Mozley: A Treatise on the Augustinian Doctrine of

84. The Pelagian Controversy. CHAP. m.
pure good, the whole of experience going so much against
it, and therefore virtually disbelieve in Him who is abso
lute goodness.
which accounted tor the universal corruption
The other extreme theory was the Pelagian,
of the world
simply upon the ground of each individual s will ; and the
practical tendency of the Pelagian, as of the Manichean
theory, was to carelessness and indifference ; attributing too
slight a power to sin over the liberty of the will, and so
lowering our idea of the nature of sin ; as the other gave it
too much, and so abandoned us to it. Between these two
theories the Church has taken the middle line, denying
evil to be original in the universe, but asserting it to be
original in our present nature ; giving it a voluntary be
ginning but a necessary continuance, and a descent, when
once begun, by a natural law. This mixture and balance
of voluntariness and necessity makes up the doctrine of
original sin ; and the practical impression it leaves, is that
of the deep and awful nature, but not the dominance of sin.
And thus S. Augustine was enabled, in answer to the
Pelagian charge of Manicheanism, to appeal to his doctrine
as a safeguard against that system. The facts of the world
drove the Manichean into blasphemy and a denial of the
Divine omnipotence but the ; doctrine of original sin ac
counted for these facts in a way which saved at once the
Divine justice and the Divine power. It attributed evil,
moral and physical, to the wilful act of man thus ; separat
ing it from the essence of his nature, and dislodging it as
a substance in the universe, while it accounted judicially
for the pains of this present life. 1
*
III. The main arguments of Pelagianism being stated 2
,
it remains to notice the bearing of this system upon the
Catholic doctrines of the Original State of man, the Incar
nation, and the Atonement.
1. Scripture represents the original state of man as
one of innocence and goodness, and as blessed with a cor-
1
Op. Imp. 1. 3. c. 170177. 186.;
Pelagian interpreted 1. 4. c. 2.; 1. 5. c. 30. b - c - 7- 9.
56.; Scripture bearing
2
-bor the mode in which the
the texts of
on the doctrine of
original sin, see NOTE XIII.