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eagerness in perfect silence, and give expression to the feelings of their minds as moved by the words of the preacher, in groans, or tears, or signs of joy without noise or shouting. Then there is refreshment for the body, as much as health and a sound condition of the body requires, every one checking unlawful appetite, so as not to go to excess even in the poor, inexpensive fare provided. So they not only abstain from flesh and wine, in order to gain the mastery over their passions, but also from those things which are only the more likely to whet the appetite of the palate and of the stomach, from what some call their greater cleanness, which often serves as a ridiculous and disgraceful excuse for an unseemly taste for exquisite viands, as distant from animal food. Whatever they possess in addition to what is required for their support (and much is obtained, owing to their industry and frugality), they distribute to the needy with greater care than they took in procuring it for themselves. For while they make no effort to obtain abun dance, they make every effort to prevent their dance, they make every effort to prevent their abundance remaining with them,-so much so, that they send shiploads to places in habited by poor people. I need say no more

on a matter known to all.'

Church as that I should limit my praise of it to the life of those here mentioned. For how many bishops have I known most excellent and holy men, how many presbyters, how many deacons, and ministers of all kinds of the divine sacraments, whose virtue seems to me more admirable and more worthy of commendation on account of the greater difficulty of preserving it amidst the manifold varieties of men, and in this life of turmoil! For they preside over men needing cure as much as over those already cured. The vices of the crowd must be borne with in order that they may be cured, and the plague must be endured before it is subdued. To keep here the best way of life and a mind calm and peaceful is very hard. Here, in a word, we are among people who are learning to live. There they live.

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70. Still I would not on this account cast a slight upon a praiseworthy class of Christians, those, namely, who live together in cities, quite apart from common life. Milan a lodging-house of saints, in number not a few, presided over by one presbyter, a 68. Such, too, is the life of the women, who Rome I knew several places where there was man of great excellence and learning. At serve God assiduously and chastely, living in each one eminent for weight of character, apart and removed as far as propriety demands and prudence, and divine knowledge, presid from the men, to whom they are united only ing over all the rest who lived with him, in in pious affection and in imitation of virtue. No young men are allowed access to them, nor even old men, however respectable and approved, except to the porch, in order to furnish necessary supplies. For the women occupy and maintain themselves by working

in wool, and hand over the cloth to the

brethren, from whom, in return, they get what they need for food. Such customs, such a life, such arrangements, such a system, I could not commend as it deserves, if I wished to commend it; besides, I am afraid that it would seem as if I thought it unlikely to gain acceptance from the mere description of it, if I considered myself obliged to add an ornamental eulogium to the simple narrative. Ye Manichæans, find fault here if you can. Do not bring into prominence our tares before

men too blind to discriminate.

CHAP. 32.-PRAISE OF THE CLERGY. 69. There is not, however, such narrowness in the moral excellence of the Catholic

[This picture of cœnobitic life, even in its purest form, is doubtless idealized. It is certain that the monasteries very soon became hot-beds of vice, and the refuge of the scum of society.A. H. N.]

I was told

Christian charity, and sanctity, and liberty.
These, too, are not burdensome to any one;
but, in the Eastern fashion, and on the au-
thority of the Apostle Paul, they maintain
themselves with their own hands.
that many practised fasts of quite amazing
daily towards night, which is everywhere quite
severity, not merely taking only one meal
days or more in succession without food or
common, but very often continuing for three
drink. And this among not men only, but
bers as widows or virgins, gaining a livelihood
women, who also live together in great num-
by spinning and weaving, and presided over
in each case by a woman of the greatest judg-
ment and experience, skilled and accom-
plished not only in directing and forming
moral conduct, but also in instructing the
understanding."

71. With all this, no one is pressed to endure hardships for which he is unfit; nothing is imposed on any one against his will; nor is he condemned by the rest because he con

2 [Augustin ascribes a broadmindedness and charitableness to the ascetics of his time which was doubtless quite subjective. The ascetics of that age with whose history we are acquainted were not of this type. Jerome is an exa.nple.-A. H. N.]

fesses himself too feeble to imitate them: for are still in need of such abstinence. The they bear in mind how strongly Scripture people I was describing know and observe enjoins charity on all; they bear in mind, these things; for they are Christians, not "To the pure all things are pure," and "Not heretics. They understand Scripture accordthat which entereth into your mouth defileth ing to the apostolic teaching, not according you, but that which cometh out of it." Ac- to the presumptuous and fictitious name of cordingly, all their endeavors are concerned apostle. Him that eats not no one despises; not about the rejection of kinds of food as him that eats no one judges; he who is weak polluted, but about the subjugation of inor- eats herbs. Many who are strong, however, dinate desire and the maintenance of brotherly do this for the sake of the weak; with many love. They remember, "Meats for the belly, the reason for so doing is not this, but that and the belly for meats; but God shall destroy they may have a cheaper diet, and may lead a both it and them;"3 and again, "Neither if life of the greatest tranquillity, with the least we eat shall we abound, nor if we refrain from expensive provision for the support of the eating shall we be in want; and, above all, body. For all things are lawful for me," this: "It is good, my brethren, not to eat he says; "but I will not be brought under the flesh, nor drink wine, nor anything whereby power of any."7 Thus many do not eat flesh, thy brother is offended;" for this passage and yet do not superstitiously regard it as shows that love is the end to be aimed at in unclean. And so the same people who abstain all these things. "For one man," he says, when in health take it when unwell without "believes that he can eat all things: another, any fear, if it is required as a cure. Many who is weak, eateth herbs. He that eateth, drink no wine; but they do not think that let him not despise him that eateth not; and wine defiles them; for they cause it to be let not him that eateth not judge him that given with the greatest propriety and moderaeateth: for God hath approved him. Who tion to people of languid temperament, and, art thou that thou shouldest judge another man's servant? To his own master he stands or falls; but he shall stand: for God is able to make him to stand." And a little after: "He that eateth, to the Lord he eateth, and giveth God thanks; and he that eateth not, to the Lord he eateth not, and giveth God thanks." And also in what follows: "So every one of us shall give account of himself to God. Let us not, then, any more judge one another: but judge this rather, that ye place no stumbling-block, or cause of offence, in the way of a brother. I know, and am confident in the Lord Jesus, that there is nothing common in itself: but to him that thinketh anything to be common, to him it is common." Could he have shown better that it is not in the things we eat, but in the mind, that there is a power able to pollute it, and therefore that even those who are fit to think lightly of these things, and know perfectly that they are not polluted if they take any food in mental superiority, without being gluttons, should still have regard to charity? See what he adds: "For if thy brother be grieved with thy meat, now walkest thou not charitably. "s

in short, to all who cannot have bodily health without it. When some foolishly refuse it, they counsel them as brothers not to let a silly superstition make them weaker instead of making them holier. They read to them the apostle's precept to his disciple to "take a little wine for his many infirmities." Then they diligently exercise piety; bodily exercise, they know, profiteth for a short time, as the same apostle says.9

8

73. Those, then who are able, and they are without number, abstain both from flesh and from wine for two reasons: either for the weakness of their brethren, or for their own liberty. Charity is principally attended to. There is charity in their choice of diet, charity in their speech, charity in their dress, charity in their looks. Charity is the point where they meet, and the plan by which they act. To transgress against charity is thought criminal, like transgressing against God. Whatever opposes this is attacked and expelled; whatever injures it is not allowed to continue for a single day. They know that it has been so enjoined by Christ and the apostles; that without it all things are empty, with it all are fulfilled.

72. Read the rest: it is too long to quote all. You will find that those able to think CHAP. 34.—THE CHURCH IS NOT TO BE BLAMED lightly of such things, that is, those of greater strength and stability,-are told that they must nevertheless abstain, lest those should be offended who from their weakness

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FOR THE CONDUCT OF BAD CHRISTIANS,
WORSHIPPERS OF TOMBS AND PICTURES.

74. Make objections against these, ye

6 See title of the Epistle of Manichæus, Contra Faust, xii. 4.
7 1 Cor. vi. 12.
81 Tim. v. 23.
91 Tim. iv. 8.

Manichæans, if you can. Look at these add to them others still worse, are indeed people, and speak of them reproachfully, if allowed to remain in the field of the Lord, you dare, without falsehood. Compare their and to grow along with the good seed; but fasts with your fasts, their chastity with yours; the time for separating the tares will come. compare them to yourselves in dress, food, Or if, from their having at least the Christian self-restraint, and, lastly, in charity. Com-name, they are to be placed among the chaff pare, which is most to the point, their pre- rather than among thistles, there will also cepts with yours. Then you will see the come One to purge the floor and to separate difference between show and sincerity, between the chaff from the wheat, and to assign to the right way and the wrong, between faith each part (according to its desert) the due and imposture, between strength and inflated- reward.3

ness, between happiness and wretchedness,

between unity and disunion; in short, between CHAP. 35.-MARRIAGE AND PROPERTY ALLOWED the sirens of superstition and the harbor of religion.

TO THE BAPTIZED BY THE APOSTLES.

does party spirit blind your eyes? Why do 77. Meanwhile, why do you rage? why you entangle yourselves in a long defence of such great error? Seek for fruit in the field, seek for wheat in the floor: they will be found easily, and will present themselves to the inquirer. Why do you look so exclusively at the dross? Why do you use the roughness of the hedge to scare away the inexperienced from the fatness of the garden? There is a proper entrance, though known to but a few; and by it men come in, though you disbelieve it, or do not wish to find it. In the Catholic Church there are believers without number who do not use the world, and there are those who "use it," in the words of the apostle, "as not using it," as was proved in

75. Do not summon against me professors of the Christian name, who neither know nor give evidence of the power of their profession. Do not hunt up the numbers of ignorant people, who even in the true religion are superstitious, or are so given up to evil passions as to forget what they have promised to God. I know that there are many worshippers of tombs and pictures. I know that there are many who drink to great excess over the dead, and who, in the feasts which they make for corpses, bury themselves over the buried, and give to their gluttony and drunkenness the name of religion. I know that there are many who in words have renounced this world, and yet desire to be burdened with all the weight of worldly things, and rejoice in such burdens. Nor is it surprising that among so many multitudes you worship idols. For then, how many wealthy should find some by condemning whose life men, how many peasant householders, how you may deceive the unwary and seduce many merchants, how many military men, them from Catholic safety; for in your small how many leading men in their own cities, numbers you are at a loss when called on to and how many senators, people of both sexes, show even one out of those whom you call the giving up all these empty and transitory elect who keeps the precepts, which in your things, though while they used them they indefensible superstition you profess. How were not bound down by them, endured death silly those are, how impious, how mischievous, for the salutary faith and religion, and proved and to what extent they are neglected by to unbelievers that instead of being posmost, nearly all of you, I have shown in sessed by all these things they really possessed

another volume.

you

4

those times when Christians were forced to

them?

76. My advice to you now is this: that 78. Why do you reproach us by saying should at least desist from slandering the that men renewed in baptism ought no longer Catholic Church, by declaiming against the to beget children, or to possess fields, and conduct of men whom the Church herself houses, and money? Paul allows it. For, condemns, seeking daily to correct them as as cannot be denied, he wrote to believers, wicked children. Then, if any of them by after recounting many kinds of evil-doers who good will and by the help of God are cor- shall not possess the kingdom of God: “And rected, they regain by repentance what they such were you," he says: but ye are washed, had lost by sin. Those, again, who with but ye are sanctified, but ye are justified in wicked will persist in their old vices, or even

1 [Augustin says nothing of the encouragement given to such pagan practices by men regarded in that age as possessed of almost superhuman sanctity, such as Sulpicius Severus, Paulinus of Nola, etc. He speaks of corruptions as if they were exceptional, whereas they seem to have been the rule. Yet there is force in his contention that Christianity be judged by its best products rather than by the worst elements associated with it.-A. H. N.]

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[Augustin's ideal representation of Christianity and his identification of the organized Catholic Church with Christianity is quite inconsistent with the practice of the Church which he here seeks to justify. No duty is more distinctly enjoined upon believers in the New Testament than separation from unbelievers and evil doers. But such separation is impracticable in an established Church such as that to which Augustin rejoiced to belong.A. H. N.]

3 Matt. iii. 13, and xiii. 24-43.

41 Cor. vii. 31.

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the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by Not to touch a woman he shows is highest the Spirit of our God.' By the washed and when he says, "I would that all men were sanctified, no one, assuredly, will venture to even as I myself. But next to this highest think any are meant but believers, and those is conjugal chastity, that man may not be the who have renounced this world. But, after prey of fornication. Did he say that these showing to whom he writes, let us see whether people were not yet believers because they he allows these things to them. He goes on: were married? Indeed, by this conjugal "All things are lawful for me, but all things chastity he says that those who are united are are not expedient: all things are lawful for sanctified by one another, if one of them is me, but I will not be brought under the an unbeliever, and that their children also power of any. Meat for the belly, and the are sanctified. "The unbelieving husband," belly for meats: but God will destroy both he says, "is sanctified by the believing wife, it and them. Now the body is not for forni- and the unbelieving woman by the believing cation, but for the Lord, and the Lord for the husband: otherwise your children would be body. But God raised up the Lord, and will unclean; but now are they holy."3 Why do raise us up also by His own power. Know ye you persist in opposition to such plain truth? not that your bodies are the members of Why do you try to darken the light of ScriptChrist? shall I then take the members of ure by vain shadows? Christ, and make them the members of an 8o. Do not say that catechumens are alharlot? God forbid. Know ye not that he lowed to have wives, but not believers; that which is joined to an harlot is made one catechumens may have money, but not body? for the twain, saith He, shall be one believers. For there are many who use as desh. But he that is joined to the Lord is not using. And in that sacred washing the one spirit. Flee fornication. Whatever sin renewal of the new man is begun so as grada man doeth is without the body: but he that ually to reach perfection, in some more committeth fornication sinneth against his quickly. in others more slowly. The proorn body. Know ye not that your members gress, however, to a new life is made in the are the temple of the Holy Spirit which is in case of many, if we view the matter without you, which ye have of God, and ye are not hostility, but attentively. As the apostle your own? For ye are bought with a great says of himself, "Though the outward man price: glorify God, and carry Him in your perish, the inward man is renewed day by body." But of the things concerning day." The apostle says that the inward which ye wrote to me: it is good for a man man is renewed day by day that it may reach not to touch a woman. Nevertheless, to avoid perfection; and you wish it to begin with fornication, let every man have his own wife, perfection! And it were well if you did wish and let every woman have her own husband. it. In reality, you aim not at raising the Let the husband render unto the wife due weak, but at misleading the unwary. benevolence: and likewise also the wife unto ought not to have spoken so arrogantly, even the husband. The wife hath not power of if it were known that you are perfect in your her own body, but the husband: and likewise childish precepts. But when your conscience also the husband hath not power of his own knows that those whom you bring into your body, but the wife. Defraud ye not one the sect, when they come to a more intimate acother, except it be with consent for a time, quaintance with you, will find many things in that ye may have leisure for prayer; and you which nobody hearing you accuse others come together again, that Satan tempt you would suspect, is it not great impertinence to not for your incontinency. But I speak this demand perfection in the weaker Catholics, by permission, and not of commandment. to turn away the inexperienced from the For I would that all men were even as I my- Catholic Church, while you show nothing of self: but every man hath his proper gift of the kind in yourself to those thus turned God, one after this manner, and another after away? But not to seem to inveigh against that." you without reason, I will now close this volume, and will proceed at last to set forth the precepts of your life and your notable customs.

79. Has the apostle, think you, both shown sufficiently to the strong what is highest, and permitted to the weaker what is next best?

11 Cor. vi. 11-20.

21 Cor. vii. 1-7.

31 Cor. vii. 14.

4 2 Cor. iv. 16.

You

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