2. But if at that time ''my thought was not able to bear and sustain tiie question concern- = In his RcfrnciationSy Augustin explains this proposition as follows: " I said this in the sense in which the creature is known to pertain to the Creator, but not in the sense that it is of Him, so as to be regarded as part of Him." — A. H. N.
3 John xiv. 6.
4 It will aid the reader in following the thread of Augustin'sargu- 96 THE WORKS OF ST. AUGUSTIN.
[Chap. III.
ing life and partaking of life, which is truly a great question, and one that requires much calm discussion among the learned, I might perchance have had power to discover that which to every man considering himself, with- out a study of the individual parts, is perfectly evident, namely, that everything we are said to know and to understand, we comprehend either by bodily sense or by mental opera- tion. That the five bodily senses are com- monly enumerated as sight, hearing, smell, taste, touch, than all of which intellect is immeasurably more noble and excellent, who would have been so ungrateful and impious as not to concede to me; which being es- tablished and confirmed, we should have seen how it follows, that whatsoever things are perceived by touch or sight or in any bodily manner at all, are by so much inferior to those things that we comprehend intellectu- ally as the senses are inferior to the intellect. Wherefore, since all life, and so every soul, can be perceived by no bodily sense, but by the intellect alone, whereas while yonder sun and moon and every luminary that is beheld by these mortal eyes, the Manichseans them- selves also say must be attributed to the true and good God, it is the height of madness to claim that that belongs to God which we observe bodily; but, on the other hand, to think that what we receive not only by the mind, but by the highest form of mind,' namely, reason and intellect,^ that is life, what- soever it may be called, nevertheless life, should be deprived and bereft of the same God as its author. For if having invoked God, I had asked myself what living is, how inscrutable it is to every bodily sense, how absolutely incorporeal it is, could not I have answered? Or would not the Manichaeans also confess not only that the souls they de- test live, but that they live also immortally? and that Christ's saying: " Send the dead to bury their dead," ^ was uttered not with refer- ence to those not living at all, but with refer- ence to sinners, which is the only death of the immortal soul; as when Paul writes: " The widow that giveth herself to pleasure is dead while she liveth, ""he says that she at the same time is dead, and alive. Wherefore I should have directed attention not to ment, if he will bear in mind that throughout this treatise the writer considers the points of antagonism between Manichssism and Catholicism from the point of view of his early entanglement in Manicha;an error. Considering the opportunities that'he had for knowing the truth, the helps to have been expected from God in answer to prayer, the capacities of the unperverted intellect to arrive at truth, he inquires how he should have guarded himself from the insinuation of Manichaean error, how he should have defended the truth, and how he should have been the means of liberating others. — A. H. N.
I Suh'limitate aniini. 2 Mente atque intelligentia.
the great degree of contamination in which the sinful soul lives, but only to the fact itself that it lives. But if I cannot perceive except by an act of intelligence, I believe it would have come into the mind, that by as much as any mind whatever is to be preferred to the light which we see through these eyes, by so much we should give to intellect the prefer- ence over the eyestiiemselves.
CHAP, 3. HOW IT IS PROVED THAT EVERY BODY ALSO IS FROM GOD. THAT THE SOUL WHICH IS CALLED EVIL BY THE MANICH/EANS IS BET- TER THAN LIGHT.
They also affirm that the light is from the Father of Christ: should I then have doubted that every soul is from Him? But not even then, as a man forsooth so inexperienced and so youthful as I was, should I have been in doubt as to the derivation not only of the soul, but also of the body, nay of every- thing whatsoever, from Him, if I had rever- ently and cautiously reflected on what form is, or what has been formed, what shape is and what has been endued with shape.
3. But not to speak at present concerning the body, I lament concerning the soul, con- cerning spontaneous and vivid movement, concerning action, concerning life, concern- ing immortality; in fine, I lament that I, miserable, should have believed that anything could have all these properties apart from the goodness of God, which properties, great as they are, I sadly neglected to consider; this I think, should be to me a matter of groaning and of weeping. I should have inwardly pondered these things, I should have dis- cussed them with myself, I should have re- ferred them to others, I should have pro- pounded the inquiry, what the power of know- ing is, seeing there is nothing in man that we can compare to this excellency? And as men, if only they had been men, would have granted me this, I should have inquired whether seeing with these eyes is knowing ^ In case they had answered negatively, I should first have concluded, that mental in- telligence is vastly inferior to ocular sensa- tion; then I should have added, that what we perceive by means of a better thing must needs be judged to be itself better. Who- would not grant this? I should have gone on to inquire, whether that soul which they call evil is an object of ocular sensation or of mental intelligence? They would have acknowledged that the latter is the case. All which things having been agreed upon and confirmed between us, I should have shown how it follows, that that soul forsooth which they execrate, is better than that light which Chap. VI.]
TWO SOULS. AGAINST THE MANICH^.ANS.
97 they venerate, since the former is an object of mental knowledge, the latter an object of corporeal sense perception. But here perhaps they would have halted, and would have refused to follow the lead of reason, so great is the power of inveterate opinion and of falsehood long defended and believed. But I should have pressed yet more upon them halting, not harshly, not in puerile fash- ion, not obstinately; I should have repeated the things that had l^een conceded, and have shown how they must be conceded. I should have exhorted that they consult in common, that they may see clearly what must be de- nied to us; whether they think it false that intellectual perception is to be preferred to these carnal organs of sight, or that what is known by means of the excellency of the mind is more excellent than what is known bv vile corporeal sensation; whether they would be unwilling to confess that those souls which they think heterogenous, can be known only by intellectual perception, that is, by the excellency itself of the mind; whether they would wish to deny that the sun and the moon are made known to us only by means of these eyes. But if they had re- plied that no one of these things could be denied otherwise than most absurdly and most impudently, I should have urged that they ought not to doubt but that the light whose worthiness of worship they proclaim, is viler than that soul which they admonish men to flee.
CHAP. 4. — EVEN THE SOUL OF A FLV IS MORE EXCELLENT THAN THE LIGHT.
4. And here, if perchance in their confusion they had inquired of me whether I thought that the soul even of a fly' surpasses that light, I should have replied, yes, nor should it have troubled me that the fly is little, but it should have confirmed me that it is alive. For It is inquired, what causes those members so diminutive to grow, what leads so minute a body here and there according to its natural appetite, what moves its feet in nu- merical order when it is running, what regu- lates and gives vibration to its wings when flying? This thing whatever it is in so small a creature towers up so prominently to one well considering, that it excels any lightning flashing upon the eyes.
CHAP. 5. — HOW VICIOUS SOULS, HOWEVER WORTHY OF CONDEMNATION THEY MAY BE, EXCEL THE LIGHT WHICH IS PRAISEWORTHY I IN ITS KIND.
Certainly nobody doubts that whatever is ' Neither Aiigustin nor the Manichsans seem to have recoijan object of intellectual perception, by virtue of divine laws surpasses in excellence every sensible object and consequently also this light. For what, I ask, do we perceive by thought, if not that it is one thing to know with the mind, and another thing to experi- ence bodily sensations, and "-hat the former is incomparably more sublime than the latter, and so that intelligible things must needs be preferred to sensible things, since the intellect itself is so highly exalted above the senses?
5. Hence this also I should perchance have known, which manifestly follows, since injus- tice and intemperance and other vices of the mind are not objects of sense, but of intellect, how it comes about that these too which we detest and consider condemnable, yet in as much as they are objects of intellect, can out- rank this light however praiseworthy it may be in its kind. For it is borne in upon the mind subjecting itself well to God, that, first of all, not everything that we praise is to be preferred to everything that we find fault with. For in praising the purest lead, I do not therefore put a higher value upon it than upon the gold that I find fault with. For everything must be considered in its kind. I disapprove of a lawyer ignorant of many statutes, yet I so prefer him to the most ap- proved tailor, that I should think him incom- parably superior. But I praise the tailor because he is thoroughly skilled in his own craft, while I rightly blame the lawyer be- cause he imperfectly fulfills the functions of his profession. Wherefore I should have found out that the light which in its own kind is perfect, is rightly to be praised; yet because it is included in the number of sensible things, which class must needs yield to the class of intelligible things, it must be ranked below unjust and intemperate souls, since these are intelligible; although we may without injus- tice judge these to be most worthy of con- demnation. For in the case of these we ask that they be reconciled to God, not that they be preferred to that lightning. Wherefore, if any one had contended that this luminary is from God, I should not have opposed; but rather I should have said, that souls, even vicious ones, not in so far as they are vicious, but in so far as they are souls, must be ac- knowledged to be creatures of God.
CHAP. 6. WHETHKR EVEN VICES THEMSELVES AS OBJECTS OF INTELLECTUAL APPREHEN- SION ARE TO BE PREFERRED TO LIGHT AS AN OBJECT OF SENSE PERCEPTION, AND ARE TO VfE ATTRIBUTED TO GOD AS THEIR nized the distinction in kind between the human soul and animal hfe.— A. H. N.
98 THE WORKS OF ST. AUGUSTIN.
[Chap. VI.
AUTHOR. VICE OF THK MIND AND CERTAIN DEFECTS ARE NOT RIGHTLY TO BE COUNTED AMONG INTELLIGIBLE THINGS. DEFECTS THEMSELVES EVEN IF THEY SHOULD BE COUNTED AMONG INTELLIGIBLE THINGS SHOULD NEVER BE PUT BEFORE SENSIBLE THINGS. IF LIGHT IS VISIBLE BY GOD, MUCH MORE IS THE SOUL, EVEN IF VICIOUS, WHICH IN SO FAR AS IT LIVES IS AN INTELLIGIBLE THING. PASSAGES OF SCRIPTURE ARE AD- DUCED BY THE MANICHiEANS TO THE CON- TRARY.
At this point, in case some one of them, cautious and watchful, now also more studi- ous than pertinacious, had admonished me that the inquiry is not about vicious souls, but about vices themselves, which, seeing that they are not known by corporeal sense, and yet are known, can only be received as ob- jects of intellectual apprehension, which if they excel all objects of sense, why can we not agree in attributing light to God as its author, but only a sacrilegious person would sav that God is the author of vices; I should have replied to the man, if either on the spur of the moment, as is customary to the wor- shippers of the good God, a solution of this question had darted like lightning from on high, or a solution had been previously pre- pared. If I had not deserved ur was unable to avail myself of either of these methods, I should have deferred the undertaking, and should have confessed that the thing pro- pounded was difficult to discern and arduous. I should have withdrawn to myself, prostrated myself before God, groaned aloud asking Him not to suffer me to halt in mid space, when I should have moved forward with assured arguments, asking Him that I might not be compelled by a doubtful question either to subordinate intelligible things to sensible, and to yield, or to call Himself the author of vices; since either of these alternatives would have been absolutely full of falsehood and impiety. I can by no means suppose that He would have deserted me in such a frame of mind. Rather, in His own ineffable way, He would have admonished me to consider again and again whether vices of mind con- cerning which I was so troubled should be reckoned among intelligible things. But that I might find out, on account of the weakness of my inner eye, which rightly befell me on account of my sins, I should have devised some sort of stage for gazing upon spiritual things in visible things themselves, of which we have by no means a surer knowledge, but a more confident familiarity. Therefore I should straightway have inquired, what properly pertains to the sensation of the eyes. I should have found that it is the color, the dominion of which the light holds. For these are the things that no other sense touches, for the motions and magnitudes and intervals and figures of bodies, although they also can be perceived by the eyes, yet to perceive such is not their peculiar function, but belongs also to touch. Whence I should have gath. ered that by as much as yonder light excels other corporeal and sensible things, by so much is sight more noble than the other senses. The light therefore having been selected from all the things that are perceived by bodily sense, by this [light] I should have striven, and in this of necessity I should have placed that stage of my inquiry. I should have gone on to consider what might be done in this way, and thus I should have reasoned with myself: If yonder sun, con- spicuous by its brightness and sufficing for day by its light, should little by little decline in our sight into the likeness of the moon, would we perceive anything else with our eyes than light however refulgent, yet seek- ing light by reason of not seeing what had been, and using it for seeing what was present?
Therefore we should not see the decline, but the light that should survive the decline. But since we should not see, we should not perceive; for whatever we perceive by sight must necessarily be seen; wherefore if that decline were perceived neither by sight nor by any other sense, it cannot be reckoned among objects of sense. For nothing is an object of sense that cannot be perceived by sense. Let us apply now the consideration to virtue, by whose intellectual light we most fittingly say the mind shines. Again, a cer- tain decline from this light of virtue, not de- stroying the soul, but obscuring it, is called vice. Therefore also vice can by no means be reckoned among objects of intellectual perception, as that decline of light is rightly excluded from the number of objects of sense perception. Yet what remains of soul, that is, that which lives and is soul, is just as much an object of intellectual perception as that is an object of sense perception which should shine in this visible luminary after any imaginable degree of decline. And so the soul, in so far as it is soul and partakes of life, without which it can in no way be soul, is most correctly to be preferred to all objects of sense perception. Wherefore it is most erroneous to say that any soul is not from God, from whom you boast that the sun and moon have their existence.
7. But if now it should be thought fit to designate as objects of sense perception not Chap. VII. j TWO SOULS, AGAINST THE MANICH^ANS.
99 only all those things that we perceive by the senses, but also all those things that though not perceiving by the senses we judge of by means of the body, as of darkness through the eyes, of silence through the ears, — for not f)y seeing darkness and not by hearing silence do we know of their existence, — and again, in the case of objects of intellectual percep- tion, not those things only which we see illu- minated by the mind, as is wisdom itself, but also those things which by the illumination itself we avoid, such as foolishness, which I might fittingly designate mental darkness; I should have made no controversy about a word, but should have dissolved the whole question by an easy division, and straight- way I should have proved to those giving good attention, that by the divme law of truth intelligible subsistences are to be preferred to sensible subsistences, not the decline of these subsistences, even though we should choose to call these intelligible, those sensi- ble. Wherefore, that those who acknowledge that these visible luminaries and those intelli- gible souls are subsistences, are in every way compelled to grant and to attribute the sub- limer part to souls; but that defects of either kind cannot be preferred the one to the other, 1 for they are only privative and indicate non- ; existence, and therefore have precisely the 1 same force as negations themselves. For when we say. It is not gold, and, It is not virtue, j although there is the greatest possible differ- lence between gold and virtue, yet there is no j difference between the negations that we ad- ijoin to them. But that it is worse indeed ;not to be virtue than not to be gold, no sane 'man doubts. Who does not know that the difference lies not in the negations themselves, jbut in the things to which they are adjoined? Tor by as much as virtue is more excellent than gold, by so much is it more wretched to be in want of virtue than of gold. Where- fore, since intelligible things excel sensible (things, we rightly feel greater repugnance [towards defect in intelligible than in sensible things, esteeming not the defects, but the :hings that are deficient more or less precious. J jFrom which now it appears, that defect of ight, which is intelligible, is far more wretched ;han defect of the sensible light, because, brsooth, life which is known is by far more precious than yonder light which is seen. 8. This being the case, who will dare, while 1 Attributing sun and moon, and whatever is efulgent in the stars, nay in this fire of ours ind in this visible earthly life, to God, to de- line to grant that any souls whatsoever, which re not souls except by the fact of their being •erfectly alive, since in this fact alone life has the precedence of light, are from God. And since he speaks truth who says. In as far as a thing shines it is from God, would I speak falsely, mighty God, if I should say, In so far as a thing lives it is from God? Let not, I beseech thee, blindness of intellect and perv'ersions of mind be increased to such an extent that men may fail to know these things. But however great their error and pertinacity might have been, trusting in these arguments and armed therewith, I believe that when I should have laid the matter before them thus considered and canvassed, and should have calmly conferred with them, I should have feared lest any one of them should have seemed to me to be of any consequence, should he endeavor to subordinate or even to compare to bodily sense, or to those things that pertain to bodily sense as objects of knowledge, either intellect or those things that are perceived (not by w-ay of defect) by the intellect. Which point having been set- tled, how would he or any other have dared to deny that such souls as he would consider evil, yet since they are souls, are to be reck- oned in the number of intelligible things, nor are objects of intellectual perception by way of defect? This is on the supposition that souls are souls only by being alive. For if they were intellectually perceived as vicious through defect, being vicious by lack of vir- tue, yet they are perceived as souls not through defect, for they are souls by reason of being alive. Nor can it be maintained that presence of life is a cause of defect, for by as much as anything is defective, by so much is it severed from life.
9. Since therefore it would have been every way evident that no souls can be separated from that Author from whom yonder light is not separated, whatever they might have now adduced I should not have accepted, and should rather have admonished them that they should choose with me to follow those who maintain that whatever is, since it is, and in whatever degree it is, has its existence from the one God.
CHAP. 7. — HOW EVIL MEN ARE OF GOD, AND NOT OF GOD.
They might have cited against me those words of the gospel: " Ye therefore do not hear, because ye are not of God;" "Ye are of your father the devil."" I also should have cij;ed: "All things were made by Him and without Him was not anything made," ' and this of the Apostle: " One God of. whom are all things, and one Lord Jesus Christ ' John viii. 47 and 44.
2 John i. 3.
i lOO THE WORKS OF ST. AUGUSTIN.
[Chap. VIII.
I through whom are all things,"' and again from the same Apostle: "Of whom are all things, through whom are all things, in whom are all things, to Him be glory." ' I should have exhorted those men (if indeed I had found them men), that we should presume upon nothing as if we had found it out, but should rather inquire of the masters who would demonstrate the agreement and har- mony of those passages that seem to be dis- cordant. For when in one and the same Scriptural authority we read: "All things are of God," 3 and elsewhere: "Ye are not of God," since it is wrong rashly to condemn books of Scripture, who would not have seen that a skilled teacher should be found who would know a solution of this problem, from whom assuredly if endowed with good intellect- ual powers, and a " spiritual man," as is said by divine inspiration ■* (for he would necessarily have favored the true arguments concerning the intelligible and sensible nature, which, as far as I can, I have conducted and handled, nay he would have disclosed them far better and more convincingly); we should have heard nothing else concerning this problem, except, as might happen, that there is no class of souls but has its existence from God, and that it is yet rightly said to sinners and unbelievers: " Ye are not of God." For we also, perchance, Divine aid having been implored, should have been able easily to see, that it is one thing to live and another to sin, and (although life in sin may be called death in comparison with just life,^ and while in one man it may be found, that he is at the same time alive and a sinner) that so far as he is alive, he is of God, so far as he is a sinner he is not of God. In which division we use that alternative that suits our sentiment; so that when we wish to insist upon the omnipotence of God as Creator, we may say even to sinners that they are of God. For we are speaking to those who are con- tained in some class, we are speaking to those having animal life, we are speaking to rational beings, we are speaking lastly — and this applies especially to the matter in hand — to living beings, all which things are essentially divine functions. But when our purpose is to con- vict evil men, we rightly sa)^: "Ye are not