6. But this Only Son of God, the Father Almighty, let us see what He did for us, what He suffered for us. "Born of the Holy Ghost and of the Virgin Mary. " He, so great God, equal with the Father, born of the Holy Ghost and of the Virgin Mary, born lowly, that thereby He might heal the proud. Man exalted himself and fell; God humbled Himself and raised him up. Christ's lowliness, what is it? God hath stretched out an hand to man laid low. We fell, He descended: we lay low, He stooped. Let us lay hold and rise, that we fall not into punishment. So then His stoop- ing to us is this, " Born of the Holy Ghost and of the Virgin Mary." His very Nativity too as man, it is lowly, and it is lofty. Whence lowly? That as man He was born of men. Whence lofty? That He was born of a vir- gin, A virgin conceived, a virgin bore, and after the birth was a virgin still.
7. What next? "Suffered under Pontius Pilate." He was in office as governor and was the judge, this same Pontius Pilate, what time as Christ suffered. In the name of the judge there is a mark of the times, when He suffered under Pontius Pilate: when He suf- fered, "was crucified, dead, and buried." Who? what? for whom? Who? God's Only Son, our Lord. What? Crucified, dead, and buried. For whom? for ungodly and sinners. Great condescension, great grace! " What shall I render unto the Lord for all that He hath bestowed on me? " - 8. He was begotten before all times, before all worlds. " Begotten before." Be- fore what, He in Whom is no before? Do not in the least imagine any time before that Nativity of Christ whereby He was begotten of the Father; of that Nativity I am speaking by which He is Son of 1 John xvi. 15.
2 Ps. cxvi. 12.
God Almighty, His Only Son our Lord; of that am I first speaking. Do not imagine in this Nativity a beginning of time; do not imagine any space of eternity in which the Father was and the Son was not. Since when the Father was, since then the Son. And what is that " since," where is no beginning? Therefore ever Father without be<nnnimr, ever Son without beginning. And how, thou wilt say, was He begotten, if He have no beginning? Of eternal, coeternal. At no time was the Father, and the Son not, and yet Son of Father was begotten. Whence is any manner of similitude to be had? We are among things of earth, we are in the visible creature. Let the earth give me a similitude: it gives none. Let the element of the waters give me some similitude: it hath not whereof to give. Some animal give me a similitude: neither can this do it. An animal indeed en- genders, both what engenders and what is engendered: but first is the father, and then is born the son. Let us find the coeval and imagine it coeternal. If we shall be able to find a father coeval with his son, and son coeval with his father, let us believe God the Father coeval with His Son, and God the Son coeternal with His Father. On earth we can find some coeval, we cannot find any coeternal. Let us stretch 3 the coeval and imagine it coeternal. Some one, it may be, will put you on the stretch,4 by saying, "When is it possible for a father to be found coeval with his son, or son coeval with his father? That the father may beget he goes before in age; that the son may be begotten, he comes after in age: but this father coeval with son, or son with father, how can it be? " Imagine to yourselves fire as father, its shining as son; see, we have found the coevals. From the instant that the fire begins to be, that instant it begets the shin- ing: neither fire before shining, nor shining after fire. And if we ask, which begets which? the fire the shining, or the shining the fire? Immediately ye conceive by natural sense, by the innate wit of your minds ye all cry out, The fire the shining, not the shining the fire. Lo, here you have a father begin- ning; lo, a son at the same time, neither go- ing before nor coming after. Lo, here then is a father beginning, lo, a son at the same time beginning. If I have shown you a father be- ginning, and a son at the same time begin- ning, believe the Father not beginning, and with Him the Son not beginning either; the one eternal, the other coeternal. If ye get on with your learning, ye understand: take 3 Intendamus.
4 Intentos.
7' THE WORKS OF ST. AUGUSTIN.
pains to get on. The being born, ye have; but also the growing, ye ought to have; be- cause no man begins with being perfect. As for the Son of God, indeed, He could be born perfect, because He was begotten without time, coeternal with the Father, long before all things, not in age, but in eternity. He then was begotten coeternal, of which genera- tion the Prophet said, " His generation who shall declare? " x begotten of the Father with- out time, He was born of the Virgin in the fullness of times. This nativity had times going before it. In opportunity of time, when He would, when He knew, then was He born: for He was not born without His will. None of us is born because he will, and none of us dies when he will: He, when He would, was born; when He would, He died: how He would, He was born of a Virgin: how He would, He died; on the cross. Whatever He would, He did: because He was in such wise Man that, unseen,2 He was God; God assuming, Man assumed;3 One Christ, God and Man.
9. Of His cross what shall I speak, what say? This extremest kind of death He chose, that not any kind of death might make His Martyrs afraid. The doctrine He shewed in His life as Man, the example of patience Fie demonstrated in His Cross. There, you have the work, that He was crucified; exam- ple of the work, the Cross; reward of the work, Resurrection. He shewed us in the Cross what we ought to endure, He shewed in the Resurrection what we have to hope. Just like a consummate task-master in the matches of the arena, He said, Do, and bear; do the work and receive the prize; strive in the match and thou shalt be crowned. What is the work? Obedience. What the prize? Resur- rection without death. Why did I add, "without death?" Because Lazarus rose, and died: Christ rose again, " dieth no more, death will no longer have dominion over Him.*'4 10. Scripture saith, " Ye have heard of the patience of Job, and have seen the end of the Lord."5 When we read what great trials Job endured, it makes one shudder, it makes one shrink, it makes one quake. And what did he receive? The double of what he had lost. Let not a man therefore with an eye to tem- poral rewards be willing to have patience, and say to himself, " Let me endure loss, God will give me back sons twice as many; Job received double of all, and begat as many sons as he had buried." Then is this not the 1 Is. liii. 8. [See R. V.] 2 Ut lateret Deus.
double? Yes, precisely the double, because the former sons still lived. Let none say, " Let me bear evils, and God will repay me as He repaid Job: " that it be now no longer patience but avarice. For if it was not patience which that Saint had, nor a brave enduring of all that came upon him; the tes- timony which the Lord gave, whence should he have it? " Hast thou observed," saith the Lord, "my servant Job? For there is not like him any on the earth, a man without fault,6 a true worshipper of God." What a testimony, my brethren, did this holy man deserve of the Lord! And yet him a bad woman sought by her persuasion to deceive, she too representing that serpent, who, like as in Paradise he deceived the man whom God first made, so likewise here by suggest- ing blasphemy thought to be able to deceive a man who pleased God. What things he suffered, my brethren! Who can have so much to suffer in his estate, his house, his sons, his flesh, yea in his very wife who was left to be his tempter! But even her who was left, the devil would have taken away long ago, but that he kept her to be his helper: be- cause by Eve he had mastered the first man, therefore had he kept an Eve. What things, then, he suffered! He lost all that he had; his house fell; would that were all! it crushed his sons also. And, to see that patience had great place in him, hear what he answered; ' The Lord gave, the Lord hath taken away; as it pleased the Lord, so hath it been done;7 blessed be the name of the Lord."8 He hath taken what He gave, is He lost Who gave? He hath taken what He gave. As if he should say, He hath taken away all, let Him take all, send me away naked, and let me keep Him. What shall I lack if I have God? or what is the good of all else to me, if I have not God? Then it came to his flesh, he was stricken with a wound from head to foot; he was one running sore, one mass of crawling worms: and showed himself immovable in his God, stood fixed. The woman wanted, devil's helper as she was not husband's comforter, to put him up to blas- pheme God. " How long," said she, "dost thou suffer" so and so; "speak some word against the Lord,9 and die."10 So then, be- cause he had been brought low, he was to be exalted. And this the Lord did, in order to show it to men; as for His servant, He kept greater things for him in heaven. So then Job who was brought low, He exalted; the devil who was lifted up, He brought low: 6 Querela.
9 Lat. from LXX.
7 Lat. from LXX. 10 Job ii. 9.
8 Job i. 21.
ON THE CREED.
O/O for " He putteth down one and setteth up an- other.''1 But let not any man, my beloved brethren, when he suffers any such-like tribu- lations, look for a reward here: for instance, if he suffer any losses, let him not peradven- ture say, " The Lord gave, the Lord hath taken away; as it pleased the Lord, so is it done: blessed be the name of the Lord;" only with the mind to receive twice as much again. Let patience praise God, not avarice. If what thou hast lost thou seekest to receive back twofold, and therefore praisest God, it is of covetousness thou praisest, not of love. Do not imagine this to be the example of that holy man; thou deceivest thyself. When Job was enduring all, he was not hoping for to have twice as much again. Both in his first confession when he bore up under his losses, and bore out to the grave the dead bodies of his sons, and in the second when he was now suffering torments of sores in his flesh, ye may observe what I am saying. Of his former confession the words run thus: " The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away: as it pleased the Lord, so is it done: blessed be the name of the Lord."2 He might have said, " The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away; He that took away can once more give; can bring back more than He took." He said not this, but, " As it pleased the Lord," said he, "so is it done: " because it pleases Him, let it please me: let not that which hath pleased the good Lord misplease His submissive servant; what pleased the Physician, not misplease the sick man. Hear his other confession: "Thou hast spoken," said he to his wife, " like one of the foolish women. If we have received TOod at the hand of the Lord, why shall we not bear evil? " 3 He did not add, what, if he had said it, would have been true. "The Lord is able both to bring back my flesh into its former condition, and that which He hath taken away from us, to make manifold more:" lest he should seem to have endured in hope of this. This was not what he said, not what he hoped. But, that we might be taught, did the Lord that for him, not hoping for it, by which we should be taught, that God was with him: because if He had not also restored to him those things, there was the crown indeed, but hidden, and we could not see it. And therefore what says the divine Scripture in exhorting to patience and hope of things future, not reward of things present? "Ye have heard of the patience of Job, and have seen the end of the Lord." Why is it, " the patience of Job," and not, Ye have seen the 1 Ps.
Ixxv. 7.
- Job i. xxi.
3 Job ii. 10.
end of Job himself? Thou wouldest open thy mouth for the "twice as much;" would- est say, " Thanks be to God; let me bear up: I receive twice as much again, like Job." "Patience of Job, end of the Lord." The patience of Job we know, and the end of the Lord we know.4 What end of the Lord? " My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?" They are the words of the Lord hanging on the cross. He did as it were leave Him for present felicity, not leave Him for eternal immortality. In this is " the end of the Lord." The Jews hold Him, the Jews insult, the Jews bind Him, crown Him with thorns, dishonor Him with spitting, scourge Him, overwhelm Him with revilings, hang Him upon the tree, pierce Him with a spear, last of all bury Him. He was as it were left: but by whom? By those insulting ones. Therefore thou shalt but to this end have patience, that thou mayest rise again and not die, that is, never die, even as Christ. For so we read, " Christ rising from the dead henceforth dieth not."5 11. " He ascended into heaven:" believe. " He sitteth at the right hand of the Father: ' ' believe. By sitting, understand dwelling: as [in Latin] we say of any person, " In that country he dwelt (sedit) three years." The Scripture also has that expression, that such an one dwelt (sedissc) in a city for such a time.6 Not meaning that he sat and never rose up? On this account the dwellings of men are called seats (sedes).7 Where people are seated (in this sense), are they always sit- ting? Is there no rising, no walking, no ly- ing down? And yet they are called seats (sedes). In this way, then, believe an in- habiting of Christ on the right hand of God the Father: He is there. And let not your heart say to you, What is He doing? Do not want to seek what is not permitted to find: He is there; it suffices you. He is blessed, and from blessedness which is called the right hand of the Father, of very blessed- ness the name is, right hand of the Father. For if we shall take it carnally, then because He sitteth on the right hand of the Father, the Father will be on His left hand. Is it consistent with piety so to put Them together, the Son on the right, the Father on the left?
There it is all right-hand, because no misery is there.
12. "Thence He shall come to judge the quick and dead." The quick, who shall be alive and remain; the dead, who shall have gone before. It may also be understood thus: 4 Ps. xxii. 1.
5 Rom. vi. 9. The Article of the descent into Hell appears not to have been included in this Creed.
374 THE WORKS OF ST. AUGUSTIN.
The living, the just; the dead, the unjust. For He judges both, rendering unto each his own. To the just He will say in the judg- ment, " Come, ye blessed of My Father, re- ceive the kingdom prepared for you from the beginning of the world." 1 For this prepare yourselves, for these things hope, for this live, and so live, for this believe, for this be baptized, that it may be said to you, " Come ye blessed of My Father, receive the king- dom prepared for you from the foundation of the world." To them on the left hand, what? " Go into everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels/' 2 Thus will they be judged by Christ, the quick and the dead. We have spoken of Christ's first nativity, which is without time; spoken of the other in the fullness of time, Christ's nativity of the Virgin; spoken of the passion of Christ; spoken of the coming of Christ to judgment. The whole is spoken, that was to be spoken of Christ, God's Only Son, our Lord. But not yet is the Trinity perfect.
13. It follows in the Creed, "And in the Holy Ghost." This Trinity, one God, one nature, one substance, one power; highest equality, no division, no diversity, perpetual dearness of love.3 Would ye know the Holy Ghost, that He is God? Be baptized, and ye will be His temple. The Apostle says, " Know ye not that your bodies are the tem- ple within you of the Holy Ghost, Whom ye have of God?"4 A temple is for God: thus also Solomon, king and prophet, was bidden to build a temple for God. If he had built a temple for the sun or moon or some star or some angel, would not God condemn him? Because therefore he built a temple for God, he showed that he worshipped God. And of what did he build? Of wood and stone, be- cause God deigned to make unto Himself by His servant an house on earth, where He might be asked, where He might be had in mind. Of which blessed Stephen says, "Solomon built Him an house; howbeit the Most High dwelleth not in temples made by hand."5 If then our bodies are the temple of the Holy Ghost, what manner of God is it that built a temple for the Holy Ghost? But it was God. For if our bodies be a temple of the Holy Ghost, the same built this temple for the Holy Ghost, that built our bodies.
Listen to the Apostle saying, "God hath tempered the body, giving unto that which lacked the greater honor; " 6 when he was speaking of the different members that there should be no schisms in the body. God 1 Matt. xxv. 34.
3 Charitas.
5 Acts vii. 47, 48 created our body. The grass, God created; our body Who created? How do we prove that the grass is God's creating? He that clothes, the same creates. Read the Gospel, "If then the grass of the field," saith it, " which to-day is, and to-morrow is cast into the oven, God so clotheth." 7 He, then, creates Who clothes. And the Apostle: " Thou fool, that which thou sowest is not quickened except it die; and that which thou sowest, thou sowest not that body that shall be, but a bare grain, as perchance of wheat, or of some other corn; but God giveth it a body as He would, and to each one of seeds its proper body."8 If then it be God that builds our bodies, God that builds our members, and our bodies are the temple of the Holy Ghost, doubt not that the Holy Ghost is God. And do not add as it were a third God; because Father and Son and Holy Ghost is One God. So believe ye.
14. It follows after commendation of the Trinity, "The Holy Church." God is pointed out, and His temple. " For the temple of God is holy," says the Apostle, " which (temple) are ye." 9 This same is the holy Church, the one Church, the true Church, the catholic Church, fighting against all heresies: fight, it can: be fought down, it cannot. As for heresies, they went all out of it, like as unprofitable branches pruned from the vine: but itself abideth in its root, in its Vine, in its charity. *' The gates of hell shall not prevail against it." I0 15. " Forgiveness of sins." Ye have [this article of] the Creed perfectly in you when ye receive Baptism. Let none say, " I have done this or that sin: perchance that is not forgiven me." What hast thou done? How great a sin hast thou done? Name any hei- nous thing thou hast committed, heavy, horri- ble, which thou shudderest even to think of: have done what thou wilt: hast thou killed Christ? There is not than that deed any worse, because also than Christ there is nothing better. What a dreadful thing is it to kill Christ! Yet the Jews killed Him, and many afterwards believed on Him and drank His blood: they are forgiven the sin which they committed. When ye have been bap- tized, hold fast a good life in the command- ments of God, that ye may guard your Bap- tism even unto the end. I do not tell you that ye will live here without sin; but they are venial, without which this life is not. For the sake of all sins was Baptism provided; for the sake of light sins, without which we cannot be, was prayer provided." What hath 7 Matt. vi. 30. 10 Matt. xvi. 18.
8 1 Cor. xv. [See R.V.]
36-38.
ON THE CREED.
375 the Prayer? "Forgive us our debts, as we also forgive our debtors." x Once for all we have washing in Baptism, every day we have washing in prayer. Only, do not commit those things for which ye must needs be separated from Christ's body: which be far from you! For those whom ye have seen doing penance,2 have committed heinous things, either adulteries or some enormous crimes: for these they do penance. Because if theirs had been light sins, to blot out these daily prayer would suffice.
1 6. In three ways then are sins remitted in the Church; by Baptism, by prayer, by the greater humility of penance; yet God doth not remit sins but to the baptized. The very sins which He remits first, He remits not but to the baptized. When? when they are baptized. The sins which are after re- mitted upon prayer, upon penance, to whom He remits, it is to the baptized that He re- mitteth. For how can they say, "Our Father," who are not yet born sons? The Catechumens, so long as they be such, have upon them all their sins. If Catechumens, i Matt. vi. 12. [See R.V.]
2 " Agere poenitentiam.
how much more Pagans? how much more heretics? But to heretics we do not change their baptism. Why? because they have baptism in the same way as a deserter has the soldier's mark:3 just so these also have Baptism; they have it, but to be condemned thereby, not crowned. And yet if the de- serter himself, being amended, begin to do duty as a soldier, does any man dare to change his mark?
17. We believe also "the resurrection of the flesh," which went before in Christ: that the body too may have hope of that which went before in its Head. The Head of the Church, Christ: the Church, the body of Christ. Our Head is risen, ascended into heaven: where the Head, there also the mem- bers. In what way the resurrection of the flesh? Lest any should chance to think it like as Lazarus's resurrection, that thou may- est know it to be not so, it is added, " Into life everlasting." God regenerate you! God preserve and keep you! God bring you safe unto Himself, Who is the Life Everlasting. Amen.
3 " Characterem" ST. AUGUSTIN: ON CONTINENCE.
[DE CONTINENTIA.]
TRANSLATED BY REV. C. L. CORNISH, MA, OF EXETER COLLEGE, OXFORD.
ON CONTINENCE.
[DE CONTINENTIA.]
St. Augustin speaks of his work On Continence in Ep. 231, Ad Darium Comitcm. [See vol. I. of this edition, p. 584. — P. S.] Possidius, Ind. c. 10, mentions it, and it is cited in the Collectanea of Bede or Florus, and by Eugypius. Erasmus is therefore wrong in as- cribing it to Hugo on the ground of the style, which is not unlike that of the earlier discourses. It is evidently a discourse, and probably for that reason unnoticed in the Retractations. The Manichasan heresy is impugned after the manner of his early works. — {Abridged from Bene- dictine ed. vol. vi.)
1. It is difficult to treat of the virtue of the soul, which is called Continence, in a manner fully suitable and worthy; but He, whose great gift this virtue is, will help our littleness under the burden of so great a weight. For He, who bestows it upon His faithful ones when they are continent, Him- self gives discourse of it to His ministers when they speak. Lastly, of so great a matter purposing to speak what Himself shall grant, in the first place we say and prove that Con- tinence is the gift of God.1 We have it written in the Book of Wisdom, that no one can be continent, unless God grant it. But the Lord, concerning that greater and more glorious Continence itself, whereby there is continence from the marriage bond, says, " Not all can receive this saying, but they to whom it is given."2 And since marriage chas- tity also itself cannot be guarded, unless there be Continence from unlawful intercourse, the Apostle declared both to be the gift of God, when He spake of both lives, that is, both that of marriage and that without marriage, saying, " I would that all men were so as myself; but each hath his own gift from 1 Wis. viii. 2i.
2 Matt. xix. 11.
God; one in this manner, another in that manner."3 2. And lest it should seem that necessary Continence was to be hoped for from the Lord only in respect of the lust of the lower parts of the flesh, it is also sung in the Psalm; " Set, O Lord, a watch to my mouth, and a door of Continence around my lips."4 But in this witness of the divine speech, if we un- derstand " mouth " as we ought to understand it, we perceive how great a gift of God Con- tinence there set is. Forsooth it is little to contain the mouth of the body, lest any thing burst forth thence, which is not for the better, through the sound of the voice. For there is, within, the mouth of the heart, where he, who spake these words, and wrote them for us to speak, desired of the Lord that the watch and door of Continence should be set for him. For many things we say not with the mouth of the body, and cry aloud with the heart: but there goes forth from the mouth of the body no word of any thing, whereof there is silence in the heart. There- fore what flows not forth thence, sounds not abroad: but what flows forth thence, if it be 3 1 Cor. vii. 7.
4 Ps. cxli. 3.
38o THE WORKS OF ST. AUGUSTIN.
evil, although it move not the tongue, defiles the soul. Therefore Continence must be set there, where the conscience even of them who are silent speaks. For it is brought to pass by means of the door of Continence, that there go not forth thence that, which, even when the lips of the flesh are closed, pollutes the life of him that hath the thought.