wait for it." ^ Not, therefore, by that which we are waiting for, but by that which we are now enduring, are the children of our flesh born. God forbid that a man who possesses faith should, when he hears the apostle bid men " love their wives," ^ love that carnal concupiscence in his wife which he ought not to love even in himself; as he may know, if he listens to the words of another apostle: " Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world. And the world passeth away, and the lust thereof: but he that doeth the will of God abideth for ever, even as also God abideth for ever." ^ ' Luke XX. 34. Augustin quotes an interpolation current in the Latin Bibles of his day, and found also in certain Greek (D. Origen) and Syriac (Curetonian version) witnesses.
2 See De Peccatoriim Meritis et Remissione, ii. 11 [ix.].
3 2 Cor. iv. 16.
•« I Cor. vi. 19, 20. Note the odd interpolation "and carry," which was a common Latin reading.
8 I John ii. 15-17. The last clause, though not in Jerome's Vulgate, was yet read by some of the Latin Fathers — by Cyprian and Lucifer, for instance, and something like it also by one of the Egyptian versions.
CHAP. 21 [XIX.] THUS SINNERS ARE BORN OF RIGHTEOUS PARENTS, EVEN AS WILD OLIVES SPRING FROM THE OLIVE.
That, therefore, which is born of the lust of the flesh is really born of the world, and not of God; but it is born of God, when it is born again of water and of the Spirit. The guilt of this concupiscence, regeneration alone remits, even as natural generation contracts it. ^^'hat, then, is generated must be regenerated, in order that likewise since it cannot be otherwise, what has been contracted may be remitted. It is, no doubt, very wonderful that what has been remitted in the parent should still be contracted in the offspring; but nevertheless such is the case. That this mysterious verity, which unbelievers neither see nor believe, might get some palpable evidence in its support, God in His providence has secured in the example of certain trees. For why should we not suppose that for this very purpose the wild olive springs from the olive? Is it not indeed credible that, in a thing which has been created for the use of mankind, the Creator provided and appointed what should afford an instructive example, applicable to the human race? It is a wonderful thing, then, how those who have been themselves delivered by grace from the bondage of sin, should still beget those who are tied and bound by the self-same chain, and who require the same process of loosening? Yes; and we admit the wonderful fact. But that the embryo of wild olive trees should latently exist in the germs of true olives, who would deem credible, if it were not proved true by experiment and observation? In the same manner, therefore, as a wild oliye grows out of the seed of the wild olive, ana from the seed of the true olive springs also nothing but a wild olive, notwithstanding the very great difference there is between the wild olive and the olive; so what is born in the flesh, either of a sinner or of a just man, is in both instances a sinner, notwithstanding the vast distinction which exists between the sinner and the righteous man.
He that is begotten is no sinner as yet in act, and is still new from his birth; but in guilt he is old. Human from the Creator, he is a captive of the destroyer, and needs a redeemer. The difficulty, however, is how a state of captivity can possibly befall the offspring, when the parents have been themselves previously redeemed from it. Now it is no easy matter to unravel this intricate point, or to explain it in a set discourse; therefore unbelievers refuse to accept it as true; just as if in that other point about the wild olive and the olive, which we gave in illustration, any reason could be easily found, or explanation clearly given, why the self-same shoot should sprout out of so dissimilar a stock. The truth, Chap. 24.]
however, of this can be discovered by any one who is wilHng to make the experiment. Let it then serve for a good example for suggesting behef of what admits not of ocular demonstration.
CHAP. 22 [XX.] — EVEN INFANTS, WHEN UNBAP- TIZED, ARE IN THE POWER OF THE DEVIL; EXORCISM IN THE CASE OF INFANTS, AND RE- NUNCIATION OF THE DEVIL.
Now the Christian faith unfalteringly declares, what our new heretics have begun to deny, both that they who are cleansed in the laver of regeneration are redeemed from the power of the devil, and that those who have not yet been redeemed by such regeneration are still captive in the power of the devil, even if thev be infant children of the redeemed, unless they be themselves redeemed by the self-same grace of Christ. For we cannot doubt that that blessing of God applies to every stage of human life, which the apostle describes when he says concerning Him: " Who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of His dear Son." ' From this power of darkness, therefore, of which the devil is the prince, — in other words, from the power of the devil and his angels, — infants are delivered when they are baptized; and whosoever denies this, is convicted by the truth of the Church's very sacraments, which no heretical novelty in the Church of Christ is permitted to destroy or change, so long as the Divine Head rules and helps the entire body which He owns — small as well as great. It is true, then, and in no way false, that the devil's power is exorcised in infants, and that they renounce him by the hearts and mouths of those who bring them to baptism, being unable to do so by their own; in order that they may be delivered from the power of darkness, and be translated into the kingdom of their Lord. What is that, therefore, within them which keeps them in the power of the devil until they are delivered from it by Christ's sacrament of baptism? What is it, I ask, but sin? Nothing else, indeed, has the devil found which enables him to put under his own control that nature of man which the good Creator made good. But infants have committed no sin of their own since they have been alive. Only original sin, therefore, remains, whereby they are made captive under the devil's power, until they are redeemed therefrom by the laver of regeneration and the blood of Christ, and pass into their Redeemer's kingdom, — the power of their enthraller being frustrated, and power being given them to become " sons of God " instead of children of this world.^ CHAP. 23 [XXI.] — SIN HAS NOT ARISEN OUT OF THE GOODNESS OF MARRIAGE; THE SACR.A..MENT OF MATRIMONY A GREAT ONE IN THE CASE OF CHRIST AND THE CHURCH A VERY SMALL ONE IN THE CASE OF A MAN AND HIS WIFE.
If now we interrogate, so to speak, those goods of marriage to which we have often referred,^ and inquire how it is that sin could possibly have been propagated from them to infants, we shall get this answer from the first of them — the work of procreation of offspring: " My happiness would in paradise have been greater if sin had not been committed. For to me belongs that blessing of almighty God: * Be fruitful, and multiply.' * For accomplishing this good work, divers members were created suited to each sex; these members were, of course, in existence before sin, but they were not objects of shame." This will be the answer of the second good — the fidelity of chastity: " If sin had not been committed, what in paradise could have been more secure than myself, when there was no lust of my own to spur me, none of another to tempt me?" And then this will be the answer of the sacramental bond of marriage, — the third good: " Of me was that word spoken in paradise before the entrance of sin: 'A man shall leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife; and they two shall become one flesh.' " s This the apostle applies to the case of Christ and of the Church, and calls it then " a great sacrament." ^ What, then, in Christ and in the Church is great, in the instances of each married pair it is but very small, but even then it is the sacrament of an inseparable union. What now is there in these three blessings of marriage out of which the bond of sin could pass over to posterity? Absolutely nothing.
And in these blessings it is certain that the goodness of matrimony is entirely comprised; and even now good wedlock consists of these same blessings.
CHAP. 24. — LUST AND SHAME COME FROM SIN; THE IA\V OF SIN; THE SHAMELESSNESS OF THE CYNICS.
But if, in like manner, the question be asked of the concupiscence of the flesh, how it is that acts now bring shame which once were free from shame, will not her answer be, that she only began to have existence in men's members after sin? [xxii.] And, therefore, that the apostle designated her influence as " the law of sin," 7 inasmuch as she subjugated man to herself when he was unwilling to remain subject to I Col. i. 13.
* John i. 12.
3 See above, chs. ii, 19, and On Original Sin, ch. 39. * Gen. i. 29. S Gen. ii. 24.
his God; and that it was she who made the first married pair ashamed at that moment when they covered their loins; even as all are still ashamed, and seek out secret retreats for cohabitation, and dare not have even the children, whom they have themselves thus begotten, to be witnesses of what they do. It was against this modesty of natural shame that the Cynic philosophers, in the error of their astonishing shamelessness, struggled so hard: they thought that the intercourse indeed of husband and wife, since it was lawful and honourable, should therefore be done in public. Such barefaced obscenity deserved to receive the name of dogs; and so they went by the title of " Cynics^ ' CH.A.P. 25 [XXIII.] CONCUPISCENCE IN THE RE- GENERATE WITHOUT CONSENT IS NOT SIN; EN WHAT SENSE CONCUPISCENCE IS CALLED SIN.
Now this concupiscence, this law of sin which dwells in our members, to which the law of righteousness forbids allegiance, saying in the words of the apostle, " Let not sin, therefore, reign in your mortal body, that ye should obey it in the lusts thereof; neither yield ye your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin: " ^ — this concupiscence, I say, which is cleansed only by the sacrament of regeneration, does undoubtedly, by means of natural birth, pass on the bond of sin to a man's posterity, unless they are themselves loosed from it by regeneration. In the case, however, of the regenerate, concupiscence is not itself sin any longer, whenever they do not consent to it for illicit works, and when the members are not applied by the presiding mind to perpetrate such deeds. So that, if what is enjoined in one passage, " Thou shalt not covet," 3 is not kept, that at any rate is observed which is commanded in another place, " Thou shalt not go after thy concupiscences." ■* Inasmuch, however, as by a certain manner of speech it is called sin, since it arose from sin, and, when it has the upper hand, produces sin, the guilt of it prevails in the natural man; but this guilt, by Christ's grace through the remission of all sins, is not suffered to regenerate man, if he does not prevail in the prevail in the yield obedience to it whenever it urges him to the commission of evil. As arising from sin, it is, I say, called sin, although in the regenerate it is not actually sin; and it has this designation applied to it, just as speech which the j tongue produces is itself called " tongue;'' and I just as the word " hatid" is used in the sense \ of writing, which the hand produces. In the I same way concupiscence is called sin, as pro-I ducing sin when it conquers the will: so to cold 3 Ex. x.\. 17: " non concupisces" in the Latin; hence the play on the word.
* Ecclus. xviii. 30.
and frost the epithet " sh/ggish" is given; not as arising from, but as productive of, sluggishness; benumbing us, in fact.
CHAP. 26. WH.'^TEVER IS BORN THROUGH CON- CUPISCENCE IS NOT UNDESERVEDLY IN SUBJEC- TION TO ' THE DEVIL BY REASON OF SIN; THE DEVIL DESERVES HEAVIER PUNISH]\IENT THAN MEN.
This wound which the devil has inflicted on the human race compels everything which has its birth in consequence of it to be under the devil's power, as if he were rightly plucking fruit off his own tree. Not as if man's nature, which is only of God, came from him, but sin alone, which is not of God. For it is not on its own account that man's nature is under condemnation, because it is the work of God, and therefore laudable; but on account of that condemnable corruption by which it has been vitiated. Now it is by reason of this condemnation that it is in subjection to the devil, who is also in the same damnable state. For the devil is himself an unclean spirit: good, indeed, so far as he is a spirit, but evil as being unclean; for by nature he is a spirit, by the corruption thereof an unclean one. Of these two, the one is of God, the other of himself. His hold over men, therefore, whether of an advanced age or in infancy, is not because they are human, but because they are polluted. He, then, who feels surprise that God's creature is a subject of the devil, should cease from such feeling. For one creature of God is in subjection to another creature of God, the less to the greater, a human being to an angelic one; and this is not owing to nature, but to a corruption of nature: polluted is the sovereign, polluted also the subject.
All this is the fruit of that ancient stock of pollution which he has planted in man; himself being destined to suffer a heavier punishment at the last judgment, as being the more polluted; but at the same time even they who will have to bear a less heavy burden in that condemnation are subjects of him as the prince and author of sin, for there will be no other cause of condemnation than sin.
CHAP. 2 7 [xxrv.] — THROUGH LUST ORIGINAL SUV IS TRANSMITTED; VENL\L SINS IN MARRIED PER- SONS; CONCUPISCENCE OF THE FLESH, THE DAUGHTER AND MOTHER OF SIN.
Wherefore the devil holds infants guilty who are born, not of the good by wliicli marriage is good, but of the evil of concupiscence, which, indeed, marriage uses aright, but at which even marriage has occasion to feel shame. Marriage is itself *■ honourable in all '' 5 the goods which properly appertain to it; but even when it has S Heb.,\iii. 4.
Chap. 29.]
275"^ its " bed undefiled " (not only by fornication and adultery, which are damnable disgraces, but also by any of those excesses of cohabitation such as do not arise from any prevailing desire of children, but from an overbearing lust of pleasure, which are venial sins in man and wife), yet, whenever it comes to the actual process of generation, the very embrace which is lawful and honourable cannot be effected without the ardour 'bf lust, so as to be able to accomplish that which ilappertains to the use of reason and not of lust. Now, this ardour, whether following or preceding the will, does somehow, by a power of its own, move the members which cannot be moved simply by the will, and in this manner it shows itself not to be the servant of a will which commands it, but rather to be the punishment of a will which disobeys it. It shows, moreover, that it must be excited, not by a free choice, but by a certain seductive stimulus, and that on this very account it produces shame. This is the carnal concupiscence, which, while it is no longer accounted sin in the regenerate, yet in no case happens to nature except from sin. It is the daughter of sin, as it were; and whenever it yields assent to the commission of shameful deeds, it becomes also the mother of many sins. Now from this concupiscence whatever comes into being by natural birth is bound by original sin, unless, indeed, it be born again in Him whom the Virgin conceived without this concupiscence. Wherefore, when He vouchsafed to be born in the flesh, He alone was born without sin.
CHAP. 28 [XXV.] — CONCUPISCENCE REMAINS AFTER BAPTISM, JUST AS LANGUOR DOES AFTER RECOVERY FROM DISEASE; CONCUPISCENCE IS DIMINISHED IN PERSONS OF ADVANCING YEARS, AND INCREASED EST THE INCONTINENT.
If the question arises, how this concupiscence of the flesh remains in the regenerate, in whose case has been effected a remission of all sins whatever; seeing that human semination takes place by its means, even when the carnal offspring of even a baptized parent is born: or, at all events, if it may be in the case of a baptized parent concupiscence and not be sin, why should this same concupiscence be sin in the offspring? — the answer to be given is this: Carnal concupiscence is remitted, indeed, in baptism; not so that it is put out of existence, but so that it is not to be imputed for sin. Although its guilt is now taken away, it still remains until our entire infirmity be healed by the advancing renewal of our inner man, day by day, when at last our outward man shall be clothed with incorruption.' It does not remain, however, substantially, as a body, or ' I Cor. XV. 53.
' I Cor. XV. 53.
a spirit; but it is nothing more than a certain affection of an evil quality, such as languor, for instance. There is not, to be sure, anything remaining which may be remitted whenever, as the Scripture says, " the Lord forgiveth all our ini(]uities."^ But until that happens which immediately follows in the same passage, " Who healeth all thine infirmities, who redcemeth thy life from corruption," ^ there remains this concupiscence of the flesh in the body of this death. Now we are admonished not to obey its sinful desires to do evil: " Let not sin reign in your mortal body."-* Still this concupiscence is daily lessened in persons of continence and increasing years, and most of all when old age makes a near approach. The man, however, who yields to it a wicked service, receives such great energies that, even when all his members are now failing through age, and those especial parts of his body are unable to be applied to their proper function, he does not ever cease to revel in a still increasing rage of disgraceful and shameless desire.
CHAP. 29 [XXVI.] — HOW CONCUPISCENCE REMAINS IN THE BAPTIZED IN ACT, WHEN IT HAS PASSED AWAY AS TO ITS GUILT.
In the case, then, of those persons who are born again in Christ, when they receive an entire remission of all their sins, it is of course necessary that the guilt also of the still indwelling concupiscence should be remitted, in order that (as I said) it should not be imputed to them for sin. For even as in the case of those sins which cannot be themselves permanent, since they pass away as soon as they are committed, the guilt yet is permanent, and (if not remitted) will remain for evermore; so, when the concupiscence is remitted, the guilt of it also is taken away. For not to have sin means this, not to be deemed guilty of sin. If a man have (for example) committed adultery, though he do not repeat the sin, he is held to be guflty of adultery until the indulgence in guilt be itself remitted. He has the sin, therefore, remaining, although the particular act of his sin no longer exists, since it has passed away along with the time when it was committed. For if to desist from sinning were the same thing as not to have sins, it would be sufticient if Scripture were content to give us the simple warning, " My son, hast thou sinned? Do so no more." 5 This, however, does not suffice, for it goes on to say, "Ask forgiveness for thy former sins." 5 Sins remain, therefore, if they are not forgiven. But how do they remain if they are passed away? Only thus, they have passed away in their act, but they are permanent in their guilt. Contrari- * Ps. ciii. 3. 5 Ecclus. XXI. I.
^ Ps. ciii. 4.
* Rom. vi. 12.
^ [Book I.
wise, then, may it happen that a thing may remain in act, but pass away in guilt.
CH.^. 30 [XXVII.] — THE EVIL DESIRES OF CON- CUPISCENCE; WE OUGHT TO WISH THAT THEY MAY NOT BE.
For the concupiscence of the flesh is in some sort active, even when it does not exhibit either an assent of the heart, where its seat of empire is, or those members whereby, as its weapons, it fulfils what it is bent on. But what in this action does it effect, unless it be its evil and shameful desires? For if these were good and lawful, the apostle would not forbid obedience to them, saying, " Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, that ye should obey the lusts thereof." ' He does not say, that ye should have the lusts thereof, but " that ye should obey the lusts thereof;" in order that (as these desires are greater or less in different individuals, according as each shall have progressed in the renewal of the inner man) we may maintain the fight of holiness and chastity, for the purpose of withholding obedience to these lusts. Nevertheless, our wish ought to be nothing less than the nonexistence of these verj^ desires, even if the accomplishment of such a wish be not possible in the body of this death. This is the reason why the same apostle, in another passage, addressing us as if in his own person, gives us this instruction: "For what I would," says he, "that do I not; but what I hate, that do I." ^ In a word, " I covet." ^ For he was unwilling to do this, that he might be' perfect on every side.
" If, then, I do that which I would not," he goes on to say, " I consent unto the law that it is good." 4 Because the law, too, wills not that which I also would not. For it wills not that I should have concupiscence, for it says, " Thou shalt not covet; " ^ and I am no less unwilling to cherish so evil a desire. In this, therefore, there is complete accord between the will of the law and my own will. But because he was unwilling to covet, 3 and yet did covet,^ and for all that did not by any means obey this concupiscence so as to yield assent to it, he immediately adds these words: " Now, then, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me." s CH.\P. 3 1 [XXVIII.] WHO IS THE IklAN THAT CAN SAY, "IT IS NO MORE I THAT DO IT "?
A man, however, is much deceived if, while consenting to the lust of his flesh, and then both resolving in his mind to do its desires and setting about it, he supposes that he has still a right to say, " It is not I that do it," even if he hates and loathes himself for assenting to evil desires. The two things are simultaneous in his case: he I Rom. vi. 12. * Rom. vii. 15.
3 " Concupisco " in the Latin, and hence used in this discussion.
4 Rom. vii. 16. 5 Rom. vii. 17.
hates the thing himself because he knows that it is evil; and yet he does it, because he is bent on doing it. Now if, in addition to all this, he proceeds to do what the Scripture forbids him, when it says, " Neither yield ye your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin," ^ and completes with a bodily act what he was bent on doing in his mind; and says, " It is not I that do the thing, but sin that dwelleth in me," s, \ because he feels displeased with himself for re- ^ solving on and accomplishing the deed, — he so greatly errs as not to know his own self. For, whereas he is altogether himself, his mind determining and his body executing his own purpose, he yet supposes that he is himself no longer! [xxix.] That man, therefore, alone speaks the truth when he says, " It is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me," who only feels the concupiscence, and neither resolves on doing it with the consent of his heart, nor accomplishes it with the ministry of his body.
CHAP. 32. — WHEN GOOD WILL BE PERFECTLY DONE.
The apostle then adds these words: " For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh) dwelleth no good thing: for to will is present with me; but how to perfect that which is good I find not." 7 Now this is said, because a good thing is not then perfected, when there is an absence of evil desires, as evil is perfected when evil desires are obeyed. But when they are present, but are not obeyed, neither evil is performed, since obedience is not yielded to them; nor good, because of their inoperative presence. There is rather an intermediate condition of things: good is effected in some degree, because the evil concupiscence has gained no assent to itself; and in some degree there is a remnant of evil, because the concupiscence is present. This accounts for the apostle's precise words. He does not say. To i^ good is not present to him, but " how to perfect it." For the truth is, one ^oes a good deal of good when he does what the Scripture enjoins, " Go not after thy lusts; " ^ yet he falls short of perfection, in that he fails to keep the great commandment, " Thou shalt not covet." 9 The law said, " Thou shalt not covet," in order that, when we find ourselves lying in this diseased state, we might seek the medicine of Grace, and by that commandment know both in what direction our endeavours should aim as we advance in our present mortal condition, and to what a height it is possible to reach in the future immortality. For unless perfection could somewhere be attained, this commandment would never have been given to us.
6 Rom. vi. 13. 9 Ex. XX. 7.
7 Rom. vii. 18.
8 Ecclus. xviii. 30.
Chap. 35.]
CHAP. 33 [XXX.] TRUE FREEDOM COMES WITH WILLING DELIGHT IN GOD'S LAW.
The apostle then repeats his former statement, the more fully to recommend its purport: " For the good," says he, *' that I would, I do not: but the evil which I would not, that I do. Now, if I do that I would not, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me." Then follows this: " I find then the law, when I would act, to be good to me; for evil is present with me." ' In other words, I find that the law is a good to me, when I wish to do what the law would have me do; inasmuch as it is not with the law itself (which says, " Thou shalt not covet ") that evil is present; no, it is with myself that the evil is present, which I would not do, because I have the concupiscence even in my willingness. "For," he adds, " I delight in the law of God after the inward man; but I see another law in my members warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members." ^ This delight with the law of God 3 after the inward man, comes to us from the mighty grace of God; for thereby is our inward man renewed day by day,'* because it is thereby that progress is made by us with perseverance. In it there is not the fear that has torment, but the love that cheers and gratifies. We are truly free there, where we have no unwilling joy.
CHAP. 34. HOW CONCUPISCENCE MADE A CAPTIVE