A Treatise on the Predestination of the Saints.

Translated by ANF/NPNF editors

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(English) · Translated by ANF/NPNF editors

Contents 115 sections

Title Page.Front matter
Book I
Introduction.
To What Extent the Massilians Withdraw from the Pelagians.
Even the Beginning of Faith is of God’s Gift.
Continuation of the Preceding.
To Believe is to Think with Assent.
Presumption and Arrogance to Be Avoided.
Augustin Confesses that He Had Formerly Been in Error Concerning the Grace of God.
What Augustin Wrote to Simplicianus, the Successor of Ambrose, Bishop of Milan.
The Purpose of the Apostle in These Words.
It is God’s Grace Which Specially Distinguishes One Man from Another.
That Some Men are Elected is of God’s Mercy.
Why the Apostle Said that We are Justified by Faith and Not by Works.
The Effect of Divine Grace.
Why the Father Does Not Teach All that They May Come to Christ.
It is Believers that are Taught of God.
Why the Gift of Faith is Not Given to All.
His Argument in His Letter Against Porphyry, as to Why the Gospel Came So Late into the World.
The Preceding Argument Applied to the Present Time.
In What Respects Predestination and Grace Differ.
Did God Promise the Good Works of the Nations and Not Their Faith, to Abraham?
It is to Be Wondered at that Men Should Rather Trust to Their Own Weakness Than to God’s Strength.
God’s Promise is Sure.
Remarkable Illustrations of Grace and Predestination in Infants, and in Christ.
That No One is Judged According to What He Would Have Done If He Had Lived Longer.
Possibly the Baptized Infants Would Have Repented If They Had Lived, and the Unbaptized Not.
Reference to Cyprian’s Treatise 'On the Mortality.'
The Book of Wisdom Obtains in the Church the Authority of Canonical Scripture.
Cyprian’s Treatise 'On the Mortality.'
God’s Dealing Does Not Depend Upon Any Contingent Merits of Men.
The Most Illustrious Instance of Predestination is Christ Jesus.
Christ Predestinated to Be the Son of God.
The Twofold Calling.
It is in the Power of Evil Men to Sin; But to Do This or That by Means of that Wickedness is in God’s Power Alone.
The Special Calling of the Elect is Not Because They Have Believed, But in Order that They May Believe.
Election is for the Purpose of Holiness.
God Chose the Righteous; Not Those Whom He Foresaw as Being of Themselves, But Those Whom He Predestinated for the Purpose of Making So.
We Were Elected and Predestinated, Not Because We Were Going to Be Holy, But in Order that We Might Be So.
What is the View of the Pelagians, and What of the Semi-Pelagians, Concerning Predestination.
The Beginning of Faith is God’s Gift.
Apostolic Testimony to the Beginning of Faith Being God’s Gift.
Further Apostolic Testimonies.
Old Testament Testimonies.
Conclusion.
Title Page.
Introduction
Of the Nature of the Perseverance Here Discoursed of.
Faith is the Beginning of a Christian Man. Martyrdom for Christ’s Sake is His Best Ending.
God is Besought for It, Because It is His Gift.
Three Leading Points of the Pelagian Doctrine.
The Second Petition in the Lord’s Prayer.
The Third Petition. How Heaven and Earth are Understood in the Lord’s Prayer.
The Fourth Petition.
The Fifth Petition. It is an Error of the Pelagians that the Righteous are Free from Sin.
When Perseverance is Granted to a Person, He Cannot But Persevere.
The Gift of Perseverance Can Be Obtained by Prayer.
Effect of Prayer for Perseverance.
Of His Own Will a Man Forsakes God, So that He is Deservedly Forsaken of Him.
Temptation the Condition of Man.
It is God’s Grace Both that Man Comes to Him, and that Man Does Not Depart from Him.
Why God Willed that He Should Be Asked for that Which He Might Give Without Prayer.
Why is Not Grace Given According to Merit?
The Difficulty of the Distinction Made in the Choice of One and the Rejection of Another.
But Why Should One Be Punished More Than Another?
Why Does God Mingle Those Who Will Persevere with Those Who Will Not?
Ambrose on God’s Control Over Men’s Thoughts.
Instances of the Unsearchable Judgments of God.
It is an Absurdity to Say that the Dead Will Be Judged for Sins Which They Would Have Committed If They Had Lived.
Why for the People of Tyre and Sidon, Who Would Have Believed, the Miracles Were Not Done Which Were Done in Other Places Which Did Not Believe.
It May Be Objected that The People of Tyre and Sidon Might, If They Had Heard, Have Believed, and Have Subsequently Lapsed from Their Faith.
God’s Ways, Both in Mercy and Judgment, Past Finding Out.
The Manicheans Do Not Receive All the Books of the Old Testament, and of the New Only Those that They Choose.
Reference to the 'Retractations.'
God’s Goodness and Righteousness Shown in All.
God’s True Grace Could Be Defended Even If There Were No Original Sin, as Pelagius Maintains.
Augustin Claims the Right to Grow in Knowledge.
Infants are Not Judged According to that Which They are Foreknown as Likely to Do If They Should Live.
The Inscrutability of God’s Free Purposes.
God Gives Both Initiatory and Persevering Grace According to His Own Will.
The Doctrine of Predestination Not Opposed to the Advantage of Preaching.
What Predestination is.
The Preaching of the Gospel and the Preaching of Predestination the Two Parts of One Message.
Ears to Hear are a Willingness to Obey.
Against the Preaching of Predestination the Same Objections May Be Alleged as Against Predestination.
Prayer and Exhortation.
When the Truth Must Be Spoken, When Kept Back.
Predestination Defined as Only God’s Disposing of Events in His Foreknowledge.
The Adversaries Cannot Deny Predestination to Those Gifts of Grace Which They Themselves Acknowledge, and Their Exhortations are Not Hindered by This Predestination Nevertheless.
Further Development of the Foregoing Argument.
Exhortation to Wisdom, Though Wisdom is God’s Gift.
Exhortation to Other Gifts of God in Like Manner.
A Man Who Does Not Persevere Fails by His Own Fault.
Predestination is Sometimes Signified Under the Name of Foreknowledge.
Practice of Cyprian and Ambrose.
Further References to Cyprian and Ambrose.
Obedience Not Discouraged by Preaching God’s Gifts.
Predestination Must Be Preached.
Previous Writings Anticipatively Refuted the Pelagian Heresy.
Augustin’s 'Confessions.'
Beginning and End of Faith is of God.
Testimony of His Previous Writings and Letters.
God Gives Means as Well as End.
How Predestination Must Be Preached So as Not to Give Offence.
The Doctrine to Be Applied with Discrimination.
Offence to Be Avoided.
The Application to the Church in General.
Use of the Third Person Rather Than the Second.
Prayer to Be Inculcated, Nevertheless.
The Testimony of the Whole Church in Her Prayers.
In What Sense the Holy Spirit Solicits for Us, Crying, Abba, Father.
The Church’s Prayers Imply the Church’s Faith.
Recapitulation and Exhortation.
The Most Eminent Instance of Predestination is Christ Jesus.
Conclusion.

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