3. Touching, however, the subject of conjugal purity, that we might be able to bestow our commendation and love upon you for it, could we possibly listen to the information of any one but some bosom friend of your own, who had no mere superficial acquaintance with you, but knew your innermost life } Concerning, therefore, this excellent gift of God to you, I am delighted to converse with you with more frankness and at greater length. I am quite sure that I shall not prove burdensome to you, even if I send you a prolix treatise, the perusal of which will only ensure a longer converse between us. For this have I discovered, that amidst your manifold and weighty cares you pursue your reading with ease and pleasure; and that you take great delight in any little performances of ours, even if they are addressed to other persons, whenever they have chanced to fall into your hands. Whatever, therefore, is addressed to yourself, in which I can speak to you as it were personally, you will deign both to notice with greater attention, and to receive with a higher pleasure. From the perusal, then, of this letter, turn to the book which I send with it. It will in its very commencement, in a more convenient manner, intimate to your Reverence the reason, both why it has been written, and why it has been submitted specially to your consideration.
' This is the 200th in the collection of Augustin's Letters.
CONTENTS OF THE TREATISE "ON MARRIAGE AND CONCUPISCENCE."
CHAPTER PACE 1. Concerning the argument of this treatise 263 2. Why this treatise was adukessed to Valerius 264 3 Conjugal chastity the gift of God 264 4. A difficulty as regards the chastity of unbelievers. None but a believer is truly A chaste man 264 5. The natural good of marriage. All society naturally repudiates a fraudulent companion. What is true conjugal purity? No true virginity and chastity, except IN devotion to true faith 265 6. The censuring of lust is not a condemnation of marriage; whence comes shame in the human body. Adam and Eve were not created blind; meaning of their '"eyes being opened", 265 7. M.\n's disobedience justly requited in the rebellion of his own flesh; the blush of shame for the disobedient members of the body 266 8 The evil of lust does not take away the good of marriage 266 9. This disease of concupiscence in marriage is not to be a m.^tter of will, but of necessity; what ought to be the will of believers in the use of matrimony; who IS TO BE REGARDED AS USING, AND NOT SUCCUMBING TO, THE EVIL OF CONCUPISCENCE; HOW THE HOLY F.-VTHERS OF THE OlD TESTAMENT FORMERLY USED WIVES 267 10. Why IT WAS sometimes permitted th.a.t a man should have several wives, yet NO WOMAN WAS ever ALLOWED TO HAVE MORE THAN ONE HUSBAND. NATURE PREFERS singleness in HER DOMINATIONS 267 11. The sacrament of marriage; marriage indissoluble; the world's law about divorce DIFFERENT FROM THE GOSPEL'S 268 12. Marriage does not cancel a mutual vow of continence; there was true wedlock BETWEEN Mary and Joseph; in what way Joseph was the father of Christ...268 13. In the marriage of Mary and Joseph there were all the blessings of the wedded STATE; all that IS BORN OF CONCUBINAGE IS SINFUL FLESH 26g 14. Before Christ it was a time for marrying; since Christ it has been a time for continence, 269 15. The teaching of the Apostle on this subject 269 16. A CERTAIN degree OF INTEMPERANCE IS TO BE TOLER.^TED IN THE CASE OF MARRIED PERSONS; the use of m.\trimony for the mere pleasure of lust is not without sin, but because of the nupti.vl relation the sin is venial 27o 17. What is sinless in the use of matrimony.' What is attended with venial sin, and WHAT WITH mortal? 27O 18. Continence better than marriage; but m.a.rriage better than fornication 271 19. Blessings of matrimony 271 20. Why children of wrath are born of holy m.\trimony 271 21. Thus sinners are born of righteous parents, even as wild olives spring from the olive, 272 22. Even infants, when unbaptized, are in the power of the devil; exorcism in the case of infants, and renunciation of the devil 273 23. Sin has not arisen out of the goodness of marri.vge; the sacrament of m./vtrimony a gre.\t one in the case of Christ and the Church — a very small one in the case OF A MAN and his WIFE 273 24. Lust and shame come from sin; the law of sin; the shamelessness of the cynics.. 273 25. Concupiscence in the regenerate without consent is not sin; in what sense concupiscence IS CALLED SIN 274 26. Wh.\TEVER is born through CONCUPISCENCE IS NOT UNDESERVEDLY IN SUBJECTION TO THE devil by reason of sin; the devil deserves heavier punishment than men...274 27. Through lust original sin is transmitted; venial sins in married persons; concupiscence OF THE FLESH, THE DAUGHTER AND MOTHER OF SIN 274 28. Concupiscence remains after bafitsm, just as languor does after recovery from disease; concupiscence is diminished in persons of advancing ye^vrs, and increased in the incontinent 275 29. how concupiscence remains in the baptized in act, when it has passed away as to its guilt, 275 30. The evil desires of concupiscence; we ought to wish th.\t they may not be...276 r. Who is the man th.\t can say, "It is no more I th.\t do it"? 276 J 32. When good will be perfectly done 276 33. Trle freedom co.mes with willing delight in God's law 277 34. How concupiscence made a captive of the Apostle; wh.\t the law of sin was to the Apostle, 277 35. The flesh, carnal affection 277 36. Even now while we still have concupiscence we may be safe in Christ 278 37. The law of sin with its guilt in unbaptized infants. By Adam's sin the human race h.\s become a "wild olive tree" 278 38. to baptism must be referred all re.mission of sins, and the complete healing of the resurrection. daily cleansing 278 39. By THE HOLINESS OF BAPTISM, NOT SINS ONLY, BUT ALL EVILS WHATSOEVER, HAVE TO BE REMOVED. The Church is not vet free from all stain 279 40. Refutation of the Pelagians by the authority of St. Ambrose, whom they quote to show that the desire of the flesh is a natural good 279 a6i 262 CONTEXTS.
r>OOK II.
1. Introductory statement. 283 2. In this and the four next chapters he adduces the garbled extracts he has to consider, 283 3. The same continued 283 4. The same continued 284 5. The same continued • 284 6. The same continued 284 7. Auc;usTiN adduces a passage selected from the preface of Julianus. (See "The 8. AunusTiN refutes the passage adduced above 285 9. The catholics maintain the doctrine of original sin, and thus are far from being Manicheans 286 10. In what manner the adversary's cavils must he refuted 286 11. The devil the author, not of nature, kvv only of sin 287 12. Eve's name means life, and is a great sacrament of the Church 287 13. The Pelagian argument to show that the devil has no rights in the fruits of marriage, 287 14. Concupiscence alone, in marriage, is not of God 2S8 15. Man, by birth, is placed under the dominion of the devil through sin; we were all one in Adam when he sinned 288 16. It is not of us, but our sins, that the devil is the author 289 17. The Pelagians are not ashamed to eulogize concupiscence, although they are ashamed to mention its na.me 289 iS. The same continued 290 19. The Pelagians misunderstand "seed" in.Scripture 290 20. Original sin is derived from the faulty condition of human seed 290 21. It is the good God that gives fkuitfulness, and the devil that corrupts the fruit. 291 22. Shall we be ashamed of what we do, or of what God does.? 291 23. The Pelagians affir.m that God in the case of Abraham and Sarah aroused concupiscence AS A gift from Heaven 291 24. What covenant of God the new-born babe breaks. What was the value of circumcision, 292 25. AUGUSITN not the DEVISER OF ORIGINAL SIN 292 26. The CHILD I.N NO SENSE FOR.MED BY CONCUPISCENCE...293 27. The Pelagians argue that God sometimes closes the wo.mb in anger, a.\d opens it when appeased 293 28. AUGUSTIN'S ANSWER TO THIS ARGUMENT. ItS DEALING WITH SCRIPTURE 294 29. The sa.me continued. Augustin also asserts that God forms man at birth 294 30. The case of Abimelech and his house examined 295 31. Why God proceeds to create human beings, who He knows will be born i.n sin...295 32. God not the author of the evil in those whom He creates 296 23- Though God makes us, we perish unless He re-makes us in Christ 296 34. The Pelagians argue that cohabitatio.n rightly used is a good, and what is born FRO.M it is good 2g6 35. He answers the arguments of Julia.nus. What is the natural use of the woman.'
what is the unnatural use? 297 36. God made nature good: the Saviour restores it when corrupted 297 37. If there is no marriage without cohabitation, so there is no cohabitation without shame, 298 38. JOVINIAN USED FORMERLY TO CALL CATHOLICS MANICHEANS; THE ArIANS ALSO USED TO CALL catholics Sabellians 298 39. Man born of whatever parentage is sinful and capable of redemption 298 40. Augustin declines the dilemma offered him 299 41. The Pelagians argue that original sin cannot come through marriage if marriage is good, 299 42. The Pelagians try to get rid of original sin by their praise of God's works; marriage, in its nature a.nd by its institution, is not the cause of sin 299 43. The good tree in the Gospel that cannot bring forth evil fruit, does not mean marriage, 300 44. The Pelagians argue that if sin comes by birth, all married people deserve condemnation, 300 45. Answer to this argument: the Apostle says we all sinned in one 301 46. The reign of death, what it is; the figure of the future Adam; how all men are JUSTIFIED through CHRIST 3OI 47. The.Scriptures repe.\tedly teach us that all sin in one 302 48. Original sin arose from Ada.m's depraved will. Whence the corrupt will sprang.. 302 49. In infants nature is of God, and the corruption of nature of the devil 303 50. The rise and origin of evil. The exorcism and exsufflation of infants, a primitive Christian rite 303 51. To call those that teach original sin Manicheans is to accuse Ambrose, Cyprian, and the whole Church 304 52. Sin was the origin of all shameful concupiscence 304 53. Concupiscence need not have been necessary for fruitfulness 304 54. How marriage is now different since the existence of sin 305 55. Lust is a disease; the word "passion" in the ecclesiastical sense 306 56. The Pelagians allow that Christ died even for infants; Julianus slays himself with his own sword 306 57. The great sin of the first man 307 58. Adam's sin is derived from him to every' one who is born even of regenerate parents; the exa.mple of the olive tree and the wild olive 307 59. The Pelagians can hardly venture to place concupiscence in paradise before the commission of sin 307 60. Let not the Pelagians indulge themselves in a cruel defence of infants 308 In Two Books, ADDRESSED TO THE COUNT VALERIUS BY AURELIUS AUGUSTIN, BISHOP OF HIPPO; WRITTEN IN 419 AND 420.
BOOK L* WHEREIN HE EXPOUNDS THE PECULIAR AND NATURAL BLESSINGS OF MARRIAGE. HE SHOWS THAT AMONG THESE BLESSINGS MUST NOT BE RECKONED FLESHLY CONCUPISCENCE; INSOMUCH AS THIS IS WHOLLY EVIL, SUCH AS DOES NOT PRO-CEED FROM THE VERY NATURE OF MARRIAGE, BUT IS AN ACCIDENT THEREOF ARISING FROM ORIGINAL SIN. THIS EVIL, NOTWITHSTANDING, IS RIGHTLY EM-PLOYED BY MARRIAGE FOR THE PROCREATION OF CHILDREN. BUT, AS THE RESULT OF THIS CONCUPISCENCE, IT COMES TO PASS THAT, EVEN FROM THE LAWFUL MARRIAGE OF THE CHILDREN OF GOD, MEN ARE NOT BORN CHILDREN OF GOD, BUT OF THE WORLD, AND ARE BOUND WITH THE CHAIN OF SIN, ALTHOUGH THEIR PARENTS HAVE BEEN LIBERATED THEREFROM BY GRACE; AND ARE LED CAPTIVE BY THE DEVIL, IF THEY BE NOT IN LIKE MANNER RESCUED BY THE SELF-SAME GRACE OF CHRIST. HE EXPLAINS HOW IT IS THAT CON-CUPISCENCE REMAINS IN THE BAPTIZED IN ACT THOUGH NOT IN GUILT. HE TEACHES, THAT BY THE SANCTITY OF BAPTISM, NOT MERELY THIS ORIGINAL GUILT, BUT ALL OTHER SINS OF MEN WHATEVER, ARE TAKEN AWAY. HE LASTLY QUOTES THE AUTHORITY OF AMBROSE TO SHOW THAT THE EVIL OF CONCU-PISCENCE MUST BE DISTINGUISHED FROM THE GOOD OF MARRIAGE.
CHAP. I. — CONCERNING THE ARGUMENT OF THIS TREATISE.
Our new heretics, my dearest son Valerius, who maintain that infants bom in the flesh have no need of that medicine of Christ whereby sins are healed, are constantly affirming, in their excessive hatred of us, that we condemn marriage and that divine procedure by which God creates human beings by means of men and women, inasmuch as we assert that they who are born of such a union contract that original sin of which the apostle says, " By one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and ■ Written about the beginning of the year A.D. 419.
so death passed upon all men, for in him all sinned; " ^ and because we do not deny, that of whatever kind of parents they are bom, they are still under the devil's dominion, unless they be born again in Christ, and by His grace be removed from the power of darkness and translated into His kingdom, ^ who willed not to be born from the same union of the two sexes. Because, then, we affirm this doctrine, which is contained in the oldest and unvarying rule of the catholic faith, these propounders of the novel and perverse dogma, who assert that there is no sin in infants to be washed away in the laver of regen- 2 In quo omnes peccaverunt, Rom. v. 5. ^ Col. i. 15.
[Book I.
eration," in their unbelief or ignorance calumniate us, as if we condemned marriage, and as if we asserted to be the devil's work what is God's own work — the human being which is born of marriage. Nor do they reflect that the good of marriage is no more impeachable on account of the original evil which is derived therefrom, than the evil of adultery and fornication is excusable on account of the natural good which is born of them. For as sin is the work of the devil, from whencesoever contracted by infants; so man is the work of God, from whencesoever born. Our purpose, therefore, in this book, so far as the Lord vouchsafes us in His help, is to distinguish between the evil of carnal concupiscence from which man who is born therefrom contracts original sin, and the good of marriage. For there would have been none of this shame-pro- \ ducing concupiscence, which is impudently praised by impudent men, if man had not previously sinned; while as to marriage, it would still have existed, even if no man had sinned, since the procreation of children in the body that belonged to that life would have been effected without that malady which in " the body of this death " ^ cannot be separated from the process of procreation.
CHAP. 2 [11.] — WHY THIS TREATISE WAS AD- DRESSED TO VALERIUS.
Now there are three very special reasons, which I will briefly indicate, why I wished to write to you particularly on this subject. One is, because by 1 the gift of Christ you are a strict observer of I conjugal chastity. Another is, because by your great care and diligence you have effectually withstood those profane novelties which we are resisting in our present discussion. The third is, because of my learning that something which I they had committed to writing had found its way into your hands; and although in your robust faith you could despise such an attempt, it is still a good thing for us also to know how to bring aid to our faith by defending it. For the Apostle Peter instructs us to be " ready always to give an answer to every one that asketh us a reason of the faith and hope that is in us; " ^ and the Apostle Paul says, " Let your speech be alway with grace, seasoned with salt, that ye may know how ye ought to answer every man."'* These are the motives which chiefly impel me to hold such converse with you in this volume, as the Lord shall enable me. I have never liked, indeed, to intrude the perusal of any of my humble labours on any eminent person, who is ' Titus iii. 5. 2 Rom. vii. 24.
^ I Pet. iii. 15. [The reading " faith and hope " stands in certain Latin Biblical MSS. Also, e.g., Codices Harleianus and Toletanus. Traces of a similar reading are not unknown also in Greek (Origen, Basil) and Syriac (Peshitto) sources. — W.]
* Col. iv. 6.
like yourself conspicuous to all from the elevation of his office, without his own request, — especially when he is not blessed with the enjoyment of a dignified retirement, but is still occupied in the public duties of a soldier's profession; this has always seemed to me to savour more of impertinence than of respectful esteem. If, then, I have incurred censure of this kind, while acting on the reasons which I have now mentioned, I crave the favour of your forgiveness, and a kindly regard to the following arguments.
CHAP. 3 [in.] — CONJUGAL CH.^STITY THE GIFT That chastity in the married state is God's gift, is shown by the most blessed Paul, when, speaking on this very subject, he says: " But I would that all men were even as I myself: but every man hath his proper gift of God, one after this manner, and another after that." s Observe, he tells us that this gift is from God; and although he classes it below that continence in which he would have all men to be hke himself, he still describes it as a gift of God. Whence we understand that, when these precepts are given to us in order that we should do them, nothing else is stated than that there ought to be within us our own will also for receiving and having them. When, therefore, these are shown to be gifts of God, it is meant that they must be sought from Him if they are not already possessed; and if they are possessed, thanks must be given to Him for the possession; moreover, that our own wills have but small avail for seeking, obtaining, and holding fast these gifts, unless they be assisted by God's grace.
CHAP. 4. — A DIFFICULTY AS REG.'^RDS THE CHAS- TIIT OF UNBELIEVERS. NONE BUT A BELIEVER IS TRULY A CHASTE MAN.^ What, then, have we to say when conjugal chastity is discovered even in some unbelievers? Must it be said that they sin, in that they make a bad use of a gift of God, in not restoring it to the worship of Him from whom they received it? Or must these endowments, perchance, be not regarded as gifts of God at all, when they are not believers who exercise them; according to the apostle's sentiment, when he says, " Whatsoever is not of faith is sin? " ^ But who would dare to say that a gift of God is sin? For the soul and the body, and all the natural endowments which are implanted in the soul and the body, even in the persons of sinful men, are still gifts of God; for it is God who made them, and not they themselves. When it is said, " Whatsoever is not of faith is sin," only those 5 I Cor. vii. 7.
6 See Augustin's work Against yulianus, iv. 3.
7 Rom. xiv. 23.
Chap. 6.]
things are meant which men themselves do. When men, therefore, do without faith those things which seem to appertain to conjugal chastity, they do them either to please men, whether themselves or others, or to avoid incurring such troubles as are incidental to human nature in those things which they corruptly desire, or to pay service to devils. Sins are not really restrained, but some sins are overpowered by other sins. God forbid, then, that a man be truly called chaste who observes connubial fidelity to his wife from any other motive than devotion to the true God.
CHAP. 5 [iV.] — THE NATUR.'^L GOOD OF MARRIAGE. ALL SOCIETY NATURALLY REPUDIATES A FRAUDU- LENT COMPANION. WHAT IS TRUE CONJUGAL PURITY? NO TRUE VIRGINITY AND CHASTITY, EXCEFr IN DEVOTION TO TRUE FAITH.
The union, then, of male and female for the purpose of procreation is the natural good of marriage. But he makes a bad use of this good who uses it bestially, so that his intention is on the gratification of lust, instead of the desire of oftspring. Nevertheless, in sundry animals unj endowed with reason, as, for instance, in most birds, there is both presented a certain kind of confederation of pairs, and a social combination of skill in nest- building; and their mutual division of the periods for cherishing their eggs and their alternation in the labor of feeding their young, give them the appearance of so acting, when they mate, as to be intent rather on securing the continuance of their kind than on gratifying lust. Of these two, the one is the likeness of man in a brute; the other, the likeness of the brute in man. With respect, however, to what I ascribed to the nature of marriage, that; the male and the female are united together as [ associates for procreation, and consequently do j not defraud each other (forasmuch as every \ associated state has a natural abhorrence of a fraudulent companion), although even men without faith possess this palpable blessing of nature, yet, since they use it not in faith, they only turn it to evil and sin. In like manner, therefore, the marriage of believers converts to the use of righteousness that carnal concupiscence by which " the flesh lusteth against the Spirit." ' For they entertain the firm purpose of generating offspring to be regenerated — that the children who are born of them as " children of the world " may be born again and become " sons of God." Wherefore all parents who do not beget children with this intention, this will, this purpose, of transferring them from being members of the first man into being members of Christ, but boast as unbelieving parents over unbelieving ' Gal. V. 17 children, — however circumspect they be in their cohabitation, studiously limiting it to the begetting of children, — really have no conjugal chastity in themselves. For inasmuch as cliastity is a virtue, having unchastity as its contrary vice, and as all the virtues (even those whose operation is by means of the body) have their seat in the soul, how can the body be in any true sense said to be chaste, when the soul itself is committing fornication against the true God? Now such fornication the holy psalmist censures when he says: " For, lo, they that are far from Thee shall perish: Thou hast destroyed all them that go a whoring from Thee." - There is, then, no true chastity, whether conjugal, or vidual, or virginal, except that which devotes itself to true faith. For though consecrated virginity is rightly preferred to marriage, yet what Christian in his sober mind would not prefer catholic Christian women who have been even more than once married, to not only vestals, but also to heretical virgins? So great is the avail of faith, of which the apostle says, " Whatsoever is not of faith is sin; "3 and of which it is written in the Epistle to the Hebrews, " Without faith it is impossible to please God." * CHAP. 6 [v.] — THE CENSURING OF LUST IS NOT A CONDEMN.'^TION OF MARRIAGE; WHENCE COMES SHAME IN THE HUMAN BODY. ADAM AND EVE WERE NOT CREATED BLIND; MEANING OF THEIR "EYES BEING OPENED."
Now, this being the real state of the question, they undoubtedly err who suppose that, when fleshly lust is censured, marriage is condemned; as if the malady of concupiscence was the outcome of marriage and not of sin. Were not those first spouses, whose nuptials God blessed with the words, "Be fruitful and multiply," 5 naked, and yet not ashamed? ^^ hy, then, did shame arise out of their members after sin, except because an indecent motion arose from them, which, if men had not sinned, would certainly never have existed in marriage? Or was it, forsooth, as some hold (who give little heed to what they read), that human beings were, like dogs, at first created blind; and — absurder still — obtained sight, not as dogs do, by growing, but by sinning? Far be it from us to entertain such an opinion. But they gather that opinion of theirs from reading: " She took of the fruit thereof, antl did eat; and gave also unto her husband with her, and he did eat: and the eyes of them both were opened, and they knew that they were naked." ^ This accounts for the opinion of unintelligent persons, that the eyes of the first man and woman were previously closed, because Holy Scripture testifies that they were * Heb. xi. 6.
[Book I.
then opened. Well, then, were Hagar's eyes, the handmaid of Sarah, previously shut, when, with her thirsty and sobbing child, she opened her eyes ' and saw the well? Or did those two disciples, after the Lord's resurrection, walk in the way with Him with their eyes shut, since the evangelist says of them that " in the breaking of bread their eyes were opened, and they knew Him "?= What, therefore, is written concerning the first man and woman, that "the eyes of them both were opened," 3 we ought to understand as that they gave attention to perceiving and recognising the new state which had befallen their body. Now that their eyes were opened, their body appeared to them naked, ancl they knew it. If this were not the meaning, how. when the beasts of the field and the fowls of the air were brought unto him,-* could Adam have given them names if his eyes were shut? He could not have done this without distinguishing them; and he could not distinguish them without seeing them. How, too, could the woman herself have been beheld so clearly by him when he said, " This is now bone of my bone, and flesh of my flesh "? 5 If, indeed, any one shall be so determined on cavilling as to insist that Adam might have acquired a discernment of these objects, not by sight but by touch, what explanation will he have to give of the passage wherein we are told how the woman " saw that the tree," from which she was about to pluck the forbidden fruit, "was pleasant for the eyes to behold " P*^ No; " they were both naked, and were not ashamed," ^ not because they had no eyesight, but because they perceived no reason to be ashamed in their members, which had all along been seen by them. For it is not said: They were both naked, and knew it not; but " they were not ashamed." Because, indeed, nothing had previously happened which was not lawful, so nothing had ensued which could cause them shame.
CHAP. 7 [vi.] — man's disobedience justly requited IN THE REBELLION OF HIS OWN FLESH J THE BLUSH OF SHAME FOR THE DISOBEDIENT MEMBERS OF THE BODY.
When the first man transgressed the law of f'God, he began to have another law in his members which was repugnant to the law of his mjnd, and he felt the evil of his own disobedience when he experienced in the disobedience of his flesh a most righteous retribution recoiling on himself Such, then, was "the opening of his eyes " which the serpent had promised him in his temptation** — the knowledge, in fact, of something which he had better been ignorant of. Then, indeed, did man perceive within himself what he had done; ■ Gen. xxi. 17-19. * Gen. ii. 19. ' Gen. ii. 25.
3 Gen. iii. 7. '' Gen. iii. 6.
then did he distinguish evil from good, — not by avoiding it, but by enduring it. For it certainly was not just that obedience should be rendered by his servant, that is, his body, to him, who had not obeyed his own Lord. Well, then, how significant is the fact that the eyes, and lips, and tongue, and hands, and feet, and the bending of I back, and neck, and sides, are all placed within our power — to be applied to such operations as are suitable to them, when we have a body free from impediments and in a sound state of health, but when it must come to man's great function of the procreation of children, the members which were expressly created for this j purpose will not obey the direction of the will, but lust has to be waited for to set these memj bers in motion, as if it had legal right over them, and sometimes it refuses to act when the mind I wills, while often it acts against its will! Must not this bring the blush of shame over the freedom of the human will, that by its contempt of God, its own Commander, it has lost all proper command for itself over its own members? Now, wherein could be found a more fitting demonstration of the just depravation of human nature by reason of its disobedience, than in the disobedience of those parts whence nature herself derives subsistence by succession? For it is by an especial propriety that those parts of the body are designated as natural. This, then, was the reason why the first human pair, on experiencing in the flesh that motion which was indecent because disobedient, and on feeling the shame of their nakedness, covered these offending members with fig-leaves; ^ in order that, at the very least, by the will of the ashamed offenders, a veil might be thrown over that which was put into motion without the will of tliose who wished it: and since shame arose from what indecently pleased, decency might be attained l»y concealment.
CHAP. 8 [VTI.] — THE EVIL OF LUST DOES KOT TAKE AWAY THE GOOD OF MARRIAGE.
Forasmuch, then, as the good of marriage could not be lost by the addition of this evil, some imprudent persons suppose that this is not an added evil, but something which appertains to the original good. A distinction, however, occurs not only to subtle reason, but even to the most ordinary natural judgment, which was both apparent in the case of the first man and woman, and also holds good still in the case of married persons to-day. What they afterward effected in propagation, — that is the good of marriage; but what they first veiled through shame, — that is the evil of concupiscence, which everywhere shuns sight, and in its shame seeks privacy. Since, therefore, marriage effects some good even out of that evil, it has whereof to glory; Chap, io.]
but since the good cannot be effected without the evil, it has reason for feeling shame. The case may be illustrated by the example of a lame man. Suppose him to attain to some good object by limping after it, then, on the one hand, the attainment itself is not evil because of the evil of the man's lameness; nor, on the other hand, is the lameness good because of the goodness of the attainment. So, on the same principle, we ought not to condemn marriage because of the evil of lust; nor must we praise lust because of the good of marriage.
CHAP. 9 [vni.] — THIS DISEASE OF CONCUPISCENCE IN MARRIAGE IS NOT TO BE A MATTER OF WILL, BUT OF NECESSITY; WHAT OUGHT TO BE THE WILL OF BELIEVERS IN THE USE OF MATRIMONY; WHO IS TO BE REGARDED AS USING, AND NOT SUCCUMBING TO, THE EVIL OF CONCUPISCENCE; HOW THE HOLY FATHERS OF THE OLD TESTA- MENT FORMERLY USED WIVES.
This disease of concupiscence is what the apostle refers to, when, speaking to married believers, he says: " This is the will of God, even your sanctification, that ye should abstain from fornication: that every one of you should know how to possess his vessel in sanctification and honour; not in the disease of desire, even as the Gentiles which know not God." ' The married believer, therefore, must not only not use another man's vessel, which is what they do who lust after others' wives: but he must know that even his own vessel is not to be possessed in the disease of carnal concupiscence. And this counsel is not to be understood as if the apostle prohibited conjugal — that is to say, lawful and honourable — cohabitation; but so as that that cohabitation (which would have no adjunct of unwholesome lust, were it not that man's perfect freedom of choice had become by preceding sin so disabled that it has this fatal adjunct) should not be a matter of will, but of necessity, without which, nevertheless, it would be impossible to attain to the fruition of the will itself in the procreation of children. And this wish is not in the marriages of believers determined by the purpose of having such children born as shall pass through life in this present world, but such as shall be born again in Christ, and remain in Him for evermore. Now if this result should come about, the reward of a full felicity will spring from marriage; but if such result be not realized, there will yet ensue to the married pair the peace of their good will. Whosoever possesses his vessel