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coupled with Rom. ix. 16. The change may be assigned to the year 396 when, in the first book, he wrote as a bishop (de Divers. Quaest. ad Simplic. I.), as he says (Retr. II. i. 1), "to solve this question, we laboured in the cause of the freedom of the human will, but the grace of God won the day" (cf. de Don. Pers. 52, plenius sapere coepi). To Simplicianus he says, I. ii. 13: "If it is in man's own power not to obey the call, it would be equally correct to say, 'Therefore it is not of God that sheweth mercy, but of man that runs and wills,' because the mercy of Him that calls does not suffice, unless the obedience of him who is called results. . . . God shows mercy on no man in vain; but on whom He has mercy, him He calls in such sort as He knows to be fitted for him [congruere], so that He does not reject him that calleth." Here we have the essential of the "Augustinian" doctrine of grace, the distinction of the vocatio congrua and vocatio non congrua ("Illi enim electi qui congruenter vocati " ), formulated more than fifteen years before the Pelagian controversy began (see also Loofs, pp. 279‒280, who shows in detail that Augustine's whole later position is virtually contained in de Div. Quaest. ad Simplician.). For the details of this controversy, see the church histories; D. C. B. (4-vol. ed.), s.v.; Bright, Introd. to Anti-Pelagian Treatises, and other authorities. (A lucid summary in Gibson, XXXIX. Articles, art. ix.) It will suffice here to mention the main outlines.

(a) 410‒417.—Pelagius, offended at a passage in Augustine's Confessions (see above), began at Rome (405‒409) to express his disapproval of such an insistence upon Divine grace as should undermine human responsibility. Before the siege of Rome (supra, § 9) he left with his friend Coelestius for Africa; there Pelagius left Coelestius, and went to Palestine. Coelestius sought ordination at Carthage, and thus attracted additional attention to his doctrines. A council of bishops in 412 condemned him; he went away to Ephesus, and there he was ordained. Subsequently he went to Constantinople and (417) to Rome. Meanwhile, opposed by Jerome in Palestine, Pelagius was found not guilty of heresy by John, bp. of Jerusalem, and by councils at Jerusalem and Diospolis (415). He dispatched to Rome (417) a confession of faith to be submitted to Innocentius: it arrived after that bishop's death. Coelestius shortly afterwards (still in 417) arrived at Rome, and submitted his confession of faith to the new bp. Zosimus. Augustine appears to have been partly aware of the opinions of Pelagius before his arrival in Africa (see de Gest. Pel. 46; also probably through Paulinus of Nola, see de Grat. Christi, 38), but he appears to have attached little importance to them at the time; and the arrival of Pelagius found him in the very thick of other questions (see above, §§ 8, 9). He alludes to the Pelagian doctrines (without any mention of names) in preaching (Serm. 170, 174, 175), but took no part in the proceedings at Carthage in 412. But his friend Marcellinus (supra, § 9) pressed him for his opinion upon the questions there discussed, and his first anti-Pelagian writings (A.D. 412, de Pecc. Meritis et Remiss. lib. III.,

and de Spiritu et Litera) were addressed to him. In 415 he wrote de Natura et Gratia, and probably the tract, in the form of a letter to Eutropius and Paulus, de Perfectione Justitiae Hominis, in refutation of the propositions of Coelestius in 412; in 417 he wrote de Gestis Pelagii, a discussion of the proceedings in Palestine above referred to. Augustine and the African bishops, who had been represented in Palestine not only by Jerome, but by Orosius, fresh from Hippo, were naturally dismayed at what had happened there. They knew that Pelagius and Coelestius were likely to address themselves to Rome, where they had a strong following (Ep. 177, 2). Accordingly councils at Carthage and at Milevis, at the latter of which Augustine was present, wrote to urge Innocentius to support them against the "alleged" decision of the Palestinian councils, either by reclaiming the heretics or by adding the authority of his see to their condemnation. A letter carefully explaining the doctrinal issue was also sent by Aurelius of Carthage, Augustine, Alypius, Possidius, and Evodius (see above, §§ 6, 7). Augustine certainly drew up the latter two (Epp. 176, 177), and his inspiration is also manifest in the Carthaginian letter. Innocent, unable to conceal his satisfaction at so important an appeal to his authority (he assumes that the African bishops, though they do not refer to them, are not unacquainted with the "instituta patrum," which direct that nothing shall be done in any province of the church without reference to the Apostolic See; Epp. 181¹, 181²; see below, § 12, c), responded cordially with a prompt condemnation of Pelagianism, root and branch. Augustine was triumphant. The unfortunate proceedings of Diospolis were more than neutralized. Preaching on Sunday, Sept. 23, 417, he says: "Jam enim de hac causa duo concilia missa sunt ad sedem Apostolicam, inde etiam rescripta venerunt. Causa finita est; utinam aliquando finiatur error" (Serm. 131). But the author of the rescripta was already dead six months before, and there was need of another council. The cause was not "finished" yet.

(b) Zosimus. Julian (418‒430).—Zosimus, the new bp. of Rome (see D. C. B. 4-vol. ed. s.v.), was favourably impressed with the confessions of faith submitted by Pelagius and Coelestius, as well as by their deference to his authority. He pronounced them orthodox, and twice wrote indignantly to Aurelius and the Africans for their hasty condemnation of the accused in their absence. He adds that he has admonished Coelestius and others to abstain from curious and unedifying questions. But the original accusers of Pelagius were unmoved. After some correspondence with Zosimus they held a plenary council at Carthage (May 418), in which they passed nine dogmatic canons condemning the characteristic Pelagian theses. Meanwhile, Aurelius had been taking more practical steps. A rescript in the emperor's name (Honorius was here, as in the Donatist question, the passive instrument of his advisers, probably count Valerius, whose ear Aurelius gained—"secuta est clementia nostra judicium sanctitatis tuae," Honorius writes in 419) ordered the banishment of Pelagius, Coelestius, and all their