Read a work attacking the heresy of Pelagius and Coelestius,
entitled _A Copy of the Proceedings taken against the Doctrines of
Nestorius by the Bishops of the West_. It states that the Nestorian
and Coelestian heresies were identical without doubt, quoting as
its authority a letter of Cyril of Alexandria[180] to the emperor
Theodosius. The Coelestians, speaking of the body or the members of
Christ, that is, the Church, audaciously deny that it is God (that
is, the Holy Spirit) who distributes to each man severally, as He
wills, faith and all that is necessary to life, piety, and salvation;
according to them, the nature of man as constituted--which by sin
and transgression fell from blessedness and was separated from God
and handed over to death--both invites and repels the Holy Spirit in
accordance with free will. The Nestorians hold and venture to assert
the same opinion concerning the head of the body, Christ. Since
Christ shares our nature and God wishes all men alike to be saved,
they say that every one of his own free will can amend his error and
make himself worthy of God; wherefore He who was born of Mary was not
Himself the Word, but, by reason of the nobility of His natural will,
He had the Word accompanying, sharing the condition of sonship by
nobleness alone and similarity of name.
This Pelagian or Coelestian heresy flourished not only in the East,
but also spread over the West. At Carthage in Africa it was detected
and refuted by Aurelius and Augustine, and publicly condemned at
various synods. Those who held these opinions were expelled from the
Church as heretics, when Theophilus was bishop of Alexandria[181]
and Innocent bishop of Rome,[182] by Roman, African, and other
Western bishops. At the synod held in Palestine,[183] however,
at which fourteen bishops attended, Pelagius was acquitted. Some
of the charges brought against him he utterly denied as foolish
and anathematized, while he admitted having made certain other
statements, not however in the sense attributed to them by his
accusers, but rather in conformity with the doctrines of the Catholic
Church. His accusers were Neporus[184] and Lazarus,[185] two bishops
of Gaul, who were not present at the inquiry, having obtained
permission to absent themselves in consequence of the illness of one
of them. So Augustine states in his letters to Aurelius, bishop of
Carthage.
After the death of the holy Augustine certain of the clergy began
to reassert these impious doctrines. They began to speak evil of
Augustine and falsely accused him of denying free will; but bishop
Coelestine checked the renewal of this slander, writing to the
bishops of the country in defence of that godlike man and against
those who had set this heresy on foot again. As time went on, and
these heretics, after having abjured their own doctrines, were
received again into the Church, the scandal was again revived by
them, and had to be put down before it went further by bishop
Septimus,[186] who wrote to Leo, pope at that time and a fervent
opponent of these impious doctrines. Not long afterwards, when
the shameless heresy again sprang up from an evil root, certain
persons at Rome openly expressed themselves in favour of it. But
Prosper,[187] truly a man of God, in his pamphlets against them, soon
crushed them, while Leo still occupied the papal throne. The heresy
was also condemned at the holy synod of Ephesus.[188] John, patriarch
of Alexandria,[189] in his _Apologia_ to Gelasius, bishop of
Rome,[190] anathematized not only the Pelagian heresy, but Pelagius
and Coelestius themselves, together with Julian,[191] who was known
to have succeeded them in the leadership of this sect.