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152 THE HISTORY OF HERESIES,
v, 5). In fine, St. Paul wishes to show us the necessity of Grace
to desire or to put in practice every good action, and shows that
for that we should be humble, otherwise we render ourselves un
worthy of it. And lest the Pelagians may reply,
that here the
Apostle does not speak of the absolute necessity of Grace, but of
the necessity of having it to do good more easily, which is all
the necessity they would admit, see what he says in another
text :
" No
(I. Cor. xii, 3).
man can say, the Lord Jesus, but by the Holy Ghost"
If, therefore, we cannot even mention the name
of Jesus with profit to our souls, without the grace of the Holy
Ghost, much less can we hope to work out our salvation without
Grace.
3. Secondly St. Paul teaches us that the grace alone of the
law given to us i3 not, as Pelagius said, sufficient, for actual
Grace is absolutely necessary to observe the law effectually :
"
For if justice be by the law, then Christ died in vain" (Gal.
ii, is 21). By justice understood the observance of the Command
"
ments, as St. John tells us : He that doth justice is
just"
(I. John, iii, 7). The meaning of the Apostle, therefore,
is this :
If man, by the aid of the law alone, could observe the law, then
Jesus Christ died in vain ; but such is not the case. We stand
in need of Grace, which Christ procured for us by his death.
Nay,
so far is the law alone sufficient for the observance of the
Commandments, that, as the Apostle says, the very law itself is
the cause of our transgressing the law, because it is by sin that
"
concupiscence enters into us : But sin taking occasion by the
Commandment, wrought in me all manner of concupiscence. For
without the law sin was dead. And I lived some time without
the law, but when the commandment came, sin revived" (Rom.
vii, 8, 9). St. Augustin, explaining how it is that the knowledge
of the law sooner renders us guilty than innocent, says
that this
happens (1), because such is the condition of our corrupt will,
that, loving it is
liberty, carried on with more vehemence to what
is prohibited than to what is permitted. Grace is, therefore,
that which causes us to love and to do what we know we ought
to do, as the Second Council of Carthage declares :
" Ut quod
faciendum cognovimus, per Gratiam praistatur, ctiam facere diri-
(1) St. Augus. /. do ^Spir. &. ft htt.