PELAGIANS, a sect of heretics that arose in the Church about the beginning of the 5th century. Their founder was Pelagius, a monk, a native of Britain, whose original name was Morgan. He was greatly scandalized by the gross sensualities and immoralities that pre vailed in the Church, and was of opinion that they arose from a belief in the efficacy of the sacraments and the suf ficiency of faith. The remedy for all, he thought, would be a creed holding man's salvation to be dependent on his own exertions. Pelagius went to Rome, and afterward to Carthage, where he was condemned by a council as holding the following heresies: (1) That Adam was by nature and would have died whether he had sinned or not; (2) that the consequences of Adam's sin were confined to himself, and did not affect the human race; (3) that new-born in fants are in the same condition as Adam was before his fall; (4) that the law qualified man for heaven, as well as the Gospel; and that before Christ some men had lived without sin; (5) that a man may keep the commandments of God without difficulty, and preserve himself in a state of perfect innocence; and that the grace of God is given in proportion to our merits. These are the chief errors
which are generally reckoned under the name of Pelagianism. Augustine and Pope Innocent I., in 417, anathemized the rising heresy. His successor, Zosi rims, also condemned the obnoxious doc trine, and the emperor promulgated de crees of confiscation and banishment against them. Pelagius retired into ex ile, where he died. The ninth article of the English Church is directed against the Pelagian error respecting original sin.