else is it that calls us back from the death of all errors, but that Life which knows not how to die, and the Wisdom which, requiring no light, enlightens the minds that do, whereby the universe is governed, even to the fluttering leaves of trees?-Thou providedst also for my obstinacy wherewith I struggled with Vindicianus,3 an acute old man, and Nebridius, a young one of remarkable talent; the former vehemently declaring, and the latter frequently, though with a certain measure of doubt, saying, "That no art existed by which to foresee future things, but that men's surmises had oftentimes the help of luck, and that of many things which they foretold some came to pass unawares to the predicters, who lighted on it by their oft speak behold how He encircleth and filleth them.gers. Let Thy mercies, out of the depth of my Where, then, is evil, and whence, and how soul, confess unto thee for this also, O my crept it in hither? What is its root, and what God. For Thou, Thou altogether, for who its seed? Or hath it no being at all? Why, then, do we fear and shun that which hath no being? Or if we fear it needlessly, then surely is that fear evil whereby the heart is unnecessarily pricked and tormented, and so much a greater evil, as we have naught to fear, and yet do fear. Therefore either that is evil which we fear, or the act of fearing is in itself evil. Whence, therefore, is it, seeing that God, who is good, hath made all these things good? He, indeed, the greatest and chiefest Good, hath created these lesser goods; but both Creator and created are all good. Whence is evil? Or was there some evil matter of which He made and formed and ordered it, but left something in it which He did not convert into good? But why was this? Was He powerless to change ing." Thou, therefore, didst provide a friend the whole lump, so that no evil should remain for me, who was no negligent consulter of the in it, seeing that He is omnipotent? Lastly, astrologers, and yet not thoroughly skilled in why would He make anything at all of it, and those arts, but, as I said, a curious consulter with not rather by the same omnipotency cause it them; and yet knowing somewhat, which he said not to be at all? Or could it indeed exist con- he had heard from his father, which, how far it trary to His will? Or if it were from eternity, would tend to overthrow the estimation of that why did He permit it so to be for infinite spaces art, he knew not. This man, then, by name of times in the past, and was pleased so long Firminius, having received a liberal education, after to make something out of it? Or if He and being well versed in rhetoric, consulted wished now all of a sudden to do something, me, as one very dear to him, as to what I this rather should the Omnipotent have accom- thought on some affairs of his, wherein his plished, that this evil matter should not be at worldly hopes had risen, viewed with regard to all, and that He only should be the whole, true, his so-called constellations; and I, who had chief, and infinite Good. Or if it were not now begun to lean in this particular towards good that He, who was good, should not also Nebridius' opinion, did not indeed decline to be the framer and creator of what was good, speculate about the matter, and to tell him what then that matter which was evil being removed, came into my irresolute mind, but still added and brought to nothing, He might form good that I was now almost persuaded that these matter, whereof He might create all things. were but empty and ridiculous follies. Upon For He would not be omnipotent were He not this he told me that his father had been very able to create something good without being curious in such books, and that he had a friend assisted by that matter which had not been cre- who was as interested in them as he was himated by Himself.1 Such like things did I re-self, who, with combined study and consultavolve in my miserable breast, overwhelmed with most gnawing cares lest I should die ere I discovered the truth; yet was the faith of Thy Christ, our Lord and Saviour, as held in the Catholic Church, fixed firmly in my heart, unformed, indeed, as yet upon many points, and diverging from doctrinal rules, but yet my mind did not utterly leave it, but every day rather drank in more and more of it. CHAP. VI. HE REFUTES THE DIVINATIONS OF STELLATIONS. 8. Now also had I repudiated the lying divinations and impious absurdities of the astrolo 1 See xi. sec. 7, note, below. tion, fanned the flame of their affection for these toys, insomuch that they would observe the moment when the very dumb animals which bred in their houses brought forth, and then observed the position of the heavens with regard to them, so as to gather fresh proofs of this so-called art. He said, moreover, that his father had told him, that at the time his mother was about to give birth to him (Firminius), a female servant of that friend of his father's was also great with child, which could not be hidden from her master, who took care with most diligent exactness to know of the birth of his very dogs. And so it came to pass that (the one for his wife, and the other for his ser Ps. cvii. 8, Vulg. 3 See iv. sec. 5, note, above. or be expressed in those figures which the astrologer is to examine that he may pronounce the truth. Nor can they be true; for, looking into the same figures, he must have foretold the same of Esau and Jacob,1 whereas the same did not happen to them. He must therefore speak falsely; or if truly, then, looking into the same figures, he must not speak the same things. Not then by art, but by chance, would he speak truly. For Thou, O Lord, most righteous Ruler of the universe, the inquirers and inquired of knowing it not, workest by a hidden inspiration that the consulter should hear what, according to the hidden deservings of souls, he ought to hear, out of the depth of Thy righteous judgment, to whom let not man say, "What is this?" or Why that?" Let him not say so, for he is man. vant, with the most careful observation, calcu- they may contend that it has in the nature of lating the days and hours, and the smaller things-cannot be noted by human observation, divisions of the hours) both were delivered at the same moment, so that both were compelled to allow the very selfsame constellations, even to the minutest point, the one for his son, the other for his young slave. For so soon as the women began to be in travail, they each gave notice to the other of what was fallen out in their respective houses, and had messengers ready to despatch to one another so soon as they had information of the actual birth, of which they had easily provided, each in his own province, to give instant intelligence. Thus, then, he said, the messengers of the respective parties met one another in such equal distances from either house, that neither of them could discern any difference either in the position of the stars or other most minute points. And yet Firminius, born in a high estate in his parents' house, ran his course through the prosperous paths of this world, was increased in wealth, and elevated CHAP. VII.—HE IS SEVERELY EXERCISED AS TO to honours; whereas that slave-the yoke of his condition being unrelaxed-continued to serve his masters, as Firminius, who knew him, informed me. 66 THE ORIGIN OF EVIL. freed me from those fetters; and I inquired, II. And now, O my Helper, hadst Thou "Whence is evil?" and found no result. But 9. Upon hearing and believing these things, Thou sufferedst me not to be carried away from related by so reliable a person, all that resist the faith by any fluctuations of thought, whereby ance of mine melted away; and first I endeav-I believed Thee both to exist, and Thy suboured to reclaim Firminius himself from that stance to be unchangeable, and that Thou hadst curiosity, by telling him, that upon inspecting a care of and wouldest judge men; and that his constellations, I ought, were I to foretell in Christ, Thy Son, our Lord, and the Holy truly, to have seen in them parents eminent among their neighbours, a noble family in its own city, good birth, becoming education, and liberal learning. But if that servant had consulted me upon the same constellations, since they were his also, I ought again to tell him, likewise truly, to see in them the meanness of his origin, the abjectness of his condition, and everything else altogether removed from and at variance with the former. Whence, then, looking upon the same constellations, I should, if I spoke the truth, speak diverse things, or if I spoke the same, speak falsely; thence assuredly was it to be gathered, that whatever, upon consideration of the constellations, was foretold truly, was not by art, but by chance; and whatever falsely, was not from the unskilfulness of the art, but the error of chance. Scriptures, which the authority of Thy Catholic What For what was that which was thence most familiar friends? Did the whole tumult through my tongue poured into the ears of my of my soul, for which neither time nor speech was sufficient, reach them? Yet went the whole into Thine ears, all of which I bellowed out 10. An opening being thus made, I ruminated from the sighings of my heart; and my desire within myself on such things, that no one of was before Thee, and the light of mine eyes was those dotards (who followed such occupations, not with me; for that was within, I without. and whom I longed to assail, and with derision Nor was that in place, but my attention was to confute) might urge against me that Firmi-directed to things contained in place; but there nius had informed me falsely, or his father him: I turned my thoughts to those that are born twins, who generally come out of the womb so near one to another, that the small distance of time between them-how much force soever did I find no resting-place, nor did they receive me in such a way as that I could say, "It is He uses the same illustration when speaking of the mathematici, or astrologers, in his De Doct. Christ. ii. 33. 2 Ps. xxxvii. 9-11, Vulg. 2 sufficient, it is well;" nor did they let me turn back, where it might be well enough with me. For to these things was I superior, but inferior to Thee; and Thou art my true joy when I am subjected to Thee, and Thou hadst subjected to me what Thou createdst beneath me.' And this was the true temperature and middle region of my safety, to continue in Thine image, and by serving Thee to have dominion over the body. But when I lifted myself proudly against Thee, and "ran against the Lord, even on His neck, with the thick bosses" of my buckler, even these inferior things were placed above me, and pressed upon me, and nowhere was there alleviation or breathing space. They encountered my sight on every side in crowds and troops, and in thought the images of bodies obtruded themselves as I was returning to Thee, as if they would say unto me, "Whither goest thou, unworthy and base one?" And these things had sprung forth out of my wound; for thou humblest the proud like one that is wounded,3 and through my own swelling was I separated from Thee; yea, my too much swollen face closed up mine eyes. Platonist, who hath indeed this beginning of St. John's Gospel, CHAP. VIII.-BY GOD'S ASSISTANCE HE BY DEGREES nature; while, on the other hand, the genial promptness is as re ARRIVES AT THE TRUTH. 12. "But Thou, O Lord, shalt endure for ever," yet not for ever art Thou angry with us, because Thou dost commiserate our dust and ashes; and it was pleasing in Thy sight to reform my deformity, and by inward stings didst Thou disturb me, that I should be dissatisfied until Thou wert made sure to my inward sight. And by the secret hand of Thy remedy was my swelling lessened, and the disordered and darkened eyesight of my mind, by the sharp anointings of healthful sorrows, was from day to day made whole. CHAP. IX.—HE COMPARES THE DOCTRINE OF THE 13. And Thou, willing first to show me how Thou "resistest the proud, but givest grace unto the humble," and by how great an act of mercy Thou hadst pointed out to men the path of humility, in that Thy "Word was it 1 Man can only control the forces of nature by yielding obedience to nature's laws; and our true joy and safety is only to be found in being "subjected" to God. So Augustin says in another place (De Trin. x. 7), the soul is enjoined to know itself, "in order that may consider itself, and live according to its own nature; that is, seek to be regulated according to its own nature, viz. under Him to whom it ought to be subject, and above those things to which it is to be preferred; under Him by whom it ought to be ruled, above those things which it ought to rule." # Job xv. 26. Ps. lxxxix. 11, Vulg. 4 Ps. cii. 12. Jas. iv. 6, and 1 Pet. v. 5. its greater readiness for receiving and heartily embracing this truth ferred to at the beginning of this note, is examined in Burton's when it arrived." The passage from Amelius the Platonist, reBampton Lectures, note 90. It has been adverted to by Eusebius, quoted in note 2, sec. 25, below. See Kayes' Clement, pp. 116Theodoret, and perhaps by Augustin in the De Civ. Dei, x. 29, 124. 7 See i. sec. 23, note, above, and also his Life, in the last vol. of the Benedictine edition of his works, for a very fair estimate of his knowledge of Greek, The Neo-Platonic ideas as to the "Word" or Aoyos, which Augustin (1) contrasts during the remainder of this book with the Greek term expresses both reason and the expression of reason in speech; and the Fathers frequently illustrate, by reference to this doctrine of the gospel, had its germ in the writings of Plato. The connection between ideas and uttered words, the fact that the "Word" that was with God had an incarnate existence in the world as the "Word" made flesh. By the Logos of the Alexandrian school something very different was meant from the Christian doctrine as to the incarnation, of which the above can only be taken as a dim illustration. It has been questioned, indeed, whether the philosophers, from Plotinus to the Gnostics of the time of St. John, believed the Logos and the supreme God to have in any sense sepa rate "personalities." Dr. Burton, in his Bampton Lectures, concludes that they did not (lect. vii. p. 215, and note 93; compare Dorner, Person of Christ, i. 27, Clark); and quotes Origen when he points out to Celsus, that "while the heathen use the reason of This God as another term for God Himself, the Christians use the term Logos for the Son of God." Another point of difference which Platonist's discarding the idea of the Logos becoming man. appears in Augustin's review of Platonism above, is found in the the very genius of their philosophy forbade them to hold, since they Christianity by Gibbon and other sceptical writers, that it has bor looked on matter as impure. (2) It has been charged against rowed largely from the doctrines of Plato; and it has been said that tyr. this doctrine of the Logos was taken from them by Justin MarThis charge, says Burton (ibid. p. 194), "has laid open in its supporters more inconsistencies and more misstatements than any other which ever has been advanced." We have alluded in the note to book iii. sec. 8, above, to Justin Martyr's search after truth. He endeavoured to find it successively in the Stoical, the Peripatetic, the Pythagorean, and the Platonic schools; and he appears to have thought as highly of Plato's philosophy as did Augus tin. He does not, however, fail to criticise his doctrine when inconsistent with Christianity (see Burton, ibid. notes 18 and 86). Justin Martyr has apparently been chosen for attack as being the earliest of the post-apostolic Fathers. Burton, however, shows that Ignatius, who knew St. John, and was bishop of Antioch thirty years before his death, used precisely the same expression as applied to Christ (ibid. p. 204). This would appear to be a conclu that, "In the beginning was the Word, and the 3 115 14. In like manner, I read there that God the Word was born not of flesh, nor of blood, nor of the will of man, nor of the will of the flesh, but of God. But that "the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us,' "I read not there. For I discovered in those books that it was in many and divers ways said, that the Son was in the form of the Father, and "thought it not robbery to be equal with God," for that naturally He was the same substance. But that He emptied Himself, "and took upon Him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men and being found in fashion as a man, He humbled Himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. Wherefore God also hath highly exalted Him" appear that this heresy that there was indeed One who might be called "the from the dead, "and given Him a name above 13 an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and four-footed beasts, and creeping things," 20 namely, into that Egyptian food" for which Esau lost his birthright; 22 for that four-footed beast instead of Thee, turning back Thy first-born people worshipped the head of a in heart towards Egypt, and prostrating Thy image their own soul-before the image "of 15. And therefore also did I read there, that they had changed the glory of Thy incorruptisive answer to this objection. (3) It may be well to note here Bur-ble nature into idols and divers forms,-" into ton's general conclusions as to the employment of this term Logos in St. John, since it occurs frequently in this part of the Confessions. Every one must have observed St. John's use of the term is peculiar as compared with the other apostles, but it is not always borne in mind that a generation probably elapsed between the date of his gospel and that of the other apostolic writings. In this interval the Gnostic heresy had made great advances; and it would it a nobler meaning, and pointed out to those being led away by John, finding this term Logos prevalent when he wrote, infused into Word"-One who was not, indeed, God's mind, or as the word that comes from the mouth and passes away, but One who, while He had been “made flesh" like unto us, was yet co-eternal with God. "You will perceive," says Archer Butler (Ancient Philosophy, vol. ii. p. 10), "how natural, or rather how necessary, is such a process, when you remember that this is exactly what every teacher must do who speaks of God to a heathen; he adopts the term, but he refines and exalts its meaning. Nor, indeed, is the procedure different in any use whatever of language in sacred senses and for sacred purposes. It has been justly remarked, by (I think) Isaac Casaubon, that the principle of all these adaptations is expressed in the sentence of St. Paul, ὃν ἀγνοοῦντες εὐσεβεῖτε, τοῦτον ἐγὼ καταγγέλλω ὑμῖν.” On the charge against Christianity of having borrowed from heathenism, reference may be made to Trench's Hulsean Lectures, lect. i. (1846); and for the sources of Gnosticism, and St. John's treatment of heresies as to the "Word," lects. ii. and v. in Mansel's Gnostic Heresies will be consulted with profit. 1 John i. 1-5. 2 Ibid. i. 7, 8. 3 See note, sec. 23, below. ✦ John i. 9. 6 lbid. i. 10. • Ibid. i. 11. Ibid. i. 12. 8 Ibid. i. 14. 9 Phil. ii. 6-11. 14 Ibid. ver. 28. 21 In the Benedictine edition we have reference to Augustin's in Ps. xlvi. 6, where he says: "We find the lentile is an Egyptian food, for it abounds in Egypt, whence the Alexandrian lentile is esteemed so as to be brought to our country, as if it grew not here. Esau, by desiring Egyptian food, lost his birthright; and so the Jewish people, of whom it is said they turned back in heart to Egypt, in a manner craved for lentiles, and lost their birthright." See Ex. xvi. 3: Num. xi. 5. Gen. xxv. 33, 34. an ox that eateth grass. These things found I there; but I fed not on them. For it pleased Thee, O Lord, to take away the reproach of diminution from Jacob, that the elder should serve the younger; and Thou hast called the Gentiles into Thine inheritance. And I had come unto Thee from among the Gentiles, and I strained after that gold which Thou willedst Thy people to take from Egypt, seeing that wheresoever it was it was Thine. And to the Athenians Thou saidst by Thy apostle, that in Thee "we live, and move, and have our being;" as one of their own poets has said. And verily these books came from thence. But I set not my mind on the idols of Egypt, whom they ministered to with Thy gold," "who changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator.' CHAP. X. DIVINE THINGS ARE THE MORE CLEARLY MANIFESTED TO HIM WHO WITHDRAWS INTO THE RECESSES OF HIS HEART. 16. And being thence warned to return to myself, I entered into my inward self, Thou 1 Ps. cvi. 20; Ex. xxxii. 1-6. Rom. ix. 12. 7 leading me on; and I was able to do it, for And I And ? Not the "corporeal brightness" which as a Manichee he had believed in, and to which reference has been made in iii. secs. 10, 12, iv. sec. 3, and sec. 2, above. The Christian belief he indicates in his De Trin. viii. 2: “God is Light (1 John i. 5), not in such way that these eyes see, but in such way as the heart sees when it is said, 'He is Truth." See also note 1, sec. 23, above. 3 Similarly, as to, all truth being God's, Justin Martyr says: "Whatever things were rightly said among all men are the property of us Christians" (Apol. ii. 13). In this he parallels what Augustin claims in another place (De Doctr. Christ. ii. 28): "Let every good and true Christian understand that wherever truth may be found, it belongs to his Master." Origen has a similar allusion to that of Augustin above (Ep. ad Gregor, vol. i. 30), but echoes the experience of our erring nature, when he says that the gold of Egypt more frequently becomes transformed into an idol, than into an ornament for the tabernacle of God. Augustin gives us at length his views on this matter in his De Doctr. Christ. ii. 60, 61: "If those who are called philosophers, and especially the Platonists, have said aught that is true and in harmony with our faith, we are not only not to shrink from it, but to claim it for our own use from those who have unlawful possession of it. For, as the Egyptians had not only the idols and heavy burdens which the people of Israel hated and fled from, but also vessels and ornaments of gold and silver, and garments, which the same people when going out of Egypt appropriated to themselves, designing them for a better use, -not doing this on their own authority, but by the command of God, the Egyptians themselves, in their ignorance, providing them with things which they themselves were not making a good use of (Ex. iii. 21, 22, xii. 35, 36); in the same way all branches of heathen learning have not only false and superstitious fancies and heavy burdens of unnecessary toil, which every one of us, when going out under the leadership of Christ from the fellowship of the heathen, ought to abhor and avoid, but they contain also liberal instruction, which is better adapted to the use of the truth, and some most excellent precepts of morality; and some truths in regard even to the worship of the One God are found among them. Now these are, so to speak, their gold and silver, which they did not create them-"we are men, created in the image of our Creator, whose eternity selves, but dug out of the mines of God's providence which are every where scattered abroad, and are perversely and unlawfully prostituting to the worship of devils. These, therefore, the Christian, when he separates himself in spirit from the miserable fellowship of these men, ought to take away from them, and to devote to their proper use in preaching the gospel. Their garments, also, that is, human institutions such as are adapted to that intercourse with men which is indispensable in this life,-we must take and turn to a Christian use. And what else have many good and faithful men among our brethren done? Do we not see with what a quantity of gold and silver, and garments, Cyprian, that most persuasive teacher and most blessed martyr, was loaded when he came out of Egypt? How much Lactantius brought with him! And Victorinus, and Optatus, and Hilary, not to speak of living men! How much Greeks out of number have borrowed! And, prior to all these, that most faithful servant of God, Moses, had done the same thing for of him it is written that he was learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians (Acts vii. 22). . . . For what was done at the time of the exodus was no doubt a type prefiguring what happens now." 4 Acts xvii. 28. 8 If we knew not God, he says, we could not love Him (De Trin. viii. 12); but in language very similar to that above, he tells us is true, and whose truth is eternal; whose love is eternal and true, and who Himself is the eternal, true, and adorable Trinity, without confusion, without separation' (De Civ. Dei, xi. 28); God, then, as even the Platonists hold, being the principle of all knowledge. "Let Him," he concludes, in his De Civ. Dei (viii. 4), “be sought in whom all things are secured to us, let Him be discovered in whom all truth becomes certain to us, let Him be loved in whom all becomes right to us." 9 Ps. xxxix. 11, Vulg. 10 Ex. iii. 14. Augustin, when in his De Civ. Dei (viii. 11, 12) he makes reference to this text, leans to the belief, from certain parallels between Plato's doctrines and those of the word of God, that he may have derived information concerning the Old Testament Scriptures from an interpreter when in Egypt. He says: "The most striking thing in this connection, and that which most of all inclines me almost to assent to the opinion that Plato was not ignorant of those writings, is the answer which was given to the question elicited from the holy Moses when the words of God were conveyed to him by the angel; for when he asked what was the name of that God who was commanding him to go and deliver the Hebrew people out of Egypt, this answer was given: I am who am; and thou shalt say to the children of Israel, He who is sent me unto you;' as though, compared with Him that truly is, because |