On Rebuke and Grace 8–10

If I am asked here why God did not give perseverance to those to whom he gave the love by which they lived as Christians, I answer that I do not know. For not arrogantly, but recognizing my small measure, I hear the Apostle saying, “O man, who are you to answer back to God?” and, “O the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How inscrutable are his judgments, and his ways unsearchable!” As far, then, as he deigns to make his judgments manifest to us, let us give thanks; and as far as he deigns to hide them, let us not murmur against his counsel, but believe that this too is most wholesome for us. But you, whoever you are, enemy of his grace, who ask this, what do you yourself say? Well that you do not deny that you are a Christian and boast that you are a Catholic. If, then, you confess that it is the gift of God to persevere in good to the end, why one receives this gift and another does not receive it, I think you do not know any more than I do, and neither of us can penetrate here the inscrutable judgments of God. Or if you say that it belongs to man's free choice, which you defend not in accordance with God's grace but against it, that each perseveres in good or does not persevere, so that if he perseveres it is not by God's giving but by the human will's doing, what will you contrive against the words of him who says, “I have prayed for you, Peter, that your faith may not fail”? Will you dare to say that even with Christ praying that Peter's faith might not fail, it would have failed if Peter had willed it to fail, that is, if he had not willed it to persevere to the end? As if Peter could in any way will otherwise than Christ had prayed for him that he might will! For who does not know that Peter's faith would then have perished if the very will by which he was faithful had failed, and would remain if that same will remained? But because the will is prepared by the Lord, Christ's prayer for him could not be in vain. When, then, he prayed that his faith might not fail, what else did he pray for but that he might have in faith a most free, most strong, most invincible, most persevering will? See how the freedom of the will is defended in accordance with God's grace, not against it. For the human will does not obtain grace by freedom, but rather obtains freedom by grace, and, so that it may persevere, a delightful permanence and an unconquerable strength. It is indeed to be wondered at, and greatly wondered at, that to some of his sons whom he has regenerated in Christ, to whom he has given faith, hope, and love, God does not give perseverance, while he forgives such great crimes to the sons of others and, by imparting grace, makes them his sons. Who would not wonder at this? Who would not be utterly astonished? But this too is no less wonderful, and yet true, and so evident that not even the enemies of God's grace can find how to deny it: that some sons of his friends, that is, of regenerated and good believers, departing this life as infants without baptism, though he in whose power all things are could certainly provide for them the grace of this washing if he willed, he estranges from his kingdom, into which he sends their parents; and he causes some sons of his enemies to come into the hands of Christians, and through this washing brings them into the kingdom from which their parents are estranged; though for the infants there is no merit, evil in the former case or good in the latter, from their own will. Certainly here the judgments of God, since they are just and deep, can be neither blamed nor penetrated. Among these is also that judgment concerning perseverance which we are now discussing. Of both let us exclaim, “O the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How inscrutable are his judgments!” Nor let us wonder that we cannot trace his untraceable ways. To pass over countless other things which are given to some men and not given to others by the Lord God, with whom there is no respect of persons, and which are not bestowed according to the merits of wills, such as swiftness, strength, good health, and beauty of body, wonderful talents, and natures of mind capable of many arts; or those that come from outside, such as wealth, nobility, honours, and other such things, which no one has except it be in God's power; not to dwell either on the baptism of infants (which none of these men can say, as they can of those other things, does not belong to the kingdom of God), why it is given to this infant and not given to that one, since both are in God's power and without that sacrament no one enters the kingdom of God: to pass over or leave these things, then, let them consider those very people we are dealing with. For we are discussing those who do not have perseverance in goodness, but die with their good will failing from good to evil. Let them answer, if they can, why God, when these were living faithfully and godly, did not then snatch them from the dangers of this life, “lest wickedness should change their understanding, and deceit beguile their souls.” Did he not have this in his power, or did he not know their future evils? Surely neither of these can be said except most perversely and most insanely. Why, then, did he not do it? Let those answer who mock us when in such matters we exclaim, “How inscrutable are his judgments, and his ways unsearchable!” For either God gives this to whom he wills, or else that Scripture lies which says of the seemingly untimely death of a righteous man, “He was snatched away lest wickedness should change his understanding, or deceit beguile his soul.” Why, then, does God, with whom there is no iniquity nor respect of persons, and in whose power it is how long each one remains in this life, which is called a trial upon earth, give so great a benefit to some and not to others? Just as they are compelled to confess that it is God's gift that a man should end his life before he is changed from good to evil, but do not know why it is given to some and not to others, so let them confess with us that perseverance in good is God's gift according to the Scriptures, of which I have already set out many testimonies; and why it is given to some and not to others, let them deign to be ignorant with us without murmuring against God.

Nor let it trouble us that God does not give this perseverance to some of his sons. Far be it that it should be so, if they were among those predestined and called according to his purpose, who are truly sons of the promise. For these others, when they live godly, are called sons of God; but since they are going to live ungodly and die in that same ungodliness, the foreknowledge of God does not call them sons of God. For there are sons of God who are not yet so to us, and are already so to God; of whom the evangelist John says that Jesus was to die for the nation, “and not for the nation only, but also to gather into one the children of God who were scattered abroad”: which they were certainly going to become by believing, through the preaching of the gospel; and yet before this had happened they were already sons of God, written in the memory of their Father with unshaken stability. And again there are some who are called sons of God by us because of grace received, even temporarily, and yet are not so to God; of whom the same John says, “They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would certainly have remained with us.” He does not say, “They went out from us, but because they did not remain with us they are no longer of us,” but he says, “They went out from us, but they were not of us”; that is, even when they seemed to be among us, they were not of us. And as though he were asked, “How do you show this?”, he says, “For if they had been of us, they would certainly have remained with us.” It is the voice of the sons of God; John speaks, placed in a foremost place among the sons of God. When, then, the sons of God say of those who did not have perseverance, “They went out from us, but they were not of us,” and add, “For if they had been of us, they would certainly have remained with us,” what else do they say but, “They were not sons even when they were in the profession and name of sons”? Not because they feigned righteousness, but because they did not remain in it. For he does not say, “For if they had been of us, they would certainly have held a true, not a feigned, righteousness with us,” but, “if they had been of us,” he says, “they would certainly have remained with us.” In good he without doubt wanted them to remain. They were, then, in good; but because they did not remain in it, that is, did not persevere to the end, they were not, he says, of us, even when they were with us; that is, they were not of the number of sons, even when they were in the faith of sons; since those who are truly sons were foreknown and predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, and were called according to his purpose so as to be chosen. For it is not the son of the promise who perishes, but the son of perdition. These, then, were of the multitude of the called, but not of the fewness of the chosen. It is not, then, to his predestined sons that God did not give perseverance; for they would have it if they were in that number of sons; and what would they have that they had not received, according to the apostolic and true statement? And therefore such sons would have been given to Christ the Son, as he himself says to the Father, “that all that you have given me may not perish, but have eternal life.” These, then, are understood to be given to Christ who are ordained to eternal life. They are those predestined and called according to his purpose, of whom none perishes. And therefore none of them ends this life changed from good to evil, since he is so ordained, and therefore given to Christ, that he may not perish but have eternal life. And again, those whom we call his enemies, or the infant sons of his enemies, whichever of them he is going to regenerate so that they end this life in the faith that works through love, are already, even before this happens, his sons in that predestination, and have been given to Christ his Son, so that they may not perish but have eternal life. Then the Saviour himself says, “If you remain in my word, you are truly my disciples.” Is Judas to be counted among these, who did not remain in his word? Are those to be counted among them of whom the Gospel speaks thus? There, when the Lord had commended his flesh to be eaten and his blood to be drunk, the evangelist says: “These things he said teaching in the synagogue in Capernaum. Many of his disciples, therefore, hearing it, said, ‘This is a hard saying; who can listen to it?’ But Jesus, knowing in himself that his disciples were murmuring at this, said to them: ‘Does this offend you? What, then, if you see the Son of Man ascending where he was before? It is the spirit that gives life; the flesh profits nothing. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life. But there are some of you who do not believe.’ For Jesus knew from the beginning who were the believers, and who was to betray him; and he said, ‘This is why I told you that no one comes to me unless it has been given him by my Father.’ From this time many of his disciples went back and no longer walked with him.” Were not these too called disciples, as the Gospel speaks? And yet they were not truly disciples, because they did not remain in his word, according to what he says, “If you remain in my word, you are truly my disciples.” Because, then, they did not have perseverance, just as they were not truly disciples of Christ, so they were not truly sons of God either, even when they seemed to be and were so called. We, then, call elect, and disciples of Christ, and sons of God, those whom we see regenerated and living godly, for so they are to be called; but they truly are what they are called if they remain in that on account of which they are so called. But if they do not have perseverance, that is, do not remain in what they have begun to be, they are not truly called what they are called and are not; for they are not so with him to whom what they will be is known, that is, evil from good. For this reason the Apostle, when he had said, “We know that for those who love God all things work together for good,” knowing that some love God and do not remain in that good to the end, at once added, “for those who are called according to his purpose.” For these remain to the end in loving God; and those who stray from it for a time return, so as to carry through to the end what they began to be in good. And showing what it is to be called according to his purpose, he at once added what I have already set out above: “For those whom he foreknew, he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers; and those whom he predestined, he also called,” namely according to his purpose; “and those whom he called, he also justified; and those whom he justified, he also glorified.” All those things have already been done: he foreknew, predestined, called, justified; since all have already been foreknown and predestined, and many already called and justified; but what he put at the end, “he also glorified” (if indeed that glory is to be understood here of which the same apostle says, “When Christ, your life, appears, then you too will appear with him in glory”), has not yet been done. Although those two too, that is, “he called” and “he justified,” have not been done in all of whom they are said, for until the end of the world many are still to be called and justified, yet he used verbs of the past tense even of future things, as though God had already done what he has arranged from eternity to be done. Therefore the prophet Isaiah too says of him, “Who has made the things that are to be.” Whoever, then, in God's most provident arrangement, are foreknown, predestined, called, justified, glorified, I say not only those not yet reborn but even those not yet born, are already sons of God and absolutely cannot perish. These truly come to Christ, since they come in the way he himself says, “All that the Father gives me will come to me, and him who comes to me I will not cast out.” And a little later he says, “This is the will of the Father who sent me, that of all that he has given me I should lose nothing.” By him, then, is perseverance in good to the end also given; for it is given only to those who will not perish, since those who do not persevere will perish. For such as love God, God makes all things work together for good; so entirely all things that even if some of them stray and go astray, he makes this very thing profit them for good, because they return humbler and more instructed. For they learn that they ought to rejoice with trembling in the right way itself, not arrogating to themselves confidence in remaining as though from their own strength, nor saying in their abundance, “We shall never be moved.” That is why it is said to them, “Serve the Lord in fear, and rejoice to him with trembling, lest at any time the Lord be angry and you perish from the right way.” For he does not say, “and you do not come to the right way,” but, “lest you perish,” he says, “from the right way.” What does he show but that those who are already walking in the right way are warned to serve God in fear, that is, not to be high-minded but to fear? Which means: let them not be proud, but humble; hence he says elsewhere too, “Not minding high things, but consenting to the lowly”; let them rejoice to God, but with trembling, glorying in nothing, since nothing is ours, so that he who glories may glory in the Lord; lest they perish from the right way in which they have already begun to walk, while they attribute to themselves the very fact that they are in it. The Apostle too used these words where he says, “Work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.” And showing why with fear and trembling: “For it is God,” he says, “who works in you both to will and to work, for his good will.” For he did not have this fear and trembling who said in his abundance, “I shall never be moved.” But because he was a son of the promise, not of perdition, when he learned by experience what he himself was, God forsaking him a little, he says, “Lord, in your will you gave strength to my beauty; you turned your face from me, and I was troubled.” See: more instructed, and therefore humbler too, he kept to the way, now seeing and confessing that it was in his will that God had given strength to his beauty; which he had attributed to himself, presuming on himself in such abundance as God had given, not on him who had given it, when he said, “I shall never be moved.” He was troubled, then, so that he might find himself, and, thinking humbly, learn in whom hope must be placed, not only of eternal life but also of godly conduct and perseverance in this life. This could also be the voice of the apostle Peter; for he too had said in his abundance, “I will lay down my life for you,” hastily attributing to himself what was afterwards to be bestowed on him by the Lord. But the Lord turned his face from him, and he was troubled, so that, fearing to die for him, he denied him three times. But the Lord turned his face to him again and washed away his fault with tears. For what else does “He looked at him” mean, but “He turned back to him the face that he had for a little turned away from him”? He had been troubled, then; but because he learned not to trust in himself, this too profited him for good, he working it who makes all things work together for good for those who love him; because he had been called according to his purpose, so that no one could snatch him from the hand of Christ, to whom he had been given. Let no one say, then, that one who strays from the right way is not to be rebuked, but that only his return and perseverance are to be asked of the Lord: let no prudent and faithful person say this. For if he has been called according to his purpose, without doubt God makes even his being rebuked work together for his good. But whether he has been so called, since he who rebukes does not know, let him do with love what he knows must be done; for he knows that such a one must be rebuked. God will do either mercy or judgment: mercy, if the one who is rebuked has been separated from the mass of perdition by the bounty of grace, and is not among the vessels of wrath fitted for destruction but among the vessels of mercy which God has prepared for glory; but judgment, if he has been condemned among the former and has not been predestined among the latter.

Here another question arises, by no means to be despised, but to be approached and solved with the help of the Lord, in whose hand are both we and our words. For we are asked, as far as concerns this gift of God, which is to persevere in good to the end, what we think of the first man himself, who was certainly made upright without any fault. I do not ask: “If he did not have perseverance, how was he without fault, when so necessary a gift of God was lacking to him?” For this question is easily answered: he did not have perseverance because he did not persevere in that good in which he was without fault; for he began to have a fault from the time he fell; and if he began, then before he began he was certainly without fault. For it is one thing not to have a fault, and another not to remain in that goodness in which there is no fault. For by the very fact that it is not said that he was never without fault, but that he did not remain without fault, it is without doubt shown that he was without fault, he who is blamed for not remaining in that good. But this must rather be asked and treated more laboriously: how we are to answer those who say, “If in that uprightness in which he was made without fault he had perseverance, he without doubt persevered in it; and if he persevered, he certainly did not sin, nor forsake that uprightness of his and God. But that he sinned and was a deserter of the good, the truth cries out. Therefore he did not have perseverance in that good; and if he did not have it, he certainly did not receive it. For how could he both have received perseverance and not have persevered? Further, if he did not have it because he did not receive it, how did he sin by not persevering, who did not receive perseverance? For it cannot be said that he did not receive it because he was not separated from the mass of perdition by the bounty of grace; for that mass of perdition did not yet exist in the human race before he sinned, from whom the vitiated origin was drawn.” Therefore we most wholesomely confess what we most rightly believe: that God, the Lord of all things, who created all things very good, and foreknew that evil things would arise from good ones, and knew that it belonged more to his most omnipotent goodness to do good even from evil things than not to allow evil things to be, so ordered the life of angels and men as to show in it first what their free choice could do, then what the benefit of his grace and the judgment of his justice could do. Then some angels, whose prince is the one called the devil, became by free choice fugitives from the Lord God. Yet, fleeing his goodness, by which they had been blessed, they could not flee his judgment, by which they were made most wretched. But the rest, by that same free choice, stood in the truth, and deserved to know as most certain that they would never fall. For if we have been able to know from the holy Scriptures that none of the holy angels will fall any more, how much more have they themselves known it, with the truth revealed to them more sublimely! For to us a blessed life without end is promised, and equality with the angels; from this promise we are certain that when after the judgment we come to that life, we shall not fall from it. If the angels do not know this of themselves, we shall not be their equals but more blessed than they; but the Truth has promised us equality with them. It is certain, then, that they know by sight what we know by faith, namely that no holy angel will ever fall. But the devil and his angels, though they were blessed before they fell and did not know that they would fall into misery, still had something that would have been added to their blessedness if by free choice they had stood in the truth, until they received that fullness of the highest blessedness as the reward of that very remaining: that is, that through the great abundance of the love of God given by the Holy Spirit they should be utterly unable to fall any more, and should know this of themselves most certainly. This fullness of blessedness they did not have; but because they did not know their future misery, they enjoyed a blessedness that was lesser, yet a blessedness without any fault. For if they had known their future fall and eternal punishment, they certainly could not have been blessed, since the fear of so great an evil would have compelled them to be wretched already. So also he made man with free choice; and though he was ignorant of his future fall, he was nevertheless blessed because he felt that it was in his power not to die and not to become wretched. If in this upright and faultless state he had willed to remain by that same free choice, then without any experience of death and unhappiness he would have received, as the reward of this remaining, that fullness of blessedness by which the holy angels too are blessed, that is, that he could no longer fall, and would know this most certainly. For not even he could have been blessed in paradise, indeed he would not have been there, where it was not fitting to be wretched, if foreknowledge of his fall had made him wretched with fear of so great an evil. But because by free choice he forsook God, he experienced the just judgment of God, so that he was condemned with his whole stock, which, being still placed in him, had sinned with him as a whole. For as many of this stock as are set free by the grace of God are certainly set free from the condemnation by which they are already held bound. Hence, even if none were set free, no one could justly find fault with the just judgment of God. That few, then, in comparison with those who perish, but many in their own number, are set free, comes about by grace, comes about freely; thanks must be given because it comes about, lest anyone be lifted up as though by his own merits, but that every mouth may be stopped, and he who glories may glory in the Lord.