{"collection":"chr","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/browse/chr/ecf/105/1050335.htm","path":"chr/ecf/105/1050335.htm","source_url":"https://sacred-texts.com/chr/ecf/105/1050335.htm","text":"A Treatise concerning man\u2019s perfection in righteousness,\nby aurelius augustin, bishop of hippo;\naddressed to eutropius and paulus, a.d. 415.\nA paper containing sundry definitions, 1362 said to have been drawn up by C\u0153lestius, was put into the hands of Augustin. In this document, C\u0153lestius, or some person who shared in his errors, had recklessly asserted that a man had it in his power to live here without sin. Augustin first refutes the several propositions in brief answers, showing that the perfect and plenary state of righteousness, in which a man exists absolutely without sin, is unattainable without grace by the mere resources of our corrupt nature, and never occurs in this present state of existence. He next proceeds to consider the authorities which the paper contained as gathered out of the Scriptures; some of them teaching man to be \u201cunspotted\u201d and \u201cperfect;\u201d others mentioning the commandments of God as \u201cnot grievous;\u201d while others again are quoted as opposed to the authoritative passages which the Catholics were accustomed to advance against the Pelagians.\nThese breves definitiones, which Augustin also calls ratiocinationes, are short argumentative statements, which may be designated breviates.","title":"Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Vol. V: A Treatise Concer...","type":"page"}