{"collection":"chr","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/browse/chr/ecf/105/1050190.htm","path":"chr/ecf/105/1050190.htm","source_url":"https://sacred-texts.com/chr/ecf/105/1050190.htm","text":"Chapter 14.\u2014In What Respect the Pelagians Acknowledge God as the Author of Our Justification.\n\u201cBut,\u201d say they, \u201cwe do praise God as the Author of our righteousness, in that He gave the law, by the teaching of which we have learned how we ought to live.\u201d But they give no heed to what they read: \u201cBy the law there shall no flesh be justified in the sight of God.\u201d 754 This may indeed be possible before men, but not before Him who looks into our very heart and inmost will, where He sees that, although the man who fears the law keeps a certain precept, he would nevertheless rather do another thing if he were permitted. And lest any one should suppose that, in the passage just quoted from him, the apostle had meant to say that none are justified by that law, which contains many precepts, under the figure of the ancient sacraments, and among them that circumcision of the flesh itself, which infants were commanded to receive on the eighth day after birth; he immediately adds what law he meant, and says, \u201cFor by the law is the knowledge of sin.\u201d 755 He refers then to that law of which he afterwards declares, \u201cI had not known sin but by the law; for I had not known lust except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet.\u201d 756 For what means this but that \u201cby the law comes the knowledge of sin?\u201d","title":"Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Vol. V: A Treatise on the...","type":"page"}