On Nature and Grace

St. Augustine of Hippo

1. 1. [I.]— The Occasion of Publishing This Work; What God's Righteousness is
2. 2. [II.]— Faith in Christ Not Necessary to Salvation, If a Man Without It Can Lead a Righteous Life
3. 3. [III.]— Nature Was Created Sound and Whole; It Was Afterwards Corrupted by Sin
4. 4. [IV.]— Free Grace
5. 5. [V.]— It Was a Matter of Justice that All Should Be Condemned
6. 6. [VI.]— The Pelagians Have Very Strong and Active Minds
7. 7. [VII.]— He Proceeds to Confute the Work of Pelagius; He Refrains as Yet from Mentioning Pelagius' Name
8. 8. — A Distinction Drawn by Pelagius Between the Possible and Actual
9. 9. [VIII.]— Even They Who Were Not Able to Be Justified are Condemned
10. 10. [IX.]— He Could Not Be Justified, Who Had Not Heard of the Name of Christ; Rendering the Cross of Christ of None Effect
11. 11. [X.]— Grace Subtly Acknowledged by Pelagius
12. 12. [XI.]— In Our Discussions About Grace, We Do Not Speak of that Which Relates to the Constitution of Our Nature, But to Its Restoration
13. 13. [XII.]— The Scope and Purpose of the Law's Threatenings; Perfect Wayfarers.
14. 14. [XIII.]— Refutation of Pelagius
15. 15. [XIV.]— Not Everything [of Doctrinal Truth] is Written in Scripture in So Many Words
16. 16. [XV.]— Pelagius Corrupts a Passage of the Apostle James by Adding a Note of Interrogation
17. 17. [XVI.]— Explanation of This Text Continued
18. 18. [XVII.]— Who May Be Said to Be in the Flesh
19. 19. — Sins of Ignorance; To Whom Wisdom is Given by God on Their Requesting It
20. 20. [XVIII.]— What Prayer Pelagius Would Admit to Be Necessary
21. 21. [XIX.]— Pelagius Denies that Human Nature Has Been Depraved or Corrupted by Sin
22. 22. [XX.]— How Our Nature Could Be Vitiated by Sin, Even Though It Be Not a Substance
23. 23. [XXI.]— Adam Delivered by the Mercy of Christ
24. 24. [XXII.]— Sin and the Penalty of Sin the Same
25. 25. [XXIII.]— God Forsakes Only Those Who Deserve to Be Forsaken. We are Sufficient of Ourselves to Commit Sin; But Not to Return to the Way of Righteousness. Death is the Punishment, Not the Cause of Sin
26. 26. [XXIV.]— Christ Died of His Own Power and Choice
27. 27. — Even Evils, Through God's Mercy, are of Use
28. 28. [XXV.]— The Disposition of Nearly All Who Go Astray. With Some Heretics Our Business Ought Not to Be Disputation, But Prayer
29. 29. [XXVI.]— A Simile to Show that God's Grace is Necessary for Doing Any Good Work Whatever. God Never Forsakes the Justified Man If He Be Not Himself Forsaken.
30. 30. [XXVII.]— Sin is Removed by Sin
31. 31. — The Order and Process of Healing Our Heavenly Physician Does Not Adopt from the Sick Patient, But Derives from Himself. What Cause the Righteous Have for Fearing
32. 32. [XXVIII.]— God Forsakes Us to Some Extent that We May Not Grow Proud
33. 33. [XXIX.]— Not Every Sin is Pride. How Pride is the Commencement of Every Sin
34. 34. [XXX.]— A Man's Sin is His Own, But He Needs Grace for His Cure
35. 35. [XXXI.]— Why God Does Not Immediately Cure Pride Itself. The Secret and Insidious Growth of Pride. Preventing and Subsequent Grace
36. 36. [XXXII.]— Pride Even in Such Things as are Done Aright Must Be Avoided. Free Will is Not Taken Away When Grace is Preached
37. 37. [XXXIII.]— Being Wholly Without Sin Does Not Put Man on an Equality with God
38. 38. [XXXIV.]— We Must Not Lie, Even for the Sake of Moderation. The Praise of Humility Must Not Be Placed to the Account of Falsehood
39. 39. — Pelagius Glorifies God as Creator at the Expense of God as Saviour
40. 40. [XXXV.]— Why There is a Record in Scripture of Certain Men's Sins, Recklessness in Sin Accounts It to Be So Much Loss Whenever It Falls Short in Gratifying Lust
41. 41. — Whether Holy Men Have Died Without Sin
42. 42. [XXXVI.]— The Blessed Virgin Mary May Have Lived Without Sin. None of the Saints Besides Her Without Sin
43. 43. [XXXVII.]— Why Scripture Has Not Mentioned the Sins of All
44. 44. — Pelagius Argues that Abel Was Sinless
45. 45. [XXXVIII.]— Why Cain Has Been by Some Thought to Have Had Children by His Mother Eve. The Sins of Righteous Men. Who Can Be Both Righteous, and Yet Not Without Sin
46. 46. [XXXIX.]— Shall We Follow Scripture, or Add to Its Declarations?
47. 47. [XL.]— For What Pelagius Thought that Christ is Necessary to Us
48. 48. [XLI.]— How the Term All Is to Be Understood
49. 49. [XLII.]— A Man Can Be Sinless, But Only by the Help of Grace. In the Saints This Possibility Advances and Keeps Pace with the Realization
50. 50. [XLIII.]— God Commands No Impossibilities
51. 51. [XLIV.]— State of the Question Between the Pelagians and the Catholics. Holy Men of Old Saved by the Self-Same Faith in Christ Which We Exercise
52. 52. — The Whole Discussion is About Grace
53. 53. [XLV.]— Pelagius Distinguishes Between a Power and Its Use
54. 54. [XLVI.]— There is No Incompatibility Between Necessity and Free Will
55. 55. [XLVII.]— The Same Continued
56. 56. [XLVIII.]— The Assistance of Grace in a Perfect Nature
57. 57. [XLIX.]— It Does Not Detract from God's Almighty Power, that He is Incapable of Either Sinning, or Dying, or Destroying Himself
58. 58. [L.]— Even Pious and God-Fearing Men Resist Grace
59. 59. [LI.]— In What Sense Pelagius Attributed to God's Grace the Capacity of Not Sinning
60. 60. [LII.]— Pelagius Admits Contrary Flesh In the Unbaptized
61. 61. [LIII.]— Paul Asserts that the Flesh is Contrary Even in the Baptized
62. 62. — Concerning What Grace of God is Here Under Discussion. The Ungodly Man, When Dying, is Not Delivered from Concupiscence
63. 63. [LIV.]— Does God Create Contraries?
64. 64. — Pelagius' Admission as Regards the Unbaptized, Fatal
65. 65. [LV.]— This Body of Death, So Called from Its Defect, Not from Its Substance
66. 66. — The Works, Not the Substance, of the Flesh Opposed to the Spirit.
67. 67. [LVII.]— Who May Be Said to Be Under the Law
68. 68. [LVIII.]— Despite the Devil, Man May, by God's Help, Be Perfected
69. 69. [LIX.]— Pelagius Puts Nature in the Place of Grace
70. 70. [LX.]— Whether Any Man is Without Sin in This Life
71. 71. [LXI.]— Augustine Replies Against the Quotations Which Pelagius Had Advanced Out of the Catholic Writers. Lactantius
72. 72. [LXI.]— Hilary. The Pure in Heart Blessed. The Doing and Perfecting of Righteousness
73. 73. — He Meets Pelagius with Another Passage from Hilary
74. 74. [LXIII.]— Ambrose
75. 75. — Augustine Adduces in Reply Some Other Passages of Ambrose
76. 76. [LXIV.]— John of Constantinople
77. 77. — Xystus
78. 78. [LXV.]— Jerome
79. 79. [LXVI.]— A Certain Necessity of Sinning
80. 80. [LXVII.]— Augustine Himself. Two Methods Whereby Sins, Like Diseases, are Guarded Against
81. 81. — Augustine Quotes Himself on Free Will
82. 82. [LXVIII.]— How to Exhort Men to Faith, Repentance, and Advancement
83. 83. [LXIX.]— God Enjoins No Impossibility, Because All Things are Possible and Easy to Love
84. 84. [LXX.]— The Degrees of Love are Also Degrees of Holiness

The book which you sent to me, my beloved sons, Timasius and Jacobus, I have read through hastily, but not indifferently, omitting only the few points which are plain enough to everybody; and I saw in it a man inflamed with most ardent zeal against those, who, when in their sins they ought to censure human will, are more forward in accusing the nature of men, and thereby endeavour to excuse themselves. He shows too great a fire against this evil, which even authors of secular literature have severely censured with the exclamation: The human race falsely complains of its own nature! This same sentiment your author also has strongly insisted upon, with all the powers of his talent. I fear, however, that he will chiefly help those who have a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge, who, being ignorant of God's righteousness, and going about to establish their own righteousness, have not submitted themselves to the righteousness of God. [[Romans 10.2]]-3 Now, what the righteousness of God is, which is spoken of here, he immediately afterwards explains by adding: For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believes. [[Romans 10.4]] This righteousness of God, therefore, lies not in the commandment of the law, which excites fear, but in the aid afforded by the grace of Christ, to which alone the fear of the law, as of a schoolmaster, [[Galatians 3.24]] usefully conducts. Now, the man who understands this understands why he is a Christian. For If righteousness came by the law, then Christ is dead in vain. [[Galatians 2.21]] If, however He did not die in vain, in Him only is the ungodly man justified, and to him, on believing in Him who justifies the ungodly, faith is reckoned for righteousness. [[Romans 4.5]] For all men have sinned and come short of the glory of God, being justified freely by His blood. [[Romans 3.23]]-24 But all those who do not think themselves to belong to the all who have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, have of course no need to become Christians, because they that be whole need not a physician, but they that are sick; [[Matthew 9.12]] whence it is, that He came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance. [[Matthew 9.13]]