OpenLLM-France/wikimedia huggingface dataset:
# Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series I/Volume V/On the Predestination of the Saints/Book I/Chapter 21

Chapter 21.—It is to Be Wondered at that Men Should Rather Trust to Their Own Weakness Than to God’s Strength.
Certainly, when the apostle says, “Therefore it is of faith that the promise may be sure according to grace,” I marvel that men would rather entrust themselves to their own weakness, than to the strength of God’s promise. But sayest thou, God’s will concerning myself is to me uncertain? What then? Is thine own will concerning thyself certain to thee? and dost thou not fear,—“Let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall”? Since, then, both are uncertain, why does not man commit his faith, hope, and love to the stronger will rather than to the weaker?

## Footnotes

* ↑ Rom. iv. 16.
* ↑ 1 Cor. x. 12.
# Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series I/Volume V/On the Predestination of the Saints/Book I/Chapter 3

Chapter 3 [II.]—Even the Beginning of Faith is of God’s Gift.
Therefore I ought first to show that the faith by which we are Christians is the gift of God, if I can do that more thoroughly than I have already done in so many and so large volumes. But I see that I must now reply to those who say that the divine testimonies which I have adduced concerning this matter are of avail for this purpose, to assure us that we have faith itself of ourselves, but that its increase is of God; as if faith were not given to us by Him, but were only increased in us by Him, on the ground of the merit of its having begun from us. Thus there is here no departure from that opinion which Pelagius himself was constrained to condemn in the judgment of the bishops of Palestine, as is testified in the same Proceedings, “That the grace of God is given according to our merits,” if it is not of God’s grace that we begin to believe, but rather that on account of this beginning an addition is made to us of a more full and perfect belief; and so we first give the beginning of our faith to God, that His supplement may also be given to us again, and whatever else we faithfully ask.

## Footnotes

* ↑ On the Proceedings of Peliagus, ch. 30.
# Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series I/Volume V/On the Predestination of the Saints/Book I/Chapter 23

Chapter 23 [XII.]—Remarkable Illustrations of Grace and Predestination in Infants, and in Christ.
But all this reasoning, whereby we maintain that the grace of God through Jesus Christ our Lord is truly grace, that is, is not given according to our merits, although it is most manifestly asserted by the witness of the divine declarations, yet, among those who think that they are withheld from all zeal for piety unless they can attribute to themselves something, which they first give that it may be recompensed to them again, involves somewhat of a difficulty in respect of the condition of grown-up people, who are already exercising the choice of will. But when we come to the case of infants, and to the Mediator between God and man Himself, the man Christ Jesus, there is wanting all assertion of human merits that precede the grace of God, because the former are not distinguished from others by any preceding good merits that they should belong to the Deliverer of men; any more than He Himself being Himself a man, was made the Deliverer of men by virtue of any precedent human merits.
# Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series I/Volume V/On the Predestination of the Saints/Book I/Chapter 27

Chapter 27.—The Book of Wisdom Obtains in the Church the Authority of Canonical Scripture.
And since these things are so, the judgment of the book of Wisdom ought not to be repudiated, since for so long a course of years that book has deserved to be read in the Church of Christ from the station of the readers of the Church of Christ, and to be heard by all Christians, from bishops downwards, even to the lowest lay believers, penitents, and catechumens, with the veneration paid to divine authority. For assuredly, if, from those who have been before me in commenting on the divine Scriptures, I should bring forward a defence of this judgment, which we are now called upon to defend more carefully and copiously than usual against the new error of the Pelagians,—that is, that God’s grace is not given according to our merits, and that it is given freely to whom it is given, because it is neither of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that showeth mercy; but that by righteous judgment it is not given to whom it is not given, because there is no unrighteousness with God;—if, therefore, I should put forth a defence of this opinion from catholic commentators on the divine oracles who have preceded us, assuredly these brethren for whose sake I am now discoursing would acquiesce, for this you have intimated in your letters. What need is there, then, for us to look into the writings of those who, before this heresy sprang up, had no necessity to be conversant in a question so difficult of solution as this, which beyond a doubt they would have done if they had been compelled to answer such things? Whence it arose that they touched upon what they thought of God’s grace briefly in some passages of their writings, and cursorily; but on those matters which they argued against the enemies of the Church, and in exhortations to every virtue by which to serve the living and true God for the purpose of attaining eternal life and true happiness, they dwelt at length. But the grace of God, what it could do, shows itself artlessly by its frequent mention in prayers; for what God commands to be done would not be asked for from God, unless it could be given by Him that it should be done.
# Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series I/Volume V/On the Predestination of the Saints/Book I/Chapter 29

Chapter 29.—God’s Dealing Does Not Depend Upon Any Contingent Merits of Men.
And thus, unless we indulge in reckless disputation, the entire question is concluded concerning him who is taken away lest wickedness should alter his understanding. And the book of Wisdom, which for such a series of years has deserved to be read in Christ’s Church, and in which this is read, ought not to suffer injustice because it withstands those who are mistaken on behalf of men’s merit, so as to come in opposition to the most manifest grace of God: and this grace chiefly appears in infants, and while some of these baptized, and some not baptized, come to the end of this life, they sufficiently point to God’s mercy and His judgment,—His mercy, indeed, gratuitous, His judgment, of debt. For if men should be judged according to the merits of their life, which merits they have been prevented by death from actually having, but would have had if they had lived, it would be of no advantage to him who is taken away lest wickedness should alter his understanding; it would be of no advantage to those who die in a state of lapse if they should die before. And this no Christian will venture to say. Wherefore our brethren, who with us on behalf of the catholic faith assail the pest of the Pelagian error, ought not to such an extent to favour the Pelagian opinion, wherein they conceive that God’s grace is given according to our merits, as to endeavour (which they cannot dare) to invalidate a true sentiment, plainly and from ancient times Christian,—“He was taken away, lest wickedness should alter his understanding;” and to build up that which we should think, I do not say, no one would believe, but no one would dream,—to wit, that any deceased person would be judged according to those things which he would have done if he had lived for a more lengthened period. Surely thus what we say manifests itself clearly to be incontestable,—that the grace of God is not given according to our merits; so that ingenious men who contradict this truth are constrained to say things which must be rejected from the ears and from the thoughts of all men.
# Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series I/Volume V/On Marriage and Concupiscence/Book I/Chapter 1

Chapter 1.—Concerning the Argument of This Treatise.
Our new heretics, my dearest son Valerius, who maintain that infants born in the flesh have no need of that medicine of Christ whereby sins are healed, are constantly affirming, in their excessive hatred of us, that we condemn marriage and that divine procedure by which God creates human beings by means of men and women, inasmuch as we assert that they who are born of such a union contract that original sin of which the apostle says, “By one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for in him all sinned;” and because we do not deny, that of whatever kind of parents they are born, they are still under the devil’s dominion, unless they be born again in Christ, and by His grace be removed from the power of darkness and translated into His kingdom, who willed not to be born from the same union of the two sexes. Because, then, we affirm this doctrine, which is contained in the oldest and unvarying rule of the catholic faith, these propounders of the novel and perverse dogma, who assert that there is no sin in infants to be washed away in the laver of regeneration, in their unbelief or ignorance calumniate us, as if we condemned marriage, and as if we asserted to be the devil’s work what is God’s own work—the human being which is born of marriage. Nor do they reflect that the good of marriage is no more impeachable on account of the original evil which is derived therefrom, than the evil of adultery and fornication is excusable on account of the natural good which is born of them. For as sin is the work of the devil, from whencesoever contracted by infants; so man is the work of God, from whencesoever born. Our purpose, therefore, in this book, so far as the Lord vouchsafes us in His help, is to distinguish between the evil of carnal concupiscence from which man who is born therefrom contracts original sin, and the good of marriage. For there would have been none of this shame-producing concupiscence, which is impudently praised by impudent men, if man had not previously sinned; while as to marriage, it would still have existed even if no man had sinned, since the procreation of children in the body that belonged to that life would have been effected without that malady which in “the body of this death” cannot be separated from the process of procreation.

## Footnotes

* ↑ In quo omnes peccaverunt, Rom. v. 5.
* ↑ Col. i. 15.
* ↑ Titus iii. 5.
* ↑ Rom. vii. 24.
# Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series I/Volume V/On Marriage and Concupiscence/Book I/Chapter 10

Chapter 10 [IX.]—Why It Was Sometimes Permitted that a Man Should Have Several Wives, Yet No Woman Was Ever Allowed to Have More Than One Husband. Nature Prefers Singleness in Her Dominations.
Now, if to the God of our fathers, who is likewise our God, such a plurality of wives had not been displeasing for the purpose that lust might have a fuller range of indulgence; then, on such a supposition, the holy women also ought each to have rendered service to several husbands. But if any woman had so acted, what feeling but that of a disgraceful concupiscence could impel her to have more husbands, seeing that by such licence she could not have more children? That the good purpose of marriage, however, is better promoted by one husband with one wife, than by a husband with several wives, is shown plainly enough by the very first union of a married pair, which was made by the Divine Being Himself, with the intention of marriages taking their beginning therefrom, and of its affording to them a more honourable precedent. In the advance, however, of the human race, it came to pass that to certain good men were united a plurality of good wives,—many to each; and from this it would seem that moderation sought rather unity on one side for dignity, while nature permitted plurality on the other side for fecundity. For on natural principles it is more feasible for one to have dominion over many, than for many to have dominion over one. Nor can it be doubted, that it is more consonant with the order of nature that men should bear rule over women, than women over men. It is with this principle in view that the apostle says, “The head of the woman is the man;” and, “Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands.” So also the Apostle Peter writes: “Even as Sara obeyed Abraham, calling him lord.” Now, although the fact of the matter is, that while nature loves singleness in her dominations, but we may see plurality existing more readily in the subordinate portion of our race; yet for all that, it was at no time lawful for one man to have a plurality of wives, except for the purpose of a greater number of children springing from him. Wherefore, if one woman cohabits with several men, inasmuch as no increase of offspring accrues to her therefrom, but only a more frequent gratification of lust, she cannot possibly be a wife, but only a harlot.

## Footnotes

* ↑ 1 Cor. xi. 3.
* ↑ Col. iii. 18.
* ↑ 1 Pet. iii. 6.
# Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series I/Volume V/On Marriage and Concupiscence/Book I

on marriage and concupiscence,
In Two Books,
addressed to the count valerius
by aurelius augustin, bishop of hippo;
written in 419 and 420.
Book I.
Wherein He expounds the peculiar and natural blessings of marriage. He shows that among these blessings must not be reckoned fleshly concupiscence; insomuch as this is wholly evil, such as does not proceed from the very nature of marriage, but is an accident thereof arising from original sin. This evil, notwithstanding, is rightly employed by marriage for the procreation of children. But, as the result of this concupiscence, it comes to pass that, even from the lawful marriage of the children of God, men are not born children of God, but of the world, and are bound with the chain of sin, although their parents have been liberated therefrom by grace; and are led captive by the devil, if they be not in like manner rescued by the self-same grace of Christ. He explains how it is that concupiscence remains in the baptized in act though not in guilt. He teaches, that by the sanctity of baptism, not merely this original guilt, but all other sins of men whatever, are taken away. He lastly quotes the authority of Ambrose to show that the evil of concupiscence must be distinguished from the good of marriage.

## Contents

* Chapter 1
* Chapter 2
* Chapter 3
* Chapter 4
* Chapter 5
* Chapter 6
* Chapter 7
* Chapter 8
* Chapter 9
* Chapter 10
* Chapter 11
* Chapter 12
* Chapter 13
* Chapter 14
* Chapter 15
* Chapter 16
* Chapter 17
* Chapter 18
* Chapter 19
* Chapter 20
* Chapter 21
* Chapter 22
* Chapter 23
* Chapter 24
* Chapter 25
* Chapter 26
* Chapter 27
* Chapter 28
* Chapter 29
* Chapter 30
* Chapter 31
* Chapter 32
* Chapter 33
* Chapter 34
* Chapter 35
* Chapter 36
* Chapter 37
* Chapter 38
* Chapter 39
* Chapter 40

## Footnotes

* ↑ Written about the beginning of the year A.D.}} 419.
# Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series I/Volume V/On Marriage and Concupiscence/Book I/Chapter 13

Chapter 13.—In the Marriage of Mary and Joseph There Were All the Blessings of the Wedded State; All that is Born of Concubinage is Sinful Flesh.
The entire good, therefore, of the nuptial institution was effected in the case of these parents of Christ: there was offspring, there was faithfulness, there was the bond. As offspring, we recognise the Lord Jesus Himself; the fidelity, in that there was no adultery; the bond, because there was no divorce. [XII.] Only there was no nuptial cohabitation; because He who was to be without sin, and was sent not in sinful flesh, but in the likeness of sinful flesh, could not possibly have been made in sinful flesh itself without that shameful lust of the flesh which comes from sin, and without which He willed to be born, in order that He might teach us, that every one who is born of sexual intercourse is in fact sinful flesh, since that alone which was not born of such intercourse was not sinful flesh. Nevertheless conjugal intercourse is not in itself sin, when it is had with the intention of producing children; because the mind’s good-will leads the ensuing bodily pleasure, instead of following its lead; and the human choice is not distracted by the yoke of sin pressing upon it, inasmuch as the blow of the sin is rightly brought back to the purposes of procreation. This blow has a certain prurient activity which plays the king in the foul indulgences of adultery, and fornication, and lasciviousness, and uncleanness; whilst in the indispensable duties of the marriage state, it exhibits the docility of the slave. In the one case it is condemned as the shameless effrontery of so violent a master; in the other, it gets modest praise as the honest service of so submissive an attendant. This lust, then, is not in itself the good of the nuptial institution; but it is obscenity in sinful men, a necessity in procreant parents, the fire of lascivious indulgences, the shame of nuptial pleasures. Wherefore, then, may not persons remain man and wife when they cease by mutual consent from cohabitation; seeing that Joseph and Mary continued such, though they never even began to cohabit?

## Footnotes

* ↑ Sacramentum.
* ↑ Sacramentum.
* ↑ Rom. viii. 3.
# Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series I/Volume V/On Marriage and Concupiscence/Book I/Chapter 14

Chapter 14 [XIII.]—Before Christ It Was a Time for Marrying; Since Christ It Has Been a Time for Continence.
Now this propagation of children which among the ancient saints was a most bounden duty for the purpose of begetting and preserving a people for God, amongst whom the prophecy of Christ’s coming must needs have had precedence over everything, now has no longer the same necessity. For from among all nations the way is open for an abundant offspring to receive spiritual regeneration, from whatever quarter they derive their natural birth. So that we may acknowledge that the scripture which says there is “a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing,” is to be distributed in its clauses to the periods before Christ and since. The former was the time to embrace, the latter to refrain from embracing.

## Footnotes

* ↑ Eccles. iii. 5.
# Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series I/Volume V/On Marriage and Concupiscence/Book I/Chapter 15

Chapter 15.—The Teaching of the Apostle on This Subject.
Accordingly the apostle also, speaking apparently with this passage in view, declares: “But this I say, brethren, the time is short: it remaineth, that both they that have wives be as though they had them not; and they that weep, as though they wept not; and they that rejoice, as though they rejoiced not; and they that buy, as though they possessed not; and they that use this world, as though they used it not: for the fashion of this world passeth away. But I would have you without solicitude.” This entire passage (that I may express my view on this subject in the shape of a brief exposition of the apostle’s words) I think must be understood as follows: “This I say, brethren, the time is short.” No longer is God’s people to be propagated by carnal generation; but, henceforth, it is to be gathered out by spiritual regeneration. “It remaineth, therefore, that they that have wives” be not subject to carnal concupiscence; “and they that weep,” under the sadness of present evil, should rejoice in the hope of future blessing; “and they that rejoice,” over any temporary advantage, should fear the eternal judgment; “and they that buy,” should so hold their possessions as not to cleave to them by overmuch love; “and they that use this world” should reflect that it is passing away, and does not remain. “For the fashion of this world passeth away: but,” he says, “I would have you to be without solicitude,”—in other words: I would have you lift up your heart, that it may dwell among those things which do not pass away. He then goes on to say: “He that is unmarried careth for the things that belong to the Lord, how he may please the Lord: but he that is married careth for the things that are of the world, how he may please his wife.” And thus to some extent he explains what he had already said: “Let them that have wives be as though they had none.” For they who have wives in such a way as to care for the things of the Lord, how they may please the Lord, without having any care for the things of the world in order to please their wives, are, in fact, just as if they had no wives. And this is effected with greater ease when the wives, too, are of such a disposition, because they please their husbands not merely because they are rich, because they are high in rank, noble in race, and amiable in natural temper, but because they are believers, because they are religious, because they are chaste, because they are good men.

## Footnotes

* ↑ 1 Cor. vii. 29–31.
* ↑ 1 Cor. iii. 32, 33.
# Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series I/Volume V/On the Spirit and the Letter/Chapter 39

Chapter 39 [XXIV]—The Eternal Reward Which is Specially Declared in the New Testament, Foretold by the Prophet.
Accordingly, in our prophet likewise, whose testimony we are dealing with, this is added, that in God is the reward, in Him the end, in Him the perfection of happiness, in Him the sum of the blessed and eternal life. For after saying, “I will be their God, and they shall be my people,” he at once adds, “And they shall no more teach every man his neighbour, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord: for they shall all know me, from the least even unto the greatest of them.” Now, the present is certainly the time of the New Testament, the promise of which is given by the prophet in the words which we have quoted from his prophecy. Why then does each man still say even now to his neighbour and his brother, “Know the Lord?” Or is it not perhaps meant that this is everywhere said when the gospel is preached, and when this is its very proclamation? For on what ground does the apostle call himself “a teacher of the Gentiles,” if it be not that what he himself implies in the following passage becomes realized: “How shall they call on Him in whom they have not believed? and how shall they believe in Him of whom they have not heard? and how shall they hear without a preacher?” Since, then, this preaching is now everywhere spreading, in what way is it the time of the New Testament of which the prophet spoke in the words, “And they shall not every man teach his neighbour, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord; for they shall all know me, from the least of them unto the greatest of them,” unless it be that he has included in his prophetic forecast the eternal reward of the said New Testament, by promising us the most blessed contemplation of God Himself?

## Footnotes

* ↑ Jer. xxxi. 34.
* ↑ 1 Tim. ii. 7.
* ↑ Rom. x. 14.
* ↑ Jer. xxxi. 34.
# Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series I/Volume V/On the Spirit and the Letter/Chapter 4

Chapter 4.—Theirs is a Much More Serious Error, Requiring a Very Vigorous Refutation, Who Deny God’s Grace to Be Necessary.
They, however, must be resisted with the utmost ardor and vigor who suppose that without God’s help, the mere power of the human will in itself, can either perfect righteousness, or advance steadily towards it; and when they begin to be hard pressed about their presumption in asserting that this result can be reached without the divine assistance, they check themselves, and do not venture to utter such an opinion, because they see how impious and insufferable it is. But they allege that such attainments are not made without God’s help on this account, namely, because God both created man with the free choice of his will, and, by giving him commandments, teaches him, Himself, how man ought to live; and indeed assists him, in that He takes away his ignorance by instructing him in the knowledge of what he ought to avoid and to desire in his actions: and thus, by means of the free-will naturally implanted within him, he enters on the way which is pointed out to him, and by persevering in a just and pious course of life, deserves to attain to the blessedness of eternal life.