But whether Pelagius did or did not hold all the doctrines of which he was accused, it is certain that the spirit of them was antagonistic to the teachings of Paul, as understood by Augustine, who felt that the very foundations of Christianity were assailed,—­as Athanasius regarded the doctrines of Arius.  So he came to the rescue, not of the Catholic Church, for Pelagius belonged to it as well as he, but to the rescue of Christian theology.  The doctrines of Pelagius were becoming fashionable and prevalent in many parts of the Empire.  Even the Pope at one time favored them.  They might spread until they should be embraced by the whole Catholic world, for Augustine believed in the vitality of error as well as in the vitality of truth,—­of the natural and inevitable tendency of society towards Paganism, without the especial and restraining grace of God.  He armed himself for the great conflict with the infidelity of his day, not with David’s sling, but Goliath’s sword.  He used the same weapons as his antagonist, even the arms of reason and knowledge, and constructed an argument which was overwhelming, if Paul’s Epistles were to be the accepted premises of his irresistible logic.  Great as was Pelagius, Augustine was a far greater man,—­broader, deeper, more learned, more logical, more eloquent, more intense.  He was raised up to demolish, with the very reason he professed to disdain, the sophistries and dogmas of one of the most dangerous enemies which the Church had ever known,—­to leave to posterity his logic and his conclusions when similar enemies of his faith should rise up in future ages.  He furnished a thesaurus not merely to Bernard and Thomas Aquinas, but even to Calvin and Bossuet and Pascal.  And it will be the marvellous lucidity of the Bishop of Hippo which shall bring back to the true faith, if it is ever brought back, that part of the Roman Catholic Church which accepts the verdict of the Council of Trent, when that famous council indorsed the opinions of Pelagius while upholding the authority of Augustine as the greatest doctor of the Church.

To a man like Augustine, with his deep experiences,—­a man rescued from a seductive philosophy and a corrupt life, as he thought, by the special grace of God and in answer to his mother’s prayers,—­the views of Pelagius were both false and dangerous.  He could find no words sufficiently intense whereby to express his gratitude for his deliverance from both sin and error.  To him this Deliverer is so personal, so loving, that he pours out his confession to Him as if He were both friend and father.  And he felt that all that is vital in theology must radiate from the recognition of His sovereign power in the renovation and salvation of the world.  All his experiences and observations of life confirmed the authority of Scripture,—­that the world, as a matter of fact, was sunk in a state of sin and misery, and could be rescued only by that divine power which converted Paul.  His views of predestination,