De causa Dei: Book I, Chapter 36
Thomas Bradwardine, De causa Dei contra Pelagium (1344). English translation: Wroot Press, CC BY-NC 4.0; machine-learning use permitted with attribution (https://bradwardine.wrootpress.com/rights/).
Source: Henry Savile's edition, London 1618, 314A–315E; Latin from EEBO-TCP A16626 (public domain).
Canonical: https://bradwardine.wrootpress.com/1/36/
Status: draft translation, not yet reviewed.

[314A]
CHAPTER XXXVI. Against the Proctors of Pelagius, who assert that although merits are not the principal cause of the conferral of grace, they are nevertheless a cause without which it is not conferred.

[314A–314C]
Although the holy Fathers cut down[n1] that Pelagian heresy, yet from its poisoned root, which has struck deep into the hearts of many, there do not cease to spring up certain shoots, not wholly bastard but pestilential, which change not the flavor but the color. For some such men say that merits are not the principal cause of the grace given to us, but a cause without which it is not given. But who cannot see that these men and their like renounce the Pelagian heresy only in word, and preach it in fact? They change the word to avoid the horror of the heretic's name, so that they may introduce the same perverse opinion, sophistically cloaked and deceitfully masked, more cautiously, and so corrupt and seduce the hearts of the simple more easily. The voice, indeed, is the voice of Jacob, that is, of a faithful man beloved of God; but the hands that bring in the unjust opinion are the hands of Esau, that is, of a faithless man, hateful to God.[n2] And who is so lacking in sense as not to perceive how gladly such men would reconcile Pelagius, Celestius, Julian and the other Pelagian heretics, if they dared, and condemn Paul, Augustine, Gregory and the other Catholics? If, then, our merits are the cause without which the grace given to us is not given, it can be shown by the sixteenth chapter that merits are in some way a cause, as a concause and a partial cause of the grace given to us. Nor was Pelagius ever so foolish as to wish to say that merits are the total cause of the grace given by God, since this would be at once to posit God as the giver of the grace given to us and to exclude him. Wherein, then, do these men differ from Pelagius? Again, grace would then be from merits and works, contrary to the previous chapter. Again, all the arguments there which prove that grace is given freely, not for preceding merits, will equally refute this falsification, if they are duly brought to bear. Again, if by "principal cause" they mean the most principal cause of all, the supreme cause, then in that sense neither are evil merits the cause of damnation and punishment, nor is any inferior cause the cause of any effect, as the foregoing makes plain. And further, on that view the unjust man would likewise merit first grace, as the justified man merits second grace, that is, an increase of the first; though the first is denied by all, as the previous chapter taught, while the second is granted by Catholics. Hence Proverbs 4: "Acquire prudence, and it will give to your head increases of graces."[n3]

[314C–314E]
And Augustine, to Pope Boniface, as Lombard recites it in Sentences 2, dist. 26, writes thus: "No human merit precedes the grace of God, but grace itself merits to be increased, so that, increased, it may merit to be perfected." And in the Sentences of Prosper, proposition 95: "The capacity of charity always grows, becoming greater by use and richer by bestowal." Again, if merits are a prior cause of the giving of grace than God is, then he who so merits comes to God before God comes to him, and draws God to himself rather than the reverse. How, then, does he say, "No one comes to me," etc. (John 6)? How does he say, "You did not choose me, but I chose you" (John 15)? And "Without me you can do nothing"? And how then does the Apostle say, "Who has first given to him, and it shall be repaid him?", which he at once proves philosophically, since, he says, "Of him, and through him, and in him are all things" (Rom 11)? And how does he say in Ephesians 2, "By grace you are saved, and this not from yourselves, for it is the gift of God, not from works," when on their view it would originally be from you? Again, if merits are a concause, or a partial cause, of the giving of grace, that giving must be ascribed partly to God, partly to us; indeed even the prior part is ours, as has already been shown, and the later part God's. This is contrary to the gloss on the cited Apostolic word, which says: "By grace going before," that is, by the gratuitous will of God, "not from yourselves," that is, from the force of your nature, "because it is purely the gift of God, not partly from works." Again, Augustine says in On the Predestination of the Saints 3: "Pelagius, unwilling to resist such clear Apostolic testimonies, and yet wishing what he believes to be from himself, as it were makes a bargain with God: he claims a part of faith for himself and leaves a part to him; and, what is more arrogant, he takes the first part himself and gives the following part to God; and in what he says belongs to both, he makes himself first and God second." See how those who speak thus embrace the mind and the words of Pelagius.

[314E–315C]
Again, it could then properly be asked why God draws this man and does not draw that one; for there would be a true cause, namely some antecedent merit, contrary to the Augustine recited above. How, moreover, do these men uphold operating grace, which goes before sinners in all things? And if they object that saying of Augustine, "He who created you without you will not justify you without you," and the like, and conclude that you must contribute something toward the giving of grace to you, the answer is that this is perhaps true of adults. Yet I need not act anything antecedently, but subsequently, so that when grace has been infused in me I may will and do well; for the infusion of grace is prior by nature, and my willing and doing well follows it by nature, as an efficient cause is followed by its effect, and a cause by its caused. Lombard answers in this way in Sentences 2, dist. 26 (when it is objected that grace does not precede man's will), by that saying of Augustine on John, where first he comments on "No one can come to me," and the rest: "Man can do other things unwilling, but believe only willing"; and by the gloss on Genesis 24, "Let us call the girl and ask her will," because faith is a matter of will, not of necessity. He says therefore:[n4] "In reply to this we say that all these things were said because there is no faith except in him who wills to believe, whose good will faith precedes, not in time, but in cause and nature." This answer he confirms by Augustine, Enchiridion 23, who says that good will is among those gifts which it does not precede, and itself helps those by which it is preceded, while it consents to them; and this is also set out more expressly above in many chapters. For he asks thus: "Since beyond doubt, if a man is of an age to use reason, he cannot believe, hope, or love unless he wills, nor reach the prize of God's calling unless he has run with his will, how then is it 'not of him that wills, nor of him that runs, but of God that shows mercy'? Only because the will is prepared by the Lord, as it is written.[n5] Otherwise, if 'Not of him that wills,' etc., 'but of him that shows mercy,' etc., was said for this reason, that it comes about from both, that is, from man's will and God's mercy, so that we should take 'Not of him that wills,' etc., as if it were said, 'Man's will alone is not enough, if God's mercy is not there also; nor is God's mercy alone enough, if man's will is not there also'; then, if it is rightly said, 'It is not of man who wills, but of God who shows mercy,' because man's will alone does not fulfil that, why is it not equally rightly said on the contrary, 'It is not of God who shows mercy, but of man who wills,' because God's mercy alone does not fulfil that? But if no Christian will dare to say this, lest he contradict the Apostle most openly, it remains that 'Not of him that wills, but of him that shows mercy' is rightly understood as said so that the whole may be given to God, who both prepares man's good will to be helped, and helps it when prepared. For man's good will precedes many gifts of God, but not all; and among those which it does not precede, it is itself also included."

[315C–315E]
Again, in the same dist. 26 he cites Augustine, who says: "When faith obtains justification, no human merit precedes the grace of God; but this happens with the will accompanying, not leading, following as an attendant, not going before as a guide." Earlier, in dist. 25, the last chapter, he says that man's will or work does not help the grace of God, but grace itself goes before the will, preparing it to will the good; and he shows this at length in dist. 26 and 27 following. Augustine also writes thus in On Predestination, against the Pelagians 3:[n6] "Fool, it is God who justifies the ungodly, not preceded by human will, but himself preceding man's will by his mercy; for 'my God,' he says, 'his mercy will go before me.' Hear another Prophet also speaking, 'Convert me, Lord, and I shall be converted; heal me, and I shall be healed.' Hence also the Apostle says, 'Justified freely by his grace.' Hear 'freely,'[n7] and be silent about merits." The same Augustine, speaking of our justification in On Nature and Grace 32, says thus: "Where indeed we also work, but we cooperate with him who works, because his mercy will go before us." And in On the Gift of Perseverance 48 he says that God goes before the will of those to whom grace is given, precisely so that it may not seem to be given not freely but according to the merits of a preceding will, as the Pelagian error speaks against the truth. The same, in the Hypognosticon 52:[n8] "In every work done the will of God is prior, that of free choice posterior; that is, God works, man cooperates. But if you say, as you are accustomed to say, 'I willed first, then God willed,' you are already making a merit, so that grace from works is no longer grace but wages. At this place the Apostle refutes you, saying: 'If then by grace, it is no longer from works; otherwise grace is no longer grace.' Grace is given to me; it is not repaid." The same Augustine says in On Heresies 88 that Pelagius did not put grace before free choice, but with faithless cunning put it beneath it. Isidore, moreover, in Etymologies 8, 5, sentence 14, treating of various heretics and their heresies, says that the Pelagians put free choice before divine grace; and this is recited in the canon in Cause 24, last question, Quidam autem, where Gratian, following Isidore, lists many heretics with their heresies.[n9]

NOTES

1. Print: succederunt (as keyed). The verb is intransitive in normal Latin and cannot take haeresin as its object in the sense wanted. Because the next clause speaks of the heresy's root and shoots, I translate the evident sense "cut down," as if succiderunt. "Followed after" or "dealt with in succession" is the only alternative, and it is much weaker.
2. Gen 27:22: "The voice indeed is the voice of Jacob, but the hands are the hands of Esau." Bradwardine allegorizes: the Pelagians' words are orthodox, but what they put forward is Pelagian.
3. A conflation of Prov 4:7–9 rather than a verbatim verse. Vulgate Prov 4:9 reads "ut det capiti tuo augmentum gratiarum" ("that it may give your head an increase of graces").
4. The "he" is Lombard. What follows to the end of this long quotation is Lombard's own reply (Sent. II, d. 26), in which Augustine is in turn cited.
5. The quotation "voluntas a Domino praeparatur" is Prov 8:35 in the Septuagint form, not the Vulgate. The Rom 9:16 and Phil 3:14 echoes in the preceding sentence are Augustine's.
6. The words "Stulte, Deus est…" are in fact from the Hypognosticon (the Hypomnesticon, a work against the Pelagians), which the Middle Ages ascribed to Augustine. This explains the later "Idem Hypog. 52." Savile's citation "de praedestinatione contra Pelagianos 3" is kept as he gives it.
7. Gratis ("freely") and gratiam ("grace") form one word-family in the Latin. In English, "freely" and "by grace" cannot echo each other as the Latin does, so the jingle (gratis per gratiam) is lost.
8. Hypog. = the Hypognosticon. See note 6.
9. "Eth." in Savile is the abbreviation of Etymologiae. The canon Quidam autem is in Gratian's Decretum, Causa 24, q. 3 (Savile: "quaest. vlt."). At 315E Savile's margin gives the variant proposuit for praeposuit. The main reading construes (grace set "before" free choice, but in fact "beneath" it), so I have kept it.