Augustinianism reacted against attempts to tone it down in theory or neutralize it in practice, until at last it broke loose in the form of Protestantism.
Evaded by Augustinianism, it came back now, with some at least of its difficulties and paradoxes, but also with its immense attractive and dynamic power.
Even after the loss of the Protestants and the suppression or expulsion of the Jansenists, the doctrinal history of the Later his- Church of Rome is described as governed by discus tory of sions in regard to Thomist Augustinianism.
Even the Counter-Reformation, so far as it was a matter of doctrine (Council of Trent, 1545-63), took the form of reaffirming a cautious version of Augustinianism.
From Harnack's point of view, the theory destroys Augustinianism, whatever honour may still be paid to that name.
If early " enthusiasm " conceived the Christian as almost entirely free from acts of sin, and if Protestant Paulinism conceives the child of God as justified by faith once for all, the full Catholic theory, representing one development of Augustinianism, views the Christian as an invalid, perpetually dependent on the good offices of the Church.
If in the West Athanasianism is a datum, but unexamined, and not valued for its own sake, Augustinianism is a bold interpretation of the essential piety of the West, but an interpretation which not i even piety can long endure - morally burdensome if religiously mpressive.
In the Church of Rome the Dominicans favoured Augustinianism, the Jesuits Semi-Pelagianism; the work of Molina on the agreement of free-will with the gifts of grace provoked a controversy, which the pope silenced without deciding; but which broke out again a generation later when Jansen tried to revive the decaying Augustinianism.
It is fallen man whom he pursues with his fierce scorn; his view of man's nature - intellect as well as character - is to be read in the light of his unflinching Augustinianism.
Meanwhile in the Western Church the subject of sin and grace, and the relation of divine and human activity in salvation, received especial attention; and finally, at the second council of Orange in 529, after both Pelagianism and semi-Pelagianism had been repudiated, a moderate form of Augustinianism was adopted,, involving the theory that every man as a result of the fall is in such a condition that he can take no steps in the direction of salvation until he has been renewed by the divine grace given in baptism, and that he cannot continue in the good thus begun except by the constant assistance of that grace, which is mediated only by the Catholic Church.
Pelagianism, the rival and contradiction of Augustinianism, represents a mode of thought which appeared early in Christianity and which could count upon sympathizers both in East and in West.
The school did not produce an extensive literature, but it played an important part in resisting an exaggerated Augustinianism by reasserting the freedom of the will and the continued existence of the divine image in human nature after the fall.
Thus they constitute one more revival of Paulinism or Augustinianism, though with qualifications.
While Pelagius was condemned, it was only a modified Augustinianism which became the doctrine of the church.