Tractatus de Gratia Divina Actuali

Moreover, the doctrine contained in the earlier chapters of that book having first been set forth, we teach that both helps are the grace of perseverance: the help, namely, without which not, coalescing from habitual gifts and actual graces, gave to Adam, after the manner of an efficient cause, the power of persevering; while the help by which is a series of graces, or a divine providence toward the saints, embracing both interior and exterior graces and whatever contributes to the salvation of the predestined, and passive perseverance itself, by which providence the just man is so ruled that he at length actually perseveres. The distinctions, however, established by Augustine between the two helps supply no sufficient reason for asserting that, on Augustine's view, grace of itself determines the will to persevere in those who persevere.

I. Jansenius (De Gratia Christi L. II. c.4.), after Calvin, affirms that the proof of his opinion is placed, as in an impregnable citadel, in chapters 10. 11. 12. of the book of Augustine de Corrept. et Gratia. From these Jansenius gathers this doctrine. 1) That there is a distinction between the helps conferred on integral nature and fallen nature.De Gratia Christi L. II. c.4. For Adam, according to Augustine, had indeed grace, but a disparate one (c. 11. n. 29); Augustine accordingly distinguishes a twofold help, namely, the help without which not and the help by which: that one, he teaches, was given to the first man, this one to the saints in the state of fall (cap. 12. n. 34).2) This distinction is held to consist in this, that the help of the first man a) was in the power of his free will, namely, a help of which man would make use if he willed: «Nor did God will that (Adam) himself be without His grace, which He left in his free will» (c. 11. n. 31). «God had given man a good will.... He had given a help without which he could not remain in it, if he willed; but that he might will, He left in his free will» (c. 11. n. 32). Of course the first man could dissent, as in fact happened. The help, therefore, was such that it did not determine the act of the will, but the determination of the good act was left by grace to the free will itself; for this is what is signified by those words: that man should will was left in his free will. Wherefore a help of this kind was a grace that gave the ability, but did not give — i.e., did not determine — the act itself; it was an indifferent, changeable grace, whose efficacy depended on the will of man. From which it followed b) that the merits of the first man would be merits proper to free will and would be attributed to it rather than to grace or to God: «because he (Adam) did not will to remain, assuredly it is his fault, whose merit it would have been if he had willed to remain; as the holy Angels did, who, when the others fell through free will, stood themselves through the same free will and merited to receive the due reward of this perseverance» (ibid). «Whence, however, would the flesh glory before God, except in its own merits? which indeed it could have had, but lost; and through that by which it could have had them, through that it lost them, i.e., through free will; on which account there remains for those to be freed nothing but the grace of the one who frees» (c. 12. n. 37). «But now, the good merit having been lost through sin, in those who are freed it has been made a gift of grace, which was to be the reward of merit» (c. XI. n. 32). Of course, since it was man who determined the use of grace and the good act, he himself distinguished himself, he himself procured good for himself, he did not receive it from God.

On the contrary, the help that is conferred in the state of fallen nature is not left in the power of free will, which was lost through sin; but it is a help that, holding itself after the manner of a formal cause, itself gives the good act, and necessarily gives the good act, so that dissent of the will cannot exist; just as a formal effect cannot fail to exist when the formal cause is present. «One thing is the help without which something is not done, and another is the help by which something is done. For without food we cannot live, and yet when food is at hand, it is not by it that he who has willed to die comes to live. Therefore the help of food is a help without which it is not done, not one by which we come to live. But beatitude, which man does not have, when it has been given, immediately he becomes blessed. For it is a help not only without which it is not done, but also by which it is done, on account of which it is given… First, therefore… there was given the help of perseverance, not by which it would come about that he persevered, but without which he could not persevere through free will. But now to the Saints predestined to the kingdom of God through the grace of God there is not given such a help of perseverance, but such that perseverance itself is given to them: not only that without this gift they cannot be persevering, but also that through this gift they are not otherwise than persevering» (C. 12, n. 34). «Did Adam not have grace? Indeed he had great, but disparate, grace… Although these (Saints in this state) now stand in need, if not of a more joyful, yet of a more powerful grace» (c. 11, nn. 29, 30). From the fact, moreover, that a help of this kind so operates in men by determining the good act, it follows that it is God who distinguishes man from man, and that God is the cause of our merits, not free will, and that everything among the things received is to be referred to God.

3. That the cause of the distinction between the two helps is to be sought in the diversity of the powers of integral and fallen nature. «If in so great an infirmity of this life their own will were left to them, so that they would remain in the help of God, without which they could not persevere, if they willed, and God did not operate in them that they might will; amid so many and so great temptations their will itself would succumb through its infirmity, and therefore they could not persevere, because, failing through infirmity, they would neither will, nor so will through the infirmity of the will that they could. Help was therefore brought to the infirmity of the human will, so that it would be moved by divine grace unswervingly and insuperably; and therefore, although infirm, it would not fail nor be conquered by any adversity… For He dismissed the very strong and permitted them to do what they would; He preserved for the infirm, that, He Himself giving, they would most invincibly will what is good, and most invincibly be unwilling to abandon it» (c. 12. n. 38). And certainly other helps are owed to a sound man, others to an infirm one, nor can what helps a sound man generally be conferred on a sick man. Accordingly, sound nature and fallen nature had to be helped by different helps, and as much distinction had to intervene between the helps as between sound nature and fallen nature, i.e., between a nature immune from concupiscence and equipped with the full powers of free will, and a nature subject to concupiscence, with the powers of free will prostrate and broken.

4. Therefore this distinction between the helps of each state is necessary, because it is determined by the diverse character of each state, and it is essential: for the modes in which those helps operate differ essentially, just as the state of integral nature and the state of fallen nature differ essentially. Thus far Jansenius.

Two things are asserted by Jansenius. 1) That the nature of the grace both of the first man and of the rest, and the reason of the difference between the two, is such as he has thus far taught: 2) that this doctrine is Augustine's and is delivered by him expressly in those chapters 10. 11. 12. of the De Corrept. et Gratia. But both are false, as we shall demonstrate separately.

II. The doctrine of Jansenius comes down to this: a) it is necessary to establish an essential distinction between the helps of integral nature and the helps of fallen nature, because the things that suit a sound nature cannot suit an infirm one. b) The grace proper to integral and sound nature is a grace that can be resisted: the grace proper to fallen nature is a grace that cannot be resisted; because nature that is sound has the full powers of free will, has therefore less need to be helped by God, and the help whose use is permitted to its free will is enough for it; but fallen nature, whose powers of free will are broken, stands in need of a greater help, nor can the help of God be permitted to its free will, which is vitiated and almost wholly destroyed. c) The grace that can be resisted is not a grace that distinguishes the just from the unjust, is not a grace that is properly the cause of merits, the cause of the whole good work: on the contrary, the distinguishing grace, the grace that is the cause of merits and of the whole good, is a grace that cannot be resisted. d) Wherefore the good Angels distinguished themselves through free will, Adam preserved himself through free will, because they had a grace that could be resisted; but fallen men have a grace that cannot be resisted. He was able to distinguish himself; the merits of the Angels were merits of free will, and such could the merits of Adam have been; on the contrary, in fallen nature the saints are distinguished through grace, and their merits and the whole good that they have are from grace.

III. Now indeed the first head of the doctrine is false. For the grace that we defend, with the Fathers, as necessary is intrinsically supernatural grace; moreover, for both states of nature the necessity of that grace for supernatural acts is the same, and in both states nature is equally impotent for supernatural works. Essentially, therefore, the grace must be the same. The reason, however, drawn from the fact that the remedies that befit a sound man are not suited to a sick one is wholly inept. For 1) even this being granted, since nevertheless when the infirm man recovers health, he can use those means which he used before the infirmity; but now fallen man is restored to health through justifying grace; the justified man, therefore, will be able to operate through that grace by which Adam operated. 2) If that which has the force of a remedy also has the character simply of a means, which nature, whether sound or sick, needs in order to do something, the same, although not under the character of a remedy, can also be applied to sound nature: this may be seen in many foods or other external things of which we make use, which are necessary of themselves to nature in order that it may live, and which can be of use to the sound and to the infirm alike, although they also confer on the infirm that which helps toward the attainment of health. But such is grace, which of itself is a means necessary to nature for supernatural acts, and therefore necessary to nature in whatever state it be: but moreover, on account of this same character of a means, it also has the character of a medicine; for since it confers the power of acting salutarily, and salutary acts, if performed by a sinner, dispose to justification, i.e., to the recovery of health, the grace that confers this power on sinners has the character of a medicine. 3) This grace, which supplies the physical and moral powers for acting supernaturally, if it finds a subject subject to concupiscence, can also avail to restrain it, or to cure its disease. For by the force of concupiscence, which acts morally by persuading or alluring, the very moral force of grace, which persuades the good and allures divinely to it, is sufficiently suited to resist; wherefore the distinction is not in grace itself, but only as to a certain effect, which proceeds from it in this state, but did not proceed in the former state, where that which demanded that effect was lacking. It must be noted, however, that this effect, considered in itself, is not the adequate reason for the necessity of grace, which is given on account of supernatural acts and without which concupiscence could be restrained.

IV. The second head of the doctrine is likewise false. For although it is true that the grace of innocent nature and of the Angels was such that the will could resist it; it is nevertheless false that the grace which is given to fallen nature cannot be resisted. This we have already sufficiently proved above. The reason, also, that is adduced first supposes something false, and then, even that being granted, concludes nothing — indeed, it demonstrates the opposite. For it supposes that through the sin of the first man the powers of free will were lost by which one can determine oneself to good and to evil, which is false, as has already been proved. But even this being conceded: since the grace that is now conferred aims at healing nature, restoring, namely, its pristine health, at least as to those things that are necessary for meriting eternal life, and the freedom of indifference was a part of Adam's health and necessary in that health for meriting; that freedom also must now be said to be restored through that grace by which that health is restored. That reason, therefore, proves the opposite of that which it wished to demonstrate.

V. The third head of the doctrine, and likewise the fourth, are false. For, as we have already seen in Thesis XLIV, the distinguishing grace is that which excludes the merits of nature, which is the beginning of every good work; and for this there is not required a determining grace, but a grace preventing and preparing the will. Again, Adam himself and the holy Angels were distinguished through grace: but that grace was such that it could be resisted; therefore. Furthermore, grace is the principle of merit, the cause of all the good in us; because it gives the good act itself — it gives it, however, inasmuch as without it we can do nothing salutary, and it itself begins by preventing the will and follows the prepared will by helping it: and for this there is not required a determining grace, but a preventing and helping grace, conferring physical and moral powers on the will. Wherefore also with respect to the Angels and Adam alike, grace gave the good act, and their merits were from grace, although not from grace conferred on the unworthy, but from grace given to those not worthy of it in the very condition of nature; and to that extent they are said, in a special sense, to have had those merits through free will, but ours from grace, inasmuch as the merits of the first man and of the Angels were not from grace mercifully superadded to a sinful and unworthy nature. Of course, just as human nature, so also free will itself can be compared both insofar as nature is a certain thing only, with grace taken simply, and insofar as such a nature is instituted by God, i.e., a nature elevated and upright, with some grace that mercifully repairs the uprightness culpably lost. If the first comparison is made, it must be said that the merits of the first man were not from nature or from free will, but from grace; if the second comparison is instituted, it must be said that the merits of the first man were through free will, namely, through a free will upright from its institution and not yet needing a grace repairing the defect of nature, which he would have freely contracted.

VI. Now it must be proved that it is utterly false that Augustine delivered the doctrine thus far impugned in those passages of the De Corrept. et Gratia. This we are about to prove, having first undertaken a brief analysis of those things which precede Augustine's disputation on the twofold help.

Accordingly, it must be noted that Augustine wrote this book, the De Correptione et Gratia, in order to prove to certain good monks of Adrumetum that those who act badly are to be corrected, although acting well is a gift of God and grace is not repaid to the merits of nature, but is given freely. Augustine, moreover, defends both things, the utility of correction and the gratuitousness of grace; for both were attacked by those monks, who, saying that those who act badly are not to be corrected, but that God alone is to be prayed to that He may give them a good will, brought the matter to this point: that, if the wicked are to be corrected, the good works must be denied to be a gift of God, and must be attributed to the will of men.

As regards the gratuitousness of grace, Augustine defends that which he had already defended before against the Pelagians; moreover, he himself had never before championed that grace which gives the good act by determining the will to one thing, so that it cannot be resisted. And certainly nothing of this kind occurs in Augustine's responses to the individual objections of the monks. We judge it not beside the point to relate summarily both the objections and the responses, which the earlier part of the book contains, and from which the occasion arose of treating of the twofold help; for thus Augustine's mind will be more clear to us.

The monks used to say (n. 4.) «Why is it preached and commanded to us that we decline from evil and do good, if we do not do this ourselves, but God operates in us both the willing and the working?» Augustine answers: that it is false that we do not act; but that it is true that we do not act from ourselves, and that preventing grace is required. Moreover, the necessity of this grace does not make the preaching and the precept of Superiors useless; for preaching and precept aim at showing what is to be done, and by whose powers it is done when it is done, and who is to be prayed to when powers are lacking; as, therefore, the external grace of the law is not useless, although interior grace, which is given freely, is necessary for doing the works of the law, so neither is preaching nor are the precepts of Superiors useless.

The monks insist (n. 5.) «Let those who preside over us, then, only command us what we ought to do, and let them pray for us that we may do it, but let them not correct and rebuke us, if we have not done it.» Augustine answers that all things ought to be done, because just as in the precept you learn what you ought to do, and in prayer you learn whence you receive what you wish to have, so in correction you learn that you do not have, through your own fault, what you ought to have. Correction, therefore, is useful, because through it we are taught that we do not receive good from God through our own fault.

The monks (n. 6.) «How is it that what I have not received is not had through my fault — from Him from whom, unless it is given, there is altogether no other from whom so great and such a gift may be had?» Augustine warns that here one must linger a little, and then, repeating their difficulty, he brings them in speaking thus.

The monks (ibid.) «Command me what I should do, and if I do it, give thanks for me to God, who gave it to me that I might do it; but if I do not do it, I am not to be corrected, but He is to be prayed to, that He may give what He has not given... pray, therefore, for me that I may receive charity... I would rightly be corrected if I did not have it through my own fault, that is, if I could give it to myself or take it myself and did not, or if, He giving it, I had been unwilling to receive it. But since the will itself also is prepared by the Lord, why do you correct me, because you see me unwilling to do His precepts?»

Augustine (nn. 7. 8.) first limits the question to those who do not do the precepts of God already known to them, of which sort those monks were. Then he answers: 1) whoever does not do the precepts of God already known to him is evil through his own fault; therefore 2) if he does not wish to be corrected, by that very fact he is to be corrected, because he does not wish his vices to be shown to him. 9) Through correction, by which vices are shown, a useful sorrow is aroused, by which, namely, a physician is sought, one's own deformity is shown, and so man is aroused to desire and pray for a reformer. Wherefore 4) correction is a certain means by which we arrive at receiving from God that which is to be asked of Him: although He alone can give it apart from the correction of superiors. But He alone can also give grace apart from prayer and faith, apart from preaching; and nevertheless these monks do not deny the utility of prayer and preaching: let them acknowledge, therefore, the utility also of correction. The answer, therefore, comes down to this: you would not be to be corrected, if you were not evil through your own fault; if correction were not a means which God uses to give grace — I concede, or let it pass: but if, on the contrary, you are evil through your own fault and God uses correction to confer grace — I deny. Moreover, note that when Augustine says that they are evil through their own fault, he says by that very fact that they had indeed been called by preventing grace, from which alone the power of acting is given, and which is given gratuitously, but that they were unwilling to consent to the calling; for to consent or to dissent belongs to one's own will.

The monks, not content, still press the same argument (n. 9.) «The Apostle says: For who distinguishes you? and what do you have that you have not received? Why, therefore, are we corrected, rebuked, reproached, accused? What do we do, who have not received? We have not received obedience; why, then, are we corrected, as though we could give it to ourselves and were unwilling to give it by our own choice?» Augustine first notes that he who says this wishes to appear outside blame in this, that he does not obey God; because, of course, obedience itself is a gift of God. Then he answers with a two-membered answer. He distinguishes it: those who speak thus are either already regenerated, or are not regenerated. If they are not yet regenerated, the disobedience which is in them is rightly corrected in them, because this is not from God, who made man upright, but from man sinning; and since his sin is so common to all that it is also proper to each one, deservedly is disobedience corrected in each one. That is, by the same reason by which original sin is ours, by the same can those bearing it be reproached on account of it — not by a reproach properly so called, by which fault is imputed to a personal will, but by a reproach that is as it were a condemnation of an evil thing, which can take place wherever damnation can be had; and on account of original sin men are rightly damned. And this was said by Augustine that men might understand that there is no iniquity with God, and that men who made themselves evil might be displeased with themselves. But this was said by Augustine rather in passing: for those monks with whom he was dealing were not such, nor did they speak in this hypothesis.

Therefore, if those who raise these objections are regenerated, Augustine denies that they have not received. Consider this answer, which opens Augustine's mind and unties the knot of the difficulty which perhaps steals upon readers throughout the whole disputation; and remember what is the proper scope of this disputation: namely, that the wicked are to be corrected.

He says, therefore: «If one already justified relapses into an evil life by his own will, certainly that man cannot say: I have not received, because he lost the grace of God which he had received by his own free will turned to evil.» If the just man who sins cannot say: I have not received obedience; because through his own fault he lost the grace which he had received: therefore with that grace there was conjoined the power of obeying, and therefore the defect of obedience is to be imputed to him, not to God, from whom, had he willed, he would have received even actual obedience, save that the good use of the grace received sufficed. This is the sense of Augustine's answer.

Augustine adds that he who has lost the grace received, if, pricked by correction, he groans salubriously and returns to better things, in him assuredly the utility of correction appears. Wherefore again it is clear that correction is useful.

The monks fight back more sharply (n. 10.) saying: «I can altogether, when you reprove me because I have relapsed from a good life into an evil one by my own will, still say: what have I done, that I should not be corrected? For I received the faith which works through love; but I did not receive perseverance in it to the end. Will anyone dare to say that this perseverance is not a gift of God!» Of course, since perseverance is a gift of God, it cannot be had unless it is received from God; but I did not receive it from God, who did not persevere; for I would have persevered if I had received it: therefore I can say: I have not received.

Note that those monks could not affirm of themselves anything but a defect of partial perseverance up to a certain time; for a defect of total perseverance to the end of life cannot be known except at the very end of life, just as neither can perseverance itself. Nevertheless, because perseverance to the end requires that the justice received be at length retained, and to abandon justice is a certain way to not persevering to the end; hence those monks say that they have not received perseverance to the end, as it were putting on the person of those who so abandon justice that they do not persevere finally.

Augustine answering 1) concedes — indeed, since for the first time he treats of this matter expressly and explicitly, he proves in a long discourse (nn. 10-24) that perseverance is a gift of God. 2) He teaches that it can truly be said: «Man, in that which you had heard and held, in that you would persevere, if you willed» (n. 11). Compare this with the preceding answer: for the same truth is inculcated. 3) He contends that although perseverance is a gift of God, that does not follow which the monks finally gathered from all these things, i.e., that they are not to be corrected; for those are justly corrected who «have been changed from a good into an evil life by their own will» (n. 11), and because correction can avail that they come to their senses and so attain final perseverance, if they are called according to the purpose (nn. 13. 25).

If they were changed from a good into an evil life by their own will; therefore this change, in turn, is to be attributed not to a defect of grace, by which they could have remained good, but to the abuse of this grace. In other words, the presence of truly sufficient grace is indicated. But of this elsewhere.

From this disputation it is clear that those monks of Hadrumetum did not attain the sense of those propositions, which are not Augustine's but Scripture's: that good works are gifts of God, that God works our will, that we have nothing which we have not received: for they understood them in such a way, as if they excluded every operation of the will, whereas on the contrary they do not exclude the free cooperation of the will with prevenient grace and the merit born of grace for subsequent graces, but only the operation of nature anticipating and meriting graces, or sufficient of itself alone for operating salutarily.

As for Augustine, it is clear that in this disputation he always had before his eyes the final conclusion of the Hadrumetines, which he attacks, namely that those acting badly ought not to be reproved, and that he directs the weapons of his argumentation chiefly to its attack.

To one who inspects Augustine's replies it is also clear that he answers as much as is enough for breaking the force of the adversaries' arguments, and that he is not so solicitous of a richer explanation and a deeper demonstration in a matter sufficiently evident: namely, that the wicked can be reproved, even though acting well is from the grace of God.

Finally, the basis of Augustine's whole response is this: we are evil by our own fault; we do not remain in the justice received, because we do not will it: God gave to the just the power of remaining in justice, that is, the power of persevering. But this basis in no way coheres with the doctrine of necessitating grace. Therefore what in this book precedes those chapters on the two helps does not at all favor the Jansenist interpretation.

VII. Moreover, it must be noted that Augustine, here disputing about grace and about those who are called by grace, keeps before his eyes, as he frequently does, both congruent grace (by which, namely, one is called in the way that is fitting for him not to reject the one calling, as he says ad Simplicianum I. I. q. II. n. 13.) and those called according to purpose, that is, the elect or predestined, whom he also calls children of the promise. Wherefore the disputation undertaken with the Hadrumetines, by which the first part of the book is completed, he concludes in this way, c. 9. n. 25. «Let no one therefore say that he who wanders off from the just way ought not to be reproved, but that his return and perseverance are only to be asked of the Lord: let no prudent and faithful man say this. For if this man is called according to purpose, without doubt God cooperates even in this very thing, that he is reproved, unto good. But whether he is so called, since the one who reproves does not know, let him do with charity what he knows ought to be done; for he knows that such a one is to be reproved, God being about to work either mercy or judgment: mercy indeed, if he who is reproved is set apart from the mass of perdition by the bounty of grace and is not among the vessels of wrath, which are perfected for perdition, but among the vessels of mercy, which God prepared for glory; judgment, however, if he is damned among those, and among these is not predestined.» But this limited manner of conceiving the grace of God renders Augustine's response somewhat obscure and intricate, which, according to the full catholic doctrine, could have been given to those good monks most briefly and most clearly. Cf. what we shall say, Th. XLVIII.

Now indeed the doctrine explained by Augustine in the last response supplied the occasion for the question of the grace of perseverance as compared with Adam, and so for the explanation of the two helps.

VIII. Augustine's doctrine of the two helps (capp. 10—12) comes down to this. He deliberately treats of the grace or help of perseverance. He compares Adam, not persevering in the state of original justice, with the Saints persevering unto death, and says that Adam had a help without which he could not persevere and by which he could persevere, and that the Saints have a help by which it comes about that they persevere, or by which they persevere.

The explanation of the former help is contained in these chapters of doctrine, which Augustine delivers in the same place. Adam had a great grace (n. 29), by which he could remain in the good which he had received (n. 32); he had a help by which he could not sin (n. 34), by which he could persevere if he willed (n. 32), a help which he would forsake when he willed and in which he would remain if he willed (n. 31); it was not brought about that he willed (n. 31); a help left in his free will (n. 31); a help which the holy Angels also had, who stood through free will (n. 32); a help by which he could persevere, not one by which perseverance itself would be given (n. 34).

On the contrary, the help by which of persevering is that by which not only the power of persevering, but perseverance itself is given (n. 34), just as through beatitude, once it has been given, a man is immediately made blessed (ibid.); it is a help of God without which they cannot persevere, in which they not only remain, if they will, but such that God works in them that they will (n. 38); it is a more powerful grace, which the saints now need (n. 30); it is a help by which the weakness of the human will is aided, so that it is acted upon indeclinably and insuperably by the grace of God (n. 38).

IX. The learned observe (cf. Zacharia Thesaurus theologicus. Tom. V. Controv. 3. opusc. 7.) that such a notion of Adam's help is exhibited by Augustine, that one must conceive something placed in habit and permanent, not something merely actual and transient. And indeed a help in which one remains, which a man forsakes when he wills, signifies something permanent (nor does Augustine usually signify actual grace by these modes of speaking. But if these are taken exclusively, they cannot be proved by us. For Augustine's opinion is also certain, that Adam needed actual grace both of intellect and of will, and needed it for any good work whatsoever, and that both were always available to him (App. ad. c. II.) and here too Augustine sufficiently indicates actual grace besides the habitual gifts. For he says (n. 32) that in order that Adam might remain in the good which he had received and which he had not yet lost, he needed the help of grace, without which he could not do that at all, and he had received the ability, if he willed. Here the help of grace is sufficiently distinguished from the good which had been received and in which he was to remain. But the good received, which had not yet been lost, is original justice and holiness itself, which is a gift of habitual grace.

You will say: the help by which, different from the help given to Adam, is exhibited such that through it God is said (n. 38) to work the willing; therefore Adam's help did not work the willing, and therefore it was not a grace of the will.

I answer: since here there is no question except about the help of perseverance: that willing is not simply any willing whatsoever, but the willing to persevere. Why, however, God is said to work this will in the Saints, and not to have worked it nor to have been about to work it in Adam, will be clear from what will be said.

Wherefore the help without which not so embraces the habitual gifts, as also to include the actual graces, which of themselves pertain to the state of justice and are owed to any just man by the law of God. Therefore the help without which not consisted of both elements. Each element pertains to the constitution of a principle capable of persevering; whence the help without which not, which constituted this power, pertains to the genus of efficient causes. Its own character, however, according to which it differs from the other help, will be recognized more distinctly once the help by which is known.

X. Therefore the help by which It is one thing to be a help without which something is not done, and another to be a help by which something is done. For without food we cannot live, and yet when food is present, it is not by it that he who has willed to die lives. Therefore the help of food is a help without which it is not done, not a help by which we live. But beatitude, which a man does not have, once it has been given, he is immediately made blessed. The help is compared to the formal cause: for it is not only that without which it is not done, but also that by which what it is given for is done... Now to the Saints predestined to the kingdom of God by the grace of God such a help is given, that perseverance itself is given to them; not only that without this gift they cannot be persevering, but also that through this gift they are only persevering.» To this help corresponds the newest freedom of not being able to sin and the newest happiness of not being able to forsake the good of perseverance, which are goods more excellent than the others, namely, being able not to sin and being able not to forsake the good, which correspond to the other help (n. 33). Moreover, the help by which it comes about that one perseveres, and by which, once given, it cannot come about that one does not persevere, by which one is made persevering, as through beatitude one is made blessed, is certainly formal perseverance itself, or without doubt embraces it.

2. That help comprehends also those efficacious aids by which active perseverance unto the end is obtained. Certainly this help, which (n. 34) is called the help by which, is that grace whose characters he describes (n. 31): «This is the first grace (the help which he would forsake, when he willed...), which was given to the first Adam; but this one is more powerful in the second Adam. For the first is that by which it comes about that a man has justice, if he wills; the second, therefore, can do more, by which it also comes about that he wills, and wills so much and loves with such ardor, that he overcomes the will of the flesh, concupiscing against it, by the will of the spirit.» The help by which is that by which it comes about that the Saints «most invincibly will what is good, and most invincibly refuse to forsake it» (n. 38). It is a help by which «their will is enkindled by the Holy Spirit to such an extent, that they can for this reason because they so will, and they so will for this reason, because God works that they will», and that «among so many and such great temptations, to which the will, by its own weakness (without grace), would succumb» (ibid.). But this is the grace, or the series of graces, effecting active perseverance.

3. This series of graces comprehends also the exterior graces, by which occasions of acting well are supplied and occasions of sinning are warded off, or an occasion of coming to one's senses is offered and death is deferred, when a man is in sin, and is inflicted when he is just. For concerning those who actually persevere he had said (n. 13): «there is no doubt that the hearing of the Gospel is procured for them, and that when they hear they believe, and in faith, which through love...» works, they persevere unto the end, and if at any time they wander off, being reproved they are corrected... and some, having received grace (of justification) at whatever age, are taken away from the dangers of this life by the swiftness of death. And concerning the same he says (n. 34) that «their faith will persevere unto the end, nor will the end of this life find it except remaining.» And he teaches that for such persons all things cooperate unto good, «to such an extent, absolutely all things, that even if some of them deviate and wander off, even this very thing (God) makes profit them unto good, because they return more humble and more learned.» Wherefore certain is the opinion of those who teach that the help by which is not one grace, but a series of graces, or divine providence toward the Saints, comprehending both interior and exterior graces and whatever contributes to the salvation of the predestined, and passive perseverance itself, by which providence the just man is so ruled that at length he actually perseveres.

XI. It is asked, therefore, whether from the characters of each help Jansenius rightly gathered that Augustine's doctrine is this, that grace, which is given in this state of fallen and repaired nature and which Augustine himself defended against the Pelagians in so many works, brings necessity upon the will, and that Augustine's doctrine of the grace of fallen nature is to be taken in this sense in all his controversy with the Pelagians or Semi-Pelagians.

I answer that the heretics do indeed contend that the distinction of the two helps handed down in lib. De Correp. et grat. is a necessary key for opening up the understanding of Augustine's whole doctrine concerning grace: but this is wrongly affirmed. 1) first, because Augustine himself does not seem to have judged this, who, in the Pelagian contest, while the disputation was raging, never made even the slightest mention of the two helps, which he nonetheless ought to have done, if, with that distinction omitted, his doctrine of grace is unintelligible: at length, when the Pelagians had been defeated, writing to certain pious monks, he brings that distinction forward, which appears only once in so many works. Because, in the judgment of the same author, this new distinction regards not grace in general, but the grace of perseverance; in the Pelagian controversy, however, there was disputation in general about the grace necessary for a good work, for faith, for any good act, whether those who act well are going to persevere or not.

Although that distinction is not a necessary key for opening up the understanding of the Augustinian doctrine of grace; yet it cannot be denied that, since it was at length brought forth by Augustine, it can bring a certain light for understanding more clearly certain chapters of his doctrine, or that from it at least it is permitted to argue for defending a certain interpretation of Augustine's doctrine.

XII. Wherefore to the proposed question I answer, directly denying that Jansenius rightly gathered what he gathers. For 1) here Augustine does not dispute about the grace necessary for individual acts, and the same efficacious, which is given even to those not persevering and which was given also to Adam, who certainly worked some good before sin, but about the grace of persevering, and indeed as regards Adam, not about the grace of persevering in justice unto the end of life, which he also had, but about the grace of persevering in the state of integrity; as regards the just, however, about the grace of persevering unto the end in the state of restored holiness. But our question with Jansenius is about the nature of actual grace, which is given for individual acts. This doctrine of Augustine, therefore, does not regard our question.

2. To dispatch the matter in a few words: whatever is affirmed about either help is rightly understood, if the help by which, insofar as it is efficient, is said to be a series of aids, both availing by divine power not only for acting salutarily, but also for overcoming concupiscence and the other impediments, and infallibly efficacious by divine foreknowledge, which are conferred by God with an absolute intention that perseverance be most certainly obtained: while the help without which not is said to be a sufficient help for acting salutarily, conferred, however, short of an absolute intention that Adam should persevere in that state of integrity.

Certainly in this hypothesis it is truly said 1) that grace and perseverance were left in the free will of Adam; ¹ of certain authors cannot be approved by us, by which it is asserted that by these words it is signified that Adam's grace was a grace of knowledge alone, and that the grace of the predestined is also a grace of the will: for neither is there here speech about the grace necessary for individual acts, nor is it understood why the grace of the will should not have been left in the free will of the saints, unless you admit our interpretation; and besides, it is falsely supposed that Augustine did not admit, for the state of integrity, a grace of the will, as we saw above. however in the free will of the Saints. For, since there was no absolute decree of Adam's perseverance in the state of integrity, neither was there a will of conferring those aids by which that perseverance would most certainly be obtained: but, given opportune aids, it depended on Adam's will alone, in the first place, to determine the perseverance of that state. Otherwise, on the contrary, it happens with regard to the perseverance of the Saints, which depends in the first place on the decree of God conferring a series of infallibly efficacious graces, once which have been given it cannot happen that a man be unwilling. Certainly God did not decree with an absolute antecedent will that the state of integrity should persevere, but with an absolute antecedent will he decreed that the grace of repaired salvation should be efficacious in many and should remain forever. For by that very fact, with the Redemption decreed, he willed Christ to be the head, he willed also that there be a body which would be perpetually fitted to him, lest it ever come about by our fault that the head should remain without a body. God certainly resolved that he would take care of this, that those would be forever who were incorporated into Christ, namely, the saints blessed forever. Augustine here keeps this divine economy before his eyes, and applies it in the concrete to those saints who in reality are saved forever.

It is truly said 2) that Adam's grace gave the power to do, the grace of the Saints gives the act; because in truth the act was lacking there, here it is. It is truly said 3) that by Adam's grace it was not brought about that he willed: for by this phrase, God works that they will, Augustine does not signify merely the grace of the will simply, as elsewhere (cf. Th. XLIV. p. 1a. et Th. XVIII. p. 1a.), but a special grace of God; for it is that grace by which a man indeclinably, insuperably, and most invincibly wills the good, which namely obtains its effect infallibly. Now such was not Adam's grace: therefore by Adam's grace it was not brought about that he willed: but through the grace of the Saints God works that they will, not only because in him the act of persevering was lacking, while in these it is: but because God, willing with absolute will for these that there be perseverance, confers those aids by which he himself infallibly obtains their perseverance; God, therefore, works, or brings it about, that they will, and does not permit that they be unwilling to persevere: but God behaved otherwise toward Adam. It is truly said 4) that men now need a more powerful grace, and that by it aid has been given to human weakness, so that they are acted upon indeclinably and insuperably by the grace of God: for by these words, besides the fact that there is signified a) that medicinal grace exercises greater powers, because it must add strength also against the concupiscence and weakness of nature b) and that the moral necessity of that grace is held in this state c) and that that grace of perseverance is now conferred, by which the effect is infallibly obtained: there is chiefly signified d) that the economy of this antecedent predestination of perseverance has been undertaken by God for fallen men, on account of the greater difficulty, on the part of the weakness of nature, of persevering in good; which indeed, whether it is true or not, it will be permitted to dispute; but now we set forth the opinion of Augustine, who so judged.

All these things do not require a grace determining the will to one thing, but only a grace which of itself is robust against impediments and, by divine foreknowledge, is about to obtain the effect infallibly. For God knows how to call men as is fitting for them to follow the one calling. To this comes back the explanation of Merlin, Oper. cit. p. 224. p. 1a, d. ult.