which
ought to be " concordantly condemned and anathema-
tized by all who have hope in Christ," as a " pestifer-
ous impiety," and excuses himself for not undertaking
its full refutation in a brief letter.
A much more important letter was dispatched at
about the same time to John of Jerusalem, who had
conducted the first Palestinian examination of Pela-
gius and had borne a prominent part in the synod at
Diospolis. With it was sent a copy of Pelagius' book
which had been examined in the treatise On Nature and
Grace, as well as a copy of that reply itself ; and John
was asked to send Augustine an authentic copy of the
proceedings at Diospolis. Augustine took this occa-
sion seriously to warn his brother bishop against the
wiles of Pelagius, and to beg him, if he loved Pelagius,
to let men see that he did not so love him as to be de-
ceived by him. He pointed out that in the book sent
with the letter, Pelagius called nothing the grace of
God except nature ; and that he affirmed, and even vehe-
mently contended, that by free will alone human na-
ture was able to suffice for itself for working righteous-
ness and keeping all God's commandments. From this
any one could see that he opposed the grace of God of
which the apostles spoke in Rom. vii. 24, 25, and con-
tradicted, as well, all the prayers and benedictions of
the Church by which blessings were sought for men
from God's grace. " If you love Pelagius, then," he
continued, " let him, too, love you as himself, — nay,
more than himself ; and let him not deceive you. For
when you hear him confess the grace of God and the
aid of God, you think he means what you mean by it.
But let him be openly asked whether he is willing that
1 Epistle 179.
60 AUGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY.
we should pray God that we sin not ; whether he
preaches the assisting- grace oi God without which we
would do much evil ; whether he believes that even
children who have not yet been able to do good or evil
are nevertheless, on account ol one man by whom sin
entered into the world, sinners in him, and in need of
being delivered by the grace of Christ." If he frankly
denies such things, Augustine would be pleased to
hear of it.
Thus we see the great bishop sitting in his library at
Hippo, placing his hands on the two ends of the world.
That nothing may be lacking to the picture of his
universal activity, we have another letter from him,
coming from about this same time, that exhibits his
care for the individuals who had placed themselves in
some sort under his tutelage. Among the refugees
from Rome in the terrible times when Alaric was a sec-
ond time threatening the city, was a family of noble
women, Proba, Juliana and Demetrias,1— grandmother,
mother, and daughter — who, finding an asylum in Af-
rica, gave themselves to God's service and sought the
friendship and counsel of Augustine. In 413 the grand-
daughter *' took the veil" under circumstances that
thrilled the Christian world, and brought out letters of
congratulation and advice from Augustine and Jerome,
and also from Pelagius. This letter of Pelagius seems
not to have fallen into Augustine's way until now (416).
He was so disturbed by it that he wrote to Juliana a
long letter warning her against its evil counsels.2 It
was so shrewdly phrased that, at first sight, Augustine
was himself almost persuaded that it did somehow ac-
knowledge the grace of God ; but when he compared
it with others of Pelagius' writings, he saw that, here
too, he was using ambiguous terms in a non-natural
sense. The object of his own letter (in which Alypius
is conjoined as joint author) is to warn Juliana and her
1 See The Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, New York ed. , vol. i. ,
p. 459, and the references there given. Compare Canon Robertson's
vivid account of them in his History of the Christian Church, ii.
18, 145.
J Epistle 188.
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 6l
holy daughter against all opinions that opposed the
grace of God, and especially against the covert teach-
ing of the letter of Pelagius to Demetrias.1 " In this
book," he says, " were it lawful for such an one to
read it, a virgin of Christ would read that her holiness
and all her spiritual riches are to spring from no other
source than herself ; and thus, before she attains to the
perfection of blessedness, she would learn — which may
God forbid ! — to be ungrateful to God." He quotes
the words of Pelagius in which he declares that ' ' earthly
riches came from others, but your spiritual riches no
one can have conferred on you but yourself ; for these,
then, you are justly praised, for these you are deservedly
to be preferred to others — for they can exist only from
yourself and in yourself." And then, he continues :
" Far be it from any virgin to listen to statements like
these. Every virgin of Christ understands the innate
poverty of the human heart, and therefore declines to be
adorned otherwise than by the gifts of her Spouse. . . .
Let her not listen to him who says, ' No one can con-
fer them on you but yourself, and they cannot exist
except from you and in you : ' but to him who says,
' We have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the ex-
cellency of the power may be of God, and not of us.'
And be not surprised that we speak of these things as
yours, and not from you ; for we speak of daily bread
as ' ours,' but yet add, ' Give it to us,' lest it should be
thought it was from ourselves." Again, he instructs
her that grace is not mere knowledge, any more than
mere nature ; and that Pelagius, even when using the
word " grace," means no inward or efficient aid, but
mere nature or knowledge or forgiveness of past sins :
and beseeches her not to forget the God of all grace
from whom (Wisdom i. 20, 21) Demetrias had that
very virgin continence which was so justly her boast.
With the opening of 417, came the answers from In-
nocent to the African letters.1 They were marred by
much boastful language concerning the dignity of his
1 Compare On the Grace of Christ, 40. In the succeeding sections,
some of its statements are examined.
5 Epistles 181, 1S2, 183, among Augustine's Letters.
62 AUGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY.
See, which could not but be distasteful to the Africans.
But they admirably served their purpose in the satis-
factory manner in which, on the one hand, the}- assert-
ed the necessity of the " daily grace and help of God"
for our good living, and, on the other, they determined
that the Pelagians had denied this grace, and declared
their leaders, Pelagius and Ccelestius, deprived of the
communion of the Church until they should " recover
their senses from the wiles of the Devil by whom they
are held captive according to his will." Augustine
may be pardoned for supposing that a condemnation
pronounced by two provincial synods in Africa and
heartily concurred in by the Roman bishop, who had
already at Jerusalem been recognized as in some sort
the fit arbiter of this Western dispute, should settle
the matter. If Pelagius had been jubilant before, Au-
gustine found this a suitable time for his rejoicing.
The Treatise on " The Proceedings in Palestine,'" and the
Letter to Paulinus.
About the same time with Innocent's letters, the
official proceedings of the synod of Diospolis at last
reached Africa, and Augustine lost no time in pub-
lishing (early in 417) a full account and examination of
them, thus providing us with that inestimable boon, a
full contemporary history of the chief events connected
with the controversy up to this time. He addresses
this treatise to Aurelius, bishop of Carthage, and opens
with an explanation of his delay in discussing Pelagius'
defence of himself in Palestine, as due to his not having
earlier received the official copy of the Proceedings of
the Council at Diospolis (i-2#). Then he proceeds to
discuss at length the doings of the synod, point by
point, following the official record step by step (2^-45).
He treats at large here eleven items in the indictment,
with Pelagius' answers and the synod's decisions ; and
shows that in all of them Pelagius either explained
away his heresy, taking advantage of the judges'
ignorance of his books, or else openly repudiated or
anathematized it. Augustine points out that when it
reached the twelfth item of the indictment (41^-43) —
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 63
which charged Pelagius with teaching that men cannot
be sons of God unless they are sinless, and with con-
doning sins of ignorance, and with asserting that choice
is not free if it depends on God's help and that pardon
is given according to merit — the synod was so indig-
nant, that, without waiting for Pelagius' answer, it
condemned the statement ; and Pelagius at once repudi-
ated and anathematized it (43). How could the synod
act in such circumstances, he asks, except by acquitting
the man who condemned the heresy ? After quoting
the final judgment of the synod (44), Augustine briefly
characterizes it and its effect (45) as being indeed all
that could be expected of the judges, but of no moral
weight to those better acquainted than they were with
Pelagius' character and writings. In a word, they ap-
proved his answers to them, as indeed they ought to
have done ; but they by no means approved, but both
they and he condemned, his heresies as expressed in
his writings. To this statement, Augustine appends
an account of the origin of Pelagianism and of his rela-
tions to it from the beginning, which has the very high-
est value as history (46-49) ; and then speaks of the
character and doubtful practices of Pelagius (50-58),
returning at the end (59-65) to a thorough canvass of
the value of the acquittal which he obtained by such
doubtful practices at the synod. He closes with an
indignant account of the outrages which the Pelagians
had perpetrated on Jerome (66).
This valuable treatise is not, however, the only ac-
count of the historical origin of Pelagianism that we
have from Augustine's hands. Soon after the death
of Innocent (March 12, 417), he found occasion to write
a very long letter1 to the venerable Paulinus of Nola,
in which he summarized both the history of and the
arguments against this " worldly philosophy." He
begins by saying that he knows Paulinus has in the past
loved Pelagius as a servant of God, but is ignorant in
what way he now loves him. For he himself not only
has loved him but loves him still, but in different ways.
Once he loved him as apparently a brother in the true
faith : now he loves him in the longing that God will
1 Epistle 186, written conjointly with Alypius.
64 AUGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY.
by His mercy free him from his noxious opinions
against God's grace. He is not merely following re-
port in so speaking of him. No doubt report had for
a long time represented this of him, but the less heed
had been given to it because report is accustomed to lie.
But a book by Pelagius1 at last came into his hands
which left no room for doubt, since in it it was asserted
repeatedly that God's grace consists of the gift to man
of the capacity to will and act, and thus was reduced to
what is common to pagans and Christians, to the un-
godly and godly, to the faithful and infidels. He then
gives a brief account of the measures that had been
taken against Pelagius, and passes on to a treatment
of the main matters involved in the controversy, — all
of which gather around the one magic word of " the
grace of God." He argues first that we are all lost,
— in one mass and concretion of perdition, — and that
God's grace alone makes us to differ. It is therefore
folly to talk of deserving the beginnings of grace. Nor
can a faithful man say that he merits justification by
his faith, although it is given to faith ; for at once he
hears the words, ' ' What hast thou that thou didst not
leceive?" and learns that even the deserving faith is
the gift of God. But if, peering into God's inscruta-
ble judgments, we go farther, and ask why from the
mass of Adam, all of which undoubtedly has fallen by
one into condemnation, this vessel is made for honor,
that for dishonor, — we can only say that we do not
know more than the fact, and that God's reasons are hid-
den but His acts are just. Certain it is that Paul
teaches that all die in Adam ; and that God, by a
sovereign election, freely chooses out of that sinful
mass some to eternal life ; and that He knew from the
beginning to whom He would give this grace, and so
the number of the saints has always been fixed, to
whom He gives in due time the Holy Ghost. Others,
no doubt, are called ; but no others are elect, or ' ' called
according to His purpose." On no other body of doc-
1 The book given him by Timasius and James, to which On Nature
and Grace is a reply.
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 65
trines can it be possibly explained that some infants
die unbaptized and are lost. Is God unjust to punish
innocent children with eternal pains ? And are they
not innocent it they are not partakers of Adam's sin ?
And can they be saved from that, save by the unde-
served, and that is the gratuitous, grace of God ? The
account of the proceedings at the Palestinian synod is
then taken up, and Pelagius' position in his latest writ-
ings is quoted and examined. " But why say more ?"
he adds. ... " Ought they not, since they call them-
selves Christians, to be more careful than the Jews
that they do not stumble at the stone of offence, while
they subtly defend nature and free will just like phi-
losophers of this world who vehemently strive to be
thought, or to think themselves, to attain for them-
selves a happy life by the force of their own will ? Let
them take care, then, that they do not make the cross
of Christ of none effect by the wisdom of word (1 Cor. i.
17), and thus stumble at the rock of offence. For
human nature, even if it had remained in that integrity
in which it was created, could by no means have served
its own Creator without His aid. Since then, without
God's grace it could not keep the safety it had re-
ceived, how can it without God's grace repair what it
has lost?" With this profound view of the Divine im-
manence, and of the necessity of His moving grace in
all the acts of all His creatures, as over against the
heathen-deistic view of Pelagius, Augustine touched
in reality the deepest point in the whole controversy,
and illustrated the essential harmony of all truth.1
The sharpest period of the whole conflict was now
drawing on." Innocent's death brought Zosimus to
the chair of the Roman See, and the efforts which he
1 Compare also Innocent's letter {Epistle 181) to the Carthaginian
Council, chap. 4, which also Neander, History of the Christian
Church, E. T., ii. 646, quotes in this connection, as showing that
Innocent ' ' perceived that this dispute was connected with a different
way of regarding the relation of God's providence to creation." As
if Augustine did not see this too !
2 The book addressed to Dardanus, in which the Pelagians are con-
futed, but not named, belongs about at this time. Compare Retrac-
tations, ii. 49. *
66 AUGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY.
made to re-instate Pelagius and Coelestius now began
(September, 417). How little the Africans were likely
to yield to his remarkable demands, may be seen from
a sermon1 which Augustine preached on the 23d of
September, while Zosimus' letter (written on the 21st
of September) was on its way to Africa. The preacher
took his text from John vi. 54-66. "We hear here,"
he said, ' ' the true master, the divine Redeemer, the
human Saviour, commending to us our ransom, His
blood. He calls His body food, and His blood drink ;
and, in commending such food and drink, He says,
' Except you eat My flesh, and drink My blood, ye
shall have no life in you.' What, then, is this eating
and drinking, but to live? Eat life, drink life; you
shall have life, and life is whole. This will come, —
that is, the body and blood of Christ will be life to
every one, — if what is taken visibly in the sacrament is
in real truth spiritually eaten and spiritually drunk.
But that He might teach us that even to believe in
Him is of gift, not of merit, He said, ' No one comes
to Me, except the Father who sent Me draw him.'
Draw him, not lead him. This violence is done to the
heart, not the flesh. Why do you marvel ? Believe,
and you come ; love, and you are drawn. Think not
that this is harsh and injurious violence ; it is soft, it
is sweet ; it is sweetness itself that draws you. Is not
the sheep drawn when the succulent herbage is shown
to him ? And I think that there is no compulsion of
the body, but an assembling of the desires. So, too,
do you come to Christ ; wish not to plan a long jour-
ney,— when you believe, then you come. For to Him
who is everywhere, one comes by loving, not by tak-
ing a voyage. No doubt, if you come not, it is your
work ; but if you come, it is God's work. And even
after you have come and are walking in the right
way, become not proud, lest jou perish from it :
' happy are those that confide in Him,' not in them-
selves, but in Him. We are saved by grace, not of our-
selves : it is the gift of God. Why do I continually
1 Sermon 131, preached at Carthage.
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 67
say this to you ? It is because there are men who are
ungrateful to grace and attribute much to unaided
and wounded nature. It is true that man received
great powers of free will at his creation ; but he lost
them by sinning. He has fallen into death ; he has
been made weak ; he has been left half dead in the
way, by robbers ; the good Samaritan has lifted him
up upon his ass and borne him to the inn. Why
should we boast ? But I am told that it is enough that
sins are remitted in baptism. But does the removal
of sin take away weakness too ? What ! will you not
see that after pouring the oil and the wine into the
wounds of the man left half dead by the robbers, he
must still go to the inn where his weakness may be
healed ? Nay, so long as we are in this life we bear a
fragile body ; it is only after we are redeemed from
corruption that we shall find no sin and receive the
crown of righteousness. Grace, that was hidden in
the Old Testament, is now manifest to the whole
world. Even though the Jew ma}' be ignorant of it,
why should Christians be enemies of grace ? why pre-
sumptuous of themselves ? why ungrateful to grace ?
For, why did Christ come ? Was not nature already
here, — that very nature by the praise of which you are
beguiled ? Was not the law here ? But the apostle
says, ' If righteousness is of the law, then is Christ
dead in vain.' What the apostle says of the law, that
we say to these men about nature : if righteousness is
by nature, then Christ is dead in vain. What then
was said of the Jews, this we see repeated in these
men. They have a zeal for God : I bear them witness
that they have a zeal for God : but not according to
knowledge. For, being ignorant of God's righteous-
ness, and wishing to establish their own, they are not
subject to the righteousness of God. My brethren,
share my compassion. Where you find such men,
wish no concealment ; let there be no perverse pity in
you : where you find them, wish no concealment at
all. Contradict and refute, resist, or persuade them
to us. For already two councils have, in this cause,
sent letters to the Apostolic See, whence also rescripts
68 AUGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY.
have come back. The cause is ended : would that
the error might some day end ! Therefore we admon-
ish so that they may take notice, we teach so that they
may be instructed, we pray so that their way may
be changed."
Here is certainly tenderness to the persons of the
teachers of error, readiness to forgive, and readiness
to go all proper lengths in recovering them to the
truth. But here is also absolute firmness as to the
truth itself, and a manifesto as to policy. Certainly,
on the lines of the policy here indicated, the Africans
fought out the coming campaign. They met in coun-
cil at the end of this year, or early in the next (418),
and formally replied to Zosimus that the cause had
been tried, and was finished ; and that the sentence
that had been already pronounced against Pelagius
and Coelestius should remain in force until they should
unequivocally acknowledge that " we are aided by the
grace of God through Christ, not only to know, but to
do, what is right, and that in each single act ; so that
without grace we are unable to have, think, speak, or
do anything belonging to piety." As we may see
Augustine's hand in this, so, doubtless, we may recog-
nize it in that remarkable piece of engineering which
crushed Zosimus' plans within the next few months.
There is, indeed, no direct proof that it was due to
Augustine, or to the Africans under his leading, or to
the Africans at all, that the State interfered in the
matter. It is even in doubt whether the action of the
Empire was put forth as a rescript, or as a self-moved
decree. But surely it is difficult to believe that such
a coup de theatre could have been prepared for Zosimus
by chance. As it is well known both that Augustine
believed in the righteousness of civil penalty for heresy,
invoking it on other occasions and defending and using
it on this, and that he had influential friends at court
with whom he was in correspondence, it seems, on
internal grounds, altogether probable that he was the
dens ex mac hind who let loose the thunders of ecclesias-
tical and civil enactment simultaneously on the poor
Pope's devoted head.
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 69
The Treatises " On the Grace of Christ" and " On
Original Sin."
The "great African Council" met at Carthage on
the 1st of May, 418. After its decrees were issued,
Augustine remained at Carthage and watched the
effect of the combination of which he was probably one
of the moving causes. He had now an opportunity to
betake himself once more to his pen. While still at
Carthage, at short notice and in the midst of much
distraction, he wrote a large work in two books, which
have come down to us under the separate titles of On
the Grace of Christ and On Original Sin, at the instance
of another of those ascetic families which formed so
marked a feature in those troubled times. Pinianus
and Melania, the daughter of Albina, were husband
and wife, who, leaving Rome amid the wars with Alaric,
had lived together continently in Africa for some
time, but now in Palestine had separated, he to become
head of a monastery, and she an inmate of a convent.
While in Africa, they had lived at Sagaste under the
tutelage of Alypius, and in the enjoyment of the friend-
ship and instruction ot Augustine. After retiring to
Bethlehem, like the other holy ascetics whom he had
known in Africa, they kept up their relations with
him. Like the others, also, they became acquainted
with Pelagius in Palestine, and were well-nigh deceived
by him. They wrote to Augustine that they had
begged Pelagius to condemn in writing all that had
been alleged against him, and that he had replied, in
the presence ot them all, that " he anathematized the
man who either thinks or says that the grace of God
whereby Christ Jesus came into the world to save sin-
ners is not necessary, not only for every hour and for
every moment, but also for every act of our lives,"
and had asserted that " those who endeavor to disannul
it are worthy of everlasting punishment. "' Moreover,
they wrote, Pelagius had read to them, out ot his book
that he had sent to Rome,3 his assertion " that infants
1 On the Grace of Christ, 2.
s The so-called Cottfession of Faith sent to Innocent after the Synod
of Diospolis, which, however, arrived after Innocent's death.
70 AUGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY.
ought to be baptized with the same formula of sacramen-
tal words as adults."1 They expressed their delight at
hearing from Pelagius these words, which seemed ex-
actly what they should wish to hear : and yet they felt
impelled to consult Augustine about them, before they
fully committed themselves regarding them.2 It was
in answer to this appeal, that the present work was
written. Its two books take up the two points in
Pelagius' asseveration. The theme of the first is, " the
assistance of Divine grace towards our justification,
by which God co-operates in all things for good to
those who love Him and whom He first loved, giving
to them that He may receive from them." While the
subject of the second is, " the sin which by one man
has entered the world along with death, and so has
passed upon all men."3
The first book. On the Grace of Christ, begins by quot-
ing and examining Pelagius' anathema of all those who
deny that grace is necessary for every action (2 sq.).
Augustine confesses that this would deceive all who
were not fortified by knowledge of Pelagius' writings.
But he asserts that in the light of these writings it is
clear that Pelagius means that grace is always neces-
sary, only because we need continually to remember
the forgiveness of our sins, the example of Christ, the
teaching of the law, and the like. Then he enters
(4 sq.) upon an examination of Pelagius' scheme of
human faculties, and quotes at length the account of
them as given in his book, In Defence of Free Will.
Pelagius distinguishes between the possibilitas {posse),
voluntas (velle) and actio (esse), and declares that the
first only is from God and receives aid from God,
while the others are entirely ours and in our own
power. Augustine opposes to this the passage in
Phil. ii. 12, 13 (6), and then criticises (7 sq.) Pelagius'
ambiguous acknowledgment that God is to be praised
for man's good works " because the capacity for any
action on man's part is from God," which reduces all
1 On Original Sin, 1. 2 Ibid. 5.
3 On the "Grace of Christ, 55.
A UG US TINE' S PART IN THE CON TR 0 VERS V. 7 I
grace to the primeval endowment of nature with
" capacity" {possibilitas, posse) and the help afforded it
by the law and teaching-. Augustine points out the
difference between law and grace, and the purpose of
the former as a pedagogue to the latter (9 sq.), and
then refutes Pelagius' further definition of grace as
consisting in the promise of future glory and the reve-
lation of wisdom, by an appeal to Paul's thorn in the
flesh and his experience under its discipline (n sq.).
Pelagius' illustrations of his theory of natural faculty
from our senses are then sharply tested (16). The
criticism on the whole doctrine is then pressed (17 sq.),
that it makes God equally sharer in our blame for evil
acts as in our praise for good ones, since if God does
help and His help is only His gift to us of ability to
act in either part, then He has equally helped to the
evil deeds as to the good. The assertion that this
"capacity of either part" is the fecund root of both
good and evil is then criticised (19 sq.), and opposed
to Matt. vii. 18, with the result of establishing that we
must seek two roots in our dispositions for so diverse
results, — covetousness for evil, and love for good, —
not a single root in nature for both. Man's " capac-
ity," it is argued, is the root of nothing; but it is
capable of both good and evil according to the moving
cause, which, in the case of evil, is man-originated,
while, in the case of good, it is from God (21). Next,
Pelagius' assertion that grace is given according to
our merits (23 sq.) is taken up and examined. It is
shown, that, despite his anathema, Pelagius holds to
this doctrine, and in so extreme a form as explicitly to
declare that man comes and cleaves to God by his free-
dom of will alone, and without God's aid. He shows
that the Scriptures teach just the opposite (24-26) ;
and then points out how Pelagius has confounded the
functions ot knowledge and love (27 sq.), and how he
forgets that we cannot have merits until we love God,
while John certainly asserts that God loved us first
(1 John iv. 10). The representation that what grace
does is to render obedience easier (28-30), and the twin
view that prayer is only relatively necessary, are next
72 AUGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY.
criticised (32). That Pelagius never acknowledges real
grace is then demonstrated by a detailed examination
of all that he had written on the subject (31-45). The
book closes (46-80) with a full refutation of Pelagius'
appeal to Ambrose, as if he supported him ; and an
exhibition of Ambrose's contrary testimony as to grace
and its necessity.
The object of the second book — On Original Sin — is
to show, that, in spite of Pelagius' admissions as to the
baptism of infants, he yet denies that they inherit
original sin and contends that they are born free from
corruption. The book opens by pointing out that
there is no question as to Coelestius' teaching in this
matter (2-8). At Carthage he refused to condemn
those who say that Adam's sin injured no one but him-
self and that infants are born in the same state that
Adam was in before the fall ; and he openly asserted
at Rome that there is no sin ex traduce. As for Pela-
gius, he is simply more cautious and mendacious than
Coelestius. He deceived the Council at Diospolis, but
failed to deceive the Romans (5-13), and, as a matter
of fact (14-18), teaches exactly what Coelestius does.
In support of this assertion, Pelagius' Defence of Free
Will is quoted, wherein he asserts that we are born
neither good nor bad " but with a capacity for either,"
and " as without virtue, so without vice ; and that pre-
vious to the action of our own proper will, that alone is
in man which God has formed" (14). Augustine also
quotes Pelagius' explanation of his anathema against
those who say Adam's sin injured only himself, as
meaning that he has injured man by setting a bad
" example ;" and his even more sinuous explanation of
his anathema against those who assert that infants are
born in the same condition that Adam was in before
he fell, as meaning that they are infants and he was a
man ! (16-18). With this introduction to them, Augus-
tine next treats of Pelagius' subterfuges (19-25), and
then animadverts on the importance of the issue (26-37),
pointing out that Pelagianism is not a mere error but
a deadly heresy, and strikes at the very centre of
Christianity. A counter argument of the Pelagians is
AUGUSTINE S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 73
then taken up (38-45), " Does not the doctrine of orig-
inal sin make marriage an evil thing?" No, says
Augustine, marriage is ordained by God and is good ;
but it is a diseased good, and hence what is born of it
is a good nature made by God, but this good nature in
a diseased condition, — the result ol the Devil's work.
Hence, if it be asked why God's gift produces any
thing for the Devil to take possession of, it is to be an-
swered that God gives his gifts liberally (Matt. v. 45),
and makes men ; but the Devil makes these men sin-
ners (46). Finally, as Ambrose had been appealed to
in the former book, so at the end of this it is shown
that he openly proclaimed the doctrine of original sin,
and here too, before Pelagius, condemned Pelagius
(47 sq.)-
Sermons at Carthage.
What Augustine meant by writing to Pinianus and
his family that he was more oppressed by work at
Carthage than anywhere else, may perhaps be illus-
trated from his diligence in preaching while in that
capital. He seems to have been almost constantly in
the pulpit during this period " of the sharpest conflict
with them," ' preaching against the Pelagians. There
is one series of his sermons, of the exact dates of which
we can be pretty sure, which may be adverted to here.
This includes Sermons 151 and 152, preached early in
October, 418 ; Sermon 155 on October 14, 156 on Oc-
tober 17, and 26 on October 18. They thus follow one
another almost with the regularity of the days. The first
was based on Rom. vii. 15-25. Augustine declares this
text to contain dangerous words if it is not properly
understood ; for men are prone to sin, and when they
hear the apostle so speaking they do evil and think
they are like him. They are meant to teach us, how-
ever, that the life of the just in this body is a war, not
yet a triumph : the triumph will come only when death
is swallowed up in victory. It would, no doubt, be
better not to have an enemy than even to conquer. It
1 On the Gift of Perseverance, 55.
74 AUG US TINE A ND THE TELA GIA N CON TR 0 VERS Y.
would be better not to have evil desires. But we have
them. Nevertheless, let us not follow after them. If
they rebel against us, let us rebel against them ; if they
fight, let us fight ; if they besiege, let us besiege : let
us look only to this, that they do not conquer. With
some evil desires we are born : others we make by bad
habit. It is on account of those with which we are
born that infants are baptized — that they may be freed
from the guilt of inheritance, not from any evil of cus-
tom, which, of course, they have not. And it is on
account of these, too, that our war must be endless :
the concupiscence with which we are born cannot be
done away as long as we live ; it may be diminished,
but not done away. Neither can the law free us, for
it only reveals the sin to our fuller apprehension.
Where, then, is hope, save in the superabundance of
grace ?
The next sermon (152) takes up the words in Rom.
viii. 1-4, and points out that the inward aid of the
Spirit brings all the help we need. ' ' We, like farmers
in the field, work from without : but, if there were no
one who worked from within, the seed would not take
root in the ground, nor would the sprout arise in the
field, nor would the shoot grow strong and become a
tree, nor would branches and fruit and leaves be pro-
duced. Therefore the apostle distinguishes between
the work of the workmen and the work of the Creator
(1 Cor. iii. 6, 7). If God give not the increase, empty
is this sound within your ears ; but if He gives, it
avails somewhat that we plant and water, and our labor
is not in vain." He then applies this to the individual
striving against his lusts ; warns against Manichean
error ; and distinguishes between the three laws, — the
law of sin, the law of faith, and the law of deeds, — de-
fending the last, the law of Moses, against the Mani-
cheans. Then he comes to the words of the text, and
explains its chief phrases, closing thus : " What else
do we read here than that Christ is a sacrifice for
sin ? . . . Behold by what ' sin ' he condemned sin : by
the sacrifice which he made for sins, he condemned sin.
This is the law of the Spirit of life which has freed you
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 75
from the law of sin and death. For that other law,
the law of the letter, the laAv that commands, is indeed
good ; ' the commandment is holy and just and good : '
but ' it was weak through the flesh,' and what it com-
manded it could not bring about in us. Therefore
there is one law, as I began by saying, that reveals sin
to you, and another that takes it away : the law of
the letter reveals sin, the law of grace takes it away."
Sermon 155 covers the same ground, and more, taking
the broader text, Rom. viii. 1-11, and fully developing
its teaching, especially as discriminating between the
law of sin and the law of Moses and the law of faith ; the
law of Moses being the holy law of God written with
His finger on the tables of stone, while the law of the
Spirit of life is nothing other than the same law writ-
ten in the heart, as the prophet (Jer. xxx. 1, 33) clearly
declares. So written, it does not terrify from without,
but soothes from within. Great care is also taken, lest
by such phrases as, " walk in the Spirit, not in the
flesh," " who shall deliver me from the body of this
death ?" a hatred of the body should be begotten.
" Thus you shall be freed from the body of this death,
not by having no body, but by having another one and
dying no more. If, indeed, he had not added, ' of this
death,' perchance an error might have been suggested
to the human mind, and it might have been said, ' You
see that God does not wish us to have a body.' But
He says, ' the body of this death.' Take away death,
and the body is good. Let our last enemy, death, be
taken away, and my dear flesh will be mine for eter-
nity. For no one can ever ' hate his own flesh.' Al-
though the ' spirit lusts against the flesh and the flesh
against the spirit,' although there is now a strife in this
house, yet the husband is seeking by his strife not the
ruin of, but concord with, his wife. Far be it, far be
it, my brethren, that the spirit should hate the flesh in
lusting against it ! It hates the vices of the flesh ; it
hates the wisdom of the flesh ; it hates the contention
of death. This corruption shall put on incorruption, —
this mortal shall put on immortality ; it is sown a natu-
ral body — it shall rise a spiritual body ; and you shall
7 6 A UGUSTINE AND THE PELA GIAN CONTRO VERS Y.
see full and perfect concord, — you shall see the crea-
ture praise the Creator." One of the special interests
of such passages is to show, that, even at this early
date, Augustine was careful to guard his hearers from
Manichean error while proclaiming original sin. One
of the sermons which, probably, was preached about
this time (153), is even entitled, " Against the Mani-
cheans openly, but tacitly against the Pelagians," and
bears witness to the early development of the method
that he was somewhat later to use effectively against
Julian's charges of Manicheanism against the Catho-
lics.1
Three days afterwards, Augustine preached on the
next few verses, Rom. viii. 12-17, but can scarcely be
said to have risen to the height of its great argument.
The greater part of the sermon is occupied with a dis-
cussion of the law, why it was given, how it is legiti-
mately used, and its usefulness as a pedagogue to bring
us to Christ. It then passes on to speak of the need ol
a mediator ; and then, of what it is to live according to
the flesh, which includes living according to merely
human nature, and the need of mortifying the flesh in
this world. All this, of course, gave full opportunity
for opposing the leading Pelagian errors ; and the ser-
mon is brought to a close by a direct polemic against
their assertion that the function of grace is only to
make it more easy to do what is right. " With the sail
more easily, with the oar with more difficulty : never-
theless even with the oar we can go. On a beast more
easily, on foot with more difficulty : nevertheless prog-
ress can be made on foot. It is not true ! For the
true Master who flatters no one, who deceives no one, —
the truthful Teacher and very Saviour to whom this
very grievous schoolmaster has led us, — when he was
speaking about good works, i.e., about the fruits of the
twigs and branches, did not say, ' Without me, indeed,
you can do something, but you will do it more easily
with me ; ' He did not say, ' You can produce your
1 Compare below. Neander, in the second volume (E. T.) of his
History of the Christian Church, discusses the matter in a very fair
spirit.
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 77
fruit without me, but more richly with me.' He did
not say this ! Read what He said : it is the holy gos-
pel,— bow the proud necks ! Augustine does not say
this : the Lord says it. What says the Lord ? ' With-
out me you can do nothing ! ' "
On the very next day he was again in the pulpit, and
taking for his text chiefly the ninety-fifth Psalm.1 He
began by quoting the sixth verse, and laying stress on
the words " Our Maker." 'No Christian,' he said,
' doubted that God had made him, and that in such a
sense that God created not only the first man, from
whom all have descended, but that God to-day creates
every man, — as He said to one of His saints, " Before
that I formed thee in the womb, I knew thee." At
first He created man apart from man ; now He creates
man from man : nevetheless, whether man apart from
man, or man from man, "it is He that made us, and
not we ourselves." Nor has He made us and then de-
serted us ; He has not cared to make us, and not cared
to keep us. Will He who made us without being
asked, desert us when He is besought? But is it not
just as foolish to say, as some say or are ready to say,
that God made them men, but they make themselves
righteous ? Why, then, do we pray to God to make
us righteous ? The first man was created in a nature
that was without fault or flaw. He was made right-
eous : he did not make himself righteous ; what he did
for himself was to fall and break his righteousness.
This God did not do : He permitted it, as if He had
said, " Let him desert Me ; let him find himself ; and
let his misery prove that he has no ability without
Me." In this way God wished to show man what
free will was worth without God. O evil free will
without God ! Behold, man was made good ; and
by free will man was made evil ! When will the
evil man make himself good by free will ? When
good, he was not able to keep himself good ; and
now that he is evil, is he to make himself good ? Nay,
behold, He that made us has also made us " His
1 Sermon 26.
I
78 A UGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY.
people" (Ps. xcv. 7). This is a distinguishing gift.
Nature is common to all, but grace is not. It is not to
be confounded with nature ; but if it were, it would
still be gratuitous. For certainly no man, before he
existed, deserved to come into existence. And yet
God has made him, and that not like the beasts or a
stock or a stone, but in His own image. Who has
iven this benefit ? He gave it who was in existence :
le received it who was not. And only He could do
this, who calls the things that are not as though they
were : of whom the apostle says that " He chose us
before the foundation of the world." We have been
made in this world, and yet the world was not when
we were chosen. Ineffable ! wonderful ! They are
chosen who are not : neither does He err in choosing
nor choose in vain. He chooses, and has elect whom
He is to create to be chosen : He has them in Himself,
not indeed in His nature, but in His prescience. Let
us not, then, glory in ourselves, or dispute against
grace. If we are men, He made us. If we are be-
lievers, He made us this too. He who sent the Lamb
to be slain has, out of wolves, made us sheep. This is
grace. And it is an even greater grace than that
grace of nature by which we were all made men.' " 1
am continually endeavoring to discuss such things
as these," said the preacher, "against a new heresy
which is attempting to rise ; because 1 wish you to be
fixed in the good, untouched by the evil. . . . For,
disputing against grace in favor of free will, they be-
came an offence to pious and catholic ears. They
began to create horror ; they began to be avoided as a
fixed pest ; it began to be said of them, that they argued
against grace. And they found such a device as
this : . . . ' Because I defend man's tree will and say
that free will is sufficient in order that I may be right-
eous,' says one, ' I do not say that it is without the
grace of God.' The ears of the pious are pricked up,
and he who hears this already begins to rejoice :
4 Thanks be to God ! He does not defend free will with-
out the grace of God ! There is free will, but it avails
nothing without the grace of God.' If, then, they do
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 79
not defend tree will without the grace of God, what
evil do the)' say ? Expound to us, O teacher, what
grace you mean? ' When I say,' he says, ' the free
will of man, you observe that I say " of man"?'
What then ? ' Who created man ? ' God. ' Who gave
him free will ? ' God. ' If, then, God created man,
and God gave man free will, whatever man is able to
do by free will, to whose grace does he owe it, except
to His who made him with free will ? ' And this is
what they think they say so acutely ! You see, never-
theless, my brethren, how they preach that general
grace by which we were created and by which we are
men ; and, of course, we are men in common with the un-
godly, and are Christians apart from them. It is this
grace by which we are Christians, that we wish them
to preach, this that we wish them to acknowledge, this
that we wish, — of which the apostle says, ' I do not
make void the grace of God, for if righteousness is by
the law, Christ is dead in vain.' " Then the true func-
tion of the law was explained as a revealer of our sin-
fulness and a pedagogue to lead us to Christ : the Mani-
chean depreciation of the Old-Testament law was
attacked, but its insufficiency for salvation was pointed
out ; and so his hearers were brought back to the
necessity of grace, which is illustrated from the story
of the raising of the dead child in 2 Kings iv. 18-37:
the dead child being Adam ; the ineffective staff (by
which we ought to walk), the law ; but the living
prophet, Christ with his grace, which we must preach.
" The prophetic staff was not enough for the dead
boy : would dead nature itself have been enough ?
Even this by which we are made, although we no-
where read of it under this name, we nevertheless, be-
cause it is given gratuitously, confess to be grace. But
we show to you a greater grace than this, by which
we are Christians. . . . This is the grace by Jesus
Christ our Lord : it was He that made us, — both be-
fore we were at all it was He that made us, and now,
after we are made, it is He that has made us all right-
eous,— and not we ourselves." There was but one
mass of perdition from Adam, to which nothing was
So A UGUSTINE AND THE PELA GIAN CON TRO VERS Y.
due but punishment ; and from that mass vessels have
been made unto honor. " Rejoice because you have
escaped ; you have escaped the death that was due, —
you have received the life that was not due. ' But,'
you ask, ' why did He make me unto honor, and an-
other unto dishonor ? ' Will you who will not hear
the apostle saying, ' O man, who art thou that repliest
against God ? ' hear Augustine ? . . . Do you wish to
dispute with me ? Nay, wonder with me, and cry out
with me, ' Oh the depth of the riches ! ' Let us both
be afraid, — let us both cry out, ' Oh the depth of the
riches ! ' Let us both agree in fear, lest we perish in
error."
The Letter to Optatus.
Augustine was not less busy with his pen, during
these months, than with his voice. Quite a series of
letters belong to the last half of 418, in which he argues
to his distant correspondents on the same themes which
he was so iterantly trying to make clear to his Cartha-
ginian auditors. One of the most interesting of these
was written to a fellow-bishop, Optatus, on the origin
of the soul.1 Optatus, like Jerome, had expressed him-
self as favoring the theory of a special creation of each
at birth ; and Augustine, in this letter as in the paper
sent to Jerome, lays great stress on so holding our
theories on so obscure a matter as to conform to the
indubitable fact of the transmission of sin. This fact,
such passages as 1 Cor. xv. 21 sq., Rom. v. 12 sq.,
make certain ; and in stating this, Augustine takes the
opportunity to outline the chief contents of the catholic
faith over against the Pelagian denial of original sin
and grace : that all are born under the contagion of
death and in the bond of guilt ; that there is no deliv-
erance except in the one Mediator, Christ Jesus ; that
before His coming men received him as promised, now
as already come, but with the same faith ; that the law
was not intended to save, but to shut up under sin and
1 Epistle 190.
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 81
so to force us back upon the one Saviour ; and that the
distribution of grace is sovereign.
Augustine pries into God's sovereign counsels some-
what more freely here than is usual with him. " But
why those also are created who, the Creator foreknew,
would belong to damnation, not to grace, the blessed
apostle mentions with as much succinct brevity as
great authority. For he says that God, ' wishing to
show His wrath and demonstrate His power,' etc. (Rom.
ix. 22). Justly, however, would He seem unjust in
forming vessels of wrath for perdition, if the whole
mass from Adam were not condemned. That, there-
fore, they are made on birth vessels of anger, belongs
to the punishment due to them ; but that they are
made by re-birth vessels of mercy, belongs to the grace
that is not due to them. God, therefore, shows His
wrath, — not, of course, perturbation of mind, such as
is called wrath among men, but a just and fixed ven-
geance. . . . He shows also His power, by which He
makes a good use of evil men, and endows them with
many natural and temporal goods, and bends their evil
to admonition and instruction of the good by compari-
son with it, so that these may learn from them to give
thanks to God that they have been made to differ from
them, not by their own deserts which wTere of like kind
in the same mass, but by His pity. . . . But by cre-
ating so many to be born who, He foreknew, would
not belong to His grace, so that they are more by an
incomparable multitude than those whom He deigned
to predestinate as children of the promise into the
glory of His kingdom, — He wished to show by this
very multitude of the rejected how entirely of no mo-
ment it is to the just God what is the multitude of
those most justly condemned. And that hence also
those who are redeemed from this condemnation may
understand, that what they see rendered to so great a
part of the mass was the desert of the whole of it, — not
only of those who add many others to original sin, by
the choice of an evil will, but as well of so many chil-
dren who are snatched from this life without the grace
of the Mediator, bound by no bond except that of orig-
inal sin alone."
82 A UGUSTIXE AXD THE PELA GIAN CONTRO VERS Y.
With respect to the question more immediately con-
cerning which the letter was written, Augustine explains
that he is willing to accept the opinion that souls are
created for men as they are born, if only it can be
made plain that it is consistent with the original sin
that the Scriptures so clearly teach. In the paper sent
to Jerome, the difficulties of creationism are sufficiently
urged ; this letter is interesting on account of its state-
ment of some of the difficulties of traducianism also, —
thus evidencing Augustine's clear view of the peculiar
complexity of the problem, and justifying his attitude
of balance and uncertainty between the two theories.
' The human understanding,' he says, ' can scarcely
comprehend how a soul arises from a parent's soul in
the offspring ; or is transmitted to the offspring as a
candle is lighted from a candle and thence another fire
comes into existence without loss to the former one.
Is there an incorporeal seed for the soul, which passes,
by some hidden and invisible channel of its own, from
the father to the mother, when it is conceived in the
woman ? Or, even more incredible, does it lie enfold-
ed and hidden within the corporeal seed ? ' He is lost
in wonder over the question whether, when conception
does not take place, the immortal seed of an immortal
soul perishes ; or, whether the immortality attaches it-
self to it only when it lives. He even expresses doubt
whether traducianism will explain what it is called in
to explain, much better than creationism ; in any case,
who denies that God is the maker of every soul ?
Isaiah lvii. 16 says, " I have made every breath;"
and the only question that can arise is as to method, —
whether He " makes every breath from the one first
breath, just as He makes every body of man from the
one first body ; or whether He makes new bodies indeed
from the one body, but new souls out of nothing."
Certainly nothing but Scripture can determine such a
question ; but where do the Scriptures speak unam-
biguously upon it ? The passages to which the crea-
tionists point only affirm the admitted fact that God
makes the soul ; and the traducianists forget that the
word " soul" in the Scriptures is ambiguous, and can
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 33
mean " man," and even a " dead man." What more
can be done, then, than to assert what is certain, viz.,
that sin is propagated, and leave what is uncertain in
the doubt in which God has chosen to place it ?
This letter was written not long after the issue of
Zosimus' Tractoria, which demanded the signature of all
to African orthodoxy ; and Augustine sends Optatus
" copies of the recent letters which have been sent
forth from the Roman See, whether specially to the
African bishops or generally to all bishops," on the
Pelagian controversy, " lest perchance they had not
yet reached" his correspondent, who, it is very evi-
dent, he was anxious should thoroughly realize " that
the authors, or certainly the most energetic and noted
teachers," of these new heresies, "had been con-
demned in the whole Christian world by the vigilance
of episcopal councils aided by the Saviour who keeps
His Church, as well as by two venerable overseers of
the Apostolical See, Pope Innocent and Pope Zosimus,
unless they should show repentance by being con-
vinced and reformed." To this zeal we owe it that the
letter contains an extract from Zosimus' Tractoria, one
of the two brief fragments of that document that have
reached our day.
The Correspondence with Sixtus.
There was another ecclesiastic in Rome, besides
Zosimus, who was strongly suspected of favoring the
Pelagians. This was the presbyter Sixtus, who after-
wards became Pope Sixtus III. But when Zosimus
issued his condemnation of Pelagianism, Sixtus sent
also a short letter to Africa addressed to Aurelius of
Carthage. This, though brief, spoke with consider-
able vigor against the heresy which he was commonly
believed to have before defended,1 and which claimed
him as its own.2 Some months afterwards, he sent an-
other similar, but longer, letter to Augustine and
Alypius, more fully expounding his rejection of ' ' the
1 See Epistle 194. 1. 2 Ibid. 191, 1.
84 A UG US TINE AND THE TELA GIAN CONTRO VERS Y.
fatal dogma" of Pelagius, and his acceptance of " that
grace of God freely given by Him to small and great,
to which Pelagius' dogma was diametrically opposed."
Augustine was overjoyed with these developments.
He quickly replied in a short letter ' in which he ex-
presses the delight he had in learning from Sixtus' own
hand that he was not a defender of Pelagius, but a preach-
er of grace. And close upon the heels of this he sent
another much longer letter,2 in which he discusses the
subtler arguments of the Pelagians with an anxious
care that seems to bear witness to his desire to confirm
and support his correspondent in his new opinions.
Both letters testify to Augustine's approval of the per-
secuting measures which had been instituted by the
Roman see in obedience to the emperor ; and urge on
Sixtus his duty not only to bring the open heretics to
deserved punishment, but to track out those who
spread their poison secretly, and even to remember
those whom he had formerly heard announcing the
error before it had been condemned and who were
now silent through fear, and to bring them either to
open recantation of their former beliefs, or to punish-
ment.
It is pleasanter to recall the dialectic of these letters.
The greater part of the second is given to a discussion
of the gratuitousness of grace, which, just because
grace, is given to no preceding merits. Many subtle
objections to this doctrine were brought forward by
the Pelagians. They said that "free will is taken
away if we assert that man does not have even a good
will without the aid of God :" that we make " God an
accepter of persons, it we believe that without any
preceding merits He has mercy on whom He will,
and whom He will He calls, and whom He will
He makes religious : " that "it is unjust, in one and
the same case, to deliver one and punish another :"
that, if such a doctrine be preached, " men who do
not wish to live rightly and faithfully, will excuse
themselves by saying that they have done nothing evil
1 Epistle 191. * Ibid. 194.
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 85
by living- ill, since they have not received the grace by
which they might live well :" that it is a puzzle " how
sin can pass over to the children of the faithful, when
it has been remitted to the parents in baptism :" that
" children respond truly by the mouth of their sponsors
that they believe in remission of sins, but not because
sins are remitted to them, but because they believe
that sins are remitted in the church or in baptism to
those in whom they are found, not to those in whom
they do not exist;" and consequently they said that
" they were unwilling that infants should be so bap-
tized unto remission of sins as if this remission took
place in them," for (they contended) " they have no sin ;
but they are to be baptized, although without sin, with
the same rite of baptism through which remission of
sins takes place in any that are sinners." This last
objection is especially interesting,1 because it furnishes
us with the reply which the Pelagians made to the
argument that Augustine so strongly pressed against
them from the very act and ritual of baptism, as imply-
ing remission of sins.2 His rejoinder to it here is to
point to the other parts of the same ritual, and to ask
why, then, infants are exorcised and exsufflated in bap-
tism. "For, it cannot be doubted that this is done
fictitiously, if the Devil does not rule over them ; but
if he rules over them, and they are therefore not falsely
exorcised and exsufflated, why does that Prince of
sinners rule over them except because of sin ?"
On the fundamental matter of the gratuitousness of
grace, this letter is very explicit. " It we seek for the
deserving of hardening, we shall find it. . . . But if
we seek for the deserving of pity, we shall not find it ;
for there is none, lest grace be made a vanity if it is
not given gratis but rendered to merits. But, should
we say that faith preceded and in it there is desert of
grace, what desert did man have before faith that he
should receive faith ? For, what did he have that he
did not receive ? and if he received it, why does he
1 It appears to have been first reported to Augustine by Marius Mer-
cator, in a letter received at Carthage. See Epistle 193, 3.
2 As, for example, in On the Merits and Remission of Sins, etc., i.
86 A UG US TINE AND THE TELA GIAN CONTRO VERS Y.
glory as if he received it not ? For as man would not
have wisdom, understanding, prudence, fortitude,
knowledge, piety, fear of God, unless he had received
(according to the prophet) the spirit of wisdom and
understanding, of prudence and fortitude, of knowl-
edge and piety and the fear of God ; as he would not
have justice, love, continence, except the spirit were
received of whom the apostle says, ' For you did not
receive the spirit of fear, but of virtue, and love, and
continence : ' so he would not have faith unless he re-
ceived the spirit of faith of whom the same apostle
says, ' Having then the same spirit of faith, according
to what is written, " I believed and therefore spoke,"
we too believe and therefore speak.' But that He is
not received by desert, but by His mercy who has
mercy on whom He will, is manifestly shown where he
says of himself, ' I have obtained mercy to be faith-
ful.' " " If we should say that the merit of prayer
precedes, that the gift of grace may follow, . . . even
prayer itself is found among the gifts of grace" (Rom.
viii. 26). " It remains, then, that faith itself, whence
all righteousness takes beginning, ... it remains, 1
say, that even faith itself is not to be attributed to the
human will which they extol, nor to any preceding
merits, since from it begin whatever good things are
merits : but it is to be confessed to be the gratuitous
gift of God, since we consider it true grace, that is,
without merits, inasmuch as we read in the same epis-
tle, ' God divides out the measure of faith to each '
(Rom. xii. 3). Now, good works are done by man,
but faith is wrought in man, and without it these are
not done by any man. For all that is not of faith is
sin" (Rom. xiv. 23.)
Letters to Mercator and Asellicus.
By the same messenger who carried this important
letter to Sixtus, Augustine sent also a letter to Mer-
cator,1 an African layman who was then apparently at
Rome, but who was afterwards (in 429) to render ser-
1 Epistle 193.
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 87
vice by instructing the Emperor Theodosius as to the
nature and history of Pelagianism, and so preventing
the appeal of the Pelagians to him from being granted.
Now he appears as an inquirer. Augustine, while at
Carthage, had received a letter from him in which he
had consulted him on certain questions that the Pela-
gians had raised, but in such a manner as to indicate
his opposition to them. Press of business had com-
pelled the postponement of the reply until this later
date. One of the questions which Mercator had put
concerned the Pelagian account of infants sharing in
the one baptism unto remission of sins, which we have
seen Augustine answering when writing to Sixtus.
In this letter he replies : " Let them, then, hear the
Lord (John iii. 36). Infants, therefore, who are made
believers by others, by whom they are brought to bap-
tism, are, of course, unbelievers by others, if they are
in the hands of such as do not believe that they should
be brought, inasmuch as they believe they are nothing
profited ; and accordingly, if they believe by believers
and have eternal life, they are unbelievers by unbe-
lievers and shall not see life, but the wrath of God
abideth on them. For it is not said, ' it comes on them.'
but ' it abideth on them,' because it was on them from
the beginning, and will not be taken from them ex-
cept by the grace of God through Jesus Christ, our
Lord. . . . Therefore, when children are baptized,
the confession is made that they are believers, and it
is not to be doubted that those who are not believers
are condemned : let them, then, dare to say now, if
they can, that they contract no evil from their origin
to be condemned by the just God, and have no con-
tagion of sin." The other matter on which Mercator
sought light concerned the statement that universal
death proved universal sin :' he reported that the Pela-
gians replied that not even death was universal — that
Enoch, for instance, and Elijah, had not died. Augus-
tine adds those who are to be found living at the sec-
ond advent, who are not to die but to be " changed ;"
1 Compare On Dtilcitius' Eight Questions, 3.
88 A UGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTRO VERS Y.
and replies that Rom. v. 12 is perfectly explicit that
there is no death in the world except that which comes
from sin, and that God is a Saviour, and we cannot at
all ' ' deny that He is able to do that, now, in any that
he wishes, without death, which we undoubtingly be-
lieve is to be done in so many after death." He adds
that the difficult question is not why Enoch and Elijah
did not die, if death is the punishment of sin ; but why,
such being the case, the justified ever die ; and he re-
fers his correspondent to his book On the Baptism of
Infants' for a resolution of this greater difficulty.
It was probably at the very end of 418 that Augus-
tine wrote a letter of some length2 to Asellicus, in re-
ply to one which he had written, on " avoiding the de-
ception of Judaism," to the primate of the Bizacene
province, and which that ecclesiastic had sent to
Augustine for answering. He discusses in this the
law of the Old Testament. He opens by pointing out
that the apostle forbids Christians to Judaize (Gal. ii.
14-16), and explains that it is not merely the ceremonial
law that we may not depend upon, " but also what is
said in the law, ' Thou shalt not covet ' (which no one,
of course, doubts is to be said to Christians too), does
not justify man, except by faith in Jesus Christ and
the grace of God through Jesus Christ our Lord."
He then expounds the use of the law : " This, then, is
the usefulness of the law : that it shows man to him-
self, so that he may know his weakness, and see how,
by the prohibition, carnal concupiscence is rather in-
creased than healed. . . . The use of the law is, thus,
to convince man of his weakness, and force him to im-
plore the medicine of grace that is in Christ. " " Since
these things are so," he adds, " those who rejoice that
they are Israelites after the flesh and glory in the law
apart from the grace of Christ, these are those con-
cerning whom the apostle said that ' being ignorant ol
God's righteousness, and wishing to establish their
own, they are not subject to God's righteousness ; '
1 That is, On the Merits and Remission of Sifts, etc., ii. 30 sq.
9 Epistle 196.
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 89
since he calls ' God's righteousness ' that which is from
God to man ; and ' their own,' what they think that
the commandments suffice for them to do without the
help and gilt of Him who gave the law. But they are
like those who, while they profess to be Christians, so
oppose the grace of Christ that they suppose that
they fulfil the divine commands by human powers,
and, ' wishing to establish their own,' are ' not subject
to the righteousness of God,' and so, not indeed in
name, but yet in error, Judaize. This sort of men
found heads for themselves in Pelagius and Ccelestius.
the most acute asserters of this impiety, who by God's
recent judgment, through his diligent and faithful ser-
vants, have been deprived even of catholic communion,
and, on account of an impenitent heart, persist still in
their condemnation."
The First Book of the Treatise " On Marriage and Con-
cupiscence.
At the beginning of 419, a considerable work was
published by Augustine on one of the more remote
corollaries which the Pelagians drew from his teach-
ings. It had come to his ears, that they asserted that
his doctrine condemned marriage. "If only sinful
offspring come from marriage," they asked, "is not
marriage itself made a sinful thing ?" The book which
Augustine composed in answer to this query, he sent,
along with an explanatory letter, to the Comes Valerius,
a trusted servant of the Emperor Honorius and one
of the most steady opponents at court of the Pelagian
heresy. Augustine explains1 why he desired to ad-
dress the book to him : first, because Valerius was a
striking example of those continent husbands of which
that age furnishes us with many instances, and, there-
fore, the discussion would have especial interest for
him ; secondly, because of his eminence as an oppo-
nent of Pelagianism ; and, thirdly, because Augustine
had learned that he had read a Pelagian document in
which Augustine was charged with condemning mar-
1 On Marriage and Concupiscence, i. 2.
90 A UGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTRO VERSY.
riage by defending original sin.1 The book in question
is the first book ol the treatise On Marriage and Con-
cupiscence. It is, naturally, tinged, or rather stained,
with the prevalent ascetic notions of the day. Its doc-
trine is that marriage is good, and that God is the
maker of the offspring that comes from it, although
now there can be no begetting and hence no birth
without sin. Sin made concupiscence, and now con-
cupiscence perpetuates sinners. The specific object
of the work, as it states it itself, is "to distinguish
between the evil of carnal concupiscence, from which
man who is born therefrom contracts original sin,
and the good of marriage" (I. i). After the brief intro-
duction, in which he explains why he writes, and why
he addresses his book to Valerius (1-2), Augustine
points out that conjugal chastity, like its higher sister-
grace of continence, is God's gift. Thus copulation,
but only for the propagation of children, has divine
allowance (3-5). Lust, or " shameful concupiscence,"
however, he teaches, is not of the essence, but only an
accident, of marriage. It did not exist in Eden, al-
though true marriage existed there ; but arose from,
and therefore only" after, sin (6-7). Its addition to
marriage does not destroy the good of marriage : it
only conditions the character of the offspring (8).
Hence it is that the apostle allows marriage, but for-
bids the " disease of desire" (1 Thess. iv. 3-5) ; and
hence the Old Testament saints were even permitted
more than one wife, because, by multiplying wives, it
was not lust, but offspring, that was increased (9-10).
Nevertheless, fecundity is not to be thought the only
good of marriage : true marriage can exist without
offspring, and even without cohabitation (11-13); and
cohabitation is now, under the New Testament, no
longer a duty as it was under the Old Testament (14-
15), but the apostle praises continence above it. We
must, then, distinguish between the goods of marriage,
and seek the best (16-19). But thus it follows that it
is not due to any inherent and necessary evil in mar-
1 Compare the Benedictine Preface to The Unfinished Work.
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 91
riage, but only to the presence, now, of concupiscence
in all cohabitation, that children are born under sin,
even the children of the regenerate, just as from the
seed of olives only oleasters grow (20-24). And yet
again, concupiscence is not itself sin in the regener-
ate ; it is remitted as guilt in baptism : but it is the
daughter of sin, and it is the mother of sin, and in the
unregenerate it is itself sin, as to yield to it is even to
the regenerate (25-39). Finally, as so often, the testi-
mony of Ambrose is appealed to, and it is shown that
he too teaches that all born from cohabitation are born
guilty (40).
In this book, Augustine certainly seems to teach
that the bond of connection by which Adam's sin
is conveyed to his offspring is not mere descent, or
heredity, or mere inclusion in him in a realistic sense
as partakers of the same numerical nature, but con-
cupiscence. Without concupiscence in the act of gen-
eration, the offspring would not be a partaker of
Adam's sin. This he had taught also previously, as,
e.g., in the treatise On Original Sin, from which a few
words may be profitably quoted as succinctly summing
up the teaching of this book on the subject : " It is,
then, manifest, that that must not be laid to the ac-
count of marriage, in the absence of which even mar-
riage would still have existed. . . . Such, however,
is the present condition of mortal men, that the con-
nubial intercourse and lust are at the same time in
action. . . . Hence it follows that infants, although
incapable of sinning, are yet not born without the con-
tagion of sin, . . . not, indeed, because of what is law-
ful, but on account of that which is unseemly : for,
from what is lawful, nature is born ; from what is un-
seemly, sin" (42).
The Treatise "On the Sou/ and its Origin."
Towards the end of the same year (419), Augustine
was led to take up again the vexed question of the
origin of the soul. This he did not only in a new letter
92 AUG US TINE A ND THE PEL A GIAN CON TRO VERS Y.
to Optatus,1 but also, moved by the zeal of the same
monk, Renatus, who had formerly brought Optatus'
inquiries to his notice, in an elaborate treatise entitled
On the Soul and its Origin, by way of reply to a rash
adventure of a young man named Vincentius Victor,
who blamed him for his uncertainty on such a sub-
ject and attempted to determine all the puzzles of the
question, though, as Augustine insists, on assumptions
that were partly Pelagian and parti)7 worse.
Optatus had written in the hope that Augustine had
heard by this time from Jerome, in reply to the treatise
he had sent him on this subject. Augustine, in an-
swering his letter, expresses his sorrow that he has not
yet been thought by Jerome worthy of an answer,
although five years had passed away since he wrote,
but his continued hope that such an answer will in
due time come. For himself, he confesses that he has
not yet been able to see how the soul can contract sin
from Adam and yet not itself be contracted from
Adam ; and he regrets that Optatus, although holding
that God creates each soul for its birth, has not sent
him the proofs on which he depends for that opinion,
nor met its obvious difficulties. He rebukes Optatus
for confounding the question of whether God makes
the soul, with the entirely different one of how he
makes it, whether ex propagine or sine propamine. No
one doubts that God makes the soul, as no one doubts
that He makes the body. But when we consider how
He makes it, sobriety and vigilance become necessary
lest we should unguardedly fall into the Pelagian
heresy. Augustine defends his attitude of uncertainty,
and enumerates the points as to which he has no
doubt : viz., that the soul is spirit, not body ; that it is
rational or intellectual ; that it is not of the nature of
God, but is so far a mortal creature that it is capable
of deterioration and of alienation from the life of God,
and so far immortal that after this life it lives on in
bliss or punishment forever ; that it was not incarnated
because of, or according to, preceding deserts ac-
1 Epistle 202, bis. Compare Epistle 190.
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 93
quired in a previous existence, yet that it is under the
curse of sin which it derives from Adam, and there-
fore in all cases alike needs redemption in Christ.
The whole subject of the nature and origin of the
soul, however, is most fully discussed in the four books
which are gathered together under the common title
of On the Soul and its Origin. Vincentius Victor was
a young layman who had recently been converted
from the Rogatian heresy. On being shown by his
friend Peter, a presbyter, a small work of Augustine's
on the origin of the soul, he expressed surprise that so
great a man could profess ignorance on a matter so
intimate to his very being ; and, receiving encourage-
ment, he wrote a book for Peter, in which he attacked
and tried to solve all the difficulties of the subject.
Peter received the work with transports of delighted
admiration. But Renatus, happening that way, looked
upon it with distrust, and, finding that Augustine was
spoken of in it with scant courtesy, felt it his duty to
send him a copy of it. This he did in the summer of
419. It was probably not until late in the following
autumn that Augustine found time to take up the mat-
ter. He wrote then to Renatus, to Peter, and two
books to Victor himself ; and it is these four books
together which constitute the treatise that has come
down to us.
The first book is a letter to Renatus, and is intro-
duced by an expression of thanks to him for sending
Victor's book, and of kindly feeling towards and appre-
ciation for the high qualities of Victor himself (1-3).
Then Victor's errors are pointed out, — as to the nature
of the soul (4-9), including certain far-reaching corol-
laries that flow from these (10-15), and also as to the
origin of the soul (16-30). The letter closes with some
remarks on the danger of arguing from the silence of
Scripture (31), on the self-contradictions of Victor (34),
and on the errors that must be avoided in any theory
of the origin of the soul that hopes to be acceptable.
These errors are that souls become sinful by an alien
original sin, that unbaptized infants need no salvation,
that souls sinned in a previous state, and that they are
94 A UG US TINE A ND THE PEL A GIAN CON TRO VERS Y.
condemned for sins which they have not committed,
but would have committed had they lived longer.
The second book is a letter to Peter, warning him of
the responsibility that rests on him, as Victor's trusted
friend and a clergyman, to correct Victor's errors, and
reproving him for the uninstructed delight he had
taken in Victor's crudities. It opens by asking Peter
what was the occasion of the great joy which Victor's
book brought him ? Could it be that he learned from
it, for the first time, the old and primary truths it con-
tained (2-3) ? Or was it due to the new errors that it
proclaimed, — seven of which he enumerates (4-16)?
Then, after animadverting on the dilemma in which
Victor stood, of either being forced to withdraw his
violent assertion of creationism, or else of making God
unjust in His dealings with new souls (17), he speaks
of Victor's unjustifiable dogmatism in the matter (18-
21), and closes with severely solemn words to Peter on
his responsibility in the premises (22-23).
In the third and fourth books, which are addressed
to Victor, the polemic, of course, reaches its height.
The third book is entirely taken up with pointing out
to Victor, as a lather to a son, the errors into which
he had fallen, and which, in accordance with his pro-
fessions of readiness for amendment, he ought to cor-
rect. Eleven are enumerated : 1. That the soul was
made by God out of Himself (3-7) ; 2. That God will
continuously create souls forever (8) ; 3. That the soul
has desert of good before birth (9) ; 4. (contradicting-
ly), That the soul has desert of evil before birth (10) ;
5. That the soul deserved to be sinful before any sin
(1 1) ; 6. That unbaptized infants are saved (12) ; 7. That
what God predestinates may not occur (13) ; 8. That
Wisd. iv. 1 is spoken of infants (14) ; 9. That some of
the mansions with the Father are outside of God's
kingdom (15-17); 10. That the sacrifice of Christ's
blood may be offered for the unbaptized (18) ; 11. That
the unbaptized may attain at the resurrection even to
the kingdom of heaven (19). The book closes by re-
minding Victor of his professions of readiness to cor-
rect his errors, and warning him against the obstinacy
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 95
that makes the heretic (20-23). The fourth book deals
with the more personal elements of the controversy,
and discusses the points in which Victor had expressed
dissent from Augustine. It opens with a statement of
the two grounds of complaint that Victor had urged
against Augustine ; viz., that he refused to express a
confident opinion as to the origin of the soul, and that
he affirmed that the soul was not corporeal, but spirit
(1-2). These two complaints are then taken up at
length (2-- 1 6 and 17-37). To the first, Augustine replies
that man's knowledge is at best limited, and often most
limited about the things nearest to him. We do not
know the constitution of our bodies ; and, above most
others, this subject of the origin of the soul is one on
which no one but God is a competent witness. Who
remembers his birth ? Who remembers what was
before birth ? But this is just one of the subjects on
which God has not spoken unambiguously in the Scrip-
tures. Would it not be better, then, for Victor to imi-
tate Augustine's cautious ignorance, than that Augus-
tine should imitate Victor's rash assertion of errors ?
That the soul is not corporeal, Augustine argues (18-
35) from the Scriptures and from the phenomena of
dreams ; and then shows, in opposition to Victor's
trichotomy, that the Scriptures teach the identity of
" soul" and " spirit" (36-37). The book closes with a
renewed enumeration of Victor's eleven errors (38),
and a final admonition to his rashness (39).
It is pleasant to know that Augustine found, in this
case also, that righteousness is the fruit of the faithful
wounds of a friend. Victor accepted the rebuke, and
professed his better instruction at the hands of his
modest but resistless antagonist.
The Second Book of " Marriage and Concupiscence."
The controvers}7 now entered upon a new stage.
Among the evicted bishops of Italy who refused to
sign Zosimus' Epistola Tractoria, Julian of Eclanum1
1 This able and learned man was much the most formidable of the
Pelagian writers. He was a son of a dear friend of Augustine and
9 6 AUGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY.
was easily the first, and at this point he appears as the
champion of Pelagianism. It was a sad fate that ar-
rayed this beloved son of an old friend against Augus-
tine, just when there seemed to be reason to hope that
the controversy was at an end and the victory won,
and the plaudits of the world were greeting him as the
saviour of the Church.1 But the now fast-aging bishop
was to find, that in this " very confident young man"
he had yet to meet the most persistent and the most
dangerous advocate of the new doctrines that had
arisen. At an earlier period Julian had sent two let-
ters to Zosimus, in which he attempted to approach
Augustinian forms of speech as much as possible, his
object being to gain standing ground in the Church for
the Italian Pelagians. Now he appears as a Pelagian
controversialist. In opposition to the book On Mar-
riage and Concupiscence, which Augustine had sent Vale-
rius, Julian published an extended work in four thick
books addressed to Turbantius.2 Extracts from the first
of these books were sent by some one to Valerius, and
were placed by him in the hands of Alypius, who was
then in Italy, for transmission to Augustine. Mean-
while, a letter had been sent to Rome by Julian,3 de-
was himself much loved by him. He became a " lector" in 404, and
was ordained bishop by Innocent I. about 417. Under Zosimus' vacil-
lating policy he took strong ground on the Pelagian side, and, refus-
ing to sign Zosimus' Tractoria, was exiled with his seventeen fellow-
recusants, and passed his long life in vain endeavours to obtain recog-
nition for the Pelagian party. His writings included two letters to
Zosimus, a Confession of Faith, the two letters answered in Against
Two Letters of the Pelagians (though he seems to have repudiated
the former of these), and two large books against Augustine, the first
of which was his four books against the first book of O11 Marriage
and Conctipiscence, in reply to extracts from which the second book
of that treatise was written, whilst Augustine's Against Ju //an, in six
books, traverses the whole work. To this second book Julian replied in
a rejoinder addressed to Florus, and consisting of eight books. Au-
gustine's Unfi?iished Work is a reply to this. Julian's character was
as noble as his energy was great and his pen acute. He stands out
among his fellow-Pelagians as the sufferer for conscience' sake. A full
account of his works may be read in the Benedictine Preface to Au-
gustine's U7ifinished Work, with which may be compared the article
on him in Smith and Wace's Dictionary of Christian Biography.
1 Compare Epistle 195. 2 A fellow-recusant.
8 Julian afterwards repudiated this letter, perhaps because of some
falsifications it had suffered : it seems to have been certainly his.
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 97
signed to strengthen the cause of Pelagianism there.
A similar one also, written in the names of the eighteen
Pelagianizing Italian bishops, was addressed to Rufus,
bishop of Thessalonica and representative of the Roman
see in that portion of the Eastern Empire which was
regarded as ecclesiastically a part of the West, the pur-
pose of which was to obtain the powerful support of
this important magnate, and perhaps, also, a refuge
from persecution within his jurisdiction. These two
letters came into the hands of the new Pope, Boniface,
who gave them also to Alypius for transmission to Au-
gustine. Thus provided, Alypius returned to Africa.
The tactics of all these writings of Julian were essen-
tially the same. He attempted not so much to defend
Pelagiansim as to attack Augustinianism, and thus liter-
ally to carry the war into Africa. He insisted that the
corruption of nature which Augustine taught was noth-
ing else than Manicheism ; that the sovereignty of
grace, as taught by him, was only the attribution of
"acceptance of persons" and partiality to God ; and
that his doctrine of predestination was mere fatalism.
He accused the anti- Pelagians of denying- the goodness
of the nature that God had created, of the marriage
that He had ordained, of the law that He had given,
of the free will that He had implanted in man, as well
as the perfection of His saints.1 He insisted that this
teaching also did dishonour to baptism itself which it
professed so to honour, inasmuch as it asserted the
continuance of concupiscence after baptism and thus
taught that baptism does not take away sins, but only
shaves them off as one shaves his beard, and leaves the
roots whence the sins may grow anew and need cutting
down again. He complained bitterly of the way in
which Pelagianism had been condemned,— that bishops
had been compelled to sign a definition ot dogma, not
in council assembled, but sitting at home ; and he de-
manded a rehearing of the whole case before a lawful
council, lest the doctrine of the Manicheans should be
forced upon the acceptance of the world.
1 Compare Agaz?ist Two Letters of the Pelagians, iii. 24 ; and
see above, p. 11.
98 AUGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY.
Augustine felt a strong desire to see the whole work
of Julian against his book On Marriage and Concupiscence
before he undertook a reply to the excerpts sent him
by Valerius. But he did not feel justified in delaying
obedience to that officer's request ; therefore he wrote
at once two treatises. One of these was an answer to
these excerpts, for the benefit of Valerius ; it consti-
tutes the second book of his On Marriage and Concu-
piscence. The other was a far more elaborate examina-
tion of the letters sent by Boniface, and bears the title,
Against Two Letters of the Pelagians.
The purpose of the second book of On Marriage and
Concupiscence, Augustine himself states, in its intioduc-
tory sentences, to be " to reply to the taunts of his ad-
versaries with all the truthfulness and scriptural author-
ity he could command." He begins (2) by identifying
the source of the extracts forwarded to him by Vale-
rius with Julian's work against his first book, and then
remarks upon the garbled form in which he is quoted
in them (3-6), and passes on to state and refute Julian's
charge that the Catholics had turned Manicheans (7-9).
At this point, the refutation of Julian begins in good
earnest, and the method that Augustine proposes to
use is stated ; viz., to adduce the adverse statements,
and refute them one by one (10). Beginning at the be-
ginning, he quotes first the title of the paper sent him,
which declares that it is directed against " those who
condemn matrimony and ascribe its fruit to the Devil"
(11). This certainly, says Augustine, does not describe
him or the Catholics. The next twenty chapters
(10-30), accordingly, following Julian's order, labour
to prove that marriage is good and ordained by God ;
but that its good includes fecundity indeed, but not con-
cupiscence, which arose from sin and contracts sin. It
is next argued, that the doctrine of original sin does
not imply an evil origin for man (3 1-5 1). In the course
of this argument, the following propositions are espe-
cially defended : that God makes offspring for good
and bad alike, just as He sends the rain and sunshine
on just and unjust (31-34) ; that God makes everything
to be found in marriage except its flaw, concupiscence
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 99
(35-40) ; that marriage is not the cause of original sin,
but only the channel through which it is transmitted
(41-47) ; and that to assert that evil cannot arise from
what is good leaves us in the clutches of that very
Manicheism which is so unjustly charged against the
Catholics— for, if evil be not eternal, what else was
there from which it could arise but something good
(48-51)? In concluding, Augustine recapitulates, and
argues, especially, that shameful concupiscence is of
sin and the author of sin, and was not in paradise
(52-54) ; that children are made by God, and only
marred by the Devil (55) ; that Julian, in admitting
that Christ died for infants, admits that they need sal-
vation (56) ; that what the Devil makes in children is
not a substance, but an injury to a substance (57-58) ;
and that to suppose that concupiscence existed in any
form in paradise introduces incongruities in our con-
ception of life in that abode of primeval bliss (59-60).
The Treatise ' ' Against Two Letters of the Pelagians. ' '
The long and important treatise, Against Tzvo Letters
of the Pelagians, consists of four books. The first of
these replies to the letter sent to Rome, and the other
three to that sent to Thessalonica. After a short in-
troduction, in which he thanks Boniface for his kind-
ness and gives reasons why heretical writings should be
answered (1-3), Augustine begins at once to rebut the
calumnies which the letter before him brings against
the Catholics (4-28). These are seven in number. 1.
That the Catholics destroy free will. To this Augus-
tine replies that none are " forced into sin by the neces-
sity of their flesh" but all sin by free will, though no
man can have a righteous will save by God's grace.
It is really the Pelagians, he argues, who destroy free
will by exaggerating it (4-8). 2. That Augustine de-
clares that such mairiage as now exists is not of God
(9). 3. That sexual desire and intercourse are made a
device of the Devil, which is sheer Manicheism (10-1 1).
4. That the Old-Testament saints are said to have died
in sin (12). 5. That Paul and the other apostles are
ioo AUGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY.
asserted to have been polluted by lust all their days.
Augustine's answer to this includes a running com-
mentary on Rom. vii. 7 sq., in which (correcting his
older exegesis) he shows that Paul is giving here a
transcript of his own experience as a typical Christian
(13-24). 6. That Christ is said not to have been free
from sin (25). 7. That baptism does not give complete
remission of sins, but leaves roots from which they
may again grow. To this Augustine replies that bap-
tism does remit all sins, but leaves concupiscence,
which, although not sin, is the source of sin (26-28).
Next, the positive part of Julian's letter is taken up,
and his profession of faith against the Catholics exam-
ined (29-41). The seven affirmations that Julian makes
here are designed as the obverse of the seven charges
against the Catholics. He believed : 1. That free will
is in all by nature, and could not perish by Adam's sin
(29) ; 2. That marriage, as now existent, was ordained
by God (30) ; 3. That sexual impulse and virility are
from God (31-35) ; 4. That men are God's work, and
no one is forced to do good or evil unwillingly, but are
assisted by grace to good and incited by the Devil to
evil (36-38) ; 5. That the saints of the Old Testament
were perfected in righteousness here, and so passed
into eternal life (39) ; 6. That the grace of Christ (am-
biguously meant) is necessary for all, and all children —
even those of baptized parents — are to be baptized (40) ;
7. And that baptism gives full cleansing from all sins —
to which Augustine pointedly asks, " What does it do
for infants, then?" (41). The book concludes with an
answer to Julian's conclusion, in which he demands a
general council and charges the Catholics with Mani-
cheism.
The second, third, and fourth books deal with the let-
ter to Rufus in a somewhat similar way. The second
and third books are occupied with the calumnies brought
against the Catholics, and the fourth with the claims
made by the Pelagians. The second book begins by re-
pelling the charge of Manicheism brought against the
Catholics (1-4). The pointed remark is added, that the
Pelagians cannot hope to escape condemnation merely
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 101
because they are willing to condemn another heresy. It
then defends (with less success) the Roman clergy
against the charge of prevarication in their dealing
with the Pelagians (5-8), and in the course of this all
that can be said in defence of Zosimus's wavering pol-
icy is said well and strongly. Next the charges against
Catholic teaching are taken up and answered (9-16),
especially the two important accusations that they
maintain fate under the name of grace (9-12), and that
they make God an "accepter of persons" (13-16).
Augustine's replies to these charges are in every way
admirable. The charge of " fate" rests solely on the
Catholic denial that grace is given according to preced-
ing meiits ; but the Pelagians do not escape the same
charge when they acknowledge that the "fates" of
baptized and unbaptized infants do differ. It is, in
truth, not a question of " fate," but of gratuitous bounty ;
and " it is not the Catholics that assert fate under the
name of grace, but the Pelagians that choose to call
divine grace by the name of 'fate ' " (12). As to " ac-
ceptance of persons," we must define what we mean
by that. God certainly does not accept one's " per-
son" above another's ; He does not give to one rather
than to another because He sees something to please
Him in one rather than another : quite the opposite.
He gives of His bounty to one while giving all their
due to all, as in the parable (Matt. xx. 9 sq.). To ask
why He does this, is to ask in vain : the apostle an-
swers by not answering (Rom.-ix.) ; and before the
dumb infants, who are yet made to differ, all objection
to God is dumb. From this point, the book becomes
an examination of the Pelagian doctrine of prevenient
merit (17-23), and the conclusion is reached that God-
gives all by grace, from the beginning to the end of
every process of doing good : 1. He commands the
good ; 2. He gives the desire to do it ; and, 3. He gives
the power to do it ; and all, of His gratuitous mercy.
The third book continues the discussion of the calum-
nies of the Pelagians against the Catholics, and enumer-
ates and answers six of them : viz., that the Catholics
teach, 1, that the Old-Testament law was given, not
lo2 AUGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY.
to justify the obedient, but to serve as cause of greater
sin (2-3) ; 2, that baptism does not give entire remis-
sion of sins, but the baptized are partly God's and part-
ly the Devil's (4-5) ; 3, that the Holy Ghost did not
assist virtue in the Old Testament (6-13) ; 4, that the
Bible saints were not holy, but only less wicked than
others (14-15) ; 5, that Christ was a sinner by necessity
of His flesh (doubtless Julian's inference from the doc-
trine of race sin) (16) ; 6, that men will begin to fulfil
God's commandments only after the resurrection (17-23).
Augustine shows that at the basis of all these calumnies
lies either misapprehension or misrepresentation. In
concluding the book, he enumerates the three chief
points in the Pelagian heresy, with the five claims
growing out of them of which they most boasted ; and
then elucidates the mutual relations of the three parties,
Catholics, Pelagians, and Manicheans, with reference
to these points, showing that the Catholics stand asun-
der from both the others and condemn both (24-27).
This conclusion is really a preparation for the fourth
book, which takes up these five Pelagian claims, and,
after showing the Catholic position on them all in brief
(1-3), discusses them in turn (4-19) : viz., the praise of
the creature (4-8), the praise of marriage (9), the praise
of the law (io-n), the praise of free will (12-16), and
the praise of the saints (17-18). At the end, Augustine
calls on the Pelagians to cease to oppose the Mani-
cheans only to fall into heresy as bad as theirs (19) ;
and then in reply to their accusation that the Catholics
were proclaiming novel doctrine, he adduces the testi-
mony of Cyprian and Ambrose, both of whom had re-
ceived Pelagius' praise, on each of the three main
points of Peiagianism (20-32), ' and closes with the dec-
laration that the " impious and foolish doctrine," as
they called it, of the Catholics, is immemorial truth
(33), and with a denial of the right of the Pelagians to
ask for a general council to condemn them (34). All
1 To wit : Cyprian's testimony on original sin (20-24), on gratuitous
grace (25-26), on the imperfection of human righteousness (27-28); and
Ambrose's testimony on original sin (29), on gratuitous grace (30),
and on the imperfection of human righteousness (31).
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 103
heresies do not need an ecumenical S3rnod for their con-
demnation ; visually it is best to stamp them out locally,
and not to allow what may be confined to a corner to
disturb the whole world.
The Treatise ' ' Against Julian.
These books were written late in 420, or early in 421,
and Alypius appears to have conveyed them to Italy
during the latter year. Before its close, Augustine,
having obtained and read the whole of Julian's attack
on the first book of his work On Marriage and Concu-
piscence, wrote out a complete answer to it.1 He was
the more anxious to complete this task, on perceiv-
ing that the extracts sent b}^ Valerius were not only all
from the first book of Julian's treatise, but were some-
what altered in the extracting. The resulting work,
Against Julian, one of the longest that Augustine wrote
in the whole course of the Pelagian controversy, shows
its author at his best. According to Cardinal Noris's
judgment, he appears in it " almost divine," and Au-
gustine himself clearly set great store by it.
In the first book of this noble treatise, after profess-
ing his continued love for Julian, " whom he was un-
able not to love, whatever he [Julian] should say against
him" (35), he undertakes to show that in affixing the
opprobrious name of Manicheans on those who assert
original sin, Julian is incriminating many of the most
famous fathers, both of the Latin and Greek Churches.
In proof of this, he makes appropriate quotations from
Ireneeus, Cyprian, Recticius, Olympius, Hilary, Am-
brose, Gregory Nazianzenus, Basil, John of Constanti-
nople.2 Then he argues, that, so far from the Cath-
olics falling into Manichean heresy, Julian himself
plays into the hands of the Manicheans in their strife
against the Catholics, by many unguarded statements,
such as, e.g., when he says that an evil thing cannot
arise from what is good, that the work of the Devil
cannot be suffered to be diffused by means of a work of
1 Compare Epistle 207, written probably in the latter half of 421.
2 That is, Chrysostom.
104 AUGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY.
God, that a root of evil cannot be inserted within a gift
of God, and the like.
The second book advances to greater detail, and, in
order to test them by the voice of antiquity, adduces
the five great arguments which the Pelagians urged
against the Catholics. These arguments are stated as
follows (2). " For you say, ' That we, by asserting
original sin, affirm that the Devil is the maker of in-
fants, condemn marriage, deny that all sins are remit-
ted in baptism, accuse God of the guilt of sin, and pro-
duce despair of perfection. ' You contend that all these
follow as consequences, if we believe that infants are
born bound by the sin of the first man and are therefore
under the Devil unless they are born again in Christ.
For, ' It is the Devil that creates,' you say, ' if they
are created from that wound which the Devil inflicted
on the human nature that was made at first.' ' And
marriage is condemned,' you say, ' if it is to be believed
to have something about it whence it produces those
worthy of condemnation.' 'And all sins are not re-
mitted in baptism,' you say, ' if there remains any evil
in baptized couples whence evil offspring are produced.'
' And how is God,' you ask, ' not unjust, if He, while
remitting their own sins to baptized persons, yet con-
demns their offspring, inasmuch as, although it is cre-
ated by Him, it yet ignorantly and involuntarily con-
tracts the sins of others from those very parents to
whom they are remitted?' 'Nor can men believe,'
\ou add, ' that virtue — to which corruption is to be
understood to be contrary — can be perfected, if they
cannot believe that it can destroy the inbred vices, al-
though, no doubt, these can scarcely be considered
vices, since he does not sin who is unable to be other
than he was created.' " These arguments are then
tested, one by one, by the authority of the earlier teach-
ers who were appealed to in the first book, and shown
to be condemned by them.
The remaining four books follow Julian's four books,
argument by argument, refuting him in detail. In the
third book it is urged that although God is good and
made man good and instituted marriage, which is,
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 105
therefore, good, nevertheless concupiscence is evil and
in it the flesh lusts against the spirit. Although chaste
spouses use this evil well, continent believers do better
in not using it at all. It is pointed out, how far all this
is from the madness of the Manicheans, who dream of
matter as essentially evil and co-eternal with God ; and
it is shown that evil concupiscence sprang from Adam's
disobedience, and, being transmitted to us, can be re-
moved only by Christ. It is shown, also, that Julian
himself confesses lust to be evil, inasmuch as he speaks
of remedies against it, wishes it to be bridled and
speaks of the continent waging a glorious warfare.
The fourth book follows the second book of Julian's
work and makes two chief contentions : that unbeliev-
ers have no true virtues, and that even the heathen
recognize concupiscence as evil. It also argues that
grace is not given according to merit, and yet is not to
be confounded with fate ; and explains the text that
asserts that ' God wishes all men to be saved,' in the
sense that ' all men ' means ' all that are to be saved,'
since none are saved except by His will.1 The fifth
book, in like manner, follows Julian's third book, and
treats of such subjects as these : that it is due to sin
that any infants are lost ; that shame arose in our first
parents through sin ; that sin can well be the punish-
ment of preceding sin ; that concupiscence is always
evil, even in those who do not assent to it ; that true
marriage may exist without intercourse ; that the
" flesh" of Christ differs from the "sinful flesh" of
other men ; and the like. In the sixth book, Julian's
fourth book is followed, and original sin is proved from
the baptism of infants, the teaching of the apostles, and
the rites of exorcism and exsufflation incorporated in
the form of baptism. Then, byr the help of the illustra-
tion drawn from the olive and the oleaster, it is ex-
plained how Christian parents can produce unregener-
ate offspring ; and the originally voluntary character
of sin is asserted, even though it now comes by inher-
itance.
1 Compare Oft Rebuke and Grace, 44 ; Enchiridion, 103 ; City of
God, xxii. 1,2.
106 AUGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY.
The ' ' Enchiridion."
After the completion of this important work, there
succeeded a lull in the controversy of some years' dura-
tion ; and the calm refutation of Pelagianism and expo-
sition of Christian grace which Augustine gave in his
Enchiridion,1 might well have seemed to him his closing
word on this all-absorbing subject. This handbook On
Faith, Hope, and Charity was written at the instance of
one Laurentius, who is not otherwise known, and cer-
tainly later than the opening of a.d. 421. In it Augus-
tine treats briefly but pretty carefully, as he himself says,
" the manner in which God is to be worshipped, which
knowledge divine Scripture defines to be the true wis-
dom of man." a One of the questions which Laurentius
had asked was not only " what ought to be man's chief
end in life," but also " what he ought, in view of the
various heresies, chiefly to avoid" (4). Accordingly,
in the first part of the treatise— that consecrated to the
treatment of faith, in which he unfolds the proper ob-
jects of faith, that is, what we are to believe — Augus-
tine briefly refutes the tenets of the leading heresies,
inclusive of Pelagianism. This is not done formally ; he
notes rather the impossibility of giving a real defence
of Christianity against these assaults in a practical hand-
book (6) : but that is said which he deemed important
in order to keep the heart rightly Christian in the midst
of the evil thoughts of men.
On creating man, he explains, God placed him in
that protected nook of life which we call Eden (25).
When man lost God's favour by sin, all his descend-
ants, being the offspring of carnal lust, were tainted
with an original sin (26), and thus the whole mass of the
human race came under condemnation and lay steeped
and wallowing in misery (27). Whence it is a matter
of course that they cannot be restored by the merit of
any good works of their own (30) ; for by an evil use
of free will man has destroyed both himself and it, and
1 See vol. iii. of Tlic Post-Nicene Library, pp. 237 sq.
2 Retractations, lib. ii. c. 63.
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 107
a dead man cannot restore himself to life (30). Man
cannot, therefore, arrogate to himself even the merit
of his own faith, " and we shall be made truly free only
when God fashions us — that is, forms and creates
us anew, not as men — for He has done that already —
but as good men" (31). The whole work belongs to
God, " who both makes the will of men righteous and
thus prepares it for assistance, and assists it when pre-
pared" (32). As the whole human race lies under just
condemnation, there is need of a Mediator (33), who,
being made sin for us, reconciles us to God (41) ; and
this is s)~mbolized in the great sacrament of baptism
(42), which is given to adults and infants alike (43 and
52). " The whole human race was originally and, as
we may say, radically condemned" on account of the
one sin of Adam, and this sin ' ' cannot be pardoned or
blotted out except through the one Mediator between
God and man, the man Christ Jesus, who alone has
had power to be so born as not to need a second birth"
(48). Who are to be interested in this salvation it is
the prerogative of God to determine, who " changes
the evil will of men whichever, whenever, and where-
soever He chooses" (98), not, therefore, according to
any works of their own foreseen by Him, but accord-
ing to His own good pleasure. " The whole human
race was condemned in its rebellious head by a divine
judgment so just that, if not a single member of the race
had been redeemed, no one could justly have ques-
tioned the justice of God ; and it was right that those
who are redeemed should be redeemed in such a way
as to show, by the greater number who are unre-
deemed and left in their just condemnation, what the
whole race deserved, and whither the deserved judg-
ment of God would lead even the redeemed, did not
His undeserved mercy interpose, so that every mouth
might be stopped of those who wish to glory in their
own merits, and that he that glorieth might glory in
the Lord" (99). Thus Augustine taught on the great
subjects of sin and grace when his mind was measura-
blv withdrawn from controversy and intent on the cre-
ation of right frames in the hearts of men.
108 AUGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY.
The Treatise ' ' On Grace and Free Will.
Augustine had not yet, however, given the world all
he had in treasure for it. And we can rejoice in the
chance that five or six years afterward drew from him
a renewed discussion of some of the more important
aspects of the doctrine of grace. The circumstances
which brought this about are sufficiently interesting in
themselves, and open to us an unwonted view into
the monastic life of the times. There was an important
monastery at Adrumetum, the metropolitan city of the
province of Byzacium.1 From this a monk named
Florus went out on a journey of charity to his native
country of Uzalis about 426. On the journey he met with
Augustine's letter to Sixtus,2 in which the doctrines of
gratuitous and prevenient grace were expounded. He
was much delighted with it, and, procuring a copy,
sent it back to his monastery for the edification of his
brethren, while he himself went on to Carthage. At
the monaster)^, the letter created great disturbance.
Without the knowledge of the abbot, Valentinus, it
was read aloud to the monks, many of whom were un-
skilled in theological questions. Some five or more of
them were greatly offended, and declared that free will
was destroyed by it. A secret strife arose among the
brethren, some taking extreme grounds on both sides.
Of all this, Valentinus remained ignorant until the re-
turn of Florus, who was attacked as the author of all
the trouble, and who felt it his duty to inform the
abbot of the state of affairs. Valentinus applied first to
the bishop, Evodius, for such instruction as would
make Augustine's letter clear to the most simple.
Evodius replied, praising their zeal and deprecating
their contentiousness, and explaining that Adam had
full free will, but that it is now wounded and weak,
and Christ's mission was as a physician to cure and re-
cuperate it. " Let them read," is his prescription,
" the words of God's elders. . . . And when they do
not understand, let them not quickly reprehend, but
1 Now a portion of Tunis. 2 Epistle 194.
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 109
pray to understand." This did not, however, cure the
malcontents ; and the holy presbyter Sabrinus was ap-
pealed to, and sent a book with clear interpretations.
But neither was this satisfactory ; and Valentinus, at
last, reluctantly consented that Augustine himself
should be consulted — fearing, he says, lest by making
inquiries he should seem to waver about the truth.
Two members of the community were consequently
permitted to journey to Hippo, though they took with
them no introduction and no commendation from their
abbot. Augustine, nevertheless, received them with-
out hesitation, as they bore themselves with too great
simplicity to allow him to suspect them of deception.
Now we get a glimpse of life in the great bishop's mo-
nastic home. The monks told their story, and were
listened to with courtesy and instructed with patience.
As they were anxious to return home before Easter,
they received a letter for Valentinus ' in which Augus-
tine briefly explains the nature of the misapprehension
that had arisen, and points out that both grace and free
will must be defended, and neither so exaggerated as
to deny the other. The letter to Sixtus, he explains,
was written against the Pelagians, who assert that
grace is given according to merit, and briefly expounds
the true doctrine of grace as necessarily gratuitous and
therefore prevenient. When the monks were on the
point of starting home they were joined by a third
companion from Adrumetum, and were led to prolong
their visit. This gave Augustine the opportunity he
craved for their fuller instruction. He read with
them and explained to them not only his letter to Six-
tus, from which the strife had risen, but also much of
the chief literature of the Pelagian controversy,2
copies of which also were made for them to take home
with them. And when they were ready to go, he sent
by them another and longer letter to Valentinus, and
placed in their hands a treatise composed for their es-
pecial use, which, moreover, he took the trouble to ex-
plain to them. This longer letter is essentially an ex-
1 Epistle 214. • Epistle 215, 2 sq.
no AUGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY.
hortation ' ' to turn aside neither to the right hand nor
to the left," — neither to the left hand of the Pelagian
error of upholding free will in such a manner as to
deny grace, nor to the right hand of the equal error of
so upholding grace as if we might yield ourselves to
evil with impunity. Both grace and free will are to be
proclaimed ; and it is true both that grace is not given
to merits, and that we are to be judged at the last day
according to our works. While the treatise which
Augustine composed for a fuller exposition of these
doctrines is the important work On Grace and Free Will.
After a brief introduction, explaining the occasion of
his writing, and exhorting the monks to humility and
teachableness before God's revelations (i), Augustine
begins this treatise by asserting and proving the two
propositions that the Scriptures clearly teach that man
has free will (2-5), and, as clearly, the necessity of
grace for his doing any good (6-9). He next examines
the passages which the Pelagians assert to teach that
we must first turn to God, before He visits us with His
grace (10-11). And then he undertakes to show that
grace is not given to merit (12 sq.), appealing especially
to Paul's teaching and example, and replying to the
assertion that forgiveness is the only grace that is not
given according to our merits (15-18), and to the query,
" How can eternal life be both of grace and of re-
ward ?" (19-21). The nature of grace, what it is, is
next explained (22 sq.). It is not the law, which gives
only knowledge of sin (22-24) ; nor nature, which
would render Christ's death needless (25) ; nor mere
forgiveness of sins, as the Lord's Prayer (which should
be read with Cyprian's comments on it) is enough to
show (26). Nor will it do to say that it is given to the
merit of a good will, thus distinguishing the good work
which is of grace from the good will which precedes
grace (27-30) ; for the Scriptures oppose this, and our
prayers for others prove that we expect God to be the
first mover, as indeed both Scripture and experience
prove that He is. It is next shown that both free will
and grace are concerned in the heart's conversion
(31-32), and that love is the spring of all good in man
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. Ill
(33-40), which, however, we have only because God
first loved us (38), and which is certainly greater
than knowledge, although the Pelagians admit only
the latter to be from God (40). God's sovereign gov-
ernment of men's wills is then proved from Scripture
(41-43), and the wholly gratuitous character of grace is
illustrated (44), while the only possible theodicy is
found in the certainty that the Lord of all the earth
will do right. For, though no one knows why He
takes one and leaves another, we all know that He
hardens judicially and saves graciously,— that He
hardens none who do not deserve hardening, but none
that He saves deserve to be saved (45). The treatise
closes with an exhortation to its prayerful and repeated
study (46).
The Treatise " On Rebuke and Grace.'''
The one request that Augustine made, on sending
the treatise On Grace and Free- Will to Valentinus, was
that the monk Floras, through whom the controversy
had arisen, should be sent to him. He wished to con-
verse with him and learn whether he had been mis-
understood, or had himself misunderstood Augustine.
In due time Floras arrived at Hippo, bringing a letter1
from Valentinus which thanked Augustine for his
"sweet" and "healing" instruction, and introduced
Floras as one whose true faith could be confided in.
It is very clear, both from Valentinus' letter and from
the hints that Augustine gives, that his loving dealing
with the monks had borne admirable fruit : " none
were cast down for the worse, some were built up for
the better."" But it was reported to him that some
one at the monastery had objected, to the doctrine he
had taught them, that " no man, then, ought to be re-
buked for not keeping God's commandments ; but only
God should be besought that he might keep them."3
In other words, it was said that if all good was, in the
last resort, from God's grace, man ought not to be
1 Epistle 216. i On Rebuke and Grace, 1.
3 Retractations, ii. 67. Compare On Rebuke and Grace, 5 sq.
112 AUGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY.
blamed for not doing what he could not do, but God
ought to be besought to do for man what He alone
could do : we ought, in short, to apply to the source
of power. This occasioned the composition of yet
another treatise, that entitled On Rebuke and Graced
the object of which was to explain the relations of
grace to human conduct, and especially to make it
plain that the sovereignty of God's grace does not
supersede our duty to ourselves or to our fellow-men.
The treatise begins by thanking Valentinus for his
letter and for sending Florus (whom Augustine finds
well instructed in the truth), praising God for the
good effect of the previous book, and recommending
its continued study. This is followed by a brief ex-
position of the catholic faith concerning grace, free-
will and the law (1-2). The general proposition that
is defended is that the gratuitous sovereignty of God's
grace does not supersede human means for obtaining
and continuing it (3 sq.). This is shown by the apos-
tle's example, who used all human means for the prose-
cution of his work and yet confessed that it was " God
that gave the increase" (3). Objections are then an-
swered (4 sq.), — especially the great one that " it is
not my fault if I do not do what I have not received
grace for doing" (6). To this Augustine replies (7-10)
that we deserve rebuke for our very unwillingness to
be rebuked, that on the same reasoning the prescrip-
tion of the law and the preaching of the gospel would
be useless, that the apostle's example opposes such a
position, and that our consciousness witnesses that we
deserve rebuke for not persevering in the right way.
From this point an important discussion arises, in this in-
terest, of the gift of perseverance (n-19) and of God's
election (20-24). It is taught that no one is saved who
does not persevere, and that all who are predestinated
or " called according to God's purpose" (Augustine's
phrase for what we should name " effectually called")
1 On the importance of this treatise for Augustine's doctrine of pre-
destination, see Wiggers' Augustinianism and Pelagianism, E. T.
p. 236, where a sketch of the history of this doctrine in Augustine's
writings may be found.
AUGUSTINE' S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 113
will persevere, and yet that we co-operate by our
will in all good deeds and deserve rebuke if we do
not. Whether Adam received the gift of perseverance,
and, in general, what the difference is between the
grace given to him (which was that grace by which he
was able to stand) and that now given to God's chil-
dren (which is that grace by which we are made act-
ually to stand), are next discussed (26-38), with the
result of showing the superior greatness of the gifts of
grace now to those given before the fall. The neces-
sity of God's mercy at all times and our constant de-
pendence on it, are next vigorously asserted (39-42) :
even in the day of judgment, it is declared, if we are
not judged " with mercy" we cannot be saved (41).
The treatise is brought to an end by a concluding ap-
plication of the whole discussion to the special matter
in hand, rebuke (43-49). Seeing that rebuke is one of
God's means of working out his gracious purposes, it
cannot be inconsistent with the sovereignty of that
grace ; for, of course, God predestinates the means
with the end (43). Nor can we know, in our igno-
rance, whether our rebuke is, in any particular case, to
be the means of amendment or the ground of greater
condemnation. How dare we, then, withhold it?
Let it be, however, graduated to the fault, and let us
always remember its purpose (46-48). Above all, let
us not venture to hold it back, lest we withhold from
our brother the means of his recovery, and, as well,
disobey the command of God (49).
The Letter to Vitalis.
It was not long afterwards (about 427) that Augus-
tine was called upon to attempt to reclaim an erring
Carthaginian friend, Vitalis by name, who had been
brought to trial on the charge of teaching that the be-
ginning of faith was not the gift of God but the act of
man's own free will {ex propria voluntatis). This was
essentially the semi- Pelagian position which was subse-
quently to make so large a figure in history ; and
Augustine treats it now as necessarily implying the
basal idea of Pelagianism.
H4 AUGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY.
In the important letter which he sent to Vitalis,1
Augustine first argues that his position is inconsistent
with the prayers of the church. He, Augustine, pra}'S
that Vitalis may come to the true faith ; but does not
this prayer ascribe the origination of right faith to
God? The Church so prays for all men. The priest
at the altar exhorts the people to pray God for unbe-
lievers, that He may convert them to the faith ; for
catechumens, that He may breathe into them a desire
for regeneration ; for the faithful, that by His aid they
may persevere in what, thev have begun. Will Vitalis
refuse to obey these exhortations, because, forsooth,
faith is of free will and not of God's gift ? Nay, will a
Carthaginian scholar array himself against Cyprian's
exposition of the Lord's prayer? For certainly
Cyprian teaches that we are to ask of God what Vitalis
says is to be had of ourselves. We may go farther.
It is not Cyprian but Paul who says, " Let us pray
to God that we do no evil " (2 Cor. xiii. 7) ; it is the
Psalmist who says, " The steps of man are directed by
God" (Ps. xxxvi. 23). " If we wish to defend free
will," Augustine urges, " let us not strive against that
by which it is made free. For he who strives against
grace, by which the will is made free for refusing evil
and doing good, wishes his will to remain captive.
Tell us, I beg you, how the apostle can say, ' We give
thanks to the Father who made us fit to have our lot
with the saints in light, who delivered us from the
power of darkness and translated us into the kingdom
of the Son of His love ' (Col. i. 12, 13), if not He, but
itself, frees our choice ? It is, then, a false rendering
of thanks to God, as if He does what He does not do ;
and he has erred who has said that ' He makes us fit,
etc' ' The grace of God,' therefore, does not consist
in the nature of free will, and in law and teaching,
as the Pelagian perversity dreams ; but it is given for
each single act by His will, concerning whom it is
written,"— quoting Ps. Ixvii. 10.
About the middle of the letter, Augustine lays down
1 Epistle 217.
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 115
twelve propositions against the Pelagians, which are
important as communicating to us what, at the end of
the controversy, he considered the chief points in dis-
pute. " Since, therefore," he writes, " we are catholic
Christians : 1. We know that new-born children have
not yet done anything in their own lives, good or evil,
neither have they come into the miseries of this life
according to the deserts of some previous life, which
none of them can have had in their own persons ; and
yet, because they are born carnally after Adam, they
contract the contagion of ancient death by the first
birth, and are not freed from the punishment of eternal
death (which is contracted by a just condemnation,
passing over from one to all), except they are by grace
born again in Christ. 2. We know that the grace of
God is given neither to children nor to adults accord-
ing to our deserts. 3. We know that it is given to
adults for each several act. 4. We know that it is not
given to all men ; and to those to whom it is given, it
is not only not given according to the merits of works,
but it is not even given to them according to the merits
of their will ; and this is especially apparent in chil-
dren. 5. We know that to those to whom it is given,
it is given by the gratuitous mercy of God. 6. We
know that to those to whom it is not given, it is not
given by the just judgment of God. 7. We know that
we shall all stand before the tribunal of Christ, and
each shall receive according to what he has done
through the body, — not according to what he would
have done, had he lived longer,— whether good or
evil. 8. We know that even children are to receive
according to what they have done through the body,
whether good or evil. But according to what 'they
have done ' not by their own act, but by the act of
those by whose responses for them they are said both
to renounce the Devil and to believe in God, wherefore
they are counted among the number of the faithful and
have part in the statement of the Lord when He says,
' Whosoever shall believe and be baptized, shall be
saved.' Therefore also, to those who do not receive
this sacrament, belongs what follows, ' But whosoever
n6 AUGUSTIXE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY.
shall not have believed, shall be damned ' (Mark xvi.
16). Whence these too, as I have said, if they die in
that early age, are judged, of course, according to
what they have done through the body, i.e., in the
time in which they were in the body, when they believe
or do not believe by the heart and mouth of their
sponsors, when they are baptized or not baptized,
when they eat or do not eat the flesh ol Christ, when
they drink or do not drink His blood, — according to
those things, then, which they have done through the
bod)-, not according to those which, had they lived
longer, they would have done. 9. We know that
blessed are the dead that die in the Lord ; and that
what the}- would have done had they lived longer is
not imputed to them. 10. We know that those that
believe, with their own heart, in the Lord, do so by
their own free will and choice. 11. We know that we
who already believe act with right faith towards those
who do not wish to believe, when we pray to God
that they may wish it. 12. We know that for those
who have believed out of this number, we both ought
and are rightly and truly accustomed to return thanks
to God, as for his benefits."
Certainly such a body of propositions commends
their author to us as Christian both in head and heart :
they are admirable in every respect ; and even in the
matter of the salvation of infants, where he had not
yet seen the light of truth, he expresses himself in a
way as engaging in its hearty faith in God's goodness
as it is honorable in its loyalty to what he believed to
be truth and justice. Here his doctrine of the Church
ran athwart and clouded his view of the reach of
grace ; but we seem to see between the lines the prom-
ise of the brighter dawn of truth that was yet to come.
The rest of the epistle is occupied with an exposition
of these propositions, which ranks with the richest pass-
ages of the anti-Pelagian writings, and which breathes
everywhere a yearning for his correspondent which,
we cannot help hoping, proved salutary to his faith.
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 117
The Treatise " On Heresies."
It is not without significance, that the error of
Vitalis took a semi-Pelagian form. Pure Pelagianism
was by this time no longer a living issue. Augustine
was himself, no doubt, not yet done with it. The sec-
ond book of his treatise On Marriage and Concupiscence,
which seems to have been taken to Italy by Alypius
in 421, received at once the attention of Julian and
was elaborately answered by him during that same
year, in eight books addressed to one of his fellow-
recusants named Florus. But Julian was now in
Cilicia, and his book was slow in working its way
westward. It was found at Rome by Alypius, appar-
ently in 427 or 428, and he at once set about transcrib-
ing it for his friend's use. An opportunity arising to
send it to Africa before it was finished, he forwarded
to Augustine the five books that were ready, with an
urgent request that they should receive his immediate
attention, and a promise to send the other three as
soon as possible. Augustine gives an account of the
progress of his reply to them in a letter written to
Ouodvultdeus, apparently in 428. ' This deacon was
urging Augustine to give the Church a succinct ac-
count of all heresies ; and Augustine excuses himself
from immediately undertaking that task by the press of
work on his hands. He was writing his Retractations,
and had already finished two books of them, in which
he had dealt with two hundred and thirty-two of his
works. His letters and homilies remained to be ex-
amined, and he had given the necessary reading to
many of the letters. He was engaged also, he tells his
correspondent, on a reply to the eight books of Julian's
new work. Working night and day, he had already
completed his response to the first three of Julian's
books and had begun on the fourth while still expect-
ing the arrival of the last three, which Alypius had
promised to send. If he had completed the answer to
the five books of Julian which he already had in hand
xEpistle 224.
Ii8 AUGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY.
before the other three reached him, he might begin
the work which Quodvultdeus so earnestly desired
him to undertake. In due time, whatever may have
been the trials and labors that needed first to be met,
the desired treatise On Heresies was written (about 428),
and the eighty-eighth chapter of it gives us a welcome
compressed account of the Pelagian heresy, which may
be accepted as the obverse of the account of catholic
truth given in the letter to Vitalis.
" To the grace of God, by which we have been pre-
destinated unto the adoption of sons by Jesus Christ
unto himself (Eph. i. 5), and by which we are delivered
from the power of darkness so as to believe in Him
and be translated into His kingdom (Col. i. 13) (where-
fore He says, ' No man comes to Me, except it be
given him of My Father ' [John vi. 66]), and by which
love is shed abroad in our hearts (Rom. v. 5), so that
faith may work by love," the Pelagians, he tells us,
" are to such an extent inimical that they believe that
man is able, without it, to keep all the Divine com-
mandments— whereas, if this were true, it would
clearly be an empty thing for the Lord to say, ' With-
out Me ye can do nothing' (John xv. 5)." " When
Pelagius," he adds, " was at length accused by the
brethren, because he attributed nothing to the assist-
ance of God's grace towards the keeping of His com-
mandments, he yielded to their rebuke so far as, not
indeed to place this grace above free will, but at least
to use faithless cunning in subordinating it, saying that
it was given to men for this purpose, viz., that they
might be able more easily to fulfil by grace what they
were commanded to do by free will. By saying,
' that they might be able more easily,' he, of course,
wished it to be believed that, although with more diffi-
culty, nevertheless men were able without Divine
grace to perform the Divine commands. But they say
that the grace of God, without which we can do noth-
ing good, does not exist except in free will, which
without any preceding merits our nature received
from Him ; and that He adds His aid only that by
His law and teaching we may learn what we ought to
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 119
do, but not that by the gift of His Spirit we may do
what we have learned ought to be done. Accord-
ingly, they allow that knowledge, by which ignorance
is banished, is divinely given to us, but deny that love,
by which we may live a pious life, is given ; so that,
forsooth, while knowledge, which without love puff-
eth up, is the gift of God, love itself, which edifieth so
that knowledge may not puff up, is not the gift of God
(1 Cor. viii. 11). They also destroy the prayers which
the Church offers, whether for those that are unbeliev-
ing and resist God's teaching, that they may be con-
verted to God ; or for the faithful, that faith may be
increased in them and they may persevere in it. For
they contend that men do not receive these things
from Him but we have them from ourselves, saying
that the grace of God by which we are freed from im-
piety is given according to our merits. Pelagius was,
no doubt, compelled to condemn this by his fear of
being condemned by the episcopal judgment in Pales-
tine ; but he is found to teach it still in his later writ-
ings. They also go so far as to say that the life of the
righteous in this world is without sin, and the Church
of Christ is perfected by them in this mortality to the
point of being entirely without spot or wrinkle (Eph.
v. 27) ; as if it were not the Church of Christ, that, in
the whole world, cries to God, ' Forgive us our debts.'
They also deny that children, who are carnally born
after Adam, contract the contagion of ancient death
from their first birth. For they assert that they are
so born without any bond of original sin, that there is
absolutely nothing that ought to be remitted to them
in the second birth ; yet the}r are to be baptized, but
only that, adopted in regeneration, they may be ad-
mitted to the kingdom of God, and thus be translated
from good into better, — not that they may be washed
by that renovation from any evil of the old bond. For
although they be not baptized, they promise to them,
outside the kingdom of God indeed, but nevertheless,
a certain eternal and blessed life of their own. They
also say that Adam himself, even had he not sinned,
would have died in the body, and that this death would
120 AUGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY.
not have come as a penalty to a fault, but as a condi-
tion of nature. Certain other things also are objected
to them, but these are the chief, and moreover either
all, or nearly all, the others may be understood to de-
pend on these."
The Treatise ' ' On the Predestination of the Saints.
The composition of the work On Heresies was not,
however, the only interruption which postponed the
completion of the second elaborate work against
Julian. It was in the providence of God that the
later energies of this great leader in the battle for
grace should be expended in dealing with the subtler
forms of error, as exhibited in semi- Pelagianism. We
have seen his attention being already called to modi-
fications of Pelagianism of this sort. And now infor-
mation as to the rise of this new form of the heresy at
Marseilles and elsewhere in Southern Gaul was con-
veyed to him along with entreaties that, as " faith's
great patron," he would give his aid towards meeting
it, by two laymen with whom he had already had cor-
respondence,— Prosper and Hilary.1
They pointed out2 the difference between the new
party and thoroughgoing Pelagianism ; but, at the
same time, the essentially Pelagianizing character of
its formative elements. Its representatives were ready,
as a rule, to admit that all men were lost in Adam, and
that no one could recover himself by his own free will
but all needed God's grace for salvation. But they ob-
jected to the doctrines of prevenient and of irresistible
grace ; and they asserted that man could initiate the
process of salvation by turning first to God, and that
all men could resist God's grace and no grace could
be given which they could not reject ; and especially
they denied that the gifts of grace came irrespective
of merits, actual or foreseen. They affirmed that what
Augustine taught as to the calling of God's elect ac-
' Compare Epistles 225, 1, and 156. It is, of course, not certain
that this is the same Hilary that wrote to Augustine from Sicily, but
it seems probable.
2 Letters 225, and 226.
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 121
cording- to His own purpose was tantamount to fatal-
ism, was contrary to the teaching of the fathers and
the true Church doctrine, and, even if true, should
not be preached, because of its tendency to drive men
into indifference or despair. Hence, Prosper espe-
cially desired Augustine to point out the dangerous
nature of these views, and to show that prevenient and
co-operating grace is not inconsistent with free will,
that God's predestination is not founded on foresight
of receptivity in its objects, and that the doctrines of
grace may be preached without danger to souls.
Augustine's answer to these appeals was a work in
two books, On the Predestination of the Saints, the sec-
ond book of which is usually known under the separate
title of The Gift of Perseverance.
The former book begins with a careful discrimina-
tion of the position of his new opponents. They have
made a right beginning in that they believe in original
sin and acknowledge that none are saved from it save
by Christ, and that God's grace leads men's wills, and
without grace no one can suffice for good deeds.
These things will furnish a good starting-point for
their progress to an acceptance of predestination also
(1-2). The first question that needs discussion in such
circumstances is, whether God gives the very begin-
nings of faith (3 sq.). Thej' admit that what Augus-
tine had previously urged suffices to prove that faith
is the gift of God so far as that the increase of faith is
given by Him ; but they deny that it will prove that
the beginning of faith may not be understood to be
man's, to which, then, God adds all other gifts (com-
pare 43). Augustine insists that this contention is no
other than a repetition of the Pelagian assertion of
grace according to merit (3), that it is opposed to
Scripture (4-5), and that it begets arrogant boasting in
ourselves (6). He replies to the charge that he had
himself once held this view, by confessing it, and ex-
plaining that he was converted from it by 1 Cor. iv. 7,
as applied by Cyprian (7-8) ; and he then expounds
that verse as containing in its narrow compass a suffi-
cient answer to the present theories (9—1 1). He an-
122 AUGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY.
swers, further, the objection that the apostle distin-
guishes faith from works, and works alone are meant
in such passages, by pointing to John vi. 28, and sim-
ilar statements in Paul (12-16). Then he answers the
objection that he himself had previously taught that
God acted on foresight of faith, by showing that he
was misunderstood (17-18). He next shows that, no
objection lies against predestination that does not lie
with equal force against grace (19-22), — since predes-
tination is nothing but God's foreknowledge of and
preparation for grace, and all questions of sovereignty
and the like belong to grace. Did God not know to
whom He was going to give faith (19)? Or did He
promise the results of faith, works, without promising
the faith without which, as going before, the works
were impossible? Would not this place God's fulfil-
ment of His promise out of His power, and make it
depend on man (20)? Why are men more willing to
trust in their weakness than in God's strength ? Do
they count God's promises more uncertain than their
own performance (22)? He next proves the sover-
eignty of grace, and of predestination which is but the
preparation for grace, by the striking examples of in-
fants, and, above all, ol the human nature of Christ
(23-31), and then speaks of the twofold calling, one ex-
ternal and one " according to purpose," — the latter of
which is efficacious and sovereign (32-37). In closing,
the semi-Pelagian position is carefully defined and re-
futed as opposed, alike with the grosser Pelagianism,
to the Scriptures of both Testaments (38-42).
The Treatise ' ' On the Gift of Perseverance.
The purpose of the second book, which has come
down to us under the separate title of On the Gift of
Perseverance, is to show that that perseverance which
endures to the end is as much of God as the beginning
of faith, and that no man who has been " called accord-
ing to God's purpose" and has received this gift, can
fall from grace and be lost.
The first half of the treatise is devoted to this theme
(1-33). It begins by distinguishing between temporary
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 123
perseverance which endures for a time, and that per-
severance which continues to the end (1), and by affirm-
ing that the latter is certainly a gift of God's grace,
and is, therefore, asked from God : which would other-
wise be but a mocking petition (2-3). This, the Lord's
Prayer itself might teach us, as under Cyprian's ex-
position it does teach us, — each petition being capable
of being read as a prayer for perseverance (4-9). Of
course, moreover, it cannot be lost ; otherwise it
would not be " to the end." If man forsakes God, of
course it is he that does it ; and he is doubtless under
continual temptation to do so. But if man abides with
God, it is God who secures that, and God is equally
able to keep one when drawn to Him, as He is to draw
him to Him (10-15). He argues anew at this point,
that grace is not according to merit but always in
mercy ; and explains and illustrates the unsearchable
ways of God in His sovereign but merciful dealing
with men (16-25). He closes this part of the treatise
with a defence of himself against adverse quotations
from his early work on Free Will, which he has already
corrected in his Retractations.
The second half of the book discusses the objections
that were being urged against the preaching of pre-
destination (34-62), as if it opposed and enervated the
preaching of the Gospel. He replies that Paul and
the apostles, and Cyprian and the fathers, preached
both together ; that the same objections will lie against
the preaching of God's foreknowledge and grace itself,
and, indeed, against preaching any of the virtues, as,
e.g., obedience, while declaring them God's gifts. He
meets the objections in detail, and shows that such
preaching is food to the soul and must not be withheld
from men ; but he explains that it must be given
gently, wisely, and prayerfully. The whole treatise
ends with an appeal to the prayers of the Church as
testifying that all good is from God (63-65), and to the
great example of unmerited grace and sovereign pre-
destination in the choice of one human nature without
preceding merit, to be united in one person with the
Eternal Word, — an illustration of his theme of the
124 AUGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY.
gratuitous grace of God which he is never tired of ad-
ducing (66-67).
The " Unfinished Work" against Julian.
These books were written in 428-429, and after their
completion the unfinished work against Julian was re-
sumed. Alypius had sent the remaining three books,
and Augustine slowly toiled on to the end of his reply
to the sixth book. But he was to be interrupted once
more, and this time by the most serious of all inter-
ruptions. On the 28th of August, 430, while the Van-
dals were thundering at the gates of Hippo, he turned
his face away from the strifes of earth — whether theo-
logical or secular— and full of faith and of good works
entered into rest with the Lord whom he loved. The
last work against Julian was already one of the most
considerable in size of all his books, but it was never
finished and retains until to-day the significant title of
The Unfinished Work. Augustine had hesitated to un-
dertake this treatise, because he found Julian's argu-
ments too vapid either to deserve refutation or to
afford occasion for really edifying discourse. Cer-
tainly the result falls below Augustine's usual level ;
and this can scarcely be due, as is so often said, to fail-
ing powers and great age, since nothing that he wrote
surpasses in mellow beauty and chastened strength the
two books On the Predestination of the Saints, which
were written after four books of this work were com-
pleted.
The plan of the work is to state Julian's arguments
in his own words, and to follow these with remarks.
It thus takes on something of the form of a dialogue.
It follows Julian's work, book by book. The first
book states and answers certain calumnies which Julian
had brought against Augustine and the catholic faith
on the ground of their confession of original sin.
Julian had argued that, since God is just, He cannot
impute another's sins to innocent infants ; since sin is
nothing but evil will, there can be no sin in infants
who are not yet in the use of their will ; and, since
the freedom of will that is given to man consists in the
AUGUSTINE'S PART IN THE CONTROVERSY. 125
capacity of both sinning and not sinning, free will is
denied to those who attribute sin to nature. Augus-
tine replies to these arguments, and answers certain
objections that are made to his work On Marriage and
Concupiscence, and then corrects Julian's false explana-
tions of certain Scriptures from John viii., Rom. vi.,
vii., and 2 Timothy. The second book is a discussion
of Rom. v. 12, which Julian had tried, like the other
Pelagians, to explain of the " imitation" of Adam's
bad example. The third book examines the abuse by
Julian of certain Old-Testament passages — in Deut.
xxiv., 2 Kings xiv., Ezek. xviii. — in his effort to show
that God does not impute the father's sins to the chil-
dren ; as well as his similar abuse of Heb. xi. The
charge of Manicheism, which was so repetitiously
brought by Julian against the catholics, is then exam-
ined and refuted. The fourth book treats of Julian's
strictures on Augustine's treatise On Marriage and Con-
cupiscence ii. 4-1 1, and proves from 1 John ii. 16 that
concupiscence is evil, and not the work of God but of
the Devil. Augustine argues that the shame that ac-
companies it is due to its sinfulness, and that there was
none of it in Christ ; also, that infants are born obnox-
ious to the first sin, and that the corruption of their
origin is proved by VVisd. x. 10, 11. The fifth book
defends On Marriage and Concupiscence ii. 12 sq., and
argues that a sound nature could not feel shame on
account of its members, and that regeneration is needed
for what is generated by means of shameful concu-
piscence. Then Julian's abuse of 1 Cor. xv., Rom. v.,
Matt. vii. 17 and 33, with reference to On Marriage
and Concupiscence ii. 14, 20, 26, is discussed ; and then
the origin of evil and God's treatment of evil in the
world are examined. The sixth book traverses Julian's
strictures on On Marriage and Concupiscence ii. 34 sq.,
and argues that human nature was changed for the
worse by the sin of Adam, and thus was made not only
sinful but the source of sinners ; and that the forces
of free will by which man could at first do lightly if he
wished and refrain from sin if he chose, were lost by
Adam's sin. An attack is made upon Julian's definition
126 AUGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY.
of free will as " the capacity lor sinning or not sin-
ning" {possibilitas pcccandi et non pcccandi') ; and it is
shown that the evils of this life are the punishment of
sin, — including, first of all, physical death. At the end,
i Cor. xv. 22 is treated.
Although the great preacher oi grace was taken
away by death before the completion of this book, yet
his work was not left incomplete. In the course of
the next year (431) the (Ecumenical Council of Ephesus
condemned Pelagianism for the whole Christian world ;
and an elaborate treatise against the pure Pelagianism
of Julian was in 430 already an anachronism. Semi-
Pelagianism was yet to run its course, and to work its
way to a permanent position in the heart of a corrupt
church ; but pure Pelagianism was to abate with the
first generation of its advocates. As a leaven it will,
of course, persist as long as an evil heart of unbelief
persists among men : but under the leadership of
Augustine the Church for all time found its bearings
with reference to it, and henceforth it must needs as-
sume subtler forms to menace the dominion of the doc-
trines of grace. As we look back now through the
almost millennium and a half of years that have inter-
vened since Augustine lived and wrote, it is to his
Predestination of the Saints, — a completed, and well-
completed, treatise, dealing with one of these subtle
forms of the great error for the confutation of which
he had expended so much of time and strength, — and
not to The Unfinished Work, which was still engaged
with its gross form, that we look as the crown and
completion of his labors in behalf of the grace of God.
THE THEOLOGY OF GRACE. 1 27
The Theology of Grace.
The theology which Augustine opposed to the errors
of Pelagianism is, briefly, the theology of grace. The
roots of this theology were deeply planted in his own
experience and the teaching of Scripture, especially in
the teaching of that apostle whom he delights to call
' ' the great preacher of grace," and to follow hard after
whom was his great desire. The grace of God in Jesus
Christ, conveyed to us by the Holy Spirit and evi-
denced by the love which He sheds abroad in our
hearts, is the centre about which his whole system
revolves.1 As over against the Pelagian exaltation of
nature, he was never weary of glorifying grace. And
this high conception the more naturally became the
centre of his soteriology because of its harmony with
the primal principle of his whole thinking, which was
theocentric and grew out of his idea of God as the im-
manent and vitalizing spirit in whom all things live,
and move, and have their being.3 That God is the ab-
1 For the relation of Augustine's doctrine of the Church to his doc-
trine of grace, and the primacy of the latter in his thought, see the
first two essays in Reuter's Augustinische Studien : "'In his later
years it was not the idea of the Church as the institute of grace, but
that of predestinational grace that was the dominating one" ; "the
doctrine of predestinational grace is the fundamental datum of his
religious consciousness ; it must be unconditionally maintained, and
all else must yield to it" (p. 102). The ecclesiastical element was the
traditional element in his teaching ; but as Thomasius points out
{Dogmengeschichte, i. 495) both experience and Scripture stood with
him above tradition. Accordingly Harnack tells us truly {Dogmen-
geschichte iii. 87. 89) : " No Western theologian before him had so
lived in the Scriptures or had drawn so much from the Scriptures as
he ;" and " as no Church father before him, he brought the practical
element into the foreground."
2 It is inexplicable how Professor Allen, in his Continuity of Chris-
tian Thought, can speak of the Augustinian theology as resting
" upon the transcendence of Deity as its controlling principle" (p. 3),
which is explained as "a tacit assumption of deism" (p. 171). A.
Dorner (Augustinus : sein theologisc/ies System, etc.) also finds
deistic implications in certain elements of Augustine's thought. Any
tendency to error in Augustine's conception of God lay, however,
128 AUGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY.
solute good, and nothing is good but God and what
comes from Him, so that only as God makes them
good may men do good, was the foundation-stone of all
his theology. His doctrine ol grace appears as but a
specific application of this broad doctrine.
The necessity of grace Augustine argued from the con-
dition of the race as sharers in Adam's sin. God creat-
ed man upright and endowed him with human facul-
ties, including free will ;' and gave to him freely that
grace by which he was able to retain his uprightness.2
Being thus put on probation,3 with divine aid to enable
him to stand if he chose, Adam perversely used his
free choice for sinning and involved his whole race in
his fall. It was on account of this sin that he died
spiritually and physically ; and this double death passes
over from him to us.4 That all his descendants by or-
dinary generation are partakers in Adam's guilt and
condemnation, Augustine is sure from the teachings of
Scripture. This is the fact of original sin from which
no one generated from Adam is free, and from which
no one is freed save as regenerated in Christ.5 But
how we are made partakers of it, he is less certain.
Sometimes he speaks as if it came by some mysterious
unity of the race, so that we were all personally present
in the individual Adam and thus the whole race was
the one man that sinned ; b sometimes he speaks more
in the sense of modern realists, as if Adam's sin cor-
rupted the nature, and the nature now corrupts those
to whom it is communicated ; 7 sometimes he speaks as
if it were clue to simple heredity." More characteris-
in precisely the opposite direction. Compare Aubrey Moore, Lux
Mundi, p. 83, and Levi L. Paine, The New World, December, 1895
(iv. 670-673).
1 On Rebuke and Grace, 27, 28.
- Ibid., 29, 31, sq.
» Ibid., 28.
4 On t/ie City of God, xiii. 2, 12, 14 ; On the Trinity, iv. 13.
5 On the Merits and Remission of Sins, i. 15, and often.
6 Against Two Letters of the Pelagians, iv. 7 ; On the Merits
and Forgiveness of Sins, iii. 14, 15.
1 On Marriage andConcupiscence, ii. 57 ; On the City of God,
xiv. 1.
8 Against Two Letters of the Pelagians, iv. 7.
THE THEOLOGY OF GRACE. 129
tically he speaks as if it depended on the presence of
shameful concupiscence in the act of procreation, so
that the propagation of guilt depends on the propaga-
tion of offspring by means of concupiscence.1 How-
ever transmitted, it is yet a fact that sin is propagated,
and all mankind became sinners in Adam. The result
is that we have lost, the divine image, though not in
such a sense that no lineaments of it remain to us.2
And, the sinning soul making the flesh corruptible, our
whole nature is corrupted, and we are unable to do
anything of ourselves truly good.3
This corruption includes, of course, an injury to our
will. Augustine, writing for the popular eye, treats
this subject in popular language. But it is clear that
in his thinking he distinguished between will as a
faculty and will in a broader sense. As a mere faculty,
will is and always remains an indifferent thing.4 After
the fall, as before, it continues poised in indifferency,
and ready, like a weathercock, to be turned whither-
soever the breeze that blows from the heart (" will,"
in the broader sense) may direct.5 It is not the faculty
of willing, but the man who makes use of that faculty,
that has suffered change from the fall. In paradise
man stood in full ability. He had the posse non peccare,
but not yet the non posse peccare ; 6 that is, he was en-
dowed with a capacity for either part, and possessed
the grace of God by which he was able to stand if he
would, but also the power of free will by which he
might fall if he would. By his fall he has suffered a
change, is become corrupt, and has fallen under the
power of Satan. His will (in the broader sense) is now
injured, wounded, diseased, enslaved — although the
faculty of will (in the narrow sense) remains indiffer-
ent. Augustine's criticism of Pelasfius' discrimina-
1 On Original Sin, 42 ; On Marriage and Concupiscence, ii. 15.
5 Retractations, ii. 24.
3 Against Julian, iv. 3, 25, 26. Compare Thomasius' Dogmen-
geschichte, i. 501 and 507.
4 On the Spirit and Letter, 58.
5 On the Merits and Forgiveness of Sins, ii. 30.
6 On Rebuke and Grace, 11.
13° AUGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY.
tion ' of "capacity" {possibilitas, posse), "will" {vol-
untas, velle) and " act" {actio, esse), does not turn on
the discrimination itself, but on the incongruity of plac-
ing" the power, ability in the mere capacity or possi-
bility, rather than in the living agent who " wills" and
" acts." He himself adopts an essentially similar dis-
tribution, with only this correction.2 He thus keeps
the faculty of will indifferent, but places the power of
using it in the active agent, man. According, then, to
the character of the man, will the use of the free will
be. If the man be holy he will make a holy use of it,
and if he be corrupt he will make a sinful use of it : if
he be essentially holy, he (like God Himself) cannot
make a sinful use of his will ; and if he be enslaved to
sin, he cannot make a good use of it. The last is the
present condition of men by nature. They have free
will ; s the faculty by which they act remains in in-
differency, and they are allowed to use it just as they
choose. But such as they cannot desire and therefore
cannot choose anything but evil ; 4 and therefore they,
and therefore their choice, and therefore their willing,
is always evil and never good. They are thus the
slaves of sin, which they obey ; and while their free
will avails for sinning, it does not avail for doing any
good unless they be first freed by the grace of God.
The superior depth of Augustine's view and its essen-
tial harmony with fact are apparent ; if " the will" be
conceived as simply the whole man in the attitude of
willing, it would seem to be immediately evident that,
however abstractly free the " will" is, it is conditioned
in all its action by the character of the willing agent : a
bad man does not cease to be bad in the act of willing,
and a good man remains good even in his acts of
choice.
In its nature, grace is assistance, help from God ; and
all divine aid may be included under the term — as well
1 On the Grace of Christ, 4 sq.
2 On the Predestination of the Saints, 10.
3 Against Two Letters of the Pelagians, i. 5 ; Epistle 215, 4 and
often.
*^* Against Two Letters of the Pelagians, i. 7 ; compare i. 5, 6.
THE THEOLOGY OF GRACE. 131
what may be called natural as what may be called
spiritual aid.1 Spiritual grace includes, no doubt, all
external help that God gives man for working out his
salvation, such as the law, the preaching of the gospel,
the example of Christ, by which we may learn the right
way. It includes also forgiveness of sins, by which
we are freed from the guilt already incurred. But
above all it includes that help which God gives by His
Holy Spirit, working within not without, by which
man is enabled to choose and to do what he is enabled
by the teachings of the law, or by the gospel, or by
the natural conscience, to see to be right.2 In this
grace are included all those spiritual operations which
we call regeneration, justification, perseverance to the
end— in a word, all the divine assistance by which, in
being made Christians, we are made to differ from
other men. Augustine is fond of representing this
grace as in essence the writing of God's law (or God's
will) on our hearts, so that it appears hereafter as our
own desire and wish. Even more prevalently he
speaks of it as the shedding abroad of love in our
hearts by the Holy Ghost given to us in Christ Jesus.
It is, therefore, conceived by him as a change of dis-
position, by which we come to love and freely choose,
in co-operation with God's aid, just the things which
hitherto we have been unable to choose because of our
bondage to sin. Grace, thus, does not make void free
will.3 It operates through free will, and acts upon it
only by liberating it from its bondage to sin — i.e., by
liberating the agent that uses the free will, so that he
is no longer enslaved by his fleshly lusts and is en-
abled to make use of his free will in choosing the good.
Thus it is only by grace that free will is enabled to act
in good part.
But just because grace changes the disposition, and
so enables man, hitherto enslaved to sin, for the first
time to desire and use his free will for good, it lies in
: Sermon 26.
2 On Nature and Grace, 62 ; On the Grace of Christ, 13 ; On Re-
bicke and Grace, 2 sq.
6 On the Spirit and Letter, 52 ; On Grace and Free Will, 1 sq.
15- AUGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY.
the very nature of the case that it is prevenient.1 Also,
as the very name imports, it is necessarily gratuitous ; 2
since man is enslaved to sin until it is given, all the
merits that he can have prior to it are bad merits and
deserve punishment, not gifts of favour. When, then,
it is asked, on the ground of what grace is given, it can
only be answered, " on the ground of God's infinite
mercy and undeserved favour." s There is nothing in
man to merit it, and it first gives merit of good to man.
All men alike deserve death, and all that comes to them
in the way of blessing is necessarily of God's free and
unmerited favour. This is true equally of all grace.
It is pre-eminently clear of that grace which gives faith,
which is the root of all other graces and which is given
of God, not to merits of good-will or incipient turning
to Him, but of His sovereign good pleasure." But
equally with faith, it is true of all other divine gifts.
We may, indeed, speak of " merits of good" as suc-
ceeding faith ; but as all these merits find their root in
faith, they are but "grace on grace," and men need
God's mercy always, throughout this life, and even on
the judgment day itself, when, if they are judged with-
out mercy, they must be condemned.6 If we ask, then,
why God gives grace, we can only answer that it is of
His unspeakable mercy. And if we ask why He gives
it to one rather than to another, what can we answer
but that it is of His will ? The sovereignty of grace re-
sults from its very gratuitousness : ° where none de-
serve it, it can be given only of the sovereign good
pleasure of the great Giver — and this is necessarily in-
scrutable, but cannot be unjust. We can faintly per-
ceive, indeed, some reason why God may be supposed
not to have chosen to give His saving grace to all,7 or
1 On the Spirit and Letter, 60, and often.
8 On Nature and Grace, 4, and often.
8 On the Grace of Christ, 27, and often.
4 Ibid., 34, and often.
5 On Grace and Free Will, 21.
6 Ibid., 30, and often.
7 On the Gift of Perseverance, 16 ; Against Two Letters of the
Pelagians, ii. 15.
THE THEOLOGY OF GRACE. 133
even to the most.1 But we cannot understand why He
has chosen to give it to just the individuals to whom
He has given it, and to withhold it from just those from
whom He has withheld it. Here we are driven to the
apostle's cry, " O the depth of the riches both of the
mercy and the justice of God !" "
The effects of grace are according to its nature. Taken
as a whole, it is the recreative principle sent forth from
God for the recovery of man from his slavery to sin
and for his reformation in the divine image. Consid-
ered as to the time of its giving, it is either operating or
co-operating3 grace, i.e., either the grace that first en-
ables the will to choose the good, or the grace that co-
operates with the already enabled will to do the good.
It is, therefore, also called either prevenient or subse-
quent grace.4 It is not to be conceived as a series of
disconnected divine gifts, but as one unbroken work of
God. But we may look upon it in the various steps of
its operation in men, as bringing forgiveness of sins,
faith, which is the beginning of all good, love to God,
progressive power of good working, and perseverance
to the end.5 In any case, and in all its operations
alike, just because it is power from on high and the
living spring of a new and re-created life, it is irresisti-
ble and indefectible* Those on whom the Lord bestows
the gift of faith, working from within, not from with-
out, of course have faith and cannot help believing.
Those to whom perseverance to the end is given will
assuredly persevere to the end. It is not to be object-
ed to this that many seem to begin well who do not
persevere. This also is of God, who has in such cases
given great blessings indeed, but not this blessing of
perseverance to the end. Whatever of good men have,
that God has given. And what they have not, why,
1 Epistle to Optatus, 190.
2 On the Predestination of the Saints, 17, 18.
3 On Grace and Free Will, 33, and often.
4 On Grace and Free Will, 17 ; On the Proceedings of Pelagius,
34, and often.
5 Compare Thomasius' Dog7nengeschichte, i. 510.
6 On Rebuke and Grace, 40, 45 ; On the Predestination of the
Saints, 13.
134 AUGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY.
of course God has not given it. Nor can it be object-
ed that this leaves all uncertain. It is only unknown
to us ; but this does not argue uncertainty. We can-
not know that we are to have any gift which God sov-
ereignly gives, of course, until it is given ; and we
therefore cannot know that we have perseverance unto
the end until we actually persevere to the end.1 But
who would call uncertain what God does and knows
He is to do, and what man is to do certain ? Nor will
it do to say that thus nothing is left for us to do. No
doubt, all things are in God's hands and we should
praise God that this is so, but we must respond to His
touch ; and it is just because it is He that is working in
us the willing and the doing, that it is worth our while
to work out our salvation with fear and trembling.
God has not determined the end without determining
the appointed means.2
Now, Augustine argues, since grace certainly is
gratuitous and given to no preceding merits, pre-
venient and antecedent to all good, and, therefore,
sovereign and bestowed only on those whom God se-
lects for its reception — we must, of course, believe that
the eternal God has foreknown all this from the begin-
ning. He would be something less than God, had He
not foreknown that He intended to bestow this pre-
venient, gratuitous and sovereign grace on some men,
and had He not foreknown equally the precise indi-
viduals on whom He intended to bestow it. To fore-
know is to prepare beforehand. And this is predestina-
tion.2 He argues that there can be no objection to
predestination, in itself considered, in the mind of any
man who believes in God. What men object to is
gratuitous and sovereign grace : and to this no addi-
tional difficulty is added by the necessary assumption
that it was foreknown and prepared for from eternity.
That predestination does not proceed on the foreknowl-
edge of good or of faith,4 follows from its being noth-
1 On Rebuke and Grace, 40.
2 On the Gift of Perseverance, 56.
3 On the Predestination of the Saints, 36 sq.
4 On the Gift of Perseveratice, 41 sq., 47.
THE THEOLOGY OF GRACE. 135
ing more than the foresight and preparation of grace,
which, in its very idea, is gratuitous and not according
to any merits, sovereign and according only to God's
purpose, prevenient and in order to faith and good
works. It is the sovereignty of grace, not its foresight
or the preparation for it, which places men in God's
hands and suspends salvation absolutely on His un
merited mercy. But just because God is God, of
course no one receives grace who has not been fore-
known and afore-selected for the gift ; and, as much of
course, no one who has been foreknown and afore-
selected for it, fails to receive it. Therefore the num-
ber of the predestinated is fixed, and fixed by God.1
Is this fate? Men may call God's grace fate if they
choose ; but it is not fate, but undeserved love and
tender mercy, without which none would be saved.2
Does it paralyze effort ? Only to those who will not
strive to obey God because obedience is His gift. Is
it unjust ? Far from it : shall not God do what He
will with His own undeserved favour ? It is nothing
but gratuitous mercy, sovereignly distributed, and fore-
seen and provided for from all eternity by Him who
has selected us in His Son.
Augustine's doctrine of the means of grace, i.e., of the
channels and circumstances of the conference of grace
upon men, is the meeting point of two very dissimilar
streams of thought — his doctrine of grace and his doc-
trine of the Church. Profound thinker as he was,
within whose active mind was born an incredible mul-
titude of the richest conceptions, he was not primarily
a systematiser, and these divergent streams of thought
rather conditioned each the purity of the other's devel-
opment at this point than were thoroughly harmonized.'
1 On Rebuke and Grace, 39 ; compare 14.
2 On the Gift of Perseverance, 29 ; Against Two Letters of the
Pelagians, ii. 9 sq.
8 Says Harnack (Vogmengesehichte, in. 90): "In conflict with
Manicheanism and Donatism, Augustine acquired a doctrine of free-
dom, of the Church and of the means of grace which has little in com-
mon with his experience of sin and grace, and is in open strife with
the theological development of this experience (doctrine of predesti-
national grace). It is possible even to draw out a double theology of
136 AUGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY.
He does not, indeed, bind the conference of grace to
the means in such a sense that the grace must be given
at the exact time of the application of the means. He
does not deny that " God is able, even when no man
rebukes, to correct whom He will, and to lead him on
to the wholesome mortification of repentance by the
most hidden and most mighty power of His medicine." J
Though the Gospel must be known in order that man
may be saved 2 (for how shall they believe without a
preacher ?), yet the preacher is nothing and the preach-
ment is nothing, but God only that gives the increase.3
He even has something like a distant glimpse of what
has since been called the distinction between the visible
and invisible Church. He speaks of men not yet born
as among those who are " called according to God's
purpose" and therefore of the saved who constitute
the Church,4 and asserts that those who are so called,
even before they believe, are " already children of God,
enrolled in the memorial of their Father with unchange-
able surety." 5 At the same time, he allows that there
are many already in the visible Church who are not of
it, and who can therefore depart from it. But he
teaches that those who are thus lost out of the visible
Church are lost because of some fatal flaw in their bap-
tism, or on account of post-baptismal sins ; and that
those who are of the " called according to the pur-
pose" are predestinated not onty to salvation, but to
salvation by baptism. Grace is not tied to the means
in the sense that it is not conferred save in the means ;
but it is tied to the means in the sense that it is not con-
ferred without the means. Baptism, for instance, is
absolutely necessary for salvation : no exception is al-
lowed except such as save the principle — baptism of
blood (martyrdom),6 and, somewhat grudgingly, bap-
Augustine, an Ecclesiastics and a Doctrine of Grace, and to present
the whole in both."
' On Rebuke and Grace, 1.
2 On the Predestitzation of the Saints, 17, 18 ; if the gospel is not
preached at any given place, it is proof that God has no elect there.
3 On the Merits and Forgiveness of Sins, etc., ii. 37.
4 On Rebuke and Grace, 23.
8 Ibid., 20.
6 On the Soul and its Origin, i. 11 ; ii. 17,
THE THEOLOGY OF GRACE. 137
tism of intention. And baptism, when worthily re-
ceived, is absolutely efficacious : " if a man were to die
immediately after baptism, he would have nothing at
all left to hold him liable to punishment." ' In a word,
while there are many baptized who will not be saved,
there are none saved who have not been or are not to
be baptized ; it is the grace of God that saves, but bap-
tism is a channel of
actually receive it.'2
One of the corollaries that flowed from this doctrine
was that by which Augustine was led to assert that all
those who died unbaptized, including infants, are
finally lost and depart into eternal punishment. He
did not shrink from the inference, although he assigned
the place of lightest punishment in hell to those who
were guilty of no sin but original sin, but who had de-
parted this life without having washed this away in the
" laver of regeneration." This is the dark side of his
soteriology. But it should be remembered that it was
not his theology of grace, but the universal and tradi-
tional belief in the necessity of baptism for remission of
sins, which he inherited in common with all of his time,
that forced it upon him. The theology of grace was
destined in the hands of his successors, who have re-
joiced to confess that they were taught by him, to re-
move this stumbling-block also from Christian teach-
ing ; and if not to Augustine, it is to Augustine's
theology that the Christian world owes its liberation
from so terrible a tenet. Along with the doctrine of
the damnation of all unbaptized infants, another stum-
bling-block also, not so much of Augustinian as of
the Church theology inherited by Augustine, has
gone. It was not because of his theology of grace or
of his doctrine of predestination, that iVugustine taught
that comparatively few of the human race are saved.
It was, again, because as a good churchman of his day
he believed that baptism and incorporation into the
visible Church were necessary for salvation. And it is
1 On the Merits and Forgiveness of Sins, etc., ii. 46.
2 On Augustine's teaching as to baptism, see Rev. James Field
Spalding's The Teaching and Influence of Augustine, pp. 39 sq.
138 AUGUSTINE AND THE PELAGIAN CONTROVERSY.
only because of Augustine's theology of grace, which
places man in the hands of an all-merciful Saviour and
not in the grasp of a human institution, that men have
come to see that, in the salvation of all who die in
infancy, the invisible Church of God embraces the
majority of the human race — saved not by the washing
of water administered by the Church, but by the blood
of Christ administered by God's own hand outside of
the ordinary channels of His grace.1 We are indeed
born in sin, and those that die in infancy are, in Adam,
children of wrath even as others ; but God's hand is
not shortened by the limits ol His Church on earth
that it cannot save.
Despite the strong churchly element within the the-
ology of Augustine, the development of which has pro-
duced the ecclesiasticism of Romish thought, it must be
admitted that, on the side that is presented in the con-
troversy against Pelagianism, it is in its essence dis-
tinctly anti-ecclesiastical. Its central thought was the
immediate dependence of the individual on the grace of
God in Jesus Christ. It made everything that con-
cerned salvation to be of God, and traced the source of
all good to Him. " Without me ye can do nothing,"
is the inscription on one side of it ; on the other stands
written, " All things are yours." Augustine held that
he who builds on a human foundation builds on sand,
and founded all his hope on the Rock itself. And
there also he founded his teaching ; as he distrusted
man in the matter of salvation, so he distrusted him in
the form of theology. No other of the fathers so con-
scientiously wrought out his theology from the re-
vealed Word ; no other of them so sternly excluded
human additions. The subjects of which theology
treats, he declares, are such as " we could by no means
find out unless we believed them on the testimony of
Holy Scripture." Q "Where Scripture gives no cer-
tain testimony," he says, " human presumption must
1 This is shown in the accompanying essay on The Develop7nent
of the Doctrine of Infant Salvation.
* On the Soul and its Origin, iv. 14.
THE THEOLOGY OF GRACE. 139
beware how it decides in favor of either side." ' " We
must first bend our necks to the authority of Scrip-
ture," he insists, " in order that we may arrive at
knowledge and understanding' through faith."2 And
this was not merely his theory, but his practice.3 No
theology was ever, it may be more broadly asserted,
more conscientiously wrought out from the Scriptures
than that which he opposed to the Pelagians. It is not
without its shortcomings. But its errors are on the
surface and not of its essence. It name from God, and
it leads to God ; and in the midst of the controversies
of so many ages it has shown itself an edifice whose
solid core is built out of material " which cannot be
shaken."
1 On the Merits and Forgiveness of Sins, etc., ii. 59.
* Ibid., i. 29.
3 Compare On the Spirit and the Letter, 63.
II.
THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE DOCTRINE
OF INFANT SALVATION.
THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE DOCTRINE
OF INFANT SALVATION.
The task which we set before us in this brief paper
is not to unravel the tangled skein of the history of
opinion as to the salvation of those who die in infancy.
We propose to ourselves only the much more circum-
scribed undertaking of tracing the development of doc-
trine on this subject. We hope to show that there has
been a doctrine as to the salvation of infants, dying
such, common to all ages of the Church. And we
hope to show that there has taken place with reference
to this, as with reference to other doctrines, a progres-
sive correction of crudities in its conception, by which
the true meaning and relations of the common teach-
ing have been more and more freed from deforming
accretions and its permanenl core brought to ever
purer expression. As the result of this process, as we
hope to show, the Church has found its way to a toler-
ably complete understanding of the teaching of the
Scriptures upon this important subject. Those por-
tions ol the Church which have chosen to sit still in
the darkness of mediaevalism will have advanced, to be
sure, but a little way into this fuller and better appre-
hension. Those portions of the Church which have
elected to light their path more or less by the rush-
144 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
light of reason, rather than by the sun of revelation,
have naturally wandered more or less aside from it.
But wherever the Word of God has been the constant
study of the Church, the darkness of this problem
too has measurably given way before its light ; and
where the apprehension of scriptural truth in general
has become most pure, there the depths of this doc-
trine too have been most thoroughly sounded and its
relations most perfectly perceived.
The Patristic Doctrine.
It is fundamental to the very conception of Chris-
tianity that it is a remedial scheme. Christ Jesus came
to save sinners. The first Christians had no difficulty
in understanding and confessing that Christ had come
into a world lost in sin to establish a kingdom of right-
eousness, citizenship in which is the condition of sal-
vation. That infants were admitted into this citizen-
ship they did not question. When the Apologist Aris-
tides, for example, would make known to the heathen
how Christians looked upon death, he did not confine
himself to saying that " if any righteous person of their
number passes away from the world, they rejoice and
give thanks to God and follow his body as if he were
moving from one place to another," but adds of the
infant, for whose birth they (unlike many of the
heathen) praised God, " if, again, it chance to die in
its infancy, they praise God mightily, as tor one who
has passed through the world without sins."1 Nor did
those early Christians doubt that the sole gateway into
this heavenly citizenship, for infants too, was not the
natural birth of the flesh, but the new birth of the
Spirit. Communion with God and the inheritance of
life had been lost for all alike, and to infants too were
restored only in Christ. To lrenseus, for example, it
seems appropriate that Christ was born an infant and
grew by natural stages into manhood, since, as he
1 Helen B. Harris, The Newly Discovered Apology of Art's tides,
London, 1891, p. 108.
THE PATRISTIC DOCTRINE. 145
says, " He came to save all by Himself — all, I say,
who by Him are born again unto God, infants and chil-
dren, and boys and young men, and old men," and
accordingly passed through every age that He might
sanctify all.1
Less pure elements, however, entered inevitably
into their thought. The ingrained legalism of both
Jewish and heathen conceptions of religion, when
brought into the Church, quite obscured for a time
the doctrines of grace. It seemed for a season almost
as if Christ had died in vain, and as if Paul's whole
proclamation of a free salvation had borne no fruit.
Men persisted in looking for salvation by the works of
the law, and found no ground of trust save in their
own virtues. In this atmosphere the problem of the
death of little children became an insoluble one.
Dying before they had acquired merit, either good or
bad, it seemed equally impossible to assign to them
reward or punishment. Even a Gregory Nazianzen
affirmed that they could be ' ' neither glorified nor
punished"8 — that is, probably, that they went into a
middle state similar to that taught by Pelagius. A
heretical sect arose, called the Hieracitas from their
master Hierax, who, arguing that if one who strives
cannot be crowned unless he strives lawfully it would
be absurd to crown one who had not striven at all,
consigned apparently all children dying before the use
of reason to annihilation.9 Gregory of Nyssa seems
to have some such notion floating before his mind,
when, at the opening of his treatise, On Infants' Early
' Iren^eus, Haer., ii., 22, 4, and iii., 18, 7.
2 Cf. Wall, Hist, of Infant Baptism. Ed. 2, 1707, p. 365.
3 See Epiphanius, Haer., 67 ; August., Haer., 47 ; and compare -y?t M
Smith and Wace, Dictionary of Christian Biography, iii., 24^ It -*-
is possible that this heresy extended itself among the sectaries of the »» =»
Middle Ages, and that it is some such notion as this that Peter the 2^full
Venerable intends when he accuses "the heretics" (i.e., Peter de a<, ,
Bruys and his friends) of "denying that children who have not £*j
reached the age of intelligence can be saved by baptism, nor that an- fx
other person's faith can profit those who cannot use their own, since
our Lord says, ' Whosoever shall have believed and shall have been
baptized shall be saved.' " Cf. A. H. Newman, A History of Ant i-
Pedobaptism, p. 31.
146 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
Death, he speaks of such children as passing out of the
world before they even become human.
This treatise, which is probably the most extended
discussion of the question from this general point of
view which has come down to us from the patristic
age, is full of interest. It was written in Gregory's
old age, at the request of Hierius, the governor of
Cappadocia, and undertakes to solve, for the instruc-
tion of that official, the problem of justice which the
early death of children raised under the legalistic view-
point. Gregory begins by asserting the incongruity
of imagining such an infant as standing before the
judgment-seat of God, and the equal injustice of sup-
posing him to pass at once into the lot of the blessed,
without having acquired any merit. With apparently
entire unconsciousness of the existence of anything like
race-sin, he frankly proceeds in his argument on the as-
sumption that future blessedness belongs of right to hu-
man beings who have not forfeited it by personally sin-
ning, and that the infant, dying such, is therefore enti-
tled to its natural happiness. The point of difficulty
arises only from the consideration that then those are un-
justly dealt with who are required to grow up in this
earthly arena and to earn bliss only with difficulty or to
lose it through their transgressions. This he attempts
to meet by two suggestions. On the one hand, he sug-
gests that though infants enter at once into happiness,
they do not at once enter intp all the happiness that
rewards him who is victor here. " But the soul that
has never felt the taste of virtue," he says, " while it
may, indeed, remain perfectly free from the sufferings
which flow from wickedness, having never caught the
disease of evil at all, does nevertheless in the first in-
stance partake only so far in that life beyond as this
nurseling can receive ; until the time comes that it has
thriven on the contemplation of the truly Existent as
on a congenial diet, and, becoming capable of receiving
more, takes at will more from that abundant supply of
the truly Existent which is offered." By this only
gradual participation in bliss he would avoid the injus-
tice of placing one that had acquired no virtue on the
THE PATRISTIC DOCTRINE. 147
same level with him who had borne the heat and bur-
den of the day. On the other hand, he suggests that
the reason why God takes some away from the chance
of failure here, removing them to certain bliss in their
infancy, may be that He owes a debt to their parents'
virtue, or that He foresees that the evil to which they
would give themselves if left on earth would far ex-
ceed that wrought by any actually permitted to re-
main ; or, at all events, he argues, it may be needful
to leave some men on earth to sin, that their evil may
serve as a foil for the virtue of the righteous, since it is
beyond doubt an addition and intensification to the feli-
city of the good " to have its contrary set against it."
We are in little danger of judging Gregory's theodicy
successful ;' but it is doubtless as successful a theodicy as
could be wrought out on his premises. If the awards
of the future life are to be conceived as distributed
strictly according to personal merit, and infants, dying
such, are to be esteemed free from sin, it would seem
logically unavoidable that we should either suppose
them to pass out of existence at death, or, like Pelagius,
invent for them a middle place of natural felicity,
neither heaven nor hell — or, at the best, like Greg-
ory, less logically but more genially, fancy the Divine
Father fitting them gradually for higher things " be-
yond the veil." ^
The same ingrained externalism in the conceptions
of both Jewish and heathen converts to Christianity
wrought, however, in the earliest ages of the Church,
more powerfully and permanently another corruption
of the Christian idea. The kingdom which Jesus came
to found was not of this world, and was not, in its
primary idea, an external organization. But it was
inevitable that it should soon be identified with the
visible Church, and the regeneration which was its
door with the baptism by which entrance into the
Church was accomplished. Already in Justin and
Irenaeus the word " regeneration" means " baptism ;"
1 The whole discussion can be conveniently read in vol. v. of T/ie
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers. Second series. New York, 1893,
pp. 372-381.
143 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
and the language of John iii. 5, " Verily, verily, 1 say
unto you, Except a man be born of water and the
Spirit he cannot enter into the kingdom of God," was
from a very early period uniformly understood to sus-
pend salvation upon water-baptism. How early this
doctrine of the necessity of baptism for salvation be-
came the settled doctrine of the Church it is difficult
to trace in the paucity of very early witnesses. Ter-
tullian already defends it from objection.1 The reply
of Cyprian and his fellow-bishops to Fidus on the duty
of early baptism, and especially his whole argument
to Jubianus against the validity of heretical baptism,
plainly presuppose it.a By this date clearly it was
the accepted Church-doctrine ; and although its strin-
gency was mitigated in the case of adults by the admis-
sion not only of the baptism of blood, but also of that of
intention,' the latter mitigation was not allowed in the
case of infants. The watchword of the Church— first
spoken in these exact words, perhaps, by Cyprian in
his strenuous opposition to the validity of heretical
baptism4 — Extra ecclesiam satus non est, hardened in this
sense into an undisputed maxim. The whole Patristic
Church thus came to agree that, martyrs excepted, no
infant dying unbaptized could enter the kingdom of
heaven.
The fairest exponent of the thought of the age on
this subject is Augustine, who was called upon to de-
fend it against the Pelagian contention that infants
dying unbaptized, while failing of entrance into the
kingdom, yet obtain eternal life. His constancy in
this controversy has won for him the unenviable title of
durus infantum pater— a designation doubly unjust, in
that not only did he not originate the obnoxious dogma
or teach it in its harshest form, but he was even pre-
paring its destruction by the doctrines of grace, of
which he was more truly the father. Augustine ex-
1 De Bapt., c. 12.
5 Epistles lviii. (lxiv.) and lxiii. (lxxii.).
8 With what limitations may be conveniently read in Wall, Hist,
of Infant Baptism, ed. 2, 1707, pp. 359 so.
* Epistle lxiii. (lxxii.), § 21.
THE PATRISTIC DOCTRINE. 149
pressed the Church-doctrine moderately, teaching, of
course, that infants dying unbaptized would be found
on Christ's left hand and be condemned to eternal
punishment, but also not forgetting to add that their
punishment would be the mildest of all, and indeed
that they were to be beaten with so few stripes that
he could not say that it would have been better for
them not to be born.1 His zeal in the matter turned
on his deepest convictions, and the essence of his argu-
ment may be exhibited by putting together two or
three sentences from one of his polemic writings
against the Pelagians. ' ' We must by no means doubt, ' '
he says, ' ' that all men are under sin, which came into
the world by one man and has passed through unto
all men, and from which nothing frees us but the grace
of God through our Lord Jesus Christ." " For inas-
much as infants are only able to become His sheep by
baptism, it must needs come to pass that they perish
if they are not baptized, because they will not have
that eternal life which He gives to His sheep." " Let
then there be no eternal salvation promised to infants
out of our own opinion, without Christ's baptism ;
for none is promised in that Holy Scripture which is
to be preferred to all human authority and opinion.''2
The Pelagian, denying original sin, found it an easy
matter to assign to infants, born innocent and taken
out of life before their own activities could soil their
consciences, a place outside of the kingdom of God,
indeed, but also free from punishment. The semi-
Pelagians, allowing original sin, were in deeper waters,
and seem to have tentatively suggested that the fate
of each infant was determined by what God knew it
would have done had it lived to years of discretion.
Augustine, with his profound conviction of the reality
of innate sin and of its guilt before God,3 could not
1 Augustine's doctrine is most strongly expressed in Sermo xiv.
In De Peccat. Merit., c, 21 (xvi.), and Contra Julian., v., 11, he
speaks of the comparative mildness of the punishment.
3 De Peccat. Merit., c. 33 (xxii.), c. 40 (xxvii.).
8 Mr. H. C. Lea, in his History of Auricular Confession, I., 97, ad-
duces a curious instance of the perversity of Monkish thought from St.
Odo of Cluny. Augustine bases the condemnability of infants on their
150 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
but contend with all his force against these teachings ;
he was really striving for the essential doctrines of uni-
versal sinfulness and of eternal bliss only through the
propitiating work of Christ. Because his doctrine was
based on such broad grounds no one could surpass
him in the strength of his conviction as to the doom of
unbaptized children — i.e., in his view, of children un-
saved by Christ. But it is not to Augustine, but to
Fulgentius (f 533),' or to Alcimus Avitus (f 523),' or to
Gregory the Great (f 604)3 that we must go for the
strongest expression of the woe of unbaptized infants.
Meanwhile, however, whether through the vigor of
Augustine's advocacy or out of the natural and indeed
inevitable revulsion of the Christian consciousness in
the presence of Pelagian error, the Church had come
at length to a fully reasoned reassertion of its primitive
and essential faith, that infants, too, need salvation, and
original sin, and he sometimes accounts for the transmission of sin by
the presence of concupiscence in the act of procreation. Odo, with-
out more ado, traces the condemnability of infants to the sinfulness
of conjugal intercourse ! Since such infants are certainly not pun-
ished for guilt of their own, he argues, it is clear that they are pun-
ished for that sin by which they are conceived ; "if, therefore," he
continues, " the sin in conjugal intercourse is so great that an infant
for that alone ought to be punished ..."
1 E.g., De Fide ad Petr., c. 27 : "It is to be most firmly held, and
by no means doubted, that not only men already in the use of reason,
but also children, whether they begin to live in their mother's womb
and there die, or pass from this world after being born from their
mothers without the sacrament of baptism, are to be punished with
the everlasting penalty of eternal fire ; because although they had no
sin of their own committing, they nevertheless incurred by their car-
nal conception and nativity the damnation of original sin."
s E.g., Ad Fuschiam Sororem :
" Omnibus id vero gravius, si forte lavacri
Divini expertem tenerum mors invidia natum
Prsepitat, dura generatum sorte Gehennse.
Qui mox, ut matris cessavit Alius esse,
Perditionis erit ; tristes tunc edita nolunt
Quae flammis tantum genuerunt pignora matres."
3 E.g., Expos, in Job, i. 16. Such phrases as these meet us in
Gregory's writings : " Those who have done nothing here of them-
selves, but have not been freed by the sacraments of salvation, enter
there into torments ;" " It is perpetual torment which those receive
who have not sinned of their own proper will at all." {Moralz'um, ix.,
xii.).
THE MEDIAEVAL MITIGATION. 151
none of any age enters life save through the saving
work of Christ. This is the fundamental thought of
the patristic age in the matter, to which only a form
was given by its belief that saving grace came only
through baptism. There were some outside Pelagian
circles, like Gregory of Nazianzus, who sought for
those who die in infancy unbaptized an intermediate
place, neither salvation nor retribution. But prob-
ably, with the exception of Gregory of Nyssa, only
such anonymous objectors as those whom Tertullian
confutes,1 or such obscure and erratic individuals as
Vincentius Victor whom Augustine convicts, in the
whole patristic age, doubted that the kingdom of
heaven was closed to all infants departing this life with-
out the sacrament of baptism. And now Augustine's
scourge had driven out the folly of imaging an eter-
nity of bliss for men outside the kingdom of heaven
and apart from the salvation of Christ.
The Mediceval Mitigation.
If the general consent of a whole age as expressed
by its chief writers, including the leading bishops of
Rome, and by its synodical decrees, is able to deter-
mine a doctrine, certainly the Patristic Church trans-
mitted to the Middle Ages as de fide that infants dying
unbaptized (with the exception only of those who suffer
martyrdom) are not only excluded from heaven but
doomed to hell. Accordingly the mediaeval synods so
define. The second Council of Lyons and the Council
of Florence declare that " the souls of those who pass
away in mortal sin or in original sin alone descend im-
mediately to hell, to be punished, however, with un-
equal penalties." On the maxim that gradiis non
mutant speciem we must adjudge Petavius2 unanswer-
able, when he argues that this deliverance determines
the punishment of unbaptized infants to be the same in
kind (in the same hell) with that of adults in mortal
1 De Bapt.,c. 12.
s Petavius, Dog. Theol., ed. Paris, 1S65, ii., 59 sq.
152 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
sin : " So infants are tormented with unequal tortures
of fire, but are tormented nevertheless."
Nevertheless scholastic thought on the subject was
characterized by a successful effort to mollify the
harshness of the Church-doctrine, under the impulse
of the prevalent semi-Pelagian conception of original
sin. The whole troup of schoolmen unite in distin-
guishing between pcena damni and p<z?ia sensus, and in
assigning to infants dying unbaptized only the former
— i.e., the loss of heaven and of the beatific vision— and
not the latter— i.e., positive torment. They differ
among themselves only as to whether th\s pcena damni,
which alone is the lot of infants, is accompanied by a
painful sense of the loss (as Lombard held), or is so
negative as to involve no pain at all, either external or
internal (as Aquinas argued). So complete a victory
was won by this mollification that perhaps only a single
theologian of eminence can be pointed to who ventured
still to teach the doctrine of Augustine and Gregory —
Gregory Ariminensis thence called tortor infantum ;
and Hurter reminds us that even he did not dare to
teach it definitively, but only submitted it to the judg-
ment of his readers.1 Dante, whom Andrew Seth not
unjustly calls " by far the greatest disciple of Aquinas,"
has enshrined in his immortal poem the leading con-
ception of his day, when he pictures the " young chil-
dren innocent, whom Death's sharp teeth have snatched
ere yet they were freed from the sin with which our
birth is blent," as imprisoned within the brink of hell,
" where the first circle girds the abyss of dread," in a
place where " there is no sharp agony" but " dark
shadows only," and whence "no other plaint rises
than that of sighs which from the sorrow without pain
arise."3 The novel doctrine attained papal authority
by a decree of Innocent III. (c. 1200), who determined
" the penalty of original sin to be the lack of the vision
1 Hurter, Theolog. Dogmat. Compend., 1878, iii., p. 516: Tract.
x., cap. iii., § 729. Wycliffe must be added ; but he stands out of
the mass.
5 Hell, iv., 23 so.; Purgatory, vii., 25 sq.; Heaven, xxxii., 76 sq.
(Plumptre's translation).
THE MEDIMVAL MITIGATION. 1 53
of God, but the penalty of actual sin to be the tor-
ments of eternal hell."
A more timid effort was also made in this period to
modify the inherited doctrine by the application to it
of a development of the baptism of intention. This
tendency first appears in Hincmar of Rheims (f 882),
who, in a particularly hard case of interdict on a whole
diocese, expresses the hope that " the faith and godly
desire of the parents and godfathers" of the infants
that had thus died unbaptized, " who in sincerity de-
sired baptism for them but obtained it not, may profit
them by the gift of Him whose Spirit (which gives re-
generation) breathes where it pleases." It is doubtful,
however, whether he would have extended this lofty
doctrine to any less stringent case.1 Certainly no
similar teaching is met with in the Church, except
with reference to the peculiarly hard case of still-born
infants of Christian parents. The schoolmen {e.g.,
Alexander Hales and Thomas Aquinas) admitted a
doubt whether God may not have ways of saving such
unknown to us. John Gerson, in a sermon before the
Council of Constance, presses the inference more
boldly." God, he declared, has not so tied the mercy
of His salvation to common laws and sacraments, but
that without prejudice to His law He can sanctify
children not yet born, by the baptism of His grace or
the power of the Holy Ghost. Hence, he exhorts ex-
pectant parents to pray that if the infant is to die be-
fore attaining baptism, the Lord may sanctify it ; and
who knows, he says, but that the Lord may hear them ?
He adds, however, that he only intends to suggest
that all hope is not taken away ; for there is no cer-
tainty without a revelation. Gabriel Biel (f 1495) fol-
lowed in Gerson's footsteps,3 holding it to be accordant
with God's mercy to seek out some remedy for such
infants. This teaching remained, however, without
effect on the Church-dogma, although something sim-
ilar to it was, among men who served God in the way
1 Cf. Wall, op. ctt., p. 371.
* Sermon, De Nat. Mar. Virg., consid. 2, col. 33.
3 In iv., Sect, iv., p. 11.
154 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
then called heresy, foreshadowing an even better to
come. John Wycliffe (f 1384) had already with like
caution expressed his unwillingness to pronounce
damned such infants as were intended for baptism by
their parents, if they failed to receive that sacrament
in fact ; though he could not, on the other hand, assert
that they were saved.1 His followers were less cau-
tious, whether in England or Bohemia ; and in this,
too, they approved themselves heralds of a brighter
day.
The Drift in the Church of Rome.
In the upheaval of the sixteenth century the Church
of Rome found her task in harmonizing, under the in-
fluence of the scholastic formulas, the inheritance
which the somewhat inconsistent past had bequeathed
her. Four varieties of opinion sought a place in her
teaching. At the one extreme the earlier doctrine of
Augustine and Gregory, that infants dying unbaptized
suffer eternally the pains of sense, found again advo-
cates, and that especially among the greatest of her
scholars, such as Noris, Petau, Driedo, Conry, Berti.
At the other extreme, a Pelagianizing doctrine that ex-
cluded unbaptized infants from the kingdom of heaven
and the life promised to the blessed, and yet accorded
to them eternal life and natural happiness in a place
between heaven and hell, was advocated by such great
leaders as Ambrosius Catharinus, Albertus Pighius,
Molina, Sfondrati. The mass, however, followed the
schoolmen in the middle path of poena damni, and,
like the schoolmen, differed only as to whether this
punishment of loss- involved sorrow (as Bellarmine
held) or was purely negative.3 The Council of Trent
(1547) anathematized those who affirm that the " sacra-
1 Cf. Wall, as above.
2 For this classification see Bellarmine, De Amiss. Gratia:, etc.,
vi., 1 ; and compare Gerhard, Loci (Cotta's ed.), vol. ix., p. 279 ;
Chamier, Panstrat. Cath. (1626), iii., 159; or Spanheim, Chamierus
Contractus (1643), p. 797.
THE DRIFT IN THE CHURCH OF ROME. 1 55
ments of the new law are not necessary to salvation,
but superfluous ; and that, without them, or without
the desire thereof, men obtain of God, through faith
alone, the grace of justification ;" or, again, that " bap-
tism is free, that is, not necessary to salvation." ' This
is explained by the Tridentine Catechism to mean that
" baptism is necessary to every one without qualifica-
tion," and that " the law of baptism is prescribed by
our Lord to all, insomuch that they, unless they be re-
generated to God through the grace of baptism, are
born to eternal misery and perdition, whether their
parents be Christian or infidel. ' ,a The Council of Trent
thus made it renewedly de fide that infants dying unbap-
tized incur damnation, though it left the way open for
discussion as to the kind and amount of their punish-
ment.3 The ordinary instruction in the Church of
Rome has naturally been conformed to this point of
view. Thus the Catechism Prepared a?id Enjoined by Or-
der of the Third Plenary Council of Baltimore teaches
that " baptism is necessary to salvation, because with-
out it we cannot enter into the kingdom of heaven."4
Muller's popular Familiar Explanation of Catholic Doc-
trine teaches that " baptism is the most necessary sac-
rament, because without it no one can be saved ;" B
words which are repeated by Deharbe.6 This is ex-
1 Schaff's Creeds of Christendom, ii., pp. 120, 123 (Seventh Ses-
sion, March 3, 1547, Canon iv. on the Sacraments, and Canon v. on
Baptism).
4 77*i? Catechism of the Council of Trent, Translated into Eng-
lish ; with Notes by Theodore Alois Buckley, B.A., pp. 150, 174,
175 (Part II., ch. i., qq. xvi., xxx., xxxiii.) ; cf. Streitwolf and
Klener, Libri Symbolici Eccles. Cath., torn, i., pp. 249, 274, 276.
On the other hand, we are credibly informed that the council was
near anathematizing as a Lutheran heresy the proposition that the
penalty for original sin is the fire of hell (so Father Paul, Hist, of
the Council of Trent, c. 2).
3 Perrone, Prcelect. Theol. in Compend. Redact., i., p. 494.
4 New York : The Catholic Publication Society — with the imprimatur
of Cardinal McCloskey, and the approval of Archbishop (now Cardi-
nal) Gibbons, dated April 6th, 1888 : No. 2, Lesson 14 (p. 27).
5 No. IV., improved ed. New York: Benziger Bros. (1888),
P- 309.
6 A Full Catechis?n of the Catholic Religion, Fander's transla-
156 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
panded by Schouppe as follows : " This necessity is
so absolute that children dying without baptism,
though innocent of all actual sin, are excluded forever
from heaven, on account of the original stain which
they bear upon their souls. Therefore our Lord has
permitted them to be baptized as soon as they are born,
and has given the utmost facility to the administration
of so indispensable a sacrament." ' " Millions," says
Wenham, " are saved with only this sacrament; but
no one is ordinarily saved without it." 3
It is natural to catch at the word " ordinary" in such
a deliverance. And the Tridentine declaration, of
course, does not exclude the baptism of blood as a sub-
stitute for baptism of water, even for infants. Neither
does it seem necessarily to exclude the application of a
theory of baptism of intention to infants. Even after
it, therefore, an alternative development seems to have
been possible. The path already opened by Gerson
and Biel might have been followed out, and a baptism
of intention developed for infants as well as for adults.
This might even have been logically pushed on so as
to cover the case of all infants dying in infancy. The
principle argued by Richard Hooker,3 for example, ap-
pears reasonable, that the unavoidable failure of bap-
tism in the case of the children of Christians cannot
lose them salvation, because of the presumed desire
and purpose of baptism for them in their Christian par-
ents and in the Church of God. And it would be to
proceed only a single step farther to have said that the
desire and purpose of Mother Church to baptize all is
intention of baptism enough for all dying in helpless
infancy, or even that what has been called the implicit
tion, revised, etc , by Bishop Lynch, of Charleston. New York :
The Catholic Publication Society Co., 1891, p. 248.
1 Abridged Course of Religious Instruction, etc. By the Rev.
Father F. X. Schouppe, S. J., new ed., etc. London : Burns &
Oates, p. 188.
3 The Catechumen, etc. By J. G. Wenham, Provost of Southwark.
3d ed. London : St. Anselm's Society, 1892, p. 293.
8 Ecclesiastical Polity, v., ch. 60, (ed. Dobson, I. 605.)
THE DRIFT IN THE CHURCH OF ROME. I57
and interpretative faith 1 of their heathen parents may
avail for them. Thus on principles agreeable to the
general Roman line of thought a salvation for all dying
in infancy might have been logically deduced, and in-
fants, as more helpless and less guilty, have been given
the preference over adults. On the other hand, it
could be argued that as baptism either in re or in voto
must mediate salvation, and as infants by reason of
their age are incapable of the intention, they cannot be
saved except they receive baptism in fact,2 and thus
infants be discriminated against in favor of adults. It
1 What is meant by this language may be gathered from the follow-
ing sentences from J. Henry Newman's Letter Addressed to His
Grace the Duke of Norfolk, on the infallibility of the Pope: "I
have employed myself, in illustration, in framing a sentence which
would be plain enough to any priest, but I think would perplex any
Protestant. 1 hope it is not to'o light to introduce here. We will sup-
pose then a theologian to write as follows : ' Holding, as we do, that
there is only material sin in those who, being i7ivincibly ignorant,
reject the truth, therefore in charity we hope that they have the future
portion of for7nal believers, as considering that by virtue of their
good faith, though not of the body of the faithful, they implicitly and
interpret at ively believe what they seem to deny.' What sense would
this statement convey to the mind of a member of some Reformation
Society or Protestant League ? He would read it as follows, and con-
sider it all the more insidious and dangerous for its being so very
unintelligible : ' Holding, as we do, that there is only a very consid-
erable sin in those who reject the truth out of contumacious igno-
rance, therefore in charity we hope that they have the future portion
of nominal Christians, as considering, that by the excellence of their
living faith, though not in the number of believers, they believe with-
out any hesitation, as interpreters [of Scripture ?], what they seem to
deny.' " (P. 93.)
* Thus, e.g., Dominicus de Soto expresses it {De Natura et Gratia,
ii. 10) : " It is most firmly established in the Church that no infant
apart from baptism in re— since he cannot have it in voto — enters the
kingdom of heaven." In a more popular form it is put thus {A Man-
teal of Instruction in Christian Doctrine, etc., 10th ed. London:
St. Anselm's Society. Ed. 3 [1871], p. 282) : " Baptism is absolutely
necessary to salvation for all infants, at least wherever the Gospel has
been promulgated. . . . Children, therefore, who die unbaptized
cannot enter into the beatific vision. . . . The case of adults is some-
what different. For them, when the actual reception of the sacrament
is impossible, an act of perfect charity, which includes the desire of it,
will suffice for salvation. . . . Again, martyrdom, which is the high-
est act of charity, has always been held to supply the place of bap-
tism." The book bears the imprimaturs of Cardinals Wiseman and
Manning.
158 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
was this second path which was actually followed by
the theologians of the Church of Rome, with the ulti-
mate result that not only are infants discriminated
against in favor of adults, but the more recent theo-
logians seem almost ready to discriminate against
the infants of Christians as over against those of the
heathen.
This certainly sufficiently remarkable result grows
out of the development which has been given in later
Romanism to the doctrine of ignorance, and especially
of " invincible ignorance," the latter of which was at
length authoritatively defined by Pope Pius IX. A
very characteristic statement of the nature of this doc-
trine is to be found in the late Cardinal Newman's A
Letter Addressed to his Grace the Duke of Norfolk on the
infallibility of the Pope. He is illustrating the care
with which doctrinal statements should be interpreted.
" One of the most remarkable instances of what I am
insisting on," he says, " is found in a dogma, which no
Catholic can ever think of disputing, viz., that ' Out of
the Church, and out of the faith, is no salvation.' Not
to go to Scripture, it is the doctrine of St. Ignatius,
St. Irenaeus, St. Cyprian in the first three centuries,
as of St. Augustine and his contemporaries in the
fourth and fifth. It can never be other than an ele-
mentary truth of Christianity ; and the present Pope
has proclaimed it as all Popes, doctors, and bishops
before him. But that truth has two aspects, according
as the force of the negative falls upon the ' Church '
or upon the ' salvation.' The main sense is, that there
is no other communion or so-called Church but the
Catholic, in which are stored the promises, the sacra-
ments and other means of salvation ; the other and
derived sense is, that no one can be saved who is not
in that one and only Church. But it does not follow,
because there is no Church but one which has the
Evangelical gifts and privileges to bestow, that there-
fore no one can be saved without the intervention of
that one Church. Anglicans quite understand this dis-
tinction ; for, on the one hand, their article says, ' They
are to be had accursed (anathematizandi) that presume
THE DRIFT IN THE CHURCH OF ROME. 159
to say, that every man shall be saved by (in) the law or
sect which he professeth, so that he be diligent to
frame his life by that law and the light of nature ;'
while on the other hand they speak of and hold to the
doctrine of the ' uncovenanted mercies of God.' The
latter doctrine in its Catholic form is the doctrine of
invincible ignorance — or, that it is possible to belong
to the soul of the Church without belonging to its
body ; and at the end of 1800 years it has been for-
mally and authoritatively put forth by the present Pope
(the first Pope, I suppose, who has done so), on the very
same occasion on which he has repeated the funda-
mental principle of exclusive salvation itself. It is to
the purpose here to quote his words ; they occur in
the course of his Encyclical, addressed to the Bishops
of Italy, under the date of August 10th, 1863 : ' We and
you knoiv that those who lie under invincible ignorance
as regards our most Holy Religion, and who, diligent-
ly observing the natural law and its precepts, which
are engraven by God on the hearts of all, and prepared
to obey God, lead a good and upright lite, are able, by
the operation of the power of divine light and grace,
to obtain eternal life.' " * Thus while an absolute
necessity for baptism in re is posited for the infants of
Christian parents, even though they die in the womb,
on the other hand, as the law of baptism is in force
only where it is known, and even an ignorance morally
invincible (as among sectaries) is counted true igno-
rance, not even an intention of baptism is demanded of
the heathen or of certain sectaries but may be held to
be implicit — that is, they may be thought ready to do
all that God requires if only they knew it. Among the
heathen thus the old remedies for sin are held to be
still probably valid, and their " primitive sacraments"
are thought to retain their force ; a and this rule may
1 op. at., p. 122.
5 From the theological point of view, Gousset, Theolog. Dogmat. ,
10th ed. , Paris, 1866, i., 548, 549, 351, ii.,3S2, may be profitably consulted
on this whole subject. How it is popularly presented may be gathered
from the following editorial remarks from The Catholic Review, 42,
25 (December 11-17, 1893) : " The truth is that God does not demand
what is impossible ; the heathen who have not heard of the Gospel
160 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
with some prudence be extended to cover some sec-
taries. It may be extended also to cover the case of
the infants of the heathen, dying such. St. Bernard,
for example, is quoted approvingly by Gousset as say-
ing, " Among the Gentiles as many as are found faith-
ful, we believe that the adults are expiated by faith and
the sacrifices ; but the faith of the parents profits the
children, nay, even suffices for them." If the fathers
are saved, in other words, why not the children ?
Sometimes a very sweeping application is given to this
principle, as may be illustrated by a popular exposition
of it made a lew years ago in the pages of The London
Month.1 The writer is oppressed by the thought of
the millions of unbaptized children who die annually.
On the basis of John iii. 5 he declares that our Lord
" excludes from the beatific vision all children who die
unbaptized and who do not supply for the baptism of
water by the baptism of desire, or the baptism of
blood." It may be taken, therefore, as a first princi-
ple " that without baptism no little child, under the
Christian dispensation, enters the kingdom of heaven."
" But," he instructs his readers, " we must not omit
to notice that we are speaking of the Christian dispen-
sation and of it alone." God provided for the Jews a
sort of anticipation of baptism ; and we must suppose
that something of the sort existed in the patriarchal
age. " How long such traditional offering lasted on
outside of the Jewish Covenant we do not know ; it
may be that during the whole period previous to the
coming of our Lord, those who were believers in the
true God had the opportunity ot obtaining from Him
the deliverance of their little children from original
will be judged by the light and grace given them. If we, with the
Sacraments and the Sacrifice, are so apt to fall into sin, how hard it
must be for the pagans to be faithful to natural virtue. Yet some of
them, no doubt, have been true to the voice of conscience and are to-
day in heaven. Having the disposition to do right, they had the im-
Elied desire for baptism, and St. Thomas says that if actual baptism
ad been essential for their salvation, the Almighty would have sent
an angel from heaven to pour the cleansing water on them. They
are few, probably, but few or many, they manifest the mercy of God
and show that nowhere was salvation made impossible."
1 London Month, February, 1803.
THE DRIFT IN THE CHURCH OF ROME. 161
sin, when they offered them to be His, and dedicated
them, according to the best of their ability and knowl-
edge, to His service. Nay, we may even hope that in
the present day the dwellers in lands where the name of
Christ is still unknown may save their children, as they
certainly can save themselves, from the eternal loss of
God, if they offer their little ones to Him with a recog-
nition of Him as their all-powerful King and Lord."
As over against this " wider hope" for the children of
the heathen, however, nothing so comforting can be
said of the children of the faithful who die unbaptized.
A few Catholic theologians may have indulged hope for
them ; but on insufficient grounds. " Here and there
it may be that God, by an extraordinary intervention in
behalf of some one of His faithful servants, may grant
such a privilege to some favored little one, but only by
a very special miracle of grace, and as a rare exception
to the general law." And even this meagre comfort
is disallowed by most writers, as, indeed, on the basis
of the Tridentine decrees it must be. Why, however,
the baptism of intention should receive so wide an ex-
tension to the heathen, so as to give even the infants
of the heathen the benefit of it, and be so inflexibly
denied to the infants of Christians, is a question which
will not easily receive satisfactory answer.
The application of the baptism of intention to the in-
fants of Christians was not abandoned without some
protest from the more tender-hearted. Cardinal Caje-
tan defended in the Council of Trent itself Gerson's
proposition that the desire of godly parents might be
taken in lieu of the actual baptism of children dying in
the womb.1 Cassander (1570) encouraged parents to
hope and pray for children so dying." Bianchi (1768)
holds that such children may be saved per oblationem
paeri qaam Deo mater extrinsecus faciat.3 Eusebius
Amort (1758) teaches that God may be moved by pray-
er to grant justification to such extra-sacramentally.*
Even somewhat bizarre efforts have been made to es-
1 In 3 Part. Thomae, Q. 68, art. 2, et. 11.
s De bapt, infant. 8 De Remedio . . . pro parentis.
4 Theolog. Moral., ii., xi., 3.
162 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
cape the sad conclusion proclaimed by the Church.
Thus Klee holds that a lucid interval is accorded to in-
fants in the article of death, so that they may conceive
the wish for baptism.1 An obscure French writer sup-
poses that they may, " shut up in their mother's womb,
know God, love Him, and have the baptism of desire." a
A more obscure German conceives that infants remain
eternally in the same state of rational development in
which they die, and hence enjoy all they are capable
of ; if they die in the womb they either fall back into
the original force from which they were produced, or
enjoy a happiness no greater than that of trees.3 These
protests of the heart have awakened, however, no gen-
eral response in the Church,* which has preferred to
hold fast to the dogma that the failure of baptism in
infants, dying such, excludes ipso facto from heaven.
What the Church of Rome, therefore, teaches as to
the fate of infants of Christian parents dying such is,
briefly, as follows : " Baptism is necessary as a means
of salvation for both infants and adults. This neces-
sity is not such as to exclude exceptions as regards the
rite, though not as regards the substance and chief
effects, in case actual baptism is impossible. ... In
the case of adults the effect can be obtained by contri-
tion, perfect love of God, with a desire of baptism. . . .
In the case of infants who are dead in sin through shar-
ing in the guilt of Adam, and are incapable of making
an act of attrition, the only way they can enter the
kingdom of heaven is by baptism. ... As infants are
incapable of rational sentiments, their sanctification
must be the work of a sacrament, that is, a divinely
ordained rite that produces its effect while their souls
are passive." 5
' Dog. iii., 2, § i.
a De la Marne, Traite" metaphysique des Dogmes de la Triniti,
etc., Paris, 1826.
8 Hermessius, Zeitschr.f. Phil. u. kath. Theol., Bonn, 1832.
4 Compare Vasquez, in 3 P. s. Th., disp. cli., cap. 1 ; Hurter, op.
cit , 1878, iii., 516 sq. ; Perrone, Pralect. Theolog. (1839), vi., 55.
6 The Very Rev. William Byrne, D.D., Vicar-General of the Arch-
diocese of Baltimore, The Catholic Doctrine of Faith and Morals,
etc., Boston, 1892, pp. 224, 225.
THE DRIFT IN THE CHURCH OF ROME. 163
The comfort which is refused from the application
of the principle of baptism of intention to infants, is
sought by the Church ot Rome by mitigating still far-
ther than the scholastics themselves the nature of that
poena damni which alone it allows as punishment of
original sin. And if we may assume that such writers
as Perrone, Hurter, Gousset and Kendrick are typical
of modern Roman theology throughout the world,
certainly that theology may be said to have come, in
this pathway of mitigation, as near to positing salva-
tion for all infants dying unbaptized as the rather
intractable deliverances of early Popes and later coun-
cils permit to them. As the definitions of Florence
and Trent require of them, they all teach, of course,
(in the words of Perrone,1) " that children of this kind
descend into hell, or incur damnation ;" but (as Hur-
ter says"), " although all Catholics agree that infants
dying without baptism are excluded from the beatific
vision, and so suffer loss, are lost (j>ati damnum, datnna-
ri), they yet differ among themselves in their deter-
mination of the nature and condition of the state into
which such infants pass." As the idea of " damna-
tion" may thus be softened to a mere failure to attain^
so the idea of " hell" may be elevated to that of a
natural paradise.1 Hurter himself is inclined to a some-
what severer doctrine. But Perrone (supported by
1 Compend., 1861, i., 494, No. 585. a Op. cit., No. 729.
3 What is possible in the Church of Rome in the way of elevating the
idea of hell to that of a paradise may be interestingly investigated by
reading the notable discussion on The Happiness in Hell by Professor
St. George Mivart and others in The Nineteenth Century for Decem-
ber, 1892, and January. February, April, September, and December,
1893. Professor Mivart's language is such as this : " Hell in its widest
sense — namely, as including all those blameless souls who do not en-
joy the Beatific Vision — must be considered as, for them, an abode of
happiness transcending all our most vivid anticipations, so that man's
natural capacity for happiness is there gratified to the very utmost ;
nor is it even possible for the Catholic theologian of the most severe
and rigid school to deny that, thus considered, there is, and there
will for all eternity be, a real and true happiness in hell" (Dec.
1892, p. 919). Professor Mivart's articles have been placed on the In-
dex, and his language is extreme. But it is language which obvious-
ly expresses a widespread conviction among Roman teachers. And,
indeed, a hell for " blameless souls" could scarcely be more severe.
1 64 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
such great lights as Balmes, Berlage, Oswald, Lessius,
and followed not afar off by Gousset and Kendrick) re-
verts to the Pelagianizing view of Catharinus and Mo-
lina and Sfondrati — which Petau called a " fabrication"
championed indeed by Catharinus but originated "by
Pelagius the heretic," and which Bellarmine contend-
ed was contra fidem— and teaches that unbaptized infants
enter into a state deprived of all supernatural bene-
fits, to be sure, but endowed with all the happiness of
which pure nature is capable. Their state is described
as having the nature of penalty and of damnation when
conceived of relatively to the supernatural happiness
from which they are excluded by original sin ; but when
conceived of in itself and absolutely, it is a state of
pure nature, and accordingly the words of Thomas
Aquinas are applied to it : " They are joined to God
by participation in natural goods, and so also can re-
joice in natural knowledge and love." '
Thus, after so many ages, the Pelagian conception of
a middle state for infants dying unbaptized has ob-
tained its revenge upon the condemnation inflicted
upon it by the Church. To be sure, it is not admitted
that this is a return to Pelagianism. Perrone, for ex-
ample, argues that Pelagius held the doctrine of a natu-
ral beatitude for infants as one unrelated to sin, while
" Catholic theologians hold it with the death of sin ; so
that the exclusion from the beatific vision has the na-
ture of penalty and of damnation proceeding from sin. ' ' a
It may be doubted whether there is more than a verbal
difference here. Both Pelagius and the Church of
Rome consign infants dying unbaptized to a natural
paradise. In deference to the language of fathers and
councils and Popes, this natural paradise is formally
assigned by Roman theologians to that portion of the
other world designated " hell." But in its own nature
it is precisely what the Pelagians taught should be the
state of unbaptized infants after death. By what ex-
pedients such teaching is to be reconciled with the
other doctrines of the Church of Rome, or with its
former teaching on this same subject, or with its boast
1 Compend, 1861, i., 494, cf. ii., 252. a Ibid., 1861, i., 494, No. 590.
THE LUTHERAN TEACHING. 1 65
of semper eadem, is more interesting to its advocates
within that communion than to us.1 Our interest as
historians of opinion is exhausted in simply noting the
fact that the Pelagianizing process, begun in the Mid-
dle Ages by ascribing to infants guilty only of original
sin liability to poena damni alone, culminates in our day
in their assignment by the most representative theo-
logians of modern Rome to a natural paradise, which
has not been purchased for them by Christ but is their
natural right: This is of the very essence of Pelagian-
ism, and logically implies the whole Pelagian system."
The Lutheran Teaching.
This Pelagianizing drift may no doubt be regarded
as in part a reaction from the harshness of the Roman-
1 See some of the difficulties very mildly stated in Hurter, loc. cit.
2 It is not necessary to point out, e.g., that such a determination
implies a Pelagianizing doctrine of sin. When we make all the hap-
piness of which nature is capable the desert of original sin, there is
little to choose between this " doctrine of original sin" and its entire
denial. Some Roman writers appear to stand, therefore, on the verge
of sending all infants dying such to heaven, despite the explicit teach-
ing of the Church to the contrary. For example, S. J. Hunter, S.J.
(Outlines of Dogmatic Theology. New York : Benziger Bros., 1896,
vol. iii.) says at p. 229 : "We hold then that, after the promulga-
tion of the Gospel, infants who die without baptism of water or of
blood are not admitted to the supernatural vision of God, which con-
stitutes the happiness of heaven ; that in consequence of the sin of
Adam they will remain forever deprived of that happiness for which
they were destined. But this privation is no injustice to them, for
their nature gave them no claim in justice to a supernatural reward ;
nor does it imply any unhappiness in them, for they need not be sup-
posed to know what they have lost." And then he adds: "What
little can be said concerning the difficult subject of their state will be
found in the closing treatise of this volume. ' ' But when we turn to
the closing treatise of the volume, what we find is this (pp. 441, 442) :
" The Catholic doctrine is that hell is the portion of those who leave
this life with the guilt of actual mortal sin. If a sin be such that the
punishment of hell is more than is deserved by the malice involved,
then that sin is not a mortal sin. . . . We have already said what
was necessary concerning the lot of infants that die without baptism
either of water or of blood, and therefore still under the guilt of original
sin, but without actual sin." Thus we are sent back and forth on a
fruitless errand— except so far as we gather this : that as hell is for
those alone who are burdened with " the guilt of actual mortal sin,"
and as infants dying such are " without actual sin," hell is no place
for them. As there is no permanent state of existence between hea-
ven and hell, and infants are excluded from both, where do they go?
1 66 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
ist syllogism, " No man can attain salvation who is not
a member of Christ ; but no one becomes a member of
Christ except by baptism, received either in re or in
voto." ' So considered, its fault is that it impinges by
way of mitigation and modification on the major pre-
mise ; which, however, is the fundamental proposition
of Christianity. Its roots are planted, in the last analy-
sis, in a conception of men, not as fallen creatures,
children of wrath and deserving of a doom which can
only be escaped by becoming members of Christ, but
as creatures of God with claims on Him for natural
happiness, but, of course, with no claims on Him for
such additional supernatural benefits as He may yet
lovingly confer on His creatures in Christ. On the
other hand, that great religious movement which we
call the Reformation, the constitutive principle of
which was its revised doctrine of the Church, ranged
itself properly against the fallacious minor premise, and
easily broke its bonds with the sword of the Word.
Men are not constituted members of Christ through
the Church, but members of the Church through
Christ : they are not made the members of Christ by-
baptism which the Church gives, but by faith, the gift
of God ; and baptism is the Church's recognition of
this inner fact.
The full benefit ol this better apprehension of the
nature of that Church of God membership in which is
the condition of salvation, was not reaped, however,
by all Protestants in equal measure. It was the
strength of the Lutheran movement that it worked out
its positions not theoretically or all at once, but step by
step, as it was forced on by the logic of events and ex-
perience. But it was an incidental evil that, being
compelled to express its faith early, its first confession
was framed before the full development of Protestant
thought, and subsequently contracted the faith of Lu-
theranism into too narrow channels. The Augsburg
Confession contains the true doctrine of the Church as
the congregatio sanctorum ; but it committed Lutheran-
1 The words are Aquinas's (p. 3, q. 68, art. 1) ; see them quoted
and applied by Perrone, Comfiend., ii., 253.
THE LUTHERAN TEACHING. 1 67
ism to the doctrine that baptism is necessary to salva-
tion. This it did by teaching that children are not
saved without baptism (Art. IX.),1 inasmuch as the
condemnation and eternal death brought by original
sin upon all are not removed except from those who
are born again by baptism and the Holy Ghost (Art.
II.)." Surely by this declaration the necessity of bap-
tism is made the necessity of means." And the doctrine
of the Augsburg Confession is repeated in the Formula
Concordiae. In this symbol the Anabaptists are con-
demned because they teach " that infants not baptized
are not sinners before God, but just and innocent, and
in this their innocence, when they have not as yet the
use of reason, may, without baptism (of which, to wit,
in the opinion of the Anabaptists they have no need)
attain unto salvation. And in this way they reject the
whole doctrine of original sin, and all the consequences
that follow therefrom." From this it seems clear that
to the framers of the Formula it is one of the conse-
quences which follow from original sin that even in-
fants, dying before the use of reason, cannot attain unto
salvation without baptism ; and this inference is
strengthened by the subsequent article which con-
demns the Anabaptists for teaching " that the children
of Christians, on the ground that they are sprung from
Christian and believing parents, are in very deed holy,
and are to be accounted as belonging to the children
of God, even apart from and before the receiving of
baptism." Whence it would seem to follow that they
1 " Of baptism they teach that it is necessary to salvation. . . .
They condemn the Anabaptists, who allow not the baptism of chil-
dren, and affirm that children are saved without baptism," "and
outside the Church of Christ," as is added in ed. 1540. (Schaff,
Creeds of Ckrzstendotn, iii., p. 13.)
2 " Also they teach that, after Adam's fall, all men begotten after
the common course of nature are born with sin ; . . . and that this
disease of original fault is truly sin, condemning and bringing eternal
death now also upon all that are not born again by baptism and the
Holy Spirit. They condemn the Pelagians and others who deny this
original fault to be sin indeed, and who, so as to lessen the glory of
the merits and the benefits of Christ, argue that a man may, by the
strength of his own reason, be justified before God" (Schaff, loc.
cit., p. 81.)
5 - ^JLc c <- -
.
1 68 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
are made holy first and only by baptism.1 These de-
liverances have naturally been felt to require some mol-
lifying interpretation, and in this direction the theo-
logians have urged : i. That the necessity affirmed is
not absolute but ordinary, and binds man and not God.
2. That as the assertion is directed against the Ana-
baptists, it is not the privation but the contempt of
baptism that is affirmed to be damning. 3. That the
necessity of baptism is not intended to be equalized
with that of the Holy Ghost. 4. That the affirmation
is not that for original sin alone any one is actually
damned, but only that all are therefor damnable.
There is force undoubtedly in these considerations.
But they obviously do not avail wholly to relieve the
Lutheran formularies of limiting salvation to those who
enjoy the means of grace, and, as concerns infants, to
those who receive the sacrament of baptism.
It is not to be contended, of course, that these for-
mularies assert such an absolute necessity of baptism
for infants, dying such, as can admit of no exceptions.
From Luther and Melanchthon down, Lutheran theolo-
gians have always taught what Hunnius expressed in
the Saxon Visitation Articles : " Unless a person be
born again of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter into
the kingdom of heaven. Cases of necessity are riot in-
tended, however, by t/iis." 2 Lutheran theology, in other
words, has taken its stand positively on the ground of
baptism of intention as applied to infants, as over
against its denial by the Church of Rome. " Luther,"
says Dorner,3 " holds fast, in general, to the necessity
of baptism in order to salvation, but in reference to the
children of Christians who have died unbaptized, he
says : ' The Holy and Merciful God will think kindly
of them. What He will do with them He has revealed
to no one, that baptism may not be despised, but has
reserved to His own mercy ; God does wrong to no
man.' " * From the fact that Jewish children dying be-
1 Schaff's Creeds of Christendom, iii., pp. 174, 175.
1 Ibid., iii., 184.
8 Hist, of Protestant Theology (E.T.), i., 171.
4 Opp., xxii., 872 (Dorner' s quotation).
THE LUTHERAN TEACHING. 169
fore circumcision were not lost, Luther argues that
neither are Christian children dying before baptism ;'
and he comforts Christian mothers ot still-born babes
by declaring that they should understand that such in-
fants are saved.3 So Bugenhagen, under Luther's
direction, teaches that Christians' children intended
for baptism are not left to the hidden judgment of God
if they fail of baptism, but have the promise of being
received by Christ into His kingdom.3 It is not neces-
sary to quote later authors on a point on which all are
unanimous ; let it suffice to add only the clear state-
ment of the developed Lutheranism of John Gerhard
(1610-22) :4 " We walk in the middle way, teaching
that baptism is, indeed, the ordinary sacrament of initia-
tion and means ot regeneration necessary to all, even
to the children of believers, for regeneration and sal-
vation ; but yet that in the event of privation or im-
possibility the children of Christians are saved by an
extraordinary and peculiar divine dispensation. For
the necessit}7 of baptism is not absolute, but ordinary ;
we on our part are obliged to the necessity of baptism,
but there must be no denial of the extraordinary action
of God in infants offered to Christ by pious parents and
the Church in prayers, and dying before the oppor-
tunity of baptism can be given them, since God does not
so bind His grace and saving efficacy to baptism as that,
in the event of privation, He may not both wish and be
able to act extraordinarily. We distinguish, then, be-
tween necessity on God 's part and on our part ; between
the case of privatio?i and the ordinary way ; and also be-
tween infants born in the Church and out of the Church.
Concerning infants born out of the Church, we say
with the apostle (i Cor. v. 12, 13), ' For what have f
to do with judging them that are without ? Do not
you judge them that are within ? For them that are
without God judgeth.' Wherefore, since there is no
1 Com. in Gen., c. 17. 2 Christliche Bedenken.
3 See for several such* quotations brought together, Laurence,
Bampton Lectures, 1804, ed. 1S20, p. 272. Also Gerhard as in next
note.
4 Ed. Cotta, vol. ix., p. 284.
170 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
promise concerning them, we commit them to God's
judgment ; and yet we hold to no place intermediate
between heaven and hell, concerning which there is
utter silence in Scripture. But concerning infants
born in the Church we have better hope. Pious par-
ents properly bring their children as soon as possible to
baptism as the ordinary means of regeneration, and
offer them in baptism to Christ ; and those who are
negligent in this, so as through lack of care or wicked
contempt for the sacrament to deprive their children
of baptism, shall hereafter render a very heavy account
to God, since they have ' despised the counsel of God '
(Luke vii. 30). Yet neither can nor ought we rashly
to condemn those infants which die in their mothers'
wombs or by some sudden accident before they receive
baptism, but may rather hold that the prayers of pious
parents, or, if the parents are negligent of this, the
prayers of the Church poured out for these infants
are clemently heard, and they are received by God into
grace and life."
From this passage we may learn not only the cordial
acceptance given by Lutheran theologians to the ex-
tension of the baptism of intention to infants, but also
the historical attitude of Lutheranism toward the en-
tirely different question of the fate of infants dying out-
side the pale of the Church and the reach of its ordi-
nances. These infants are a multitude so vast that it
is wholly unreasonable to suppose them (like Chris-
tians' children deprived of baptism) simply exceptions
to the rule laid down in the Augsburg Confession.
And it is perfectly clear that the Lutheran Confessions
extend no hope for them. It is doubtful whether it
can even be said that they leave room for hope for
them. Melanchthon in the Apology is no doubt arguing
against the Anabaptists, and intends to prove only that
children should be baptized ; but his words in explana-
tion of Art. IX. deserve consideration in this connec-
tion also — where he argues that " the promise of salva-
tion" " does not pertain to those who are without the
Church of Christ, where there is neither the Word nor
the Sacraments, because the kingdom of Christ exists
THE LUTHERAN TEACHING. 171
only with the Word and the Sacraments." Luther's
personal opinion as to the fate of heathen children
dying in infancy is in doubt : now he expresses the
hope that the good and gracious God may have some-
thing good in view for them ; ' and again/though leav-
ing it to the future to decide, he only expects some-
thing milder for them than for the adults outside the
Church : a and Bugenhagen, under his eye, contrasts
the children of Turks and Jews with those of Chris-
tians, as not sharers in salvation because not in Christ.3
From the very first the opinion of the theologians was
divided on the subject. (1) Some held that all infants
except those baptized in fact or intention are lost, and
ascribed to them, of course — for this was the Prot-
estant view of the desert of original sin — both privative
and positive punishment. This party included such
theologians as Quistorpius, Calovius, Fechter, Zeibi-
chius, Buddeus. (2) Others judged that we may cher-
ish the best of hope for their salvation. Here belong
Dannhauer, Hulsemann, Scherzer, J. A. Osiander,
Wagner, Musaeus, Cotta, and Spener. (3) But the
great body of Lutherans, including such names as Ger-
hard, Calixtus, Meisner, Baldwin, Bechmann, Hoff-
mann, Hunnius, held that nothing is clearly revealed
as to the fate of such infants, and they must be left to
the judgment of God. (a) Some of these, like Hun-
nius, were inclined to believe that they will be saved.
{b) Others, with more (like Hoffmann) or less (like Ger-
hard) clearness, were rather inclined to believe they
will be lost. But all of them alike held that the means
for a certain decision are not in our hands.4 Thus
Hunnius says : 6 " That the infants of Gentiles, outside
the Church, are saved, we cannot pronounce as certain,
since there exists nothing definite in the Scriptures
concerning the matter ; so neither do I dare simply
to assert that these children are indiscriminately
1 Cf. Dorner, Hist. Prot. TheoL, i., 171.
s Cf. Laurence, Bampton Lectures, p. 272.
3 Lbz'd.
4 This classification is taken from Cotta (Gerhard's Loci, ix., 282).
6 Qucest. in cap. vii. Gen.
172 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATIOA
damned. . . . Let us commit them, therefore, to the
judgment of God." And Hoffmann says : ' " On the
question, whether the infants of the heathen nations
are lost, most of our theologians prefer to suspend
their judgment. To affirm as a certain thing that they
are lost could not be done without rashness."
This cautious agnostic position has the best right to
be called the historical Lutheran attitude on the subject.
It is even the highest position thoroughly consistent
with the genius of the Lutheran system and the stress
which it lays on the means of grace. The drift in more
modern times has, however, been decidedly in the
direction of affirming the salvation of all that die in
infancy, on grounds identical with those pleaded by
this party from the beginning — the infinite mercy of
God, the universality of the atonement, the inability of
infants to resist grace, their guiltlessness of despising
the ordinance, and the like.2 Even so, however, care-
ful modern Lutherans moderate their assertions. They
may affirm that " it is not the doctrine of our Confes-
sion that any human creature has ever been or ever
will be lost purely for original sin ;" 3 but they speak
of the matter as a " dark" or a " difficult question," *
and suspend the salvation of such infants on an " ex-
traordinary" and " uncovenanted" exercise of God's
mercy.5 We cannot rise to a conviction ora " faith"
in the matter, but may attain to a " well-grounded
hope," based on our apprehension of God's all-embrac-
ing mercy.6 In short, it is not contended that the Lu-
theran doctrine lays a foundation for a conviction of the
salvation of all infants dying in infancy ; at the best it
is held to leave open an uncontradicted hope. We are
afraid we must say more : it seems to contradict this
hope. For should this hope prove true, it would no
longer be true that " baptism is necessary to salvation"
even ordinarily ; the exception would be the rule. Nor
1 See Krauth, Co7iservative Reformation, p. 433.
s Compare the statements in Cotta and Krauth, locc. citt.
3 Krauth, I.e., p. 429. 4 lb., pp. 561-563.
5 lb., pp. 430, 437.
6 lb., Infant Salvation in the Calvinistic System, p. 22.
THE LUTHERAN TEACHING. 173
would the fundamental conception of the Lutheran the-
ory of salvation — that grace is in the means of grace —
be longer tenable. The logic of the Lutheran system
leaves little room for the salvation of all infants, dying
in infancy, and if their salvation should prove to be a
fact, the integrity of the system is endangered.
That it is not merely the letter of the Lutheran for-
mularies which needs to be transcended, if we are to
cherish a hope for the salvation of all infants dying
such, but the distinctive principle of the Lutheran sys-
tem, is doubtless the cause of the great embarrassment
exhibited by Lutheran writers in dealing with this
problem, and of the extraordinary expedients which
are sometimes resorted to for its solution. Thus, for
example, Klieforth knows nothing better to suggest
than that unbaptized children dying in their infancy,
whether children of Christian parents or of infidel,
stand in the same category with adult heathen, and are
to have an opportunity to exercise saving faith when
the Lord calls them before Him for judgment on His
second coming. And the genial Norse missionary
bishop Dahle, though he recognizes the scriptural dis-
tinction between the infants ot Christian and those ot
heathen parents (1 Cor. vii. 14), seeks in vain to ground
a hope on which he may rest his heart even for Chris-
tians' infants ; and ends by falling back on the conjec-
ture of the mediating theology of an opportunity for
receiving Christ extended in the future life to those
who have not enjoyed that opportunity here ; thus, in
other words, in his own way also assimilating the in-
fant children of Christians with heathen. " The sum
of the whole," he says, in concluding his discussion,
" is that we may entertain a hope of salvation and bliss
for our unbaptized children immediately after death,
yet not more than a hope. But the question is still un-
answered. Under any circumstances we have this con-
solation : that if the hope shall be unfounded such chil-
dren will at least have the opportunity of the uncalled
at some time to receive God's gracious call."1 For
1 Lars Nielsen Dahle, Life After Death, etc., translated from the
Norse by the Rev. John Beveridge, M.A., B.D. (Edinburgh,.! 896), p. 227.
174 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
the Lutheran the question is thus still unanswered, and
must remain unanswered. The restrained paragraph
with which Dahle opens his discussion appears, indeed,
to put into words what every Lutheran must feel :
' ' This is a very difficult— indeed, we might almost say
a hitherto unanswered — question," he says. ' ' All sal-
vation is connected with Christ. But we come into
connection with Him only through the means of grace ;
at all events, we do not know of any other way to
Christ than this. Now, the means of grace are the
Word and the sacraments. But the child is not sus-
ceptible to such means of grace as are afforded in the
Word of God, which directs itself to the developed per-
sonal life ; and so we have only the sacraments left. Of
these, baptism is the one which incorporates into fel-
lowship with Christ, and thereby with the Triune God,
into whose name the candidate is baptized (Matt, xxvii.
19). Now, if a child is not susceptible to the means of
grace of the Word, and does not receive the opportu-
nity of baptism, is there any means whereby it can
come into connection with Christ, apart from whom
there is no salvation ? This is the knot which no one
yet has been able to undo." '
The Anglican Position.
A similar difficulty has been experienced by all
types of Protestant thought in which the Roman idea of
the Church, as primarily an external body, has been
incompletely reformed. This may be illustrated, for
example, from the history of opinion in the Church of
England. The Thirty-nine Articles in their final
form are thoroughly Protestant and Reformed. And
many of the greatest English theologians, from the very
earliest days of the Reformation, even among those not
most closely affiliated with Geneva, have repudiated
the " scrupulous superstition" 2 of the Church of Rome
1 Lars Nielsen Dahle, Life After Death, translated from the
Norse by the Rev. John Beveridge, M.A., B.D. (Edinburgh, 1896),
pp. 219, 220.
2 Reform. Legum ; de Baptismo : " Illorum etiam videri debet
scrupulosa superstitio, qui Dei gratiam et Spiritum Sanctum tanto-
THE ANGLICAN POSITION. 1 75
as to the fate of infants dying unbaptized. But such
repudiation neither was immediate, nor has it ever
been universal. And it must needs be confessed that
this " scrupulous superstition" was so deeply imbedded
in the forms of the Book of Common Prayer, that it
has survived all the changes which successive revis-
ions have brought to its language, and remains to-day
the natural implication of its Baptismal Offices.
The history of the formularies of the Church of Eng-
land begins with the publication in 1536 of the some-
what more than semi- Romish Articles devised by the
Kinges Highnes Mqfestie, to stably she Christen quietnes and
unitie amonge us, and to avoyde contentious opinions, which
articles be also approved by the consent and determination
of the hole clergie of this realme? commonly known as
the " Ten Articles." These Articles explicitly teach
the twin doctrines of baptismal regeneration and the
necessity of baptism for salvation. Among the things
which "ought and must of necessity" be believed re-
garding baptism, they tell us, is " that it is offered unto
all men, as well infants as such as have the use of rea-
son, that by baptism they shall have remission of sins,
and the grace and favourof God ;" that it is " by virtue
of that holy sacrament" that men obtain " the grace and
remission of all their sins ;" and that it is " in and by
this said sacrament" which they shall receive," that
' ' God the Father giveth unto them, for His son Jesus
Christ's sake, remission of all their sins, and the grace
of the Holy Ghost, whereby they be newly regener-
ated and made the very children of God." Accord-
pere cum sacramentonim dementis colligant, ut plane affirment,
nullum Christianorum infantem salutem esse consecuturum, qui prius
morte fuerit occupatus, quam ad Baptismum adduci potuerit : quod
longe secus habere judicamus." This code of laws seems to have
been drawn up by a commission with Cranmer at the head of it. It
was published by Parker in 15 71.
' " As seen by us, from the position we now occupy," says Hard-
wick (A History of the Articles of Religion, etc. Third ed. revised
by the Rev. Francis Procter, M.A., etc. London: Bell, 1876,
p. 42), " these articles belong to a transition-period. They embody
the ideas of men who were emerging gradually into a different sphere
of thought, who could not for the present contemplate the truth they
were recovering, either in its harmonies or contrasts, and who conse-
176 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
ingly they " ought and must of necessity" also believe
that " the sacrament of baptism was instituted and or-
dained in the New Testament by our Saviour Jesu
Christ, as a thing necessary for the attaining of ever-
lasting life ;" that original sin cannot be remitted
" but by the sacrament of baptism ;" and that, there-
fore, since " the promise of grace and everlasting life
(which promise is adjoined unto this sacrament of
baptism) pertaineth not only unto such as have the use
of reason, but also to infants, innocents, and children,"
they " ought therefore and must needs be baptized,"
and " by the sacrament of baptism, they do also obtain
remission of their sins, the grace and favour of God,
and be made thereby the very sons and children of
God ;" " insomuch as infants and children dying in
their infancy shall undoubtedly be saved thereby, and
else not."' The express assertion of the loss of all
unbaptized infants included in these last words was
taken over from the " Ten Articles" into TJie Institu-
tion of the Christian Man, commonly called " The
Bishop's Book," which was published in 1537 ;' and
thence, though with the omission of the final words in
which the statement reaches its climax, into The Neces-
sary Doctrine and Erudition of Any Christian Man, com-
monly called " The King's Book," which was published
in 1543. 3 Here its career in the doctrinal formularies
ceased.
quently did not shrink from acquiescing in accommodations and con-
cessions, which to riper understandings might have seemed like the
betrayal of a sacred trust." Dr. Schakf repels Dixon's description
{History of the Reformation, i., p. 415) of these articles as bearing
" the character of a compromise between the old and the new learn-
ing." " They are essentially Romish," he says (Creeds of Christen-
dom, i., 611), " with the Pope left out in the cold ;" and he endorses
Foxe's characterization of them (which Hardwick deprecates) as in-
tended for " weakelings, which were newely weyned from their
mother's milke of Rome."
1 The full text may be conveniently read in Hardwick, as above,
p. 242 sq.
2 The text may be seen in Bishop Lloyd's Formularies of Faith in
the Reign of Henry VIII., p. 1.
3 Ibia. Cf. Francis Procter, A History of the Book of Common
Prayer, etc. 15th ed. London and New York : Macmillan & Co.,
1881, pp. 384, 385, note 1.
THE ANGLICAN POSITION. 177
But it still had a part to play in the liturgical forms
of the Church of England. The first Book of Common
Prayer was published in 1549, and in it, among the
rubrics which precede the Order of Confirmation, is
found this parargaph : " And that no man shall think
that any detriment shall come to children by deferring
of their confirmation : he shall know for truth, that it
is certain by God's word, that children being baptized
(if they depart out of this life in their infancy) are un-
doubtedly saved."1 In the Prayer Book for 1552 this
was so far altered that its latter portion reads, " That
children being baptized have all things necessary for
their salvation, and be undoubtedly saved ;"2 and so it
stands in the Elizabethan Prayer Book of 1559, and
substantially in later issues, until in the Prayer Book
of 1661 it was transferred to the end of the order for
the Public Baptism of Infants in the form : " It is cer-
tain by God's Word, that Children which are baptized,
dying before they commit actual sin, are undoubtedly
saved." Thus it still remains in the Book of Common
Prayer according to the use of the Church of England,
although it has dropped out of the Prayer Book ac-
cording to the use of the Protestant Episcopal Church
in the United States of America.
The successive alterations in this statement, no
doubt, mark in a general way the growing Protestant
sentiment in the Church of England, although it is
noteworthy that the omission of the most obnoxious
words, " and else not," in which the condemnation of
unbaptized infants, dying in infancy, is made express,
first occurs in the reactionary " King's Book," while
the effect of the transposition of the rubric from the
Confirmation Service to that for Baptism, which took
place so late as 1661, was distinctly reactionary. Its
primary effect, standing in the Confirmation Service,
1 The Two Liturgies, A.D. 1549 and A.D. 1552, etc., edited for
the Parker Society, by the Rev, Joseph Ketley, M.A., etc. (Cam-
bridge, 1844, p. 121).
1 Ibid., p. 295. The two may be found together in The Two
Books of Common Prayer set forth . . . in the Reign of King Ed-
ward the Sixth, by Edward Cardwell, D.D., etc. (Oxford, 1852,
P- 544)-
178 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
was to declare that confirmation is not necessary to
salvation ; and any implication which may be thought to
reside in the words of the necessity of baptism to sal-
vation was entirely incidental. While, standing at the
end of the Baptismal Service, its primary effect seems
to be to declare the certain efficacy of baptism when
administered to infants, and the implication of the loss
of the unbaptized infants dying in infancy is certainly
more natural, even if not necessary. The explanation
of this reactionary alteration is to be found, of course,
in the general spirit which governed the revision of
1661, which not only was hostile to the more Protestant
party in the Church, but was determined upon all pos-
sible insult and degradation to it.1
The more Protestant party had, of course, never been
satisfied with this rubric ; and it had, of late, necessarily
received its share of criticism. The committee of di-
vines appointed by the House of Lords in 1641 had
proposed the omission from it of the words, ' ' and be
undoubtedly saved."3 The Presbyterian divines at
the Savoy Conference had commented on it : " Al-
though we charitably suppose the meaning of these
words was only to exclude the necessity of any other
sacraments to baptized infants ; yet these words
are dangerous as to the misleading of the vulgar, and
therefore we desire they may be expunged." 8 The
1 Observe how even Cardweli, speaks of the general spirit of this
revision {A History of Conferences and other Proceedings connected
with the Revision of the Book of Common Prayer, etc. Third ed.
Oxford, 1849, pp. 387 sq.) and the warning he draws from it (pp. 463
sq.) : " Let it be remembered, also, on the part of nonconformists,
that whenever objection is made against any expressions as ambigu-
ous or indefinite, other parties, of different and even opposite opin-
ions, will be as ready as they themselves are, to offer amendments.
In such a case, the result will probably be that phrases, which had
previously afforded a common shelter to both, will be made precise
and contracted in accordance with the wishes of the more rigid inter-
preters. Let it be remembered that if one party complain of a strict
adherence to forms and a tendency toward superstition, another
party, more compact, more learned, and more resolute, may call for
the restoration of prayers and usages which once found a place in the
liturgy, and were removed by the fathers of the reformation as too
nearly allied to Romanism."
5 Cardwell, as cited, p, 276. 3 Ibid., p. 327.
THE ANGLICAN POSITION. 179
answer of the bishops was not conciliatory : "It is
evident that the meaning of these words is, that chil-
dren baptized, and dying before they commit actual
sin, are undoubtedly saved, though they be not con-
firmed : wherein we see not what danger there can
be of misleading the vulgar by teaching them truth.
But there may be danger in this desire of hav-
ing these words expunged, as if they were false ; for
St. Austin says he is an infidel that denies them to
be true. Ep. 23. ad Bonifac."1 This defence of the
rubric obviously is ad rem only in the form and place
which it had in the Confirmation Service. When, as
was immediately done, it was removed from its place
in the Confirmation Service and, curtailed of all refer-
ence to confirmation, inserted into the Baptismal Order
in the sharply assertive form : " It is certain by God's
Word, that Children which are baptized, dying before
they commit actual sin, are undoubtedly saved," it
must be accounted one of the alterations designed to
exclude a Protestant interpretation of the Book of
Common Prayer ; and as, in the intention of the authors
of the change at all events, no longer open to the inter-
pretation that it does not imply the necessity of bap-
tism for salvation but only asserts that confirmation is
not necessary to salvation. It was obviously intended
by those who gave it its present form and place to
1 Cardwell, as cited, p. 358. The reference to Augustine is to Ep. 98
in the Benedictine enumeration (§ 10). Augustine is discussing the pro-
priety and effect of baptism prior to the exercise of active faith on
the part of the recipient, and says : ' ' During the time in which he is
by reason of youth unable to do this, the sacrament will avail for his
protection against adverse powers, and will avail so much on his
behalf, that if before he arrives at the use of reason he depart from
this life, he is delivered by Christian help, namely, by the love of
the Church, commending him through the sacrament unto God, from
that condemnation which by one man entered into the world. He
who does not believe this, and thinks that it is impossible, is assuredly
an unbeliever, although he may have received the sacrament of
faith ; and far before him in merit is the infant which, though not
yet possessing a faith helped by the understanding, is not obstructing
faith by any antagonism of the understanding, and therefore receives
with profit the sacrament of faith" (translation of the Rev. J. G. Cun-
ningham, M.A., in The Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, first series,
vol. i., p. 410).
180 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
assert baptismal regeneration, and to leave whatever
implications the doctrine of baptismal regeneration
may include as the natural teaching of the rubric. .
Nor can it be denied that, as assertorial of bap-
tismal regeneration, the rubric finds a very natural
place in the Book of Common Prayer. It was inevita-
ble that in the beginning of the Reformation movement
remainders of the unreformed doctrine of baptismal
regeneration should intrench themselves in the liturgi-
cal offices of the Church. As a matter of fact, the
assumption of this doctrine underlay a good deal of
the language relative to baptism in the first Prayer
Book (1549).1 This may be true even of the words of
the opening address, which recite the fact of original
sin and declare that ' ' no man born in sin can enter
into the kingdom of God (except he be regenerate and
born anew of water and the Holy Ghost)." It is more
clearly true of the language of the opening prayer,
where the figure of baptism found in the flood and the
passage through the Red Sea is developed rather on
the negative than on the positive side ; and God is
besought, therefore, to look mercifully upon these chil-
dren, " that by this wholesome laver of regeneration,
whatsoever sin is in them may be washed clean away ;
that they, being delivered from His wrath, may be re-
ceived into the ark of Christ's church, and so be saved
from perishing." Similarly, after " the white ves-
ture" had been given to the child " for a token of the
innocence which by God's grace, in this holy sacra-
ment of baptism, is given unto it," the priest was to
bless the child in the name of the God " who hath re-
generate it by water and the Holy Ghost, and hath
given unto it remission of all its sins." When a child
privately baptized was brought to the church for the
priest to examine whether it had been lawfully bap-
tized, if it were so decided, the minister was to certify
the parents of their well-doing in having the child bap-
tized, because it "is now, by the laver of regeneration
1 The quotations that follow are taken from the text as given by
Cardwei.l, The Two Books of Common Prayer . . . in the Reign
of King Edward the Sixth, etc., 3d ed. Oxford, 1852, pp. 320 sq.
THE ANGLICAN POSITION. 181
in baptism, made the child of God, and heir of ever-
lasting- life." The same implication naturally underlay
also the whole form for the sanctification of the font,
which appears only in this earliest of Anglican Prayer
Books. In it God is said to have " ordained the ele-
ment of water for the regeneration of His faithful peo-
ple," and is asked to sanctify "this fountain of bap-
tism . . . that by the power of His word all those that
should be baptized therein might be spiritually regen-
erated and made the children of everlasting adoption."
In the Catechism included in the Confirmation Service,
the child is instructed to say that it was in its bap-
tism that it ' ' was made a member of Christ, the child
of God, and the inheritor of the kingdom of heaven ;"
while in the Invocation in the Confirmation Service
itself God is addressed as He " who has vouchsafed to
regenerate these His servants of water and the Holy
Ghost, and also has given unto them forgiveness of all
their sins."
The revising hand was, to be sure, as busy with this
as with other portions of the Prayer Book. In par-
ticular, the opening prayer was already in the second
Prayer Book (1552) brought into substantially the form
which it still preserves : and this involved not only
the omission of the words, " and so saved from perish-
ing"— " expressions," as even Laurence is forced to
admit, " too unequivocal to be misconceived," in
their exclusion of all unbaptized infants from salva-
tion1— but also a recasting of the whole tone of the
prayer. But the revision was never complete enough
to exscind the underlying doctrine of baptismal regen-
eration ; and, in the shifting opinion of the Church of
England, after a while a reaction set in in its favor,
which not only resisted all attempts to eliminate it,a
1 Laurence, Bampton Lectures for 1804, rev. ed., Oxford, 1820,
p. 71. Compare Procter, A History of the Book of Common
Prayer, 15th ed, 1881, p. 374, note 1 ; Schaff, Creeds of Christen-
dom, i., 642.
s It was naturally against this doctrine that the " Puritan party"
directed their most persistent objection. See the form of their objec-
tions in the documents printed by Cardwell, A History of Confer-
1 82 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
but added new expressions of it.1 So it came about
that when the Presbyterians at the Savoy Conference
represented it as a hardship that ministers should " be
forced to pronounce all baptized infants to be regener-
ate by the Holy Ghost, whether they be the children
of Christians or not," and protested that they could
not " in faith say," as required to say in the Thanks-
giving-, " that every child that is baptized is ' regener-
ated by God's Holy Spirit,' " 2 the bishops' reply sim-
ply asserts in terms the obnoxious doctrine : " Seeing
that God's sacraments have their effects, where the re-
ceiver doth not ' ponere obicem,' put any bar against
them (which children cannot do) ; we may say in faith
of every child that is baptized, that it is regenerated by
God's Holy Spirit." 3 There seems to be little room
for doubting, therefore, that these expressions were
retained by the revisers of 1661 not as " ambiguous
and indefinite," but as distinct enunciations, and just
because they were judged to be distinct enunciations,
of the doctrine of baptismal regeneration. We must
adjudge Laurence right, therefore, in finding this doc-
trine plainly taught in the Book of Common Prayer as
now in use ; nor can we see how his summing up of
the case can be set aside. " In the prayer after Bap-
tism," he says, " every child is expressly declared to
be regenerated : ' We yield thee hearty thanks, most
merciful Father, that it hath pleased thee to regenerate
this infant with thy Holy Spirit, to receive him for
thine own child by adoption, and to incorporate him
into thy holy Church.' And in the Office of private
Baptism it is unreservedly stated, that he ' is now by
the laver of regeneration in Baptism received into the
number of the children of God, and heirs of everlasting
life.' That all baptized children are not nominally,
ences, etc., 3d ed., Oxford, 1849, pp. 266, 276, 325, 326 ; and the an-
swers of the bishops, pp. 357 and 358.
1 For example, the thanksgiving address and prayer after baptism
inserted in the Prayer Book of 1552, which declare the baptized child
to be regenerate, and the questions, at the end of the Catechism, on
the sacraments, added apparently in 1604, which declare that " we
are made the children of grace" by baptism.
a Cakdwell, as cited, pp. 276, 325 ; cf. 326. 3 Ibid., p. 356.
THE ANGLICAN POSITION. 183
but really, the elect of God, our Church Catechism
likewise distinctly asserts. ' Q. Who gave you that
name ? A. My Godfathers and Godmothers in my Bap-
tism, wherein I was made a member of Christ, the child
of God, and an inheritor of the kingdom of heaven.'' . . .
Nor is the position, that an actual regeneration always
takes place confined to our Baptismal service, but also
subsequently recognized in the Order of Confirmation,
the first prayer of which thus commences : ' Almighty
and everlasting God, who hast vouchsafed to regenerate
these thy servants by water, and the Holy Ghost,'' " etc.
" Surely," he adds, with some justice, " it requires
something more than a common share of ingenuity to
pervert language like this from its plain grammatical
sense, into one directly repugnant."1
On the basis of this doctrine of baptismal regenera-
tion, thus clearly implied in her forms of worship and
firmly retained in their latest revision, the Church of
England is justified in asserting with the emphasis with
which the rubric at the close of the Baptismal Service
asserts it, that" it is certain" " that Children which
are baptized, dying before they commit actual sin, are
undoubtedly saved." Whether, however, this asser-
tion carries with it, as Laurence contends, no implica-
tion of the loss of those who die unbaptized, is more
questionable." The mere change of language from the
earlier form of " children being baptized" into the
more distinguishing seventeenth-century form of " chil-
dren which are baptized," bears a contrary sugges-
tion. And the arguments which Laurence adduces
from the known opinions of Cranmer and his coadju-
tors, and from the elimination from the earlier forms,
under their hand, of phrases which assert the necessity
of baptism to salvation, are vitiated by the fatal flaw
1 Op. cit , pp. 440, 441.
8 Op cit., pp. 70 and 176. Laurence contends that " the Reformers"
intended by the language of the Prayer Book in no way " to establish
any opinion inconsistent with the salvation of infants unbaptized :"
" the very reverse of this is the fact," he thinks. And thus it has
become customary to speak. So, e.g., Procter, Op. cit., p. 384,
note 1 : and even Blunt, The Annotated Book of Common Prayer
(London, 1866), ii., 230, although himself inclining to believe the loss
1 84 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
that he neglects to distinguish times and seasons.1
That the leaders of the Reformation in England ad-
vanced rapidly from a semi-Romish, through a Luther-
an, to a Reformed stage of opinion, and that their
handiwork in the public formularies of the Church
bears traces of this growth, is true enough. But it
does not follow that every product of their labors must,
therefore, have left their hands in a form which repre-
sents their highest attainments in doctrinal thought ;
or that every one has reached us in the precise form
which they gave it. That much that was inconsistent
with the better thought of the Protestant world was
eliminated from the first Prayer Book of 1549 in its
passage through the Book of 1552 to the Elizabethan
Book of 1559 is thankfully to be recognized. But it
must needs be recognized also that much was left in it
which was scarcely consistent with the higher point
of view which had been only gradually attained by the
Reformers themselves ; and that in the reactionary re-
vision of the seventeenth century this unreformed ele-
ment was even increased.3
of all infants dying unbaptized. These opinions would seem, how-
ever, to be too little determined by historical considerations. See
further below.
1 In some cases also his knowledge of historic facts was defective.
2 It must be thankfully recognized also that a more complete refor-
mation of doctrinal statement was accomplished in the doctrinal for-
mularies of the Church of England than in her devotional forms.
This is probably due to the singular discontinuity in the growth of
the doctrinal formularies, by which the later Articles were saved from
corruption through inheritance from the earlier and more tentative
attempts to state the reformed faith. The first Prayer Book (1549)
stands at the basis of and contributes its substance to the whole
series of Prayer Books. But the first doctrinal formularies, the " Ten
Articles" and the "Bishop's" and "King's Books," though they
contributed to the Prayer Book the very rubric in which the assertion
of baptismal regeneration reaches its climax, had little effect on the
development of the "Articles of Religion." For them, an entirely
new beginning was made in the " Thirteen Articles" of 1538, which
were formed under Lutheran influence and rather on the basis of
Lutheran than earlier Anglican formularies. In these Articles the
Lutheran doctrine of the sacraments, of course, finds expression, and
is sometimes even strengthened. In Article 2, for example, it is
asserted that original sin condemns and brings eternal death "to
those who are not born again by baptism and the Holy Spirit." In
Article 4 it is declared that " by the word and sacraments, as by in-
THE ANGLICAN POSITION. 1 85
Whatever may be thought, however, of the implica-
tions of the doctrine taught in the Prayer Book, this
much is at least certain — that the formularies of the
Church of England hold out absolutely no hope for
the salvation of infants who die unbaptized. They
assert with great strength of language the certainty of
the salvation of all baptized children dying in infancy.
As to those who die unbaptized, they at the least pre-
serve a profound silence. " This assertion," says Mr.
Francis Procter, the learned historian of the Book of
Common Prayer, " carefully avoids all mention of
children unbaptized. . . . Our Reformers are intend-
ing to speak only of that which is revealed — the cove-
nanted mercy of Almighty God." ' Whence we may
learn that, in the judgment of Mr. Procter at least,
the Prayer Book knows of no covenanted mercy of
God for children dying before baptism, and can find
nothing in God's revealed word which will justify an
struments, the Hoi)' Spirit is given, who effects faith when and where
it seems good to God, in those who hear the Gospel." These state-
ments came from the Augsburg Confession. Article 6, "on Bap-
tism," teaches, in the words of the Augsburg Confession, that " bap-
tism is necessary to salvation, and by baptism remission of sins and
the grace of Christ are offered to infants and adults." Then it is
added that " by baptism infants receive remission of sins and grace
and are the children of God," and " that the Holy Spirit is efficacious
even in infants and cleanses them" — a statement which is repeated
in Article 9. These Articles were never published, and have influ-
enced the development of the Articles of the Church of England only
through their use by the framers of the Forty-two Articles of 1553.
The first draught of these was from the hand of Cranmer himself,
and reflects his more advanced Reformed opinions, deriving practically
nothing from former Articles except where the " Thirteen Articles"
have been drawn upon. In the portions at least which have been re-
tained in the Thirty-nine Articles the influence of even the " Thirteen
Articles" has affected rather language than doctrine, in which latter
particular the new Articles follow Reformed rather than Lutheran
modes of statement. If the language of the " Thirteen Articles," by
which the sacraments are said, "as by instruments," to convey the
Holy Spirit who effects faith, seems to be repeated here in the Article
on Baptism (Art. 28 of 1553, 27 of 1563-71), it is along with an im-
portant caveat by which the effect is confined ' ' to those that receive
baptism rightly." By this the stress is thrown rather on the sub-
jective attitude of the recipient than on the mere reception of the rite.
1 A History of the Book of Common Prayer, etc., 15th ed. (Lon-
don and New York, 1881), p. 384, note 1.
l86 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
assured hope for them. In the same spirit is conceived
the comment in Mr. Blunt's Annotated Book of Common
Prayer, which runs as follows : " Neither in this Rubric,
nor in any other formulary of the Church of England,
is any decision given as to the state of infants dying
without Baptism. Bishop Bethell says {Regeneration
in Baptism, p. xiv.] that the common opinion of the
ancient Christians was, that they are not saved : and
as our Lord has given us such plain words in John iii.
5, this seems a reasonable opinion. But this opinion
does not involve any cruel idea of pain or suffering for
little ones so deprived of the Sacrament of new birth
by no fault of their own. It rather supposes them to
be as if they had never been, when they might, through
the care and love of their parents, have been reckoned
among the number of those ' in whom is no guile,' and
'who follow the Lamb whithersoever He goeth.' " '
This position has indeed the best right to be called the
historical understanding of the Church of England as
to the teaching of her Prayer Book, as we may be ad-
vised by the statement of it by the great historian of
infant baptism, William Wall, writing indeed two hun-
dred years ago, but putting into his carefully chosen
and sober language just what, as we have seen, the best
accredited expounders of the Prayer Book in our own
day repeat. " The Church of England," says Wall,2
" have declared their sense of its [i.e baptism's] neces-
sity by reciting the saying of our Saviour, John iii. 5,
both in the Office of Baptism of Infants and also in that
for those of riper years. . . . Concerning the ever-
lasting state of an infant that by misfortune dies un-
baptized, the Church of England has determined noth-
ing (it were fit that all churches would leave such
things to God) save that they forbid the ordinary
Office for Burial to be used for such an one ; for that
were to determine the point and acknowledge him for
a Christian brother. And though the most noted men
1 The Annotated Book of Common Prayer, etc., edited by the
Rev. John Henry Blunt, M.A., F.S.A., etc. (London, 1866), ii., 230.
2 Hist, of Infant Baptism, ed. 2, 1707, p. 377.
THE ANGLICAN POSITION. 187
in the said Church from time to time since the Refor-
mation of it to this time have expressed their hopes
that God will accept the purpose of the parent for the
deed ; yet they have done it modestly and much as
Wycliffe did, rather not determining the negative than
absolutely determining the positive, that such a child
shall enter into the kingdom of heaven."
The Church of England holds thus the unenviable
place among Protestant churches of alone of them hav-
ing no word of cheer to say as to the destiny of the
children of Christian parents who depart from this
world without baptism. There is no covenant with
reference to them ; it may be that they may be saved
— but if so, she is sure she cannot tell how ; or if they
be not saved, it may be that they shall be "as if they
had never been :" there is no word of God with refer-
ence to them. Surely this is all cold comfort enough.
And if this is all that can be said of the children of the
faithful, lacking baptism, where will those of the infidel
appear ?
The hope which the formularies of the Church of
England can find no basis for in the Word of God, and
which those whose views of Divine truth are moulded
by these formularies must deny or at least withhold,
has nevertheless, as Wall tells us, been " from time
to time since the Reformation" freely expressed by
individual teachers in that Church, and that especially,
as he adds, by " the most noted men" in it. Those to
whose labors and sufferings the Church of England
owed her very existence were in no respect behind
their successors in this. We have seen that the Refor-
mation of the Ecclesiastical Laws, drawn up by a com-
mission with Cranmer at its head, affirmed, of the opin-
ion that no infant dying without baptism could be saved
— which Cranmer and his coadjutors had themselves in-
corporated into the earliest formularies— that it was a
" scrupulous superstition" and far different from the
opinion of the Church of England.1 Obviously " in the
1 See above, foot-note on p. 174.
1 88 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
meantime," as Dr. Schaff suggests, Cranmer " had
changed his opinion."1 What was the current convic-
tion on this subject among the leading reformers we may
learn, as well as from another, from one of Cranmer's
chaplains, Thomas Becon, who chances to have written
repeatedly and at length upon it.
In the second part of his treatise on The Demands
of Holy Scripttire, the preface to which is dated on
the first of September, 1563, Becon raises the ques-
tion, " What if the infants die before they receive
the sacrament of baptism ?" and answers it succinctly
as follows: " God's promise of salvation unto them
is not for default of the sacrament minished, or made
vain and of no effect. For the Spirit is not so bound
to the water that it cannot work his office when
the water wanteth, or that it of necessity must
always be there where the water is sprinkled.
Simon Magus had the sacramental water, but he had
not the Holy Ghost, being indeed an hypocrite and
filthy dissembler. In the chronicle of the apostles'
Acts we read that, while Peter preached, the Holy
Ghost came upon them that heard him, yea, and that
before they were baptized ; by the reason whereof
Peter brast out into these words, and said : ' Can any
man forbid water, that these should not be baptized,
which have received the Holy Ghost as well as we ? '
True Christians, whether they be old or young, are
not saved because outwardly they be washed with the
sacramental water, but because they be God's children
by election through Christ, yea, and that before the
foundations of the world were laid, and are sealed up
by the Spirit of God unto everlasting life."2
In the voluminous Catechism, which he wrote some-
what earlier (1560) for the instruction of his children
and presents to them in a touching and beautiful preface,
he develops his views on this matter at great length.
" The infants of the heathen and unbelieving," " for-
. ' Creeds of Christendom, i., p. 642.
2 Prayers and Other Pieces by Thomas Becon, S. T.P., edited for
the Parker Society by the Rev. John Ayre, M.A. (Cambridge, 1844),
p. 617.
THE ANGLICAN POSITION. 189
asmuch as they belong not unto the household of
faith, neither are contained in this covenant, ' 1 will
be thy God, and the God of thy seed ; ' again, ' I
will pour out my Spirit upon thy seed, and my
blessing upon thy buds,' " he leaves "to the judg-
ment of God, to whom they either stand or fall."
But " with the children of the faithful God hath
made a sure and an everlasting covenant, that he
will be their God and Saviour, yea, their most
loving Father, and take them for his sons and heirs,
as St. Peter saith, ' The promise was made to you
and to your children.' " He knows well " how
hard and rigorous divers fathers of Christ's church
are to such infants as die without baptism," but he
judges this opinion of theirs to be injurious to the
grace of God and dissenting from the verity of God's
Word. Injurious to the grace of God, because " the
Holy scripture in every place attributeth our salvation
to the free grace of God, and not either to our own
works, or to any outward sign or sacrament." ' ' Hath
God so bound himself and made himself thrall to a
sacrament, that without it his power of saving is lame,
and of no force to defend from damnation ?" Baptism
is to Christians what circumcision was to the Jews, not
a thing that makes righteous, but " ' a seal of right-
eousness,' and a sign of God's favor toward us," and
so " the outward baptism, which is done by water,
neither giveth the Holy Ghost, nor the grace of God,
but only is a sign and token thereof," and therefore,
" if any of the Christian infants, prevented by death,
depart without baptism (necessity so compelling), they
are not damned, but be saved by the free grace of
God ; forasmuch, as we tofore heard, they be contained
in the covenant of grace, they be members of God's
church, God promiseth to be their God, they have
faith, and be endued with the Spirit of God, and so
finally ' sons and heirs of God, and heirs annexed with
Christ Jesu.' ' His firm conviction from Scripture
is ' ' that the grace and Spirit of God cometh where and
when it pleaseth God, yea, and that they be not bound
to any external ceremony, as to be present and to be
190 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
given when the sacraments are ministered, and other-
wise not, so that the Spirit and grace of God must
wait and attend upon these outward signs, as servants
do attend and wait upon their lords and masters" —
" which is nothing else," he declares, " than to bring
God into bondage to his creatures, and to make him not
master of his own." " They, therefore," he concludes,
" that teach and hold this doctrine are not only ene-
mies to the salvation of the infants, but they also utterly
obscure, yea, and quench the grace and election of
God and the secret operation of the Holy Ghost in the
tender breasts of the most tender infants, and attribute
to an external sign more than right is."1 In a word,
Thomas Becon plants himself squarely on that " cove-
nanted mercy of Almighty God," which Mr. Procter
tells us the framers of the Prayer Book failed to dis-
cover for those who die unbaptized ; and finds no diffi-
culty in showing from Scripture that it underlies bap-
tism which is its seal, and does not rather wait on bap-
tism as its cause.
Such an instance as that of John Hooper is, of course,
even more striking. He had come under distinctly
Zwinglian influences, and, like Zwingli and possibly
first after Zwingli, taught the salvation not only of the
infants of Christians dying unbaptized, but also of all
infants dying such, whether the children of Christians
or of infidels. As to baptismal regeneration, he speaks
of " the ungodly opinion, that attributeth the salvation
of man unto the receiving of an external sacrament,"
" as though God's holy Spirit could not be carried by
faith into the penitent and sorrowful conscience except
it rid always in a chariot and external sacrament."
With reference to the salvation of unbaptized infants,
therefore, he says : " It is ill done to condemn the in-
fants of the Christians that die without baptism, of
whose salvation by the Scripture we be assured : Ero
Dens tuus, et seminis tuis post te. I would likewise judge
well," he adds, " of the infants of the infidels who hath
1 The Catechism of Thomas Becon, S T.P., etc., edited for the
Parker Society by the Rev. John Ayre, M.A. (Cambridge, 1844), pp.
214-225.
THE ANGLICAN POSITION. 19 1
none other sin in them but original, the sin of Adam's
transgression. And as by Adam sin and death entered
into the world, so by Christ justice and life. Ut quem-
admodum regnaverat peccatum in morte, sic et gratia reg~
naret per justiciam ad vitam aternam per Jesum Christum.
Rom. v. Whereas the infants doth not follow the
iniquity of the father, but only culpable for the trans-
gression of Adam, it shall not be against the faith of a
Christian man to say, that Christ's death and passion
extendeth as far for the salvation of innocents, as
Adam's fall made all his posterity culpable of damna-
tion. Quia quemadmodum per inobedientiam unius hominis
peccatores constituti fecimus multi, ita per obedientiam
unius justi constituentur multi. The Scripture also pre-
ferreth the grace of God's promise to be more abun-
dant than sin. Ubi exuberavit peccatum, ubi magis exu-
beravit gratia. Rom. v. It is not the part of a Chris-
tian to say, this man is damned, or this is saved, except
he see the cause of damnation manifest. As touching
the promises of God's election, sunt sine pcenitentia dona
et vocatio Dei."1
Naturally many other opinions have found expres-
sion in the bosom of this most inclusive communion.
In the vexed time of the seventeenth century, for ex-
ample, men like William Perkins2 and James Usher3 ap-
proached the question from the side of the Reformed
1 An Answer unto My Lord of Winchester ' s Booke, etc., 1547, in
the Parker Society's Early Writings of Bishop Hooper, pp. 129,
131.
* " Reprobates are either infants or men of riper age. In repro-
bate infants the execution of God's decree is this : As soon as they
are born, for the guilt of original and natural sin, being left in God's
secret judgment unto themselves, they dying are rejected of God
forever" (The Golden Chain, ch. 53, in Works, ed. 1608, i., p. 107).
" We are to judge that Infants of believing parents in their infancy
dying, are justified" (How to Live Well, i., 486).
3 " Some Reprobates dying Infants . . . Being once conceived they
are in a state of Death (Rom. 5. 14), by reason of the sin of Adam
imputed, and of original corruption cleaving to their Nature, wherein
also, dying they perish : As (for instance) the Children of Heathen
Parents. For touching the Children of Christians, we are taught and
account them holy. 1 Cor. 7. 14" (Body of Divinity, 4to ed., 1702,
P- 165).
192 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
theology ; others, like Jeremy Taylor,1 from a funda-
mentally Pelagianizing standpoint ; others, like Mat-
thew Scrivener,3 from a " churchly" one. From a
somewhat earlier period, the argument of Richard
Hooker may be taken as fairly representing the more
considerate churchmanship of the time. Holding
to the necessity of baptism, not indeed as "a cause
of grace," but as " an instrument or means whereby
we receive grace," ordained as such by Christ, he
argues that " if Christ himself which giveth salvation
do require Baptism ; it is not for us that look for sal-
vation to sound and examine him, whether unbaptized
men may be saved ; but seriously to do that which is
required, and religiously to fear the danger that may
grow by the want thereof." Nevertheless he remarks
that the " Law of Christ, which in these considerations
maketh Baptism necessary, must be construed and
understood according to rules of natural equity ;"
"and (because equity so teacheth) it is on our part
gladly confessed, that there may be in divers cases life
by virtue of inward Baptism, even when outward is
not found." Whether this principle may be extended
to infants dying unbaptized, he makes the subject of
special consideration. Inasmuch as " grace is not ab-
solutely tied unto Sacraments ;" and God accepts the
will for the deed in cases where the deed is impossible ;
and there is a presumed desire and even purpose in
Christian parents and the Church to give these chil-
dren baptism ; and their birth of Christian parents
marks them, according to Scripture, as holy, and gives
them " a present interest and right to those means
wherewith the ordinance of Christ is that his Church
shall be sanctified :" "it is not to be thought that he
1 The Whole Works of, etc. (London, 1828), vol. ii., p. 258 sq.,
289 sq.; vol. viii., 150 sq. ; vol. ix., p. 12 sq., 90 sq., 369 sq.
2 " Either all children must be damned, dying unbaptized, or they
must have baptism. . . . The principle in Christian religion is, That
children come into the world infected with original sin ; and there-
fore, if there be no remedy against that, provided by God, all children
of Christian parents, which St. Paul says are holy, are liable to eter-
nal death without remedy. Now, there is no remedy but Christ ;
and his death and passion are not communicated to any but by out-
ward signs and sacraments. And no other do we read of but that of
water in baptism" (Course of Divinity, London, 1674, p. 196).
THE ANGLICAN POSITION. 193
which, as it were, from Heaven, hath nominated and
designed them unto holiness by special privilege of
their very birth, will himself deprive them of regen-
eration and inward grace, only because necessity de-
priveth them of outward sacraments."1
It would seem that on grounds such as these, even the
highest churchmanship might find it possible to assert
the certain salvation of all the children of Christians, at
least, which die unbaptized ; and, as has been pointed
out on an earlier page,5 the considerations thus so
judiciously set forth would even appear to open a way
for the development, on churchly grounds, of a bap-
tism of intention as applied to infants, which could be
extended, without danger to any important interest,
to embrace all infants that die in infancy. Neverthe-
less it has not been on the part of high-churchmen
that, in the Church of England, the salvation of infants
dying such has been affirmed. This has rather been
the part of low-churchmen, like John Newton3 and
Thomas Scott4 and Augustus Toplady,6 while high-
1 Ecclesiastical Polity, Book V., § 60. (Dobson's ed , i., 600-607 ;
Keble's ed. ii., 341-347.)
2 See above, p. 156.
3 Works, IV., 182 : " I cannot be sorry for the death of infants.
How many storms do they escape ! Nor can I doubt, in my private
judgment, that they are included in the election of grace. Perhaps
those who die in infancy are the exceeding great multitude of all
people, nations, and languages mentioned (Rev. 7 : 9) in distinction
from the visible body of professing believers, who were marked on
their foreheads and openly known to.be the Lord's."
4 The Articles of the Synod of Dort, etc. (Philadelphia, 1818,
p. 189) : " The salvation of the offspring of believers dying in infancy
is here scripturally stated, and not limited to such as are baptized.
Nothing is said of the children of unbelievers dying in infancy, and
the Scripture says nothing. But why might not these Calvinists have
as favorable a hope of all infants dying before actual sin as anti-Cal-
vinists can have?"
5 The Works of, etc. (new ed., London, 1837, pp. 645, 646) : " But
you observe . . . that ' With regard to infants, the rubrick declares
it is certain by God's word that children which are baptized, dying
before they commit actual sin, are undoubtedly saved.' I firmly
believe the same ; nay, I believe more. I am convinced that the
souls of all departed infants whatever, whether baptized or unbap-
tized, are with God in glory. ... I believe that in the decree of
predestination to life, God hath included all whom he hath decreed
to take away in infancy ; and that the decree of reprobation has
nothing to do with them." So, again, p. 142, note m : " No objection
194 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
churchmen have ever shown a tendency to doubt or
deny the salvation of those who die without haying
been " admitted into covenant with God" by baptism.
This is the language of Tract No. 351 (written by A. C.
Percival) of the Oxford Tracts for the Times, within
which were included also Dr. Pusey's voluminous
treatises on baptismal regeneration. These treatises
have not failed of their effect, and possibly at no time
before the present in the whole history of the Church
of England since the first years of its reformation, has
there ever been a more widespread tendency to stand
simply upon the wording of the rubric at the end of
the Baptismal Service, as if it included all ascertainable
truth, and to affirm only the certainty of the salvation
of those infants dying in infancy which have been bap-
tized. All others, though they be the children of
God's recognized children, are, sometimes with a cer-
tainly not very easily understood complacency, at the
best committed to the " uncovenanted mercies of
God,"8 at the worst consigned to a place among those
can hence arise against the salvation of such as die in infancy (all of
whom are undoubtedly saved) ; nor yet against the salvation of God's
elect among the Heathens, Mohametans, and others. The Holy
Spirit is able to inspire the grace of actual faith into those hearts
(especially at the moment of dissolution) which are incapable of ex-
erting the explicit act of faith."
1 " The Sacrament of Baptism, by which souls are admitted into
covenant with God, and without which none can enter into the king-
dom of heaven (John 3 : 5)" {Tract No. jj, p. 1). Cf. the words of
Tract No. 67 which affirms that the relationship of sonship to God
is imparted through baptism, and is not imparted without it.
8 Efforts to assign salvation to them on the " uncovenanted mercies
of God," proceed ordinarily either upon a Romish conception of
" ignorance," or upon the conjecture of a proclamation of the Gospel
to them in the intermediate state. Thus a recent writer declares that
" those souls who have, until this season, been ignorant of their God,
or seen Him, at the best,.but dimly, through their heathen faiths, and
yet, despite of this, have "followed and obeyed, as best they could, His
guidings and ' enlightenings ' of their minds— those souls, I say, will
doubtless, in that ' Vision ' at last receive the Full Light, hear His
Gospel, and know Him as their Lord." Then he adds in a note :
" In this category, also, evidently belong unbaptized infants" (Alan S.
Hawkesworth, De Incarnatione Verbi Dei, p. 64). Why "unbap-
tized infants," even of believers, " evidently" belong in the category
of the heathen, we are not told ; nor why, if they are so classed by
God, they should belong in the category of those heathen who " have
followed and obeyed, as best they could ;" nor what reason we have to
THE REFORMED DOCTRINE. 1 95
who know not God and obey not the Gospel of our
Lord Jesus.
The Reformed Doctrine.
It was among the Reformed alone that the newly
recovered scriptural apprehension of the Church to
which the promises were given, as essentially not an
external organization but the true Body of Christ,
membership in which is mediated not by the external
act of baptism but by the internal regeneration of the
Holy Spirit, bore its full fruit in rectifying the doc-
trine of the application ol redemption. This great
truth was taught alike, to be sure, by both branches of
Protestantism, Lutheran as well as Reformed. But it
was limited in its application in the one line of teach-
ing by a very high doctrine of the means of grace ;
while in the other, wherever the purity of the Re-
formed doctrine was not corrupted by a large infusion
of Romish inheritance, it became itself constitutive of
the doctrine of the means of grace. There were some
Reformed theologians, even outside the Church of
England, no doubt, who held a high doctrine of the
means. Of these Peter Jurieu (1637-1713) may be
taken as a type.' This famous writer, to whom Wit-
sius somewhat rashly promised the grateful veneration
of posterity, taught that even elect infants, children of
covenanted parents, are children of wrath until they
are baptized, and up to that time have not received
their complete reconciliation, nor have been washed
from the stains with which they are born, nor are the
objects of God's love of complacency ; that baptism is
as necessary to salvation as eating is to living or taking
the remedy is to recovery from disease ; that therefore
infants properly baptized and dying in infancy are cer-
tainly saved, and their baptism is an indubitable proof
of their election, while of the salvation of those who
die before baptism we can have no certainty, but only a
think that all of either these or those will receive the Gospel when it
is offered them.
1 See his views quoted and discussed by Witsius, De Efficace et
Militate Bapt. in Miscel. Sacra (1736), ii., 513.
196 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
judgment of charity ; that God no doubt does save
some infants without baptism, but this is done in an
extraordinary, and, so to speak, miraculous way, and
so that the death of the infant may be supposed to sup-
ply the defect of baptism, as martyrdom does for adults
in the Romish teaching. Such opinions, however,
were not characteristic of the Reformed churches, the
distinguishing doctrine of which, rather, by suspend-
ing salvation on membership in the invisible instead
of in the visible Church, transformed baptism from a
necessity into a duty, and left men dependent for sal-
vation on nothing but the infinite love and free grace
of God.
From this point of view the absolutely free and lov-
ing election of God alone is determinative of the saved.
How many are saved, and who they are, can therefore
be known absolutely to God alone ; to us, only so far
forth as may be inferred from the presence of the marks
and signs of election revealed to us in the Word. Faith
and its fruits are the chief signs in the case of adults ;
and accordingly he that believes may know that he is
of the elect and be certain of his salvation. In the case
of infants dying in infancy, birth within the bounds of
the covenant is a sure sign, since the promise is ' ' unto
us and our children." But present unbelief is not a
sure sign of reprobation in the case of adults ; for who
knows but that unbelief may yet give place to faith ?
Nor in the case of infants, dying such, is birth outside
the covenant a trustworthy sign of reprobation ; for
the election of God is free. Accordingly there are
many — adults and infants — of whose salvation we may
be sure : but Of reprobation we can never be sure ; a
judgment to that effect is necessarily unsafe even as to
such adults as are apparently living in sin, while as to
infants who " dieand give no sign, "it is presumptuous
and rash in the extreme. The above is practically an
outline of the teaching of Zwingli.1 He himself, after
1 Zwingli's teaching may be conveniently worked out by the aid of
August Baur's valuable Zwingli's Theologie, especially vol. ii.
(Halle, 1889). Zwingli's peculiar doctrine of original sin had practi-
cally very little influence on his resolution of the question of the sal-
THE REFORMED DOCTRINE. 1 97
some preliminary hesitation,1 worked it out in its logi-
cal completeness, and taught that : I. All believers
are elect and hence are saved ; though we cannot know
infallibly who are true believers, except each man in
his own case." 2. All children of believers dying in
infancy are elect, and hence are saved ; their inclusion
in the covenant of salvation rests on God's immutable
promise, and their death in infancy must be taken as a
sign of election.3 3. It is probable, from the super-
vation of infants, which rather turned on his doctrine of the extent
of the atonement.
1 Works, i., 423 (1523).
2 The word "church," says Zwingli, "is used variously in the
Scriptures. First of all, it is used for those elect who are destinated
by the will of God to eternal life. . . . This is known to God alone, for
He, according to the word of Solomon, alone knows the hearts of the
sons of men. But none the less, those who are members of this
church know that they themselves, since they have faith, are elect
and are members of this first church ; but they are ignorant of other
members than themselves. . . . Those then who believe are ordained
to eternal life. But who truly believe no one knows except the believer
himself. . . . From these, therefore, it follows that that first church
is known to God alone, and only those who have certain and unshaken
faith know that they are members of this church." ( Works, iv.,
p. 8.) " It follows, therefore, that those who believe know they are
elect ; for those who believe are elect. Election is, therefore, the
antecedent of faith. ... It is proper to pronounce concerning those
only who persist in disbelief until death. However much any give
open signs, whether by cruelty or lust, that they are repudiated by
God, nevertheless we ought not before the end or ' departure ' (as the
poet says) to condemn any one." ( Works, iv., 723 sq., 1530.)
3 " We are more certain of the election of none than of infants who
are taken away in youth, while as yet they are without law ; for
human life is sometimes not truly, but only apparently innocent,
while there cannot be any stain {tabes) in infants who spring from
believers. For original sin is expiated by Christ ; for as in Adam all
died, so in Christ we are all restored to life— we, that is, who either
believe or are of the church by promise. But no stain of misdeeds
(labes facinorum) can contaminate them, for they are not yet under
law. But since no cause disjoins them from God except sin, and they
are alien from all sin, it follows that none can so irrefragably be
known to be among the elect as those infants who are taken away by
fate in youth ; for in their case to die is the sign of election, just as
faith is in adults. And those who are reprobated or repudiated by
God do not die in this state of innocence, but are preserved by Divine
providence, that their repudiation may be manifested by a wicked
life." {Works, iv., 127, 1530.) "Therefore the infants of Chris-
tians, since they are not less than adults of the visible Church of
Christ, are not less to be (so it follows) in the number of those whom
198 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
abundance of the gift of grace over the offence, that
all infants dying such are elect and saved ; there is,
indeed, no sure promise of their salvation, which must,
therefore, be left with God, but it is certainly rash and
even impious to affirm their damnation.1 4. All who
are saved, whether adult or infant, are saved only by
the free grace of God's election and through the re-
demption of Christ.2
we judge to be elect than their parents. Hence it happens that those
judges act impiously and presumptuously who devote the infants of
Christians to dreadful things, since so many clear testimonies of
Scripture contradict this . . ." ( Works, iv., 8.)
1 " Since those alone who have heard and then either believed or
remained in unbelief are subject to our judgment, it follows that we
vehemently err in judging infant children, whether of Gentries or of
Christians. Of Gentiles, because no law condemns them, for they do
not fall under that of ' Who shall not believe,' etc. Hence, since the
election of God is free, it is impious to exclude from it those of whom
by these signs, faith and unbelief, we are not able to determine
whether they are in it or not. With reference to those of Christians,
however, we are not only intruding rashly into the election of God,
but we are not even believing His word by which He manifests this
election to us. For since He admits us into the covenant of Abraham,
this word now renders us no less certain of their election than former-
ly of the Hebrews. For that word, that they are within the covenant,
testament, people of God, makes us certain of their election until
God shall announce something else concerning any one." {Works,
iii., 427, cf. 429. 1527.) " Hence it follows that if in Christ, the second
Adam, we are restored to life, just as we were handed over to death
in the first Adam, we rashly condemn the children born of Christian
parents ; nay, even the children of Gentiles. But as to the infants of
Gentiles, whatever opinion may be held, we confidently assert that
on account of the virtue of the pre-eminent salvation of Christ, they
go beyond the mark who adjudge them to eternal malediction, both
because of the reparation spoken of and because of the free election
of God, which does not follow, but is followed by, faith. . . . They
ought not, therefore, to be rashly condemned by us who, by reason
of age, have not faith ; for although they do not as yet have it, the
election of God is nevertheless hidden from us, with respect to which,
if they are elect, we judge rashly concerning things of which we
know nothing." {Works, iv., 7.)
2 " But I have spoken in this manner, That the children of Chris-
tians cannot be damned by original sin for this reason, because though
sin should condemn according to the law, yet on account of the remedy
exhibited in Christ it cannot condemn, especially not those included
in the covenant made with Abraham ; for concerning these we have
other clear and solid testimonies : concerning the rest, who are born
out of the church, we have nothing except the present testimony"
{i.e., " As in Adam, so in Christ, but more"), " so far as I know, and
similar ones in this fifth chapter of Romans, by which to prove that
THE REFORMED DOCTRINE. 1 99
It is probable that Zwingli stood alone among the
Reformers in his extension of salvation to all infants
dying in infancy. That all children of believers, dying
in infancy, are included in the covenant of God and
enter at once into glory was the characteristic feature
ot the Reformed doctrine ; the boldness of which and
the relief which it brought to the oppressed heart are
alike scarcely estimable by us after centuries of eman-
cipation from the dreadful burden of what had up to
the rise of the Reformed theology been for ages the
undoubting belief of the Church — viz., that all un-
baptized infants are excluded from bliss. With this
great advance the minds and hearts of most men were
satisfied, and, happy in teaching from positive Scrip-
tures the certain salvation of all the children of Chris-
tian parents departing from their arms to the arms of
Jesus, they were content to leave the children of un-
believers, dying such, to the just but hidden judgment
of God. It has been thought by many, indeed, that
both John Calvin and Zwingli's successor in the leader-
ship of the Church at Zurich, Henry Bullinger, shared
to the full extent the hope of Zwingli, and were ready,
with him, to extend their assurance of infant salvation
to all who die in infancy of whatever parentage. It is
true that it is not easy to adduce from the writings
of these great teachers passages which clearly affirm
the opposite ; what have been brought forward as such
are usually rather assertions of the presence and desert
of " original sin" in infants than declarations of the
punishment which they actually undergo. But, on the
other hand, there is a more entire lack of positive evi-
dence for the affirmation ; and there are not altogether
those who are born outside the Church are cleansed from original
contamination. But if any one should say that it is more probable
that the children of the Gentiles are saved by Christ than that they
are damned, certainly he is less making Christ void than those who
damn those born in the Church, if they die without baptism ; and he
will have more foundation and authority from the Scriptures than
those who deny this, for he would assert nothing more than that the
children of the Gentiles, too, while of tender age, are not damned on
account of original vice, but this, of course, through the benefit of
Christ." ( Works, 637, 1526 )
200 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
wanting passages from either writer which appear, in
their natural sense, to imply belief that some infants
dying such pass into doom. It would seem difficult to
read, for example, Calvin's rejoinders to Pighius, Ser-
vetus and Castellio without becoming convinced that
he did not think of all infants, dying such, as escaping
the just recompense of their sinfulness. Even such a
comment as that which he makes on Rom. v. 7 seems,
indeed, to carry this implication on its face : " Hence,
in order to partake of the miserable inheritance of sin,
it is enough for thee to be a man, for it dwells in flesh
and blood ; but in order to enjoy the righteousness of
Christ, it is necessary for thee to be a believer, for a
participation of Him is obtained by faith alone. He is
communicated to infants in a peculiar manner ; for
they have in the covenant the right of adoption, by
which they pass over into participation of Christ. It
is of the children of the pious that I am speaking, to
whom the promise of grace is directed. For the rest
are by no means released from the common lot." '
Similarly Bullinger's language, as he argues for the
inclusion of believers' infants within the covenant and
their consequent right to baptism, now and again ap-
pears inconsistent with the supposition that he sup-
posed all infants dying such to be alike included in the
election of God. Thus a fundamental distinction be-
tween the children of the faithful and those of unbe-
lievers, not only in privileges but also in ultimate des-
tiny, seems to color the whole language of a passage
like the following : " Wherefore, I, trusting to God's
mercy and his truth and undoubted promise, believe
that infants, departing out of this world by a too time-
ly death, before they can be baptized, are saved by the
mere mercy of God in the power of his truth and
promise through Christ, who saith in the Gospel, ' Suf-
fer little ones to come unto me ; for of such is the king-
dom of God :' Again, ' It is not the will of my Father
which is in heaven that one of these little ones should
1 Amsterdam ed. of Calvin's Opera, vii., 36a / " De piorum liberis
loquar, ad quos promissio gratiae dirigitur. Nam alii a communi
forte nequaquam eximuntur."
THE REFORMED DOCTRINE. 201
perish.' For verily God who cannot lie hath said,
' I am thy God, and the God of thy seed after thee.'
Whereupon St. Paul also affirmeth that they are born
holy which are begotten of holy parents ; not that of
flesh and blood any holy thing is born, for ' that which
is born of flesh is flesh :' but because that holiness and
separation from the common seed of men is of promise,
and by right of the covenant. For we are all by natu-
ral birth born the sons of wrath, death, and damna-
tion : but Paul attributeth a special privilege to the
children ot the faithful, wherewith by the grace of God
they which by nature are unclean are purified. So the
same apostle, in another place, doth gather holy
branches of a holy root ; and again elsewhere saith :
' If by the sin of one many be dead, much more the
grace of God and the gift of grace which is by one
man, Jesus Christ, hath abounded unto many.' " ' As
over against the natural implications of such passages
there is nothing positive to set, and it is certainly
within the mark to say that as yet no decisive evidence
has been adduced to show that either Calvin a or
Bullinger 3 agreed with Zwingli in cherishing the hope
1 Decades, Parker Soc. ed., iv., 373 ; cf. 382, 313, 344.
s Dr. Charles W. Shields, in a very thorough and learned paper in
The Presbyterian and Reformed Review for October, 1890 (vol. i., pp.
634-651), has said everything possible to be said in favor of including
Calvin in the class of those who teach the salvation of all infants dying
such. Dr. Shields's ingenious and powerful argument is vitiated,
however, by two faults of interpretation. He does not always catch
the drift of Calvin's argument, as directed rather to showing against
the Anabaptists that infants, too, as subjects of salvation, are also
subjects of baptism ; and he refers Calvin's repeated assertions of
the presence of personal guilt as distinguished from imputed guilt
in all those who are lost, to guilt arising from actual sinning, whereas
Calvin means it of guilt arising from inherent corruption or " original
sin." Calvin says that every soul that is lost deserves it not merely
because it is implicated in the guilt of Adam's first sin, but also be-
cause it is inwardly corrupt and wrath-deserving ; he does not say it
is not condemned unless it has committed overt acts of sinning.
When these two errors of interpretation are eliminated, no passages
remain which would seem to imply the salvation of all who die in
infancy.
8 That Bullinger agreed with Zwingli in holding that all who die
in infancy are saved is repeatedly asserted by Dr. Schaff, but with-
out the adduction of evidence, unless we are to read the note in
Creeds of Christendom, L, 642, note 3, as directing us to the passages
202 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
that all infants dying in infancy are saved ; the proba-
bility is distinctly to the contrary.
The constitutive principles of Zwingli's teaching,
however, are not only the common conviction of all
the Reformed, but are even the essential postulates of
the whole Reformed system. That the salvation of
men depends ultimately upon nothing except the free
election of God must be the hinge of all Reformed
thinking in the sphere of soteriology ; and differences
relative to the salvation of infants can arise within the
limits of Reformed thought only on the two points of
what the signs of election and reprobation are, and
how surely these signs may be identified in men. On
these points the Reformed were early divided into five
distinguishable classes.
cited in Laurence's B amp ton Lectures, pp. 266, 267, as such. But
these passages do not support the contention ; they only prove that
Bullinger taught that infants, too, are salvable (arguing for their bap-
tism as against the Anabaptists), not that all that die in infancy are
saved. In the seventh volume of his History of the Christian
Church, published in 1892, Dr. Schaff somewhat qualifies the sharp-
ness of his previous statement by adding a justifying clause. Bul-
linger, he here says, " agreed with Zwingli's extension of salvation
to all infants and to elect heathen ; at all events, he nowhere dis-
sents from these advanced views, and published with approbation
Zwingli's last work, where they are most strongly expressed"
(p. 211). That the young Bullinger— he was then thirty-two— did put
forth his beloved master's last work, the Expositio Fidei, addressed
to King Francis, with a preface of hearty appreciation and praise, is
certainly true. But this can scarcely be said to commit him to every
statement in the work. We know that he did not share his master's
doctrine of original sin, but labors to explain away its peculiarities
and reduce it to only a verbal deviation from the common doctrine
of the Reformers {Decades as above, ii., 394, 388). Why should the
case be different with reference to matters lying on the periphery of
the doctrinal system ? Surely the argument from silence here is most
precarious. Nor is it clear that he nowhere betrays dissent from
these views of his master. We have adduced passages which appear
to imply that he did not contemplate heathen infants dying in infancy
as saved. And in a little book on the Judgment Day, published in
1572 {Von hochsler Freud und gr ostein Leyd des kunftigenjung-
sten Tags, u.s.w.), he certainly does not speak in Zwingli's manner
of the heathen. The learned Zwingli scholar, Dr. J. W. Wyss, of
Zurich, suggests that Bullinger may have changed his mind in the
interval between the ages of thirty-two and sixty-eight, a suggestion
which seems unnecessary in the entire absence of proof that he ever
had a different mind from that suggested in the Decades of 1551 as
well as in his Judgment Day of 1572.
THE REFORMED DOCTRINE. 203
I. There were a few, from the very beginning, who
held with Zwingli that death in infancy is one of the
signs of election, and hence that all who die in infancy
are the children of God and enter at once into glory.
After Zwingli it is probable that Bishop Hooper was
the first to embrace this view.1 It is presented in a
characteristically restrained and winning way by Fran-
cis Junius in his work on Nature and Grace, which was
published in 1592. " Some one will say, perhaps," he
says, " ' But infants surely who are called from this
life before they commit actual sin are not to be as-
signed to destruction nor held by us to be lost on ac-
count of that natural vitiosity which they have con-
tracted as an inheritance from their parents ?' 1 re-
spond that there is a double question raised here under
the appearance of one : one is, What end do they de-
serve according to God's justice by their vitiosity ? the
other is, What end will they actually have ? The first
we answer, briefly, thus : they cannot but deserve for
their vitiosity, according to God's justice, separation
from God — that is, destruction and eternal death. . . .
Let us look, then, at the second question. None of us
is so wild, or has ever been known to be so wild, as to
condemn infants simpliciter. Let those who teach other-
wise look to it by what right they do it, and relying on
what authority. For, although they are in themselves
and in our common nature condemnable, it does not
follow that we ought to pass the sentence of condemna-
tion upon them. What then ? Will they be saved ?
We hold that all those will be saved who belong to the
covenant and who belong to the election. But those
infants belong to the covenant who spring from cove-
nanted parents, whether immediately— i.e., from cove-
nanted father and mother, or either ; or mediately — i.e.,
from covenanted ancestors, even though the continuity
has been broken, as God says He ' will show mercy
unto thousands of generations ' (Ex. xx.). And this is
the way in which Paul speaks of the Jews as being in-
cluded in his time (Rom. xi.) ; nor do we doubt that by
1 See reference, ante, p. 191.
204 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
the same force of the covenant God sanctifies by the
covenant as His own some from the number of unbe-
lievers— for the sake of the covenant, we mean, that
their ancestors received. Some also, however, belong
to the election, for God has not cut off from Himself
the right and authority to communicate more widely
the grace of His own election to those of whom it can-
not be said that either their parents or ancestors be-
longed to the covenant ; for just as of old He called
into the covenant afresh, according to His election,
those who were not in the covenant, in order that they
might be in it, so also in every age the same benefit
may be conferred by His most free action. And why
may not this happen to infants as well as to others,
since of them may be justly said what the author of
the Book of Wisdom wrote of Enoch, that ' he was
taken away lest evil should change his mind or guile
ensnare his soul ' ? All infants, therefore, are in them-
selves condemnable by the justice of God ; and if God
have condemned any (a matter to be left to Him) they
are justly condemned ; but we nevertheless affirm that
those who are of the covenant and those who are of the
election are saved — whomsoever He has ordained to
eternal life ; and out of charity we presume that those
whom He calls to Himself as infants and snatches sea-
sonably out of this miserable vale of sins are rather
saved according to His election and fatherly provi-
dence than expelled from the kingdom of heaven. We
rest utterly in His counsel." ' More lately this genial
judgment has become the ruling view, especially
among English-speaking Calvinists, and we may select
Augustus M. Toplady a and Robert S. Candlish as its
types. The latter, for example, writes : 3 "In many
ways I apprehend it may be inferred from Scripture
1 Francis Junius, De Natura et Gratia, 1592, pp. 83, 84 : the clos-
ing words are : " Ex charitate antem eos quos ad se infantes vocat,
et tempestive ex hac misera valle peccatorum eripit, potius servari
praesumimus, secundum electionem et providentiam ipsius paternam,
quam a regno ccelorum abdicari. Omnino conquiescimus in consilio
ejus."
1 See reference, ante, p. 193.
8 The Atonement, etc., 1861, pp. 183, 184.
THE REFORMED DOCTRINE. 205
that all dying in infancy are elect, and are, therefore,
saved. . . . The whole analogy of the plan of saving
mercy seems to favor the same view, and now it may
be seen, if 1 am not greatly mistaken, to be put beyond
question by the bare fact that little children die. . . .
The death of little children must be held to be one of
the fruits of redemption. . . ."
2. At the opposite extreme a very few Reformed
theologians taught that the only sure sign of election
is faith with its fruits, and, therefore, that we can have
no real ground of conviction concerning the fate of
any infant. As, however, God certainly has His elect
among infants too, each man can cherish the hope that
his own children are of the elect. This sadly agnostic
position, which was afterward condemned by the whole
body of the Reformed assembled in the Synod of Dort,
is at least approached by Peter Martyr, who writes :
" Neither am 1 to be thought to promise salvation to
all the children of the faithful which depart without
the sacrament, for if I should do so I might be counted
rash ; I leave them to be judged by the mercy of God,
seeing 1 have no certainty concerning the secret elec-
tion and predestination ; but I only assert that those
are truly saved to whom the divine election extends,
although baptism does not intervene. Just so, I hope
well concerning infants of this kind, because I see them
born from faithful parents ; and this thing has prom-
ises that are uncommon ; and although they may not
be general, quoad omnes, yet when I see nothing to the
contrary it is right to hope well concerning the salva-
tion of such infants." ' Even after the declaration of
the Synod of Dort there remained some to whom it
did not seem possible to speak with the Synod's con-
fidence of the salvation of all the children of believers
dying in infancy. Thus, Thomas Gataker writes to
Richard Baxter on November ist, 1653, * that he dares
not " herein speak so peremptorilie as the Synod of
1 Loci Communes, i., class. 4, cap. 5, § 16 (compare iv., 100).
5 This letter is preserved in the Williams Library, London, and was
printed by Dr. Briggs in The Presbyterian Review, v., 705 sg.
See pp. 708 and 706.
206 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
Dort doth ;" " nor," he adds, " do Zanchie, Ursine,
or divers other of our Divines, of whom see Malderi
Antisynodica,' pp. 63, 64. Tho 1 confess that some
of them in their Discourses and Disputes overthrow
sometime with one hand, what they seem to build up
with the other." That the infants of believing parents
are included in the covenant he did not doubt ; but
he conceived of this covenant as rather conditional
than absolute, and therefore felt it to be " more than
can certainlie be avowed or from Scr. can be averred,"
4 ' that the Child is therein considered as a member of
the Parents, and is by its parents' faith discharged of
the guilt of its sin, and put in an actual state of Salva-
tion." " Concerning the state of infants, even of true
believers," therefore, he thinks that the Scripture is
"verie sparing; and in averring ought therein per-
emptorilie we have great cause therefore to be verie
warie." Something of the same hesitancy character-
izes also Baxter's own statements on the subject. In
his Plain Scripture Proof of Infant Church-Membership
and Baptism, the third edition of which was issued short-
ly before the date of the letter to which Gataker's was
a reply, he speaks in a very similar manner. " We
have," he says, " a stronger probability than he
[Tombes] mentioneth of the salvation of all the Infants
of the Faithfull so dying, and a certainty of the salva-
tion of some. ... If any will go farther and say that
God's assuring mercy to them, and calling them blessed,
and covenanting to be their God, with the rest of the
Arguments, will prove more than a probability, even
a full certainty of the salvation of all Believers' Infants
so dying ; though I dare not say so my selfe, yet I pro-
fess to think this opinion far better grounded than Mr.
1 Dr. Briggs prints " Antisquodica," which is a mere blunder, of
course, for Gataker's " Antisynodica." Malderus was bishop of Ant-
werp and a prolific writer, author of a number of commentaries and
theological and ethical treatises. The book cited by Gataker was
published at Antwerp by Balthasar Moretus, in 1620, and is a volume
of over 300 8 vo pages. Its full title is : Antisynodica, sive Animad-
versiones in decreta conventus Dordraceni, quam vocant synodum
nationalem, de quinque doctrinae capitihus inter Remonstrantes et
Contra-Remonstrantes controversis.
THE REFORMED DOCTRINE. 20J
T[ombs]'s, that would shut them all out of the Church." '
Twenty years later he returns to the question, and
treats it at great length. He thinks that " there can
no promise or proof be produced that all unbaptized
Infants are saved, either from the poena damni or
sensus, or both ;" but, on the other hand, he can now
" say, as the Synod of Dort, Art. I., that Believing Par-
ents have no cause to doubt of the salvation of their children
that dye in infancy, before they commit actual sin ; that
is, not to trouble themselves with fears about it :" and
he thinks ' ' it very probable that this ascertaining prom-
ise belongeth not only to the natural seed of believers,
but to all whom they have the true power and right to
dedicate in covenant to God." Still, however, he
" dares not say" that he is " undoubtedly certain ofit;,r
he is giving opinions, not convictions.2 A hint of the
same unwillingness to make the affirmation of the sal-
vation of the children of believers absolute is found
even in the statement of the Compendium of John
Marck. " Nor is it to be doubted," he says, " that to
those reprobated, there are likewise most justly to be
referred as well the Gentiles who are strangers to the
proclamation of the Gospel as the infants of unbeliev-
ers, while we have good hope for those of believers
because of God's promise (Gen. xvii. 7, etc.), although
they are in themselves not less damnable, and possibly
some of them are even to be damned (cceteroquin in se
non minus damnabilibus, et forte quibusdam etiam damnan-
dis). For although concerning individual persons of
Gentiles and of infants born of unbelievers we neither
can nor wish to determine anything particularly, be-
cause of God's freedom and the frequently hidden paths
of the Spirit, yet all these are by nature children of
wrath, impure, alien, and remote from God, without
hope, left to themselves (cf. Eph. ii. 3 ; 1 Cor. vii. 14 ;
Eph. ii. 12, 17 ; Acts xiv. 16, etc.) ; God has revealed
nothing concerning a salvation decreed or to be wrought
1 Op. cit., ed. 3, 1653, PP- 76 and 78.
5 A Christian Directory, etc., London, 1673, p. 807 sq. See p. 809.
("Christian Ecclesiastics: Ecclesiastical Cases of Conscience,"
Quest. 35.)
208 THE DOCTRINE OP INFANT SALVATION.
for them ; and they are destitute of the ordinary means
of grace." l
To the great body of Calvinists, however, both of
these views seemed insufficiently in accord with " what
is written." The one appeared to err by going be-
yond, and the other by falling short of, the warrant of
Scripture. All their thought on this subject took its
start from the cardinal scriptural fact of the covenant;*
and they were jealous of everything which seemed to
dull the sharpness of the distinction between the cov-
enanted children of believers and the uncovenanted
children of unbelievers. Triglandius speaks not for
himself alone but for practically the whole body of the
Reformed when, in answer to the suggestion of Epis-
copius that ' ' it makes no difference whether the in-
fants are children of believers or unbelievers, since the
same innocence is found in all infants as such," he re-
plies : " But to us the two do not stand on the same
footing ; since the one are included in the covenant of
God and the others are strangers to that covenant
(Gen. xvii. 7 ; Eph. ii. 11, 12). For this reason children
of unbelieving Gentiles are said to be impure, but those
of believers holy (1 Cor. vii. 14) ; wherefore also Peter
says, when exhorting the Jews to repentance and faith
(Acts ii. 39), ' To you is the promise {i.e., of remission
of sins and the gift of the Holy Ghost), and to your
children, and to all who are afar off whom our Lord
God shall call.'"1 And John Gerhard might have
quoted many more names than those of Calvin, Beza,
Sadeel, Ursinus, Gentilis, and Musculus, as affirming
that " the infants of believers, all alike, whether bap-
tized or unbaptized, are rightly holy from their mothers'
womb by the inheritance of the promise, and enjoy
eternal salvation in the covenant and company of
God. ' ' ■ With this central point of agreement, the great
1 Joannis Marckii Compendium, etc. (1752), p. 147 (cap. vii.,
§ xxxiii.). In defending Marck's suggestion, De Moor quotes a
similar passage from the Censura Confess. Remonstr., and another
from Triglandius very much to the same effect as Gataker's.
4 Antapolog., caput. 13, p. 207a.
s Loci., ix., p. 281. edition of 1769.
THE REFORMED DOCTRINE. 209
body of Calvinists differed among themselves only in
their belief concerning the destiny of infants dying
outside the covenant, and on this point parted into
three varieties of opinion.
3. Many held that faith and the promise are sure
signs of election, and accordingly that all believers and
their children are certainly saved ; but that the lack of
faith and the promise is an equally sure sign of repro-
bation, so that all the children of unbelievers dying
such are equally certainly lost. The younger Span-
heim, for example, writes : " Confessedly, therefore,
original sin is a most just cause of positive reprobation.
Hence no one fails to see what we should think con-
cerning the children of pagans dying in their child-
hood ; for unless we acknowledge salvation outside of
God's covenant and Church (like the Pelagians of old,
and with them Tertullian, Epiphanius, Clement of Al-
exandria, of the ancients, and of the moderns, Andra-
dius, Ludovicus Vives, Erasmus, and not a few others,
against the whole Bible), and suppose that all the chil-
dren of the heathen, dying in infancy, are saved, and
that it would be a great blessing to them if they should
be smothered by the midwives or strangled in the cra-
dle, we should humbly believe that they are justly
reprobated by God on account of the corruption \labes)
and guilt {reatus) derived to them by natural propaga-
tion. Hence, too, Paul testifies (Rom. v. 14) that death
has passed upon them which have not sinned after the
similitude- of Adam's transgression, and distinguishes
and separates (1 Cor. vii. 14) the children of the cove-
nanted as holy from the impure children of unbeliev-
ers." 1 Somewhat similarly Stapfer, alter affirming
the salvation of the infants of believers, dying such,
continues : " As to the children of unbelievers, we be-
lieve, indeed, that they will be separated from com-
munion with God ; and hence, because as children of
wrath and cursing they are excluded from the beatific
communion with God, they will be damned" — though he
eases the apparent harshness of his language by recalling
1 Opera, Hi., cols. 1173-74, § 22.
2io THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
the fact of various degrees of punishment in hell.1 On
an earlier page* we have quoted a passage from Usher's
Body of Divinity to the same effect. That work was a
compilation, and we find the same words in an earlier
Catechism published by Samuel Crooke,8 which may
stand as an example from English ground of this very
widespread opinion.
4. More held that faith and the promise are certain
signs of election, so that the salvation of believers'
children is certain, while the lack of the promise only
leaves us in ignorance of God's purpose ; nevertheless
that there is good ground for asserting that both elec-
tion and reprobation have place in this unknown
sphere. Accordingly they held that all the infants of
believers, dying such, are saved, but that some of the
infants of unbelievers, dying such, are lost. Probably
as much as this is intended to be asserted by Thomas
Goodwin when to the question, " Doth God inflict eter-
nal death merely for the corruption of nature upon any
infants ?" he answers : " My brethren, it must be said,
Yes : we are children of wrath by nature ; and unless
there come in election amongst them, for it is election
saveth and is the root of salvation, it must needs be
so. . . . But you will say, Do these perish ? or
Doth God let those perish ? Doth His wrath seize
upon them ? Not only what the text [Eph. ii. 3] saith,
but that in Rom. v. is clear for it. . . . It is true elec-
tion knows its own amongst infants, but it must be free
grace, it must be by grace that ye are saved, for clearly
by nature ye are all children of wrath. Therefore the
Lord, as He will have instances of all sorts that are in
heaven, so He will have some that are in hell for their
sin brought into the world." * But probably no higher
expression of this general view can be found than John
Owen's. He argues that there are two ways in which
God saves infants. " (1) By interesting them in the
covenant, if their immediate or remote parents have
1 Institut. Theolog. Polemic, 17 16, iv., 518,
» See above, p. 191.
3 Guide unto True Blessedness, etc., ed. 2, 1614.
* Works, ii., 135-36.
THE REFORMED DOCTRINE. 21 1
been believers. He is a God of them and of their seed,
extending his mercy to a thousand generations of
them that fear him. ' (2) By his grace of election
which is most free and not tied to any conditions, by
which I make no doubt but God taketh many unto him
in Christ whose parents never knew or had been de-
spisers of the Gospel." a
5. Most Calvinists of the past, however, have held
that faith and the promise are marks by which we may
know assuredly that all those who believe and their
children, dying such, are elect and saved ; while the
absence of sure marks of either election or reprobation
in infants, dying such outside the covenant, leaves us
without ground for inference concerning them, and
they must therefore be left to the judgment of God,
which, however hidden from us, is assuredly just and
holy and good. This agnostic view of the fate of un-
covenanted infants has been held, of course, in con-
junction with every degree of hope or the lack of hope
concerning them, and thus in the hands of the several
theologians it approaches each of the other views.
Petrus de Witte may stand as one example of it. He
says : " We must adore God's judgments and not curi-
ously inquire into them. Of the children of believers
it is not to be doubted but that they shall be saved,
inasmuch as they belong unto the covenant. But be-
cause we have no promise for the children of unbeliev-
ers we leave them to the judgment of God." ' Our own
Jonathan Dickinson * may stand as another. " It may be
further urged against this proposition," he says, "That it
drives multitudes of poor infants to Hell who never commit-
ted any actual Sin ; and is therefore a Doctrine so cruel and
unmerciful as to be unworthy of God. To this I answer
that greatest Modesty becomes us in drawing any Con-
clusions on this Subject. We have indeed the highest
1 It is, perhaps, worth noting that this is the general Calvinistic
view of what "children of believers" means. Compare Calvin,
Tracts, vol. Hi., p. 351 ; and also Junius as quoted above, p. 203.
* Works, x., 81 ; compare v., 137.
1 Catechism, q. 37.
* The True Scripture Doctrine concerning some Important
Points of Christian Faith, etc. Boston, 1741, pp. 123, 124.
212 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
Encouragement to dedicate our children to Christ, since
he has told us, Of such is the Kingdom of Heaven ; and the
strongest Reason to Hope as to the Happiness of those
deceased Infants, who have been thus dedicated to him.
But God has not been pleased to reveal to us how far
he will extend His uncovenanted Mercy to others that
die in Infancy. — As, on the one Hand, I don't know that
the Scripture anywhere assures us that they shall all
be saved : So, on the other Hand, we have not (that 1
know of) any Evidence, from Scripture or the Na-
ture of Things, that any of them will eternally perish. —
All those that die in Infancy may (for aught we know)
belong to the Election of Grace ; and be predestinated to
the Adoption of Children. They may, in Methods to us
unknown, have the benefits of Christ's Redemption ap-
plied to them ; and thereby be made Heirs of Eternal
Glory. They are (it is true) naturally under the Guilt
and Pollution of Original Sin ; but they may, notwith-
standing this, for any thing that appears to the con-
trary, be renewed by the gracious Influences of the
Spirit of God, and thereby be made mete for Eternal
Life. It therefore concerns us, without any bold and
presumptuous conclusions, to leave them in the Hands
of that God whose tender Mercies are over all His
Works." It is this cautious, agnostic view which has
the best historical right to be called the general Cal-
vinistic one, and it has persisted as such until the pres-
ent day in all but English-speaking lands. One of the
ablest living Calvinistic thinkers, for example, Dr.
A. Kuyper, of Amsterdam, writes as follows : " Con-
stantly and unwaveringly the Reformed Confession
stations itself on the standpoint of the covenant and
withholds baptism from all who stand outside the cov-
enant, because it belongs to those within the covenant.
To be sure, the Reformed Confession does not pass
judgment on the children of heathen who die before
coming to years of discretion. They depend on God's
mercy, widened as broadly as possible. But where the
Scriptures are silent, the Confession, too, preserves
silence. Men know nothing here and can say nothing.
Mere conjecture and imagination have no right to enter
THE REFORMED DOCTRINE. 213
so serious a matter. The lot of these numerous chil-
dren belongs to the hidden things that are for the Lord
God, and is not included among the things which He
has revealed to the children of men. Revealed, how-
ever, is the matter of the covenant, and this cove-
nant makes known to us the remarkable rule that God
has been pleased to set His holy election in connection
with the bond of generation."1 Van Mastricht cor-
rectly says that while the Reformed hold that infants
are liable to reprobation, yet ' ' concerning believers' in-
fants . . . they judge better things. But unbelievers'
infants, because the Scriptures determine nothing clear-
ly on the subject, they judge should be left to the Di-
vine discretion." a
The Reformed Confessions with characteristic cau-
tion refrain from all definition upon the negative side
of this great question, and thus confine themselves to
emphasizing the gracious doctrine common to the
whole body of Reformed thought. The fundamental
Reformed doctrine of the Church is nowhere more
beautifully stated than in the sixteenth article of the
Old Scotch Confession, while its polemical appendix
of 1580, in its protest against the errors of " antichrist,"
specifically mentions " his cruell judgement againis
infants departing without the sacrament : his absolute
necessitie of baptisme." No synod probably ever met
which labored under greater temptation to declare that
some infants, dying in infancy, are reprobate, than the
Synod of Dort. Possibly nearly every member of it
held as his private opinion that there are such infants.
And the certainly very shrewd but scarcely sincere
methods of the Remonstrants in shifting the form in
which this question came before the Synod were very
irritating. But the fathers of Dort, with truly Re-
formed loyalty to the positive declarations of Scrip-
ture, confined themselves to a clear testimony to the
positive doctrine of infant salvation and a repudiation
of the calumnies of the Remonstrants, without a word
of negative inference. ' ' Since we are to judge of the
1 De Heraut, for September 7th, 1890: c/. /h^1i^±t^--
3 Theoretico-Pract. TheoL (1724). P- 308.
214 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
will of God from His Word," they say, " which testi-
fies that the children of believers are holy, not by na-
ture, but in virtue of the covenant of grace, in which
they together with their parents are comprehended,
godly parents have no reason to doubt of the election
and salvation of their children whom it pleaseth God
to call out of this life in their infancy" (cap. i., art.
xvii.). Accordingly they repel in the Conclusion the
calumny that the Reformed teach " that many children
of the faithful are torn guiltless from their mothers'
breasts and tyrannically plunged into hell." ' It is
easy to say that nothing is here said of the children of
any but the " godly" and of the "faithful." This is
true. And therefore it is not implied (as is often
thoughtlessly asserted) that the contrary of what is
here asserted is true of the children of the ungodly ;
but nothing is taught of them at all. It is more to the
purpose to observe that it is asserted here that all the
children of believers, dying such, are saved ; and that
this assertion is an inestimable advance on that of the
Council of Trent and that of the Augsburg Confession
that baptism is necessary to salvation, as well as upon
the ominous silence of the Anglican Prayer Book as to
all who die unbaptized. It is, in a word, the confes-
sional doctrine of the Reformed churches and of the
Reformed churches alone, that all believers' children,
dying in infancy, are saved. ?
What has been said of the Synod of Dort may be
repeated of the Westminster Assembly. The Vvest-
1 The language here used has a not uninteresting history. It is
Calvin's challenge to Castellio : " Put forth now thy virulence against
God, who hurls innocent babes torn from their mothers* breasts into
eternal death" (Be Occulta Dei Providentia, in Opp. ed., Amst.,
yiii., pp. 644-45). The underlying conception that God condemns
infants to eternal death may, no doubt, be Calvin's ; but the mode of
expression is Calvin's reductio ad absurdum (or rather ad blasphe-
miam) of Castellio's opinions. Nevertheless the Remonstrants al-
lowed themselves in their polemic zeal to apply the whole sentiment
to the orthodox, and that, even in a still more sharpened form — viz.,
with reference to believers' children. This very gross calumny the
Synod repels. Its deliverance is subjected to a very sharp and not
very candid criticism by Ei'iscopius {Opera I., i., p. 176, and specially
II., p. 28).
I
THE REFORMED DOCTRINE. 215
minster divines were generally at one in the matter of
infant salvation with the doctors ot Dort, but, like
them, they refrained from any deliverance as to its
negative side. That death in infancy does not preju-
dice the salvation of God's elect they asserted in the
chapter of their Confession which treats of the appli-
cation of Christ's redemption to His people : " All
those whom God hath predestined unto life, and those
only, He is pleased, in His appointed and accepted
time, effectually to call, by His word and Spirit, . . .
so as they come most freely, being made willing by
His grace. . . . Elect infants dying in infancy are
regenerated and saved by Christ, through the Spirit
who worketh when, and where, and how He pleas-
eth." ' With this declaration of their faith that such
1 Westminster Confession of Faith, X., i. and iii. The opinion
that a body of non-elect infants dying in infancy and not saved is
implied in this passage, although often controversially asserted, is
not only a wholly unreasonable opinion exegetically, but is absolutely
negatived by the history of the formation of this clause in the Assem-
bly as recorded in the Minutes, and has never found favor among
the expositors of the Confession. David Dickson's (1684) treatment
of the section shows that he understands it to be directed against the
Anabaptists ; and all careful students of the Confession understand
it as above, including Shaw, A. A. Hodge, Macpherson, Mitchell,
and Beattie. This is true of all schools of adherents to the Confes-
sion. See, e.g., Lyman Beecher {Spirit of the Pilgrims, 1828, i.,
pp. 49, 81) : " The phrase ' elect infants,' which, in his usual way, the
reviewer takes for granted implies that there are infants who are not
elect, implies no such thing." " But this Confession, which repre-
sented the Calvinism of Old England and New, and which expresses
also the doctrinal opinions of the Church of Scotland and of the Pres-
byterian Church in the United States, teaches neither directly nor by
implication that infants are damned." Compare also Philip Schaff,
Creeds of Christendom, i., 380, 795. Compare also The Presbyterian
Pastor's Catechis?n, by the Rev. John H. Bockok, D.D. (Presby-
terian Board, 1857) : " Q. 13. Why do we not baptize the i?ifant
children of unbelievers ? A. 1. Not because we think such children
would be lost if they died in infancy. We do not think children will
be saved on account of their baptism, but through the merits of
Christ. Baptism does not confer salvation, but only acknowledges
and recognizes it. 2. Non-elect infants are such as do not die in
infancy, but grow up to be wicked and impenitent men, as Cain,
Herod, Judas, Voltaire, Paine." The impression that the phrase
" elect infants dying in infancy," implies as its contrast " non-elect
infants dying in infancy," rather than " elect infants living to grow
up," is probably due in some measure to lack of acquaintance with
the literature of the subject. A glance into Cornelius Burges's
216 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
of God's elect as die in infancy are saved by His own
mysterious working in their hearts, although incapable
of the response of faith, they were content. Whether
these elect comprehend all infants, dying such, or some
only — whether there is such a class as non-elect in-
fants dying in infancy, their words neither say nor
suggest. No Reformed confession enters into this
question ; no word is said by any one of them which
either asserts or implies either that some infants are
reprobated^or that all are saved. What has been held
in common by the whole body of Reformed theolo-
gians on this subject is asserted in these confessions ;
of what has been disputed among them the confessions
are silent. And silence is as favorable to one type of
belief as to another.
treatise entitled Baptismal Regeneration of Elect Infants, which
was published in 1629, will supply a number of instances of the use of
the phrase in the latter contrast. For example : ' ' Elect infants that live
to years . . . yet such as dye in infancy" (p. 166). Some think Calvin
in his Institutes, iv., 16, 21, speaks only of the " case of elect infants
dying in infancy," " but he is not so to be taken, as if he held that
only elect infants who dye in infancy doe receive the Spirit in bap-
tism : but that all the elect, whether they live or dye, doe ordinarily
partake of the Spirit in that ordinance" (p. 164). " That all elect in-
fants doe ordinarily, in Baptism, receive the Spirit of Christ, to seaze
upon them for Christ, and to be in them as the roote and first principle
of regeneration and future newnesse of life. . . . This I speake . . .
with reference only unto such Infants as dye not in infancy, but live
to years of discretion, and then come to be effectually called, and
actually converted by the ordinary means of the word applied by the
same Spirit unto them, when and how he pleaseth. As for the rest
of the elect who dye infants. I will not deny a further worke, some-
times in, sometimes before baptisme, to fit them for heaven" (p. 3).
The relation of this sentence to the statement in the Westminster
Confession is obvious. Among the testimonies which Burges cites
from leading Reformed theologians in support of his contentions, we
may adduce two, the language of which is closely similar to that of the
Confession. One is from the Continental divine Junius (De Padobapt.
7), and asserts that " elect infants are regenerated when they are in-
grafted unto Christ (regenerantur infantes electi cum Christo inserun-
tur), and this is sealed to them when they are baptized" (quoted p. 26).
The other is from the English divine Whitaker (De Sacrum, in
Genere, quast. i., cap. 3, p. 15), and affirms that " God renews elect
infants dying in infancy by the power of His Spirit (infantes electos,
morientes antequam adoleverint, Deus virtute Spiritus sui renovat) ;
but if it falls to them to five to greater age, they are the more incited
to seek renewal, because they know they received its badge while
infants" (quoted p. 211).
THE REFORMED DOCTRINE. 217
Although, thus, the cautious agnostic position as to the
fate of uncovenanted infants dying in infancy may fairly
claim to be historically the Calvinistic view, it is perfect-
ly obvious that it is not per se more Calvinistic than the
others. The adherents of all the types enumerated
above are clearly within the limits of the Reformed
system, and hold with the same firmness to the funda-
mental Reformed position that salvation is absolutely
suspended on no earthly condition, but ultimately rests
on God's electing grace alone, while our knowledge
of who are saved depends on our view of what are the
signs of election and of the clearness with which they
may be interpreted. As these several types differ only
in the replies they offer to the subordinate question,
there is no " revolution" involved in passing from one
to the other ; and as in the lapse of time the balance
between them swings this way or that, it can only be
truly said that there is advance or retrogression, not
in fundamental conception, but in the clearness with
which details are read and with which the outline of
the doctrine is filled up. In the course of the latter
half of the eighteenth century the agnostic view of the
fate of uncovenanted infants, dying such, gradually
gave place, among English-speaking Calvinists at least,
to an ever-growing universality of conviction that these
infants too are included in the election of grace ; so
that in the first half of the nineteenth century it was
almost forgotten among American theologians that
anything else had ever been believed among them.
Men like Henry Kollock and James P. Wilson, of
course, retained consciousness of the past and spoke
with caution. " It is in perfect consistence," says the
one, " with both these doctrines [of original sin and
the necessity of atonement], that we maintain that
God has ordained to confer eternal life on all whom
He has ordained to remove from this world before
they arrive at the years of discretion." ' And the other,
having spoken of the desert of original sin, adds simi-
larly : " Nevertheless it does not follow that any dying
1 Sermons (Savannah, Ga., 1822), iii., pp. 20 sq. (esp. p. 23) ; cf.
iv., p. 273 sq.
C^r erf !
218 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
in infancy are lost, since their salvation by Christ is
more than possible." ' But Dr. Lyman Beecher, in a
sermon which this declaration made famous, was almost
ready to assert that there never had been a Calvinist
who believed that any of those dying in infancy were
lost. " I am aware," he said in his inimitable way,
" that Calvinists are represented as believing and teach-
ing the monstrous doctrine that infants are damned,
and that hell is doubtless paved with their bones. But
having passed the age of fifty, and been conversant for
thirty years with the most approved Calvinistic writ-
ers, and personally acquainted with many of the most
distinguished Calvinistic divines in New England, and
in the Middle and Southern and Western States, I
must say that I have never seen nor heard of any book
which contained such a sentiment, nor a man, minister
or layman, who believed or taught it. And I feel
authorized to say that Calvinists as a body are as far
from teaching the doctrine of infant damnation as any
of those who falsely accuse them. And I would ear-
nestly and affectionately recommend to all persons who
have been accustomed to propagate this slander that
they commit to memory without delay the ninth com-
mandment, which is, ' Thou shalt not bear false wit-
ness against thy neighbor.' " a A challenge delivered
in such a tone as this could not fail of a reply,' and Dr.
1 An Essay on the Probation of Fallen Man, etc., 1827, pp. 15, 16.
Dr. H. M. Dexter, in The Congregationalist, December 10th, 1874,
says that Dr. Wilson, editing Ridgeley's Body of Divinity, "dissents
from his author, and argues effectively and at great length in proof
that all infants dying before actual transgression are ' saved by sov-
ereign mercy, by free favor, to the praise of the glory of God's
grace.' " The reference given is vol. i., p. 422, but it is wrong ; and
we have, consequently, not been able to verify the statement.
2 The Government of God Desirable. A sermon delivered at
Newark, N. J., October, 1808, during the session of the Synod of
New York and New Jersey. By Lyman Beecher, A.M., Pastor of
the Church of Christ in East Hampton, L. I. Seventh edition.
Boston : T. R. Marvin, 1827, 8vo, pp. 27. P. 15, note. This footnote
was added in this (seventh) edition. The sermon is also reprinted in
Dr. Beecher's Works.
3 In three articles in The Christian Examiner for 1827 and 1828
(vols. iv. and v.), said to be by F. Jenks. In The Spirit of the Pil-
grims, i. (1828), pp. 42 sq., 78 sq., and 149 sq. Dr. Beecher explained
THE REFORMED DOCTRINE. 219
Beecher's history was soon set right ; but his testimony
to the state of opinion in his own day on the subject is,
of course, unaffected by his historical error. The same
state of affairs is witnessed also by Dr. Charles Hodge,
-who, as the end of his long life of service as a teacher
of theology was drawing to a close, could remark of
the opinion, ' ' that only a certain part, or some of those
who die in infancy, are saved :" " We can only say that
we never saw a Calvinistic theologian who held that
doctrine."' Dr. Hodge's predecessor as teacher of
theology at Princeton spoke of the salvation of all in-
fants dying such in something of the tone prevalent
early in the century : " As infants, according to the
creed of all Reformed churches, are infected with orig-
inal sin, they cannot without regeneration be qualified
for the happiness of heaven. Children dying in in-
fancy must, therefore, be regenerated without the in-
strumentality of the Word ; and as the Holy Scriptures
have not informed us that any of the human family de-
parting in infancy will be lost, we are permitted to
hope that all such will be saved." s Dr. Hodge himself
speaks with more decision ; ' and to-day few English-
that in writing the note attacked his mind was more upon contem-
porary than past teachers. He says further : " I have only to add that
I have nowhere asserted that Calvinists as a body teach that all in-
fants are certainly saved. I am aware that many, with Dickinson
and the Reformers" (doubtless a blunder, from Van Mastricht's Re-
formatio " and ' moderate Calvinists ' have hoped that they are
saved, and referred the event to the unerring discretion of heaven"
(p. 51). -
1 Systematic Theology, iii., 605, note 4, published in 1872. In the
succeeding words Dr. Hodge approaches, but fortunately does not
attain, the unhistorical assertion of Dr. Beecher. He adds : " We
are not learned enough to venture the assertion that no Calvinist ever
held it ; but if all Calvinists are responsible for what every Calvinist
has ever said, and all Lutherans are responsible for everything
Luther or Lutherans have ever said, then Dr. Krauth as well as our-
selves will have a heavy burden to carry." Dr. Krauth, of course,
found no more difficulty than the writer in The Christian Examiner
had found in reply to Dr. Beecher, in bringing together, in reply to
Dr. Hodge, a great list of Calvinists who had held this doctrine.
The result is found in his Infant Baptism and Infant Salvation in
the Calvinistic System, etc. (Phila., 1874, p. 83.)
2 The Life of Archibald Alexander, D.D., etc., by James W.
Alexander, D.D., p. 585.
3 Systematic Theology, i., 26 ; iii., 605.
* JV : '
, ... . ' . -
220 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
speaking Calvinists can be found who do not hold with
Toplady, and Thomas Scott, and John Newton, and
J. H. A. Bomberger, ' and Nathan L. Rice, and Rob-
ert J. Breckinridge, and Robert S. Candlish, and
Thomas Hamilton,' and Charles Hodge, and William
G. T. Shedd,' and the whole body of those of recent
years whom the Calvinistic churches delight to honor,
that all who die in infancy are the children of God and
enter at once into His glory— not because original sin
alone is not deserving of eternal punishment (for all are
born children of wrath), nor because those that die in
infancy are less guilty than others (for relative inno-
cence would merit only relatively light punishment,
not freedom from all punishment), nor because they
die in infancy (for that they die in infancy is not the
cause but the effect of God's mercy toward them), but
simply because God in His infinite love has chosen
them in Christ, before the foundation of the world, by
a loving foreordination of them unto adoption as sons
in Jesus Christ. Thus, as they hold, the Reformed
theology has followed the light of the Word until its
brightness has illuminated all its corners, and the dark-
ness has fled away.
" Ethical ' ' Tendencies.
The most serious peril which the orderly develop-
ment of the Christian doctrine of the salvation of in-
fants has had to encounter, as men strove age after
age more purely and thoroughly to apprehend it, has
arisen from the intrusion into Christian thought of what
we may without lack of charity call the unchristian
conception of man's natural innocence. For the task
which was set to Christian thinking was to obtain a
clear understanding of God's revealed purpose of
mercy to the infants of a guilty and wrath-deserving
race. And the Pelagianizing conception of the inno-
' Infant Salvation in its Relation to Infant Depravity, Infant
Regeneration and Infant Baptisjn. Philadelphia, 1859, pp. 64,
109, 196.
9 Beyond the Stars, ch. vii. (pp. 184, etc.). * -\ L 7\ <■ r
■ Dogmatic Theology, ii., 714. Cf «-<-• A -/• A*££~j; ^^r
th-'bi-iy*'
"ETHICAL" TENDENCIES. 221
cence of human infancy, in however subtle a form it
may be presented, puts the solution of the problem in
jeopardy by suggesting that no suchjjroblem exists
and no solution is~neeaed. We have seen Eow some
Greek Fathers cut the knot with the facile formula that
infantile innocence, while not deserving of supernatural
reward, was yet in no danger of being adjudged to
punishment. We have seen how, in the more active
hands of Pelagius and his companions, as part of a
great unchristian scheme, the assertion that there has
been no such thing as a" fall" and that every human
being comes into the world in the same condition as
Adam when he came from his Maker's hands, men-
aced Christianity itself and was repelled only by the
vigor and greatness of an Augustine. We have seen
how the same conception, creeping gradually into the
Latin Church in the modified form of semi-Pelagianism,
lulled her heart to sleep with suggestions of less and
less ill-desert for original sin, until she neglected the
problem of infant salvation altogether and comforted
herself with a constantly attenuating doctrine of infant
punishment. If infants are so well off without Christ,
there is little impulse to consider whether they may
not be in Christ.
The Reformed churches could not hope to work out
the problem free from menace from the perennial
enemy. From the very beginning of their history, of
course, they were continually called upon to meet the
assaults of individuals who found that the most telling
form they could give their Pelagian attack was to charge
the Reformed with dishonoring God by attributing to
Him cruel treatment of "innocent infants."1 The
1 Outstanding instances may be found in Castellio and Servetus.
The latter taught that infants are born with hereditary disease (morbus)
of sin, indeed, but without guilt, which comes only with responsibility,
i.e., with the knowledge of good and evil, the age for which he sets
at about twenty. Those who die before that age go, like all men, to
the purifying pains of Hades — a sort of purgatory : whence they are
released by Christ at the resurrection. They are soiled by the ser-
pent of original sin ; but they are guilty of no impiety, and hence the
merciful and pitiful Master who gave His blessing tounbaptized babes
in this life will not condemn them, but will raise them up at the last
day and convey them to heavenly bliss. These tenets may be veri-
222 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
crisis came, however, with the Remonstrant contro-
versy, which marked the first considerable Pelagianiz-
ing defection from the Reformed ranks. Like all their
predecessors, the Remonstrants put themselves for-
ward as the defenders of " innocent infancy" against
the " barbarity" of the Reformed doctrine, which rep-
resented them as born, on account of original sin, under
the condemnation of God ; and they accordingly pas-
sionately asserted the " salvation" of all that die in in-
fancy. " Neither does it matter," said Episcopius,1
" whether these infants are the children of believers or
of heathen, for the innocence is just the same in infants
as infants." The anthropology of the Remonstrants,
however, was distinctly semi-Pelagian, and on that
basis no solid advance was possible toward a sound
doctrine of infant salvation. Nor was the matter
helped by their postulation of a universal atonement,
which lost in intention as much as it gained in exten-
sion. Infants may have very little to be saved from,
but their salvation from even that cannot be wrought
by an atonement which only purchases for them the
opportunity for salvation. Of this opportunity they
cannot avail themselves, however uninjured by the fall
the natural power of free choice may be, for the sim-
ple reason that they die infants. Nor can God be
held to make them, without their free choice, partakers
in the atonement without an admission of that sov-
ereign discrimination among men which it was the
very object of the whole Remonstrant theory to ex-
clude. It is not strange that the Remonstrants looked
with some favor on the Romish theory of poena damni,
fied from the extracts given from the Christianismi Restitutio by
Dr. Schafk, History of the Christian Church, vii., pp. 748 so. Dr.
Schaff is wrong, however, in paralleling Servetus's doctrine of orig-
inal sin with Zwingli's. Zwingli taught the universality of the guilt
of Adam's first sin, only denying that hereditary corruption is the
source of guilt ; while Serve tus makes no more of adherent than he
does of z'#herent guilt, denying guilt altogether to infants. On the
other hand, Servetus's doctrine is curiously similar to that of our mod-
ern Pelagianizing Arminians, as represented, say, by Drs. Whedon,
Miner Raymond and John Miley.
1 Opera Theologica, ed. Curcellaeus, altera pars. Goudse, 1665,
p. i53«-
••ETHICAL" TENDENCIES. 223
which would have been more conformable to their
Pelagianizing standpoint. Though the doctrine of
the salvation of all infants dying in infancy became one
of their characteristic tenets, therefore, it had no logi-
cal basis in their scheme of faith, and their proclama-
tion of it could have no direct effect in working out the
problem. Indirectly it had, however, a twofold effect.
On the one hand, it retarded the true course of the
development of doctrine, by leading those who held
fast to biblical teaching on original sin and particular
election to oppose the doctrine of the salvation of all
dying in infancy, as if it were necessarily inconsistent
with those teachings. Probably Calvinists were never
so united in affirming that some infants, dying such,
are reprobates, as in the height of the Remonstrant
controversy. On the other hand, so far as the doc-
trine of the salvation of all infants, dying such, was
accepted by the anti- Remonstrants, it tended to bring
in with it, in more or less measure, the other tenets
with which it was associated in the teaching of the
Remonstrants, and thus to lead men away from the
direct path along which alone the solution was to be
found.
Wesleyan Arminianism brought only an ameliora-
tion, not a thoroughgoing correction, of the faults of
Remonstrantism. The theoretical postulation of orig-
inal sin and natural inability, corrected by universal
justification and the gift to all men of a gracious abil-
ity on the basis of universal atonement in Christ, was
a great advance. But it left the salvation of infants
dying in infancy logically as unaccounted for as had
been done by original Remonstrantism. A universal
atonement could scarcely bring to these infants more
than it brought to such infants as did not die in
infancy but grew up to exhibit the corruption of their
hearts in appropriate action ; and surely this was some-
thing short of salvation — at the most an ability to im-
prove the grace given alike to all. But infants, dying
such, cannot improve grace ; and, therefore, it would
seem, cannot be saved, unless we suppose a special gift
to them over and above what is given to other men — a
224 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
supposition subversive at once of the whole Arminian
contention. The assertion of the salvation of all infants
dying in infancy, although a specially dear tenet of
Wesleyan Arminianism, remains, therefore, as with the
earlier Remonstrants, unconformable to the system.
The Arminian difficulty, indeed, lies one step further
back ; it does not make clear how any infant dying in
infancy is to be saved. This is thrown into startling
relief by such sentences as these from a sermon by Dr.
Phillips Brooks : " What do we mean by original sin ?
Not surely that each being comes into the world guilty,
already bearing the burden of responsible sin. If that
were so, every infant dying before the age of conscious
action must go to everlasting punishment, which hor-
rible doctrine, I think, nobody holds to-day."1 This
" horrible doctrine" probably no one in any age ever
avowed ; 3 but the noteworthy point is that Dr. Brooks
found it inconceivable that anything deserving the
name of salvation could take place " before the age of
conscious action." If " salvation" were needed be-
fore that, there would be no hope for those needing it.
And this is logically involved in the Arminian principle.
The difficulty which faces Arminian thought at this
point is fairly illustrated by the evident embarrassment
of Arminian theologians in dealing with the whole
question of infant salvation. There are doubtless few
who will be willing to follow Dr. James Strong in his
admission that the Arminian doctrine of salvation is
inapplicable to infants, and his consequent suggestion
that those who die in infancy are incapable of salva-
tion ; that, like " idiots, lunatics, and other irresponsi-
ble human beings" (all of whom present the same diffi-
culty to a type of thought which suspends salvation
absolutely on a personal act of rational choice), it may
be doubted whether they have souls, since " the exist-
ence of an absolutely undeveloped soul is to us incon-
ceivable." 3 But it cannot be said that the attempts
1 Sermons, vol. vi., Sermon i, on The Mystery of Iniquity.
'' Something similar to it has occasionally been held; see above, p. 145.
3 The Doctrine of a Future Life (New York, 1891), p. 94, note.
The text is speaking of probation and of the fact of reprobation found-
"ETHICAL" TENDENCIES. 225
that have been made to explain, conformably to Ar-
minian principles, the salvation of those who die before
reaching the age of responsible action have met with
much success. The original Wesleyan position, in its
effort to evangelicalize the Arminian scheme, began
with allowing the evangelical doctrine of original sin and
the consequent guilt of the whole human race, and laid,
therefore, the whole weight of infant salvation upon the
cancelling grace supposed to come equally to all men on
the basis of the atonement in Christ. Though all men
are by nature guilty and condemned, yet no one comes
into being under mere nature but under grace ; and ' ' the
condemnation resting upon the race as such is removed
by the virtue of the one oblation beginning with the
beginning of sin." ' Every man comes into the world,
therefore, in a saved state ; and if he departs from the
world again before reaching the age of responsible
action, he enters at once into the fruition of this salva-
tion. This is essentially the doctrine not only of Wes-
ley, and indeed of Arminius before him,1 but hitherto
of the leading Weslevan thinkers— of Fletcher5 and
Richard Watson,* and, in our own day, of W. B. Pope 6
ed on it ; and the note adds : " All this is, of course, inapplicable to
infants, idiots, lunatics and other irresponsible human beings who
can hardly be called persons in the strict sense. Their case has its
peculiar difficulties. . . . We may be permitted, however, to ven-
ture the suggestion that where the moral disability is congenital and
total there is grave reason to doubt the existence of an immortal
spirit ; and perhaps we may be forced to believe that immortality it-
self is developed rather than innate. Certain it is that the soul, as a
thinking, moral substance, is itself at least developed at some point
of embryonic life, and why may not its immortality be likewise a stage
in its progress ? The perpetuity or even the existence of an abso-
lutely undeveloped soul is to us inconceivable."
1 W. B. Pope, Christian Theology, ii., 59.
• He is defending his friend Borrius, and denies that Borrius would
have infants saved without the intervention of Christ ; and affirms
that Borrius's doctrine of infant salvation rested on the conception
that " God has taken the whole human race into the grace of recon-
ciliation, and has entered into a covenant of grace with Adam and
with the whole of his posterity in him." {Works, Nichols's trans-
lation, ii., 10, 11.)
3 Works, i., 283, 284.
4 Theological Institutes, ii., 57 sq.
s As above.
226 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
and T. O. Summers' and all who follow the original
type of Wesleyan theology .a It may, indeed, be looked
upon as the official teaching of the great Methodist
Episcopal Church, which says in its Discipline : " We
hold that all children, by virtue of the unconditional
benefits of the atonement, are members of the kingdom
of God, and therefore graciously entitled to baptism." '
Therefore it is customary among Methodist theolo-
gians, in treating of the benefits of the atonement, to
separate between the " immediate" or " uncondition-
al" and the " conditional" benefits, and to speak of the
salvation of infants under the former and of the salva-
tion of adults under the latter caption. There have
naturally arisen minor differences among them as to
exactly what is included in these " unconditional bene-
fits" conferred prenatally on all who come into being.
The ordinary custom is to identify them with " justifica-
1 Systematic Theology, ii. 39.
5 This includes very explicitly the late Dr. Henry J. Van Dyke,
who wrote : " We believe that the satisfaction which He [Christ] as
the seed of the woman and Saviour of the world, rendered to God's
broken law, takes away the guilt and condemnation of Adam's sin
from the whole human race. We do not say the inherited corruption
and depravity of our nature, which is commonly called original sin ;
but we say the guilt and condemnation of original sin ; so that the
multitude of the redeemed which no man can number will include
not only all believers, but ' all who have not sinned after the simili-
tude of Adam's transgression,' that is to say, who die in infancy"
(The Presbyterian Review for January, 1885, vol. vi., p. 58 ; cf.
The Church : Her Ministry ana Sacraments, p. 106, where the
middle clause of the above is omitted, but without change of sense).
So also Dr. Henry Van Dyke (God and Little Children, N. Y., 1890,
p. 62 sq.) : " The obedience of Christ countervails the disobedience of
Adam and blots it out completely. . . . Original sin is all atoned
for ; the guilt of it is taken away from the race by the Lamb of God."
Perhaps a shade less clearly assertory of the fundamental Arminian
soteriologic principle is Dr. Henry E. Robins ( The Harmony of Ethics
with Theology, 1891, p. 63 sq.) : " The sentence of acquittal is the
first indispensable step in the process of redemption which will go on
to its consummation unless thwarted by personal moral resistance.
Now, since infants dying in infancy, idiots, the congenitally insane,
and all who in the infallible judgment of God have not reached the
stature of moral personality, are incapable of such intelligent moral
resistance, incapable of resisting the new terms of salvation proposed
under the grace system, they become, we believe, on that account,
subjects of regeneration by the Holy Spirit."
» Methodist Discipline, % 43 (1892).
"ETHICAL" TENDENCIES. 227
tion," and to speak, as standing over against the " decree
of condemnation" which has been " issued against origi-
nal sin, irresponsibly derived from the first Adam," of an-
other " decree of justification" which has " issued from
the same court, whose benefits are unconditionally
bestowed through the second Adam." ' Others have
seen that such a justification must necessarily drag in
its train a " regeneration" also, by which the sinful de-
pravity, which otherwise infants would bring with
them into the world, is removed. While Richard Wat-
son draws off to himself in his cautious hesitancy to
affirm even actual " justification" of all who come into
the world, preferring to say that they are " all born
under the ' free gift,' the effects of the ' righteousness '
which extended to ' all men ; ' and this free gift is be-
stowed on them in order to justification of life ;" which
" justification" follows unconditionally, by a process
of which we are not informed, in the case of all who die
in infancy.2 These minor variations of statement, how-
ever, while they illustrate the difficulties of its construc-
tion, do not affect the common doctrine ; which is,
briefly, that all men are born into the world, in princi-
le, saved, and it is therefore that they who die in in-
ancy enter into life. Nor do they affect the por-
tentous consequences which flow from this doctrine —
fatal, it would seem, to the whole system. For that all
men enter the world in a saved state is assuredly not
verifiable from experience ; those that do not die in in-
fancy certainly do not exhibit the traits of salvation :
and, in order to believe that all are born in a saved state,
we would seem to be forced to postulate a universal in-
dividual apostasy to account for universal sin — a thing
which the Wesleyan theologians are naturally somewhat
loath to do. ' Further, if all men enter the world in a saved
state, but with the certainty of apostatizing if they live to
1 The words quoted here are Dr. John J. Tigert's in Summers's
Systematic Theology, ii., 39.
2 Theological Institutes, ii., 59.
3 Dr. Pope, for example, says : " We do not assume a second per-
sonal fall in the case of each individual reaching the crisis of respon-
sibility" {Comp. Christ. Theology, ii., 59.)
i
228 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
years of discretion, the difficulty of justifying the ways
of God with man is surely vastly increased ; for we have
now the permission of two universal apostasies to ac-
count for instead of one. Moreover, it would look as
if, in that case, grace were openly exhibited as hope-
lessly weaker than nature ; and one would seem justi-
fied in douDting whether the grace which protects none
from sin who live beyond infancy can be depended on
to introduce all who die in infancy into certain glory. *-
It cannot be held strange, therefore, that a strong ten-
dency has recently developed itself among Arminian
theologians to discard entirely the assuredly very arti-
ficial scheme which postulates a purely theoretical race
sin, corrected by an equally theoretical race salvation
that cannot be traced in any portion of the race sub-
ject to our scrutiny, and to revert to the Pelagianizing
anthropology of the Dutch Arminians. From this
point of view, which denies the guilt of original sin, in-
fants are thought to enter into the world unfortunates
indeed, and soiled by an inherited depravity which
will inevitably cause them to sin when responsible action
begins, but in the meantime under no condemnation ;
so that if they die in infancy they are liable to no pun-
ishment and must perforce enter into life, for which
they are then unconditionally fitted by grace. This is,
in general, the doctrine of Drs. Whedon,1 Raymond,*
1 The Methodist Quarterly Review, 1883, p. 757. Commentary
on Epn. ii. 3 et at.
8 Systematic Theology, ii., 311 so. Dr. Raymond is not without
some little hesitation in his rejection of the older Wesleyan view.
" The doctrine of inherited depravity," he says, "involves the idea
of inherited disqualification for eternal life. The salvation of infants,
then, has primary regard to a preparation for the blessedness of
heaven — it may have a regard to a title thereto ; not all newly cre-
ated beings, nor those sustaining similar relations, are by any natural
right entitled to a place among holy angels and glorified saints. The
salvation of infants cannot be regarded as a salvation from the peril
of eternal death. They have not committed sin, the only thing that
incurs such a peril. The idea that they are in danger of eternal death
because of Adam's transgression, is at most nothing more than the
idea of a theoretic peril. But if it be insisted that ' by the offence of
one, judgment came upon all men to [a literal and actual] condemna-
tion,' we insist that, from that condemnation, be it what it may, theo-
retic or literal, all men are saved ; for ' by the righteousness of one,
X^Ku ., ^ <^«*VV fw *-"^r >v^/^ ^«.~^ — y*^ c^v *+
"ETHICAL" TENDENCIES. 229
John Miley,1 C. W. Miller,1 G. W. King,* and a great
host of others who are in our day illustrating the in-
evitable tendency of consistent Arminian thought to
find its level in a Pelagian anthropology. The gain to
Arminian thought, however, of substituting for the
formula, " All infants are born saved," the simpler one
of " All infants are born innocent and need no salva-
tion," is certainly not apparent enough to justify the
price at which it is purchased — which is no less than
the denial that Jesus is, in any proper sense, the Sa-
viour of those that die in infancy. For, this account
of the " salvation" of infants, no less than that which
it would supplant, is fundamentally destructive to the
very principle of Arminianism. For, whether the
grace of Christ is called in for the pardon of the sin of
those who die in infancy or merely for the removal of
their uncondemnable depravity, in either case their
destiny is determined irrespective of their choice, by an
the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life.' so that the
conditions and relations of the race in infancy differ from those of
newly created beings solely in that, by the natural law of propaga-
tion, a corrupted nature is inherited. As no unclean thing or unholy
person can be admitted to the presence of God ... it follows that if
infants are taken to heaven, some power, justifying, sanctifying their
souls, must be vouchsafed unto them ; the saving influence of the
Holy Spirit must be, for Christ's sake, unconditionally bestowed. Not
only their preparation for, but also their title to, and enjoyment of,
the blessedness of heaven comes, as came their existence, through the
shed blood of our Lord Jesus Christ. . . . Our Lord's assurance of
infant salvation is sufficient ; that, if saved, they are saved by His
blood, admits of no doubt ; hence we catalogue among the uncondi-
tional benefits of atonement the secured salvation of those dying in
infancy."
1 Systematic Theology, i., 518, 532 ; ii., 247, 408, 505 sq. Dr. Miley
is very decided in his Pelagianizing construction and controverts at
length the earlier Wesleyan view. We are indebted to him for a
number of references.
* The Conflict of Centuries (Nashville, Tenn., Southern Meth. Pub.
House. 1884,) pp. 115 sq., 166, 208. " The fundamental truth is here
affirmed ' that there is no corruption in children which is truly and
properly sin,' " etc.
* Future Retribution (New York, 1891) : " This is not the place to
discuss the question of the relation of children to the atonement, and
we need only say that, not being sinners in any true definition of sin,
their relation to Christ must be wholly peculiar, as is their relation to
probation and the new birth" (p. 159 note).
230 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
unconditional decree of God, suspended for its execu-
tion on no act of their own ; and their salvation is
wrought by an unconditional application of the grace
of Christ to their souls, through the immediate and irre-
sistible operation of the Holy Spirit prior to and apart
from any action of their own proper wills. We can
scarcely speak of their death in infancy as their own
voluntary act, and we are therefore forbidden to say
that their salvation is conditioned on their death in in-
fancy— that is no proper condition which depends on
God's providence and not their act. And if death in
infancy does depend on God's providence, it is as-
suredly God in His providence who selects this vast
multitude to be made participants of His unconditional
salvation. It would be hard to contend that He did
not foreknow those who would die in infancy, when He
gave Christ to die for the sin of the world ; and it
would be inevitable that He should have had them in
mind as certainly and unconditionally recipients of the
benefits of His atonement, whatever other benefits it
might bring conditionally to others. And this is but to
say that they were unconditionally predestinated to
salvation from the foundation of the world. If only a
single infant dying in irresponsible infancy be saved, the
whole Arminian principle is traversed. If all infants
dying such are saved, not only the majority of the saved,
but doubtless the majority of the human race hitherto,
have entered into life by a non- Arminian pathway.
The truth, indeed, seems to be that there is but one
logical outlet for any system of doctrine which sus-
pends the determination of who are to be saved upon
any action of man's own will, whether in the use of
gracious or natural ability. That lies in the extension
of " the day of grace" for such as die before the age of
responsible action, into the other world. Otherwise,
there will inevitably be brought in covertly, in the sal-
vation of infants, that very sovereignty of God, " irre-
sistible" grace and passive receptivity, to deny which
is the whole raison d'etre of these schemes. There are
indications that this is being felt increasingly and in
ever wider circles among those who are most con-
"ETHICAL" TENDENCIES. 231
cerned ; we have noted it recently among the Cum-
berland Presbyterians,1 who, perhaps alone of Chris-
tian denominations, have embodied in their confession
their conviction that all infants, dying such, are saved.8
The theory of a probation in the other world for such
as have had in this no such probation as to secure from
them a decisive choice, has come to us from Germany,
and bears accordingly a later Lutheran coloring. Its
roots are, however, planted in the earliest Lutheran
thinking,' and are equally visible in the writings of the
early Remonstrants ; its seeds are present, in fact,
wherever man's salvation is causally suspended on any
act of his own, and they are already germinated wher-
ever the Scriptural declaration that none can be saved
except through Christ is transmuted into its pseudo-
disjunctive that none can be lost except through re-
jection of Christ— as if from the proposition that none
can live without food it followed that none can die who
do not reject food. But the outcome offered by this
theory certainly affords no good reason for affirming
that all infants, dying such, are saved. It is not un-
common, indeed, for its advocates to suppose the pres-
ent life to be a more favorable opportunity for moral
1 Cumberland Presbyterian Review, July, 1890, p. 369 ; cf. Janu-
ary, 1890, p 113.
* " All infants dying in infancy are regenerated and saved by Christ
through the Spirit, who worketh when, and where, and how He
pleaseth ; so also are others who have never had the exercise of rea-
son, and who are incapable of being outwardly called by the minis-
try of the Word." — The Confession of Faith of the Cumberland
Presbyterian Church, revised and adopted by the General Assembly
at Princeton, Ky., May, 1829 (Nashville, Tenn., Board of Publication
C. P. Church, 1880, ch. x., § 3). In the revision of 1883, this runs :
" All infants dying in infancy, and all persons who have never had
the faculty of reason, are regenerated and saved." — Confession of
Faith and Government of the Cumberland Presbyterian Church.
(Nashville, etc., 1893, § 54, p. 34.)
8 Cf. e.g., Andrew (Actis Col log. Montisbelligart, p. 447, 448),
who argues that those who are adjudicated to eternal punishment
are not condemned for the reason that they have sinned, but because
they have refused to embrace Christ in true faith. Beza very appro-
priately replied : "This that you say, ' these are not therefore damned
because they have sinned,' is something wholly new to me and hitherto
unheard of, since sin is the sole cause of eternal damnation, why the
wicked are left in their wickedness and condemned."
232 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
renewal in Christ than the next.1 Some, no doubt,
think otherwise. But in either event what can assure
us that all whose opportunity comes to them only on
the other side of the grave will be so renewed ? Surely
we must bear constantly in mind that, however the cir-
cumstances in that world may differ from those of life
here, there will nevertheless always " remain the mys-
tery of that freedom which makes it possible to reject
Christ," a and therefore a probability less or greater, ac-
cording to our estimate of the relative favorableness of
the opportunity for moral renewal in Christ, offered
then and now, that fewer or more of those that die in
infancy will use their freedom in rejecting Christ, and
so pass to doom.
Efforts enough, no doubt, have been made to show
that, even on the so-called " ethical" postulates, it is
reasonable to believe that all infants, dying such, will
attain blessedness, and that, without the assumption
of any proper probation beyond the grave. We are
ready to accept the subtle argument in Dr. Kedney's
valuable work, Christian Doctrine Harmonized,* as the
best that can be said in the premises. Dr. Kedney
denies the theory of "future probation," but shares
the general " ethical" view on which it is founded, and
projects the salvation of infants dying in infancy into
the next world on the express ground that they are in-
capable of choice here. He assures us that they will
surely welcome the knowledge of God's love in Christ
there. But we miss the grounds of assurance, on the
fundamental postulates of the scheme. He reasons
that we may fairly believe ' ' that even in such cases the
moral trend is in this life determined, and through
mystical influence, as in all cases whatever, such deter-
mination sure to issue in self-determination, foreseen
by God and the environment adapted accordingly."
" This simply locates the will," he adds, " back of the
point of clear self-consciousness, and uses the word to
' Cf. Progressive Orthodoxy, p. 76 : " There is much reason also,
in the nature of the case, to believe that the present life is the most
favorable opportunity for moral renewal in Christ."
i Progressive Orthodoxy, p. 93. ■ Vol. ii., pp. 91 so.
"ETHICAL" TENDENCIES. 233
represent the rudimentary consciousness, which last
has spiritual elements." " Hence the inference," he
concludes, " that infants dying are on the way to per-
fection, since the knowledge of God's love in Christ is
sure to reach them under the coming environment, and
that, not to be possibly rejected, but sure to be wel-
comed, and to carry them to the blessed end. This
supply of the highest possible motive-spring, in every
case needful for perfection, is not probation, but eleva-
tion." We certainly rejoice in this conclusion. But
as certainly we do not find it possible to view it as a
logical corollary from Dr. Kedney's general principle
that every man's eternal state is determined by a true
probation, personally undergone by him under influ-
ences and providential provisions for making a holy
choice easy. Rather it appears to us to rest on as-
sumptions which stand in flagrant contradiction with
this principle; and it is hard for us to see why, if the great
majority of those who are saved are saved by a mysti-
cal influence of the Holy Spirit's, acting beneath con-
sciousness, such as makes their choice of Christ certain,
we need be so strenuous in denying with reference to
the minority the morality of so blessed and sure a sal-
vation.1
Dr. Kedney's inconsistency * appears to us happy in-
1 It is a view not essentially differing from Dr. Kedney's that the
Rev. D. Fisk Harris, himself a Congregational minister (Calvinism
Contrary to God's Word and Man's Moral Nature, p. 107), tells
us " seems to be the prevailing view of Congregationalists." This
he states thus : " All infants become moral agents after death. Exer-
cising a holy choice, they ' are saved on the ground of the atonement
and by regeneration.'" Suppose they do not exercise a "holy
choice"? What is to assure us that they will all "exercise a holy
choice" ? If the choice of these infants while it remains free can be
made certain there, why not the same for adults here ? And if their
choice is made certain, by what is it that their destiny is determined
— by their choice, or by the Divine act which makes it certain ? As-
suredly, no thoroughfare is open along this path for a consistent doc-
trine of the salvation of all that die in infancy, unless the whole prin-
ciple of the theory is given up and the Reformed doctrine of the sov-
ereign and irresistible grace of God sub-introduced.
2 This inconsistency naturally appears in all writers of similar ten-
dencies, and the popular religious literature of the day is accordingly
full of it. An example may be found in Bishop Hugh Miller Thomp-
son's Baldwin Lectures on The World and the Man (New York,
234 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
deed when we consider what the more consistent solu-
tion of the problem would be, as it is offered, say, by
1890). His conception of Christianity is the so-called " ethical" one
(pp. 59, 150), and his central idea is that the world is " the wilder-
ness" or trial-ground necessary for fitting men for heaven. In the
middle of a chapter the very object of which is to show that the sons
of God must needs be trained by tests and trials, attempts and tempta-
tions, and that the law that " resistance is the measure of advance"
is universal, he needs to stop suddenly and say : " And it does not
change the law that myriads of the children of our race are spared
this trial. The majority of those born into the wilderness are taken
out of it before temptation begins." " There is no sense in this," he
adds justly, " if we look at our ' science ' only. The death of infants
is absolutely irrational in the face of the law of survival, if we confine
that law only to time and the world. I dare say there is nothing
more preposterously senseless than the death, at a year old, of a child
who in head and hand, in health and intellect, was the perfect flower
of his race ! But the great Father has other schools besides this. He
is not confined to one curriculum for the training of His sons, and
those He takes away need other discipline than this wilderness
affords. He trains some here. He need not train all" (p. 96). It
certainly is interesting to learn that a ' ' universal' ' law is not affected by
its inapplicability to "the majority" of those over whom it was to
rule. It is equally worthy of note that Dr. Thompson's "ethical"
theory of the necessity of " probation" forces him to assume that chil-
dren departing this life must enter, not a place of bliss, but a new
trial place in the same sense in which this life is a trial-place, and
equally including likewise the risk and certainty of many failures.
There is, in other words, no pathway open along this road for belief
in the salvation of all who die in infancy, nor even for the immediate
salvation of any who die in infancy. All who are saved must
be saved through trial, here or hereafter. Whether Dr. Thompson
would assent to this or not, we do not know ; his theory involves it.
Compare the following words of Dr. E. H. Plumptre {The Wider
Hope, edited by James Hogg, London, 1890, p. 132) : " I dwelt . . .
on the fact that for a large number of human souls, whom the great
mass of Christians recognize as heirs of immortality, there has been
absolutely no possibility of any action that could test or develop char-
acter. ' As yet I am compelled to believe that where there has been
no adequate probation or none at all, there must be some extension
of the possibility of development or change beyond the limits of this
present life. Take the case of unbaptized children. Shall we close
the gates of Paradise against them and satisfy ourselves with the
levissima damnatio which gained for Augustine the repute of the
durus pater infantum ? And if we are forced in such a case to
admit the law or progress, is it not legitimate to infer that it extends
beyond them to those whose state is more or less analogous ? ' " Dr.
Plumptre does not once think of the possibility of infants passing at
once to bliss, — " unbaptized children," he says out of his Anglican
consciousness; the best he can hope for is that they " may have a
chance" under probation : and that is certainly the best that can be
hoped under his "ethical" view.
"ET/f/CAL" TENDENCIES. 235
Dr. Emory Miller.' Because his theory forces him to
consider that the racial and social life existent in this
world affords the lowest and easiest conditions which
" all-conditioning love" can prepare for the rise, prog-
ress and perfection of finite personalities, Dr. Miller
can find nothing better to say of " infants of days,"
dying such, than that, along with idiots, as they have
' ' never exercised self-determination, they have not at-
tained to individual self-consciousness," and are per-
sons " only in the sense of a bundle of personal condi-
tions ;" and hence " physical death, which is merely
racial retribution, the dissolution of race conditions,
must, so far as we can determine without a revelation
on the subject, end their being." Even for children
of a somewhat larger growth, " who have passed from
human conditions without human temptation or pro-
bation into the conditions and associations of the
blessed," though he is forced to allow that their new
conditions are those of " overwhelming motives to
love and entire absence of temptation," he yet, because
he is required to contend that any conceivable condi-
tions are less easy for attaining perfection than those
provided in this world, can only promise relatively
low attainments and doubtful advance toward perfec-
tion. These new conditions, after all, are not such as
will afford opportunity of " self-determined conquest
of natural susceptibilities to selfishness," or of the at-
tainment " of the consciousness of moral security as
against supposable temptation to sin." By them alone,
therefore, perfect personality or the hignest order of
moral character cannot be reached ; though it must be
admitted that through association with the " faithful"
who have determined their own security (and whom
Dr. Miller strangely speaks of as constituting the
" main body" of the perfect universe, as if the number
of these conquering faithful" could possibly exceed
the combined numbers of " angels, infants, and innocent
heathen") they too may eventually acquire a like tran-
1 Tkt Evolution of Love. By Emory Miller, D.D., LL.D. (Chi-
cago, 1892), p. 330 ; cf. pp. 254 and 336. which speak of children and
not merely infants.
236 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
scendent security. From such speculations one turns
with the sense of a great relief to the simplicity of the
Word, which does not suspend salvation upon man's
action, but solely upon the loving act of God, for whom
nothing is " too hard ;" and with a deepened convic-
tion that it is better to fall into the hands of God than
in those of men, however well-intentioned.
The drifts of doctrine which have come before us in
this rapid sketch may be reduced to three generic
views. I. There is what may be called the ecclesiasti-
cal doctrine. According to this the Church, in the sense
of an outwardly organized body, is set as the sole foun-
tain of salvation in the midst of a lost world ; the Spirit
of God and eternal life are its peculiar endowments,
of which none can partake save through communion
with it. Accordingly to all those departing this life in
infancy, baptism, the gateway to tjie Church, is the
condition of salvation. 2. There is what may be called
the gracious doctrine. According to this the visible
Church is not set in the world to determine by the gift
of its ordinances who are to be saved, but, as the har-
bor of refuge for the saints, to gather into its bosom
those whom God Himself in His infinite love has select-
ed in Christ Jesus belore the foundation of the world
in whom to show the wonders of His grace. Men ac-
cordingly are not saved because they are baptized, but
they are baptized because they are saved ; and the fail-
ure' of the ordinance does not argue the failure of the
grace. Accordingly to all those departing this life in
infancy, inclusion in God's saving purpose alone is the
condition of salvation : we may be able to infer this
purpose from manifest signs, or we may not be able to
infer it, but in any case it cannot fail. 3. There is
what may be called the humanitarian doctrine. Ac-
cording to this the determining cause of man's salva-
tion is his own free choice, under whatever variety of
theories as to the source of his power to exercise this
choice, or the manner in which it is exercised. Ac-
"ETHICAL" TENDENCIES. 237
cordingly whether one is saved or not is dependent not
on inclusion by baptism in the Church, the God-en-
dowed institution of salvation, nor on inclusion by grace
in God's hidden purpose of mercy, but on the decisive
activity of the individual soul itself.
The first of these doctrines is characteristic of the
early, the mediaeval, and the Roman churches, and is
not without echoes in those sections of Protestantism
which love to think of themselves as " more historical"
or less radically reformed than the rest. The second
is the doctrine of the Reformed churches. These two
are not opposed to one another in their most funda-
mental conception, but are related rather as an earlier
misapprehension and a later correction of the same
basal doctrine. The phrase extra ecclesiam nulla salus is
the common property of both ; they differ only in their
understanding of what is meant by the " ecclesia" out-
side of which is no salvation, whether the visible or
the invisible church, whether the externally organized
institution or the true " body of Christ" bound to Him
by the indwelling Spirit. The third doctrine, on the
other hand, has cropped out ever and again in every
age of the Church, has dominated the thought of whole
sections of it and of whole ages, but has never, in its
purity, found expression in any great historic confes-
sion or exclusively characterized any age. It is, in
fact, not a development of Christian doctrine at all, but
an intrusion into Christian thought from without. In
its purity it has always and in all communions been
recognized as deadly heresy ; and only as it has been
more or less modified and concealed among distinctive-
ly Christian adjuncts has it ever made a position for
itself in the Church. Its fundamental conception is
the antipodes of that of the other doctrines, inasmuch
as it looks to man and not to God as the decisive actor
in the saving of the soul.
The first sure step in the development of the doctrine
of infant salvation was taken when the Church drew
from the Scriptures that foundation which from the be-
ginning has stood firm, Infants too are lost members of a
lest race, and only those savingly united to Christ are saved.
238 THE DOCTRINE OF INFANT SALVATION.
It was only in its definition of what infants are thus
savingly united to Christ that the early Church missed
the path. All that are brought to Him in baptism, was
its answer. And long ages needed to pass before a
second step in the development of the doctrine was
taken in a corrected definition. The way for a truer ap-
prehension was prepared indeed by Augustine's doc-
trine of grace, by which salvation was made dependent
on the dealings of God with the individual heart, and
thus in principle all ecclesiastical bonds were broken.
But his own eyes were holden that he should not see
it. It was thus reserved to Zwingli to proclaim the
true answer clearly, All the elect children of God, who
are regenerated by the Spirit, who works when, and where,
and how He pleases. The sole question that remains is,
Who of those that die in infancy are the elect children
of God ? Tentative answers have been given. The
children of God's people, some have said. Others have
said, The children of God's people, with such others as
His love has set upon to call. All those that die in
infancy, others still have said. And it is to this reply
that Reformed thinking and not Reformed thinking
only, but in one way or another, logically or illogi-
cally, the thinking of the Christian world has been
converging. Is it the Scriptural answer ? If it be
really conformable to the Word of God it will stand ;
and the third step in the development of the doctrine
of infant salvation is already taken.
But if this answer stand, it must be clearly under-
stood that it can stand on no other theological basis than
lhat of the Reformed theology. If all infants dying in
infancy are saved, it is certain that they are not saved
by or through the ordinances of the visible Church ;
for they have not received them. It is equally cer-
tain that they are not saved through their own improve-
ment of a grace common to all men ; for, just because
they die in infanc}', they are incapable of personal
activity. It is equally certain that they are not saved
through the granting to them of a bare opportunity of
salvation in the next world ; for a bare opportunity
indubitably falls short of salvation. If all that die in
"ETHICAL" TENDENCIES. 239
infancy are saved, it can only be through the almighty
operation of the Holy Spirit, who works when, and
where, and how He pleases, through whose ineffable
grace the Father gathers these little ones to the home
He has prepared for them. If, then, the salvation of
all that die in infancy be held to be a certain or prob-
able fact, this fact will powerfully react on the whole
complex of our theological conceptions, and no system
of theological thought can live in which it cannot find a
natural and logical place. It can find such a place in
the Reformed theology. It can find such a place in no
other system of theological thought.
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