Letter 193: Augustine praises Mercator's anti-Pelagian arguments and answers objections about infant baptism, death, Enoch, Elijah, and the last day.

To Marius Mercator, my dearly beloved son, worthy of praise for the most sincere love among the members of Christ: Augustine sends greetings in the Lord. The letters Your Love sent earlier, which I received from you at Carthage, filled me with so much joy that even in your later letters, where you were annoyed that I had not written back, I received your complaint with gratitude. Your indignation was not the beginning of hostility, but the sign of love. As for why I did not reply from Carthage, there was no lack of bearers; rather, other more urgent matters kept us extremely occupied and intent until we left. When we departed from there, we traveled as far as Caesarian Mauretania, where ecclesiastical necessity drew us. Across all those lands, while different matters pressing on our senses dragged our attention here and there, no one came with the insistence to remind me to write back to you, and no opportunity of a bearer appeared. Then, when I returned, I found among our people other letters of Your Sincerity, already sharpened by complaint, and another book against the new heretics, filled with testimonies of the holy Scriptures. After I read and ran through these, together with the things you had sent at first, I had to reply, because the very convenient occasion of our dearest brother Albinus, acolyte of the Roman Church, offered itself. Therefore, my dearly beloved son, far be it from me to receive you negligently or despise you with proud vanity when you write to me or send me your writings for consideration. My joy over you is all the greater because it came so unexpectedly and suddenly. I admit that I did not know you had made such progress. What could we desire more than that people abound everywhere who refute the errors that attack the Catholic faith and lie in wait for weak and untrained brothers, and who defend the church of Christ sharply and faithfully against profane novelties of speech? For it is written, "A multitude of the wise is the health of the whole world." I inspected your heart in your writings as far as I could, and I found it worthy of embrace and encouragement, so that with most persevering diligence you may stretch forward to what lies ahead, with the Lord helping your strength, who gave you the powers he now nourishes. Those whom we are trying to call back from wandering into the way have come quite close to the truth in the question of infant baptism when they confess that even an infant newly poured from the mother's womb nevertheless believes through those by whom he is offered for baptism. For they say, as you write, that infants do not believe in the remission of sins in such a way that sins are remitted to them, because they think infants have no sin; rather, since infants too receive the same washing by which, wherever it takes place, remission of sins is effected, they believe that this remission happens in others, though it does not happen in them. When they say, then, "They do not believe in that way, but they do believe in this way," they plainly do not doubt that infants believe. Let them hear the Lord, then: "Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever does not believe the Son will not see life, but the wrath of God remains upon him." Therefore infants, because they become believers through others, by whom they are offered for baptism, are certainly unbelievers through others if they are with people who do not believe they should be offered, since those people believe baptism does them no good. And so, if through believers they believe and have eternal life, then through unbelievers they are unbelievers and will not see life, but the wrath of God remains upon them. It does not say, "It comes upon them," but "it remains upon them," because from their origin it was already in them and is not removed from them except by the grace of God through Jesus Christ our Lord. Of this wrath we also read in the book of Job: "A human being born of woman is short of life and full of wrath." From where, then, is God's wrath upon the innocence of an infant, unless from the lot and stain of original sin? In the same book it is also written that not even an infant whose life on earth is one day is clean from this. So what is being argued against them with the greatest urgency, and what Catholic voices sound into their ears from every side, has not done nothing among them. While trying to argue against the sacraments of the church, they have nevertheless confessed that infants believe. Therefore let them not promise life to infants even if they have not been baptized. For of what other life is it said, "Whoever does not believe the Son will not see life"? Nor should they confess infants to be alien from the kingdom of heaven in such a way that they still defend them from condemnation. What does the wrath which the Lord testifies remains upon the one who does not believe signify, if not condemnation? A very great advance has been made, and the case is finished without fussy dispute. If they concede that infants believe, then just as infants are held by the sentence, "Unless one is born again of water and the Spirit, he will not enter the kingdom of heaven," so they are also held by this sentence of the same Lord: "Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved; whoever does not believe will be condemned." Since, when infants are baptized, these people confess that they are believers, let them not doubt that when infants do not believe they are condemned. And now let them dare to say, if they can, that those who draw no evil from their origin and have no contagion of sin are condemned by a just God. As for what you mentioned in your letters, that they object to us with Enoch and Elijah, saying that they did not die but were translated with their bodies from this human life, I do not understand how this helps them in the matter at issue. I pass over the fact that they too are reported to be going to die later, as many interpret the Apocalypse of John concerning the two prophets of whom it speaks without naming them: these two saints, they say, will appear then with the same bodies in which they now live, so that they too may die for the truth of Christ as the other martyrs do. Leaving that question aside, however it may stand, how does it help them, I ask? They do not show by this that human beings do not die in the body because of sin. If God, who grants to so many of his faithful the remission of sins themselves, also willed to grant to some the remission of this penalty of sin, who are we to answer God and ask why one is treated this way and another that way? We therefore say what the apostle says most openly: "The body is dead because of sin, but the spirit is life because of righteousness. And if the Spirit of the one who raised Christ from the dead dwells in you, the one who raised Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit dwelling in you." We do not say this in such a way as to deny that God can now do without death in whomever he wills what we believe without doubt he will do after death in so many. Nor on that account will it be false that "through one man sin entered this world, and through sin death, and so it passed to all human beings." This was said because, unless death had entered through sin, there would be no death. When we say, "All are sent into Gehenna because of sins," do we speak falsely because not all human beings are sent into Gehenna? That statement is true not because every human being is sent there, but because no one is sent there except by the merits of sins. In the opposite direction the same is true of the sentence, "Through one act of righteousness came justification of life for all human beings." Not all human beings belong to the justification of Christ; rather, this was said because no one is justified except through Christ. The question that more reasonably troubles people is why the penalty of sin remains when sin itself does not remain. That is, if bodily death too is a penalty of sin, the question is rather why an infant dies after being baptized, not why Elijah did not die after being justified. In the baptized infant, whose sin is ended, it is reasonable to ask why the penalty of sin follows. In Elijah, whose sin is also ended, it should not trouble us if the penalty of sin does not follow. In the books On the Baptism of Infants, which I know are very familiar to you, we resolved as best we could with the Lord's help that question concerning the death of the baptized: why, after the abolition of sin has taken place, a certain penalty of sin still follows. How much less should this question disturb us when someone says, "Why did righteous Elijah not die, if death is the penalty of sin?" as though the question were, "Why did sinful Elijah not die, if death is the penalty of sin?" Perhaps they raise one point from another and say, "If Enoch and Elijah were so free from sin that they did not suffer even death, which is the penalty of sin, how is it that no one lives here without sin?" As though the more probable answer could not be given: "Those whom the Lord willed to live after their sins were ended were not permitted to live here, because no one can live here without sin." Such things and things like them could have been said against these people if they had proved with certainty from some other source that Enoch and Elijah will never die. But since they cannot teach this, and since it is better believed that they will come to death, there is no reason for them to throw these men against us, since they will help their case in no way at all. Those, however, about whom the apostle spoke when he was discussing the resurrection of the dead, do raise a question: "And we who are alive, who remain, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet Christ in the air; and so we shall always be with the Lord." They raise some question by themselves, though not for these people. Even if they too are not going to die, I do not see at all how they help these people, since the same kinds of things can be said about them as were said about those two. But in truth, so far as the words of the blessed apostle are concerned, he appears to affirm that some people at the end of the age, when the Lord comes and the resurrection of the dead takes place, will not die, but will be found alive and suddenly changed into the immortality given also to the rest of the saints, and caught up together with them in the clouds. Nothing else has seemed to me whenever I have wanted to think about these words. But on this matter I would rather hear from those more learned, lest the apostle also be found to say to those who think some will be brought to everlasting life without death first, "Fool, what you sow is not brought to life unless it first dies." And the reading found in many copies, "We shall all rise," how can it come about unless we all die? There is no resurrection unless death has preceded it. The reading in some copies, "We shall all sleep," compels this understanding much more easily and plainly. If anything else of this sort is found in the holy Scriptures, it seems to press us toward thinking that no human being obtains immortality unless death has preceded it. Therefore, where the apostle says, "We who are alive, who remain until the coming of the Lord, will not precede those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord himself, with a command, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trumpet of God, will descend from heaven, and the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive, who remain, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet Christ in the air; and so we shall always be with the Lord," I would, as I said, rather hear from those more learned about these words. If they can now be explained in such a way that all human beings who are alive, or who will live after us, can be understood to be going to die, I am ready to correct what I once thought otherwise about this. Teachers must not be unteachable. Certainly it is better for a small person to be corrected than for a hard one to be broken. Let the things we have written exercise and train our weakness or that of others, but let no canonical authority be established in them. If no other meaning can be found in these words of the apostle, and it becomes clear that he intended what the words themselves seem to shout, namely that at the end of the age and the coming of the Lord there will be people who are not stripped of the body but clothed over with immortality, so that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life, this view will undoubtedly agree with what we confess in the rule of faith: that the Lord will come to judge the living and the dead. Here we should not understand "the living" as the righteous and "the dead" as the unrighteous, although both righteous and unrighteous will be judged. Rather, the living are those whom his coming finds not yet departed from their bodies, and the dead are those whom it finds already departed. If this is established, those words will have to be examined: how shall we take "What you sow is not brought to life unless it first dies," and "We shall all rise," or "We shall all sleep," so that they do not oppose this view, in which some are believed to live forever even with their bodies without tasting death? Whichever of these two understandings is found to be truer and clearer, what does it have to do with these people, whether all are struck by the debt of death or some are spared from this condition? It remains certain that death, not only of the soul but also of the body, would not have followed if sin had not preceded it, and that the grace by which the righteous are revived from death to eternal blessedness is more wonderful in its power than not coming into the experience of death. Let what has been said be enough for those about whom you wrote to me, though I do not now think they still say that Adam would have died even in the body if he had not sinned. As for the question of the resurrection, because of those who are thought not to be going to die but to pass from this mortality into immortality without death in between, a more careful inquiry must be applied. If you have heard, read, or yourself been able to think of anything definite and settled on this point by reasonable and complete discussion, or if you are still able to hear, read, or think of something, I ask you not to hesitate to send it to me. I confess to Your Charity that I love learning more than teaching. We are reminded of this also when the apostle James says, "Let every person be quick to hear, slow to speak." The sweetness of truth should invite us to learn; the necessity of love should compel us to teach. We should rather wish that this necessity would pass away, by which one human being teaches another, so that we may all be taught by God. Yet we are taught by God when we learn the things that belong to true devotion, even when a human being seems to teach them. For neither the one who plants nor the one who waters is anything, but God who gives the growth. If, then, apostles who planted and watered would be nothing unless God gave the growth, how much more am I, or you, or any people of this age, when we see that we are teachers?

EPISTOLA 193 Scripta ca. a. 418. A. Mercatori, gratiae vindici (cf. De octo Dulcit. quaest., 3), excusans cur ad ipsius priores litteras nondum responderit, gratulatur quod profecerit in catholica doctrina defendenda (nn. 1-2) ostendens Pelagianos in quaestione de parvulorum baptismo prope esse convictos quod fateantur parvulos quodammodo credere per eos a quibus baptizandi offeruntur (nn. 3-4); demonstrat haereticos ex Enoch et Eliae ante obitum translatione (nn. 5-8) sive ex fidelium ad secundum Christi adventum raptu frustra contendere mortem non esse poenam peccati (nn. 9-12) affirmans se malle discere quam docere (n. 13). DOMINO DILECTISSIMO, ET IN CHRISTI MEMBRIS SINCERISSIMA CARITATE PRAEDICANDO FILIO MERCATORI, AUGUSTINUS, IN DOMINO SALUTEM. Cur A. non responderit ad priores litteras. 1. 1. Litterae Dilectionis tuae, quas prius abs te missas apud Carthaginem accepi, tanto me affecerunt gaudio, ut etiam in posterioribus te succensentem quod tibi non rescripserim, gratissime acceperim. Ipsa quippe indignatio tua non erat simultatis initium, sed indicium caritatis. Ut autem a Carthagine non rescriberem, non occasio defuit perlatorum, sed alia magis urgentia, donec inde proficisceremur, nos occupatissimos et intentissimos continebant. Cum vero inde digressi sumus, perreximus usque ad Mauritaniam Caesariensem, quo nos ecclesiastica necessitas traxit; per quas totas terras cum intentionem nostram huc atque illuc, quae ingerebantur sensibus diversa raptarent, nullius ut tibi rescriberem adfuit admonitoris instantia, nulla occurrit opportunitas perlatoris. Deinde remeans, alias apud nostros iam querela exasperatas litteras tuae Sinceritatis inveni, et alium adversus novos haereticos librum refertum sanctarum testimoniis Scripturarum; quibus lectis excursisque, etiam illis quae primum miseras, quia et carissimi fratris nostri Albini Ecclesiae Romanae acolythi opportunissima se offerebat occasio, rescribendum fuit. Gratulatur Mercatori vindici catholicae fidei. 1. 2. Ego itaque te, fili dilectissime, scribentem mihi, vel ad me consideranda tua scripta mittentem, absit ut neglegenter accipiam, vel superba vanitate contemnam, praesertim cum mihi de te gaudium tanto maius sit, quanto magis inopinatum improvisumque provenit: fateor enim, tantum te profecisse nesciebam. Et quid nobis esse debet optatius, quam ut abundent qui errores infestantes catholicam fidem et insidiantes infirmis ineruditisque fratribus usquequaque redarguant, et Ecclesiam Christi adversus profanas vocum novitates 1 acriter fideliterque defendant; quandoquidem sicut scriptum est: Multitudo sapientium sanitas est orbis terrarum 2? Inspexi ergo cor tuum in scriptis tuis quantum potui, et inveni amplectendum, et hortandum ut perseverantissima diligentia in anteriora te extendas, adiuvante Domino vires tuas, qui tibi eas quas nutriret dedit. Haeretici parvulos credere confitentur. 2. 3. Non autem parum veritati propinquarunt in quaestione de baptismo parvulorum, quos devios in viam revocare conamur, cum infantem quamlibet recenti partu matris effusum, tamen per eos a quibus baptizandus offertur, credere confitentur. Cum enim dicunt, sicut scribis, non infantes ita credere in remissionem peccatorum, tamquam et illis remittantur, quos nullum putant habere peccatum; sed (quia ipsi quoque idem lavacrum percipiunt, quo fit, in quibuscumque fit, remissio peccatorum) hanc fieri credere in aliis, quae non fit in eis: cum ergo dicunt: "Non ita credunt, sed ita credunt"; profecto eos non ambigunt credere. Audiant itaque Dominum: Qui credit in Filium, habet vitam aeternam; qui autem incredulus est Filio, non videbit vitam, sed ira Dei manet super eum 3. Quapropter infantes, quia per alios fiunt credentes, a quibus baptizandi offeruntur, per illos utique sunt increduli, si apud tales sunt, qui eos, dum nihil prodesse credunt, offerendos esse non credunt: ac per hoc si per credentes credunt, et habent vitam aeternam; profecto per incredulos increduli sunt, et non videbunt vitam, sed ira Dei manet super eos. Non enim dictum est: "Venit super eos"; sed: Manet super eos, quia ex origine erat iam in eis, nec omnino nisi gratia Dei per Iesum Christum Dominum nostrum 4 aufertur ab eis. De hac ira legitur etiam in libro Iob: Homo natus ex mulieri, brevis vitae et plenus iracundiae 5. Unde igitur ira Dei super innocentiam parvuli, nisi originalis sorte ac sorde peccati? de qua in eodem libro itidem scriptum est, non esse ab hac mundum nec infantem cuius est unius diei vita super terram 6. Parvulos non credentes damnari. 2. 4. Non ergo in istis nihil egit quod adversus eos instantissime disputatur, et eorum auribus catholicae voces hinc atque inde circumsonant, quandoquidem volentes argumentari contra Sacramenta Ecclesiae, confessi sunt tamen parvulos credere. Non eis ergo promittant vitam, etiamsi non fuerint baptizati: de qua enim alia vita dicitur: Qui incredulus est Filio, non videbit vitam 7? Nec eos a regno coelorum sic fateantur alienos, ut tamen a damnatione defendant: nam quid nisi damnatio significatur per iram, quam Dominus super non credentem manere testatur? Multum prorsus accessum est, et sine scrupulosa conflictatione causa finita est. Si enim concedunt parvulos credere, procul dubio sicut eos tenet illa sententia: Qui non renatus fuerit ex aqua et Spiritu, non intrabit in regnum coelorum 8; sic etiam ista quae eiusdem Domini est: Qui crediderit et baptizatus fuerit, salvus erit: qui autem non crediderit, condemnabitur 9. Quia ergo cum parvuli baptizantur fatentur isti eos esse credentes, damnari non dubitent non credentes: et audeant iam dicere, si possunt, a iusto Deo damnari nihil mali ex origine trahentes, et peccati contagium non habentes. De Enoch et Elia inanis obiectio. 3. 5. Illud vero quod in litteris tuis commemorasti, obiicere nobis Enoch et Eliam quod mortui non fuerint, sed cum suis corporibus ex ista hominum conversatione translati; quid eos ad hoc unde agitur adiuvet, non intellego. Ut enim omittam quod ipsi quoque morituri postea perhibentur, sicut plerique exponunt Apocalypsim Ioannis de duobus illis prophetis, de quibus, tacitis eorum nominibus, loquitur, quod isti duo sancti cum suis tunc corporibus apparebunt, in quibus nunc vivunt, ut etiam ipsi quemadmodum caeteri martyres pro Christi veritate moriantur 10: ut ergo hoc omittam, ista quaestione dilata, quomodolibet sese habeat, quid istos adiuvat, quaeso te? Neque enim hinc ostendunt non propter peccatum homines secundum corpus mori. Nam si Deus, qui tam multis fidelibus suis donat ipsa peccata, voluit quibusdam etiam istam poenam donare peccati 11; qui nos sumus qui respondeamus Deo, cur alius sic, alius autem sic 12? Neminem nisi ob peccata in gehennam mitti. 3. 6. Dicimus ergo quod apertissime Apostolus ait: Corpus quidem mortuum est propter peccatum; spiritus autem vita est propter iustitiam. Si autem Spiritus eius qui suscitavit Christum a mortuis, habitat in vobis; qui suscitavit Christum a mortuis, vivificabit et mortalia corpora vestra per inhabitantem Spiritum eius in vobis 13. Nec tamen ista sic dicimus, ut negemus Deum posse in quibus voluerit, nunc facere sine morte quod sine dubitatione credimus in tam multis facturum esse post mortem: nec ideo tamen illud falsum erit, quod per unum hominem peccatum in hunc mundum intravit, et per peccatum mors, et ita in omnes homines pertransiit 14. Hoc enim dictum est, quia nisi per peccatum mors intrasset, nulla mors esset. Nam et cum dicimus: "Omnes propter peccata mittuntur in gehennam", numquid ideo falsum dicimus, quia non omnes homines mittuntur in gehennam? Illud quippe ideo verum est, non quia omnis homo mittatur, sed quia nullus nisi peccatorum meritis mittitur. Talis est e contrario etiam illa sententia: Per unius iustificationem in omnes homines ad iustificationem vitae 15: non enim omnes homines pertinent ad iustificationem Christi; sed hoc dictum est, quia nemo iustificatur nisi per Christum. Cur poena peccati, peccato non remanente, remaneat. 3. 7. Magis ergo illa quaestio non immerito movet, cur poena peccati, peccato non remanente, remanet; id est, si mors etiam corporis poena peccati est, ista potius aliqua quaestio est, cur moriatur infans cum fuerit baptizatus, quam cur mortuus non sit Elias cum fuerit iustificatus. Illius enim finito peccato movet cur secuta sit poena peccati; huius etiam finito peccato movere non debet si non sequatur poena peccati. Si ergo illam quaestionem de morte baptizatorum, cur, facta abolitione peccati, sequatur tamen quaedam poena peccati, in libris de Baptismo Parvulorum, quos tibi scio esse notissimos, quantum potuimus domino adiuvante dissolvimus 16: quanto minus ista movere nos debet ubi dicitur: "Quare iustus Elias mortuus non est, si mors poena peccati est?" quasi diceretur: "Quare peccator Elias mortuus non est, si mors poena peccati est?". Enoch et Eliam aliquando mortem passuros esse. 3. 8. Nisi forte aliud ex alio movent et dicunt: "Si Enoch et Elias usque adeo non habebant peccatum, ut nec mortem, quae peccati est poena, paterentur; quomodo nemo hic vivit sine peccato?" Quasi non eis probabilius respondeatur: "Ideo quos finitis peccatis voluit Dominus vivere, non hic permissi sunt vivere, quoniam hic quisquam sine peccato non potest vivere". Sed haec atque huiusmodi adversus istos dici potuerunt, si pro certo aliunde convincerent illos numquam esse morituros. Cum vero id docere non possint, meliusque illos venturos esse credatur ad mortem, nihil est cur eos velint nobis obiicere causae suae nulla ex parte aliquid profuturos. Utrum morituri sint viventes in fine saeculi. 4. 9. Illi autem de quibus dixit Apostolus, cum loqueretur de resurrectione mortuorum: Et nos viventes qui reliqui sumus, simul cum illis rapiemur in nubibus obviam Christo in aera; et ita semper cum Domino erimus 17, afferunt quidem aliquid quaestionis; sed per seipsos, non propter istos. Nam etsi non sunt etiam ipsi morituri, quid istos adiuvent omnino non video, cum talia de his dici possint, qualia de illis dicta sunt duobus. Sed revera, quantum ad verba beati Apostoli pertinet, videtur asserere quosdam in fine saeculi adveniente Domino, cum futura est resurrectio mortuorum, non esse morituros, sed vivos repertos in illam immortalitatem quae sanctis etiam caeteris datur, repente mutandos, et simul cum illis rapiendos, sicut dicit, in nubibus: nec aliquid aliud mihi visum est, quoties de his verbis volui cogitare. Pauli locus de viventibus in fine saeculi. 4. 10. Sed vellem hinc potius audire doctiores, ne illis etiam, qui putant aliquos morte non praecedente vivificatos ad vitam perpetuam transituros, dicere inveniatur Apostolus: Stulte, tu quod seminas non vivificatur, nisi prius moriatur 18. Nam et illud quod in plerisque codicibus legitur, omnes resurgemus 19, unde fieri poterit, nisi omnes moriamur? Resurrectio quippe, nisi mors praecesserit, nulla est. Et quod nonnulli codices habent, omnes dormiemus, multo facilius et apertius id cogit intellegi; et si quid aliud tale in sanctis Litteris invenitur, ad id videtur impellere ut nullus hominum existimetur immortalitatem, nisi mors praecesserit, adepturus. Proinde ubi dixit Apostolus: Et nos viventes qui reliqui sumus in adventum Domini, non praeveniemus eos qui ante dormierunt. Ipse enim Dominus in iussu, in voce archangeli, et in tuba Dei descendet de coelo; et mortui in Christo resurgent primi: deinde nos viventes, qui reliqui sumus, simul cum illis rapiemur in nubibus obviam Christo in aera; et ita semper cum Domino erimus 20; vellem, sicut dixi, de his audire doctiores, et si modo potuerint haec ita exponi, ut in eis possit intellegi omnes homines qui vivunt, vel post nos victuri sunt, esse morituros, corrigere quod hinc aliquando aliter sensi. Neque enim debemus indociles esse doctores: et certe melius homo corrigitur parvus, quam frangitur durus; cum iis quae scripsimus, ita nostra vel aliorum exerceatur et erudiatur infirmitas, ut tamen in eis nulla velut canonica constituatur auctoritas. Paulus congruens cum fidei regula ac Scriptura. 4. 11. Si enim in his verbis Apostoli nullus alius sensus potuerit reperiri, et hoc eum intellegi voluisse claruerit quod videntur verba ipsa clamare; id est, quod futuri sint in fine saeculi et in adventu Domini, qui non exspolientur corpore, sed superinduantur immortalitate, ut absorbeatur mortale a vita 21: huic sententiae procul dubio conveniet quod in regula fidei confitemur, venturum Dominum iudicaturum vivos et mortuos 22; ut non hic intellegamus vivos iustos, mortuos autem iniustos, quamvis iudicandi sint iusti et iniusti; sed vivos quos nondum exiisse, mortuos autem quos iam exiisse de corporibus adventus eius inveniet. Quae si ita esse constiterit, illa verba excutienda erunt, quomodo sic accipiemus: Tu quod seminas non vivificatur, nisi prius moriatur; et, omnes resurgemus, sive, omnes dormiemus 23, ut non adversentur huic sententiae, qua quidam creduntur etiam cum suis corporibus in aeternum, non degustata morte, victuri. Mors non esset nisi peccatura praecessisset. 4. 12. Sed utrumlibet horum veracior et perspicacior intellectus inveniatur, quid ad causam pertinet istorum, sive omnes debita morte plectantur, sive aliquibus ab hac conditione parcatur; cum tamen constet mortem non solum animae, verum etiam corporis secuturam non fuisse, si peccatum non praecessisset, et gratiae mirabiliore virtute iustos a morte ad aeternam beatitudinem reviviscere, quam in mortis experientiam non venire? Haec propter illos de quibus mihi scripsisti, satis dicta sint; quamvis eos iam non existimem dicere, etiamsi non peccasset Adam, fuisse vel corpore moriturum. A. praefert discere quam docere. 4. 13. Caeterum quod attinet ad quaestionem resurrectionis, propter illos qui creduntur non esse morituri, sed ex hac mortalitate ad immortalitatem sine media morte transituri, inquisitio diligentior adhibenda est; et si quid hinc absolutum ac definitum disputatione rationabili atque perfecta vel audisti, vel legisti, vel etiam ipse cogitare potuisti, sive adhuc audire, aut legere, aut cogitare potueris, peto mihi mittere non graveris. Ego enim (quod confitendum est Caritati tuae) plus amo discere quam docere. Nam hoc admonemur etiam dicente apostolo Iacobo: Sit autem omnis homo velox ad audiendum, tardus ad loquendum 24. Ut ergo discamus, invitare nos debet suavitas veritatis; ut autem doceamus, cogere necessitas caritatis: ubi potius optandum est ut transeat ista necessitas qua hominem docet aliquid homo, ut simus omnes docibiles Dei 25; quamvis hoc simus, cum ea quae ad veram pietatem pertinent, discimus, etiam quando illa docere videtur homo. Quia neque qui plantat est aliquid, neque qui rigat; sed qui incrementum dat Deus 26. Cum itaque si Deus incrementum non daret, nihil essent Apostoli plantatores et rigatores; quanto magis ego vel tu, vel quilibet huius temporis homines, quando nobis videmus esse doctores!