City of God

Chapter 1

BOOK XXII: Of the eternal happiness of the saints, the resurrection

of the body, and the miracles of the early Church: -- 6 of 1136 -- Editor's Preface THE "City of God" is the masterpiece of the greatest genius among the Latin Fathers, and the best known and most read of his works, ex

Chapter 2

BOOK I

ARGUMENT AUGUSTIN CENSURES THE PAGANS, WHO ATTRIBUTED THE CALAMITIES OF THE WORLD, AND ESPECIALLY THE RECENT SACK OF ROME BY THE GOTHS, TO THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION, AND ITS PROHIBITION OF THE WORSHIP OF THE GODS. HE SPEAKS

Chapter 3

1. For to this earthly city belong the enemies against whom I have to

defend the city of God. Many of them, indeed, being reclaimed from their ungodly error, have become sufficiently creditable citizens of this city; but many are so inflamed with hatred against it, and are so ungrateful to

Chapter 4

1. There are histories of numberless wars, both before the building of

Rome and since its rise and the extension of its dominion; let these be read, and let one instance be cited in which, when a city had been taken by foreigners, the victors spared those who were found to have fled for san

Chapter 5

1. And these be the gods to whose protecting care the Romans were

delighted to entrust their city! O too, too piteous mistake! And they are enraged at us when we speak thus about their gods, though, so far from being enraged at their own writers, they part with money to learn what they

Chapter 6

1. Troy itself, the mother of the Roman people, was not able, as I

have said, to protect its own citizens in the sacred places of their gods from the fire and sword of the Greeks, though the Greeks worshipped the same gods. Not only so, but "Phœnix and Ulysses fell In the void courts by

Chapter 7

1. Even Cæsar himself gives us positive testimony regarding this

custom; for, in his deliverance in the senate about the conspirators, he says (as Sallust, a historian of distinguished veracity, writes) "that virgins and boys are violated, children torn from the embrace of their paren

Chapter 8

1. Why, then, need our argument take note of the many nations who

have waged wars with one another, and have nowhere spared the conquered in the temples of their gods? Let us look at the practice of the Romans themselves let us, I say, recall and review the Romans, whose chief praise i

Chapter 9

1. All the spoiling, then, which Rome was exposed to in the recent

calamity—all the slaughter, plundering, burning, and misery—was the result of the custom of war. But what was novel, was that savage barbarians showed themselves in so gentle a guise, that the largest churches were chose

Chapter 10

1. Will some one say, Why, then, was this divine compassion

extended even to the ungodly and ungrateful? Why, but because it was the mercy of Him who daily "maketh His sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust." For though some of the

Chapter 11

2. There is, too, a very great difference in the purpose served both by

those events which we call adverse and those called prosperous. For the good man is neither uplifted with the good things of time, nor broken by its ills; but the wicked man, because he is corrupted by this world's happi

Chapter 12

1. What, then, have the Christians suffered in that calamitous period,

which would not profit every one who duly and faithfully considered the following circumstances? First of all, they must humbly consider those very sins which have provoked God to fill the world with such terrible disast

Chapter 13

2. If any one forbears to reprove and find fault with those who are

doing wrong, because he seeks a more seasonable opportunity, or because he fears they may be made worse by his rebuke, or that other weak persons may be disheartened from endeavoring to lead a good and pious life, and ma

Chapter 14

3. Accordingly this seems to me to be one principal reason why the

good are chastised along with the wicked, when God is pleased to visit with temporal punishments the profligate manners of a community. They are punished together, not because they have spent an equally corrupt life, but

Chapter 15

1. These are the considerations which one must keep in view, that he

may answer the question whether any evil happens to the faithful and godly which cannot be turned to profit. Or shall we say that the question is needless, and that the apostle is vaporing when he says, "We know that all

Chapter 16

2. They, then, who lost their worldly all in the sack of Rome, if they

owned their possessions as they had been taught by the apostle, who himself was poor without, but rich within,—that is to say, if they used the world as not using it,—could say in the words of Job, heavily tried, but not

Chapter 17

3. But some good and Christian men have been put to the torture,

that they might be forced to deliver up their goods to the enemy. They could indeed neither deliver nor lose that good which made themselves good. If, however, they preferred torture to the surrender of the mammon of ini

Chapter 18

4. Again, they say that the long famine laid many a Christian low. But

this, too, the faithful turned to good uses by a pious endurance of it. For those whom famine killed outright it rescued from the ills of this life, as a kindly disease would have done; and those who were only -- 38 of

Chapter 19

1. But, it is added, many Christians were slaughtered, and were put to

death in a hideous variety of cruel ways. Well, if this be hard to bear, it is assuredly the common lot of all who are born into this life. Of this at least I am certain, that no one has ever died who was not destined to

Chapter 20

1. Further still, we are reminded that in such a carnage as then

occurred, the bodies could not even be buried. But godly confidence is not appalled by so ill-omened a circumstance; for the faithful bear in mind that assurance has been given that not a hair of their head shall perish,

Chapter 21

2. The men against whom I have undertaken to defend the city of

God laugh at all this. But even their own philosophers have despised a careful burial; and often whole armies have fought and fallen for their earthly country without caring to inquire whether they would be left exposed

Chapter 22

1. Nevertheless the bodies of the dead are not on this account to be

despised and left unburied; least of all the bodies of the righteous and faithful, which have been used by the Holy Spirit as His organs and instruments for all good works. For if the dress of a father, or his ring, or a

Chapter 23

1. But, say they, many Christians were even led away captive. This

indeed were a most pitiable fate, if they could be led away to any place where they could not find their God. But for this calamity also -- 42 of 1136 -- sacred Scripture affords great consolation. The three youths wer

Chapter 24

1. But among their own famous men they have a very noble example

of the voluntary endurance of captivity in obedience to a religious scruple. Marcus Attilius Regulus, a Roman general, was a prisoner in the hands of the Carthaginians. But they, being more anxious to exchange their pris

Chapter 25

2. But if they say that M. Regulus, even while a prisoner and

enduring these bodily torments, might yet enjoy the blessedness of a virtuous soul, then let them recognize that true virtue by which a city also may be blessed. For the blessedness of a community and of an individual fl

Chapter 26

1. But they fancy they bring a conclusive charge against Christianity,

when they aggravate the horror of captivity by adding that not only wives and unmarried maidens, but even consecrated virgins, were violated. But truly, with respect to this, it is not Christian faith, nor piety, nor eve

Chapter 27

1. And consequently, even if some of these virgins killed themselves

to avoid such disgrace, who that has any human feeling would refuse to forgive them? And as for those who would not put an end to their lives, lest they might seem to escape the crime of another by a sin of their own, he

Chapter 28

1. But is there a fear that even another's lust may pollute the

violated? It will not pollute, if it be another's: if it pollute, it is not another's, but is shared also by the polluted. But since purity is a virtue of the soul, and has for its companion virtue, the fortitude which w

Chapter 29

2. For the sanctity of the body does not consist in the integrity of its

members, nor in their exemption from all touch; for they are exposed to various accidents which do violence to and wound them, and the surgeons who administer relief often perform operations that sicken the spectator. A

Chapter 30

1. This, then, is our position, and it seems sufficiently lucid. We

maintain that when a woman is violated while her soul admits no consent to the iniquity, but remains inviolably chaste, the sin is not hers, but his who violates her. But do they against whom we have to defend not only t

Chapter 31

2. But how is it, that she who was no partner to the crime bears the

heavier punishment of the two? For the adulterer was only banished along with his father; she suffered the extreme penalty. If that was not impurity by which she was unwillingly ravished, then this is not justice by whic

Chapter 32

3. Nevertheless, for our purpose of refuting those who are unable to

comprehend what true sanctity is, and who therefore insult over our outraged Christian women, it is enough that in the instance of this noble Roman matron it was said in her praise, "There were two, but the adultery was

Chapter 33

1. It is not without significance, that in no passage of the holy

canonical books there can be found either divine precept or -- 51 of 1136 -- permission to take away our own life, whether for the sake of entering on the enjoyment of immortality, or of shunning, or ridding ourselves

Chapter 34

1. However, there are some exceptions made by the divine authority

to its own law, that men may not be put to death. These exceptions are of two kinds, being justified either by a general law, or by a special commission granted for a time to some individual. And in this latter case, he

Chapter 35

1. But they who have laid violent hands on themselves are perhaps to

be admired for their greatness of soul, though they cannot be applauded for the soundness of their judgment. However, if you look at the matter more closely, you will scarcely call it greatness of soul, which prompts a m

Chapter 36

2. Again, it is said many have killed themselves to prevent an enemy

doing so. But we are not inquiring whether it has been done, but whether it ought to have been done. Sound judgment is to be preferred even to examples, and indeed examples harmonize with the voice of reason; but not all

Chapter 37

1. Besides Lucretia, of whom enough has already been said, our

advocates of suicide have some difficulty in finding any other prescriptive example, unless it be that of Cato, who killed himself at Utica. His example is appealed to, not because he was the only man who did so, but bec

Chapter 38

1. Our opponents are offended at our preferring to Cato the saintly

Job, who endured dreadful evils in his body rather than deliver himself from all torment by self-inflicted death; or other saints, of whom it is recorded in our authoritative and trustworthy books that they bore captivit

Chapter 39

1. But, we are told, there is ground to fear that, when the body is

subjected to the enemy's lust, the insidious pleasure of sense may entice the soul to consent to the sin, and steps must be taken to prevent so disastrous a result. And is not suicide the proper mode of preventing not on

Chapter 40

1. But, they say, in the time of persecution some holy women escaped

those who menaced them with outrage, by casting themselves into rivers which they knew would drown them; and having died in this manner, they are venerated in the church catholic as martyrs. Of such persons I do not pres

Chapter 41

1. There remains one reason for suicide which I mentioned before,

and which is thought a sound one,—namely, to prevent one's falling into sin either through the blandishments of pleasure or the violence of pain. If this reason were a good one, then we should be impelled to -- 59 of 11

Chapter 42

1. Let not your life, then, be a burden to you, ye faithful servants of

Christ, though your chastity was made the sport of your enemies. You have a grand and true consolation, if you maintain a good conscience, and know that you did not consent to the sins of those who were permitted to comm

Chapter 43

2. We must further notice that some of those sufferers may have

conceived that continence is a bodily good, and abides so long as the body is inviolate, and did not understand that the purity both of the body and the soul rests on the steadfastness of the will strengthened by God's g

Chapter 44

1. The whole family of God, most high and most true, has therefore a

consolation of its own,—a consolation which cannot deceive, and which has in it a surer hope than the tottering and falling affairs of earth can afford. They will not refuse the discipline of this temporal life, in which

Chapter 45

1. If the famous Scipio Nasica were now alive, who was once your

pontiff, and was unanimously chosen by the senate, when, in the panic created by the Punic war, they sought for the best citizen to entertain the Phrygian goddess, he would curb this shamelessness of yours, though you wo

Chapter 46

1. For at what stage would that passion rest when once it has lodged

in a proud spirit, until by a succession of advances it has reached -- 64 of 1136 -- even the throne. And to obtain such advances nothing avails but unscrupulous ambition. But unscrupulous ambition has nothing to work

Chapter 47

1. Know then, ye who are ignorant of this, and ye who feign

ignorance be reminded, while you murmur against Him who has freed you from such rulers, that the scenic games, exhibitions of shameless folly and license, were established at Rome, not by men's vicious cravings, but by t

Chapter 48

1. Oh infatuated men, what is this blindness, or rather madness,

which possesses you? How is it that while, as we hear, even the eastern nations are bewailing your ruin, and while powerful states in the most remote parts of the earth are mourning your fall as a public calamity, ye you

Chapter 49

1. And that you are yet alive is due to God, who spares you that you

may be admonished to repent and reform your lives. It is He who has permitted you, ungrateful as you are, to escape the sword of the enemy, by calling yourselves His servants, or by finding asylum in the sacred places of

Chapter 50

1. Let these and similar answers (if any fuller and fitter answers can

be found) be given to their enemies by the redeemed family of the Lord Christ, and by the pilgrim city of King Christ. But let this city bear in mind, that among her enemies lie hid those who are destined to be fellow-ci

Chapter 51

1. But I have still some things to say in confutation of those who refer

the disasters of the Roman republic to our religion, because it prohibits the offering of sacrifices to the gods. For this end I must -- 68 of 1136 -- recount all, or as many as may seem sufficient, of the disasters wh

Chapter 52

BOOK II

ARGUMENT -- 69 of 1136 -- IN THIS BOOK AUGUSTIN REVIEWS THOSE CALAMITIES WHICH THE ROMANS SUFFERED BEFORE THE TIME OF CHRIST, AND WHILE THE WORSHIP OF THE FALSE GODS WAS UNIVERSALLY PRACTISED; AND DEMONSTRATES THAT, FA

Chapter 53

1. IF the feeble mind of man did not presume to resist the clear

evidence of truth, but yielded its infirmity to wholesome doctrines, as to a health-giving medicine, until it obtained from God, by its faith and piety, the grace needed to heal it, they who have just ideas, and express

Chapter 54

1. In the foregoing book, having begun to speak of the city of God, to

which I have resolved, Heaven helping me, to consecrate the whole of this work, it was my first endeavor to reply to those who attribute the wars by which the world is being devastated, and especially the recent sack of

Chapter 55

1. But remember that, in recounting these things, I have still to

address myself to ignorant men; so ignorant, indeed, as to give birth to the common saying, "Drought and Christianity go hand in hand." There are indeed some among them who are thoroughly well- educated men, and have a t

Chapter 56

1. First of all, we would ask why their gods took no steps to improve

the morals of their worshippers. That the true God should neglect those who did not seek His help, that was but justice; but why did those gods, from whose worship ungrateful men are now complaining that they are prohibi

Chapter 57

1. In this matter I would prefer to have as my assessors in judgment,

not those men who rather take pleasure in these infamous customs than take pains to put an end to them, but that same Scipio Nasica -- 74 of 1136 -- who was chosen by the senate as the citizen most worthy to receive in

Chapter 58

1. This is the reason why those divinities quite neglected the lives and

morals of the cities and nations who worshipped them, and threw no dreadful prohibition in their way to hinder them from becoming utterly corrupt, and to preserve them from those terrible and detestable evils which visit

Chapter 59

1. But will they perhaps remind us of the schools of the philosophers,

and their disputations? In the first place, these belong not to Rome, but to Greece; and even if we yield to them that they are now Roman, because Greece itself has become a Roman province, still the teachings of the phi

Chapter 60

1. But, some one will interpose, these are the fables of poets, not the

deliverances of the gods themselves. Well, I have no mind to arbitrate between the lewdness of theatrical entertainments and of mystic rites; only this I say, and history bears me out in making the assertion, that those

Chapter 61

1. The opinion of the ancient Romans on this matter is attested by

Cicero in his work De Republica, in which Scipio, one of the interlocutors, says, "The lewdness of comedy could never have been suffered by audiences, unless the customs of society had previously sanctioned the same lewd

Chapter 62

1. It is alleged, in excuse of this practice, that the stories told of the

gods are not true, but false, and mere inventions, but this only makes matters worse, if we form our estimate by the morality our religion teaches; and if we consider the malice of the devils, what more wily and astute a

Chapter 63

1. It was a part of this same reasonableness of the Greeks which

induced them to bestow upon the actors of these same plays no inconsiderable civic honors. In the above-mentioned book of the De Republica, it is mentioned that Æschines, a very eloquent Athenian, who had been a tragic a

Chapter 64

1. The Romans, however, as Scipio boasts in that same discussion,

declined having their conduct and good name subjected to the assaults and slanders of the poets, and went so far as to make it a capital crime if any one should dare to compose such verses. This was a very honorable cour

Chapter 65

1. But Scipio, were he alive, would possibly reply: "How could we

attach a penalty to that which the gods themselves have consecrated? For the theatrical entertainments in which such things are said, and -- 83 of 1136 -- acted, and performed, were introduced into Roman society by the

Chapter 66

1. We have still to inquire why the poets who write the plays, and

who by the law of the twelve tables are prohibited from injuring the good name of the citizens, are reckoned more estimable than the actors, though they so shamefully asperse the character of the gods? Is it right that t

Chapter 67

2. This philosopher, Plato, has been elevated by Labeo to the rank of

a demigod, and set thus upon a level with such as Hercules and Romulus. Labeo ranks demigods higher than heroes, but both he counts among the deities. But I have no doubt that he thinks this man whom he reckons a demigod

Chapter 68

1. But is it not manifest that vanity rather than reason regulated the

choice of some of their false gods? This Plato, whom they reckon a demigod, and who used all his eloquence to preserve men from the most dangerous spiritual calamities, has yet not been counted worthy even of a little sh

Chapter 69

1. Moreover, if the Romans had been able to receive a rule of life

from their gods, they would not have borrowed Solon's laws from the Athenians, as they did some years after Rome was founded; and yet they did not keep them as they received them, but endeavored to improve and amend them

Chapter 70

1. But possibly we are to find the reason for this neglect of the

Romans by their gods, in the saying of Sallust, that "equity and virtue prevailed among the Romans not more by force of laws than of nature." I presume it is to this inborn equity and goodness of disposition we are to as

Chapter 71

1. I will therefore pause, and adduce the testimony of Sallust himself,

whose words in praise of the Romans (that "equity and virtue prevailed among them not more by force of laws than of nature") have given occasion to this discussion. He was referring to that period immediately after the e

Chapter 72

2. Now, if these were the days in which the Roman republic shows

fairest and best, what are we to say or think of the succeeding age, when, to use the words of the same historian, "changing little by little from the fair and virtuous city it was, it became utterly wicked and dissolute

Chapter 73

3. However, I suppose you now see, or at least any one who gives his

attention has the means of seeing, in what a sink of iniquity that city was plunged before the advent of our heavenly King. For these things happened not only before Christ had begun to teach, but before He was even born

Chapter 74

1. Here, then, is this Roman republic, "which has changed little by

little from the fair and virtuous city it was, and has become utterly wicked and dissolute." It is not I who am the first to say this, but their own authors, from whom we learned it for a fee, and who wrote it long befor

Chapter 75

1. But the worshippers and admirers of these gods delight in

imitating their scandalous iniquities, and are nowise concerned that the republic be less depraved and licentious. Only let it remain undefeated, they say, only let it flourish and abound in resources; let it be glorious

Chapter 76

1. But if our adversaries do not care how foully and disgracefully the

Roman republic be stained by corrupt practices, so long only as it -- 95 of 1136 -- holds together and continues in being, and if they therefore pooh- pooh the testimony of Sallust to its "utterly wicked and profligate

Chapter 77

2. When this question has been handled to the satisfaction of the

company, Scipio reverts to the original thread of discourse, and repeats with commendation his own brief definition of a republic, that it is the weal of the people. "The people" he defines as being not every assemblage

Chapter 78

3. When, therefore, the Roman republic was such as Sallust

described it, it was not "utterly wicked and profligate," as he says, but -- 97 of 1136 -- had altogether ceased to exist, if we are to admit the reasoning of that debate maintained on the subject of the republic by it

Chapter 79

4. This is the confession of Cicero, long indeed after the death of

Africanus, whom he introduced as an interlocutor in his work De Republica, but still before the coming of Christ. Yet, if the disasters he bewails had been lamented after the Christian religion had been diffused, and had

Chapter 80

1. But what is relevant to the present question is this, that however

admirable our adversaries say the republic was or is, it is certain that by the testimony of their own most learned writers it had become, long before the coming of Christ, utterly wicked and dissolute, and indeed had no

Chapter 81

2. Possibly they will be bold enough to suggest in defence of the gods,

that they abandoned the city on account of the profligacy of the citizens, according to the lines of Virgil: "Gone from each fane, each sacred shrine, Are those who made this realm divine." But, firstly, if it be so, the

Chapter 82

1. But, further, is it not obvious that the gods have abetted the

fulfilment of men's desires, instead of authoritatively bridling them? For Marius, a low-born and self-made man, who ruthlessly provoked and conducted civil wars, was so effectually aided by them, that he was seven times

Chapter 83

2. It is thus apparent, that when the republic was being destroyed by

profligate manners, its gods did nothing to hinder its destruction by the direction or correction of its manners, but rather accelerated its destruction by increasing the demoralization and corruption that already existe

Chapter 84

1. It is certain that Sylla—whose rule was so cruel that, in comparison

with it, the preceding state of things which he came to avenge was regretted—when first he advanced towards Rome to give battle to Marius, found the auspices so favourable when he sacrificed, that, according to Livy's ac

Chapter 85

2. Afterwards, when Sylla had come to Tarentum, and had sacrificed

there, he saw on the head of the victim's liver the likeness of a golden crown. Thereupon the same soothsayer Postumius interpreted this to signify a signal victory, and ordered that he only should eat of the entrails. A

Chapter 86

1. Now, who does not hereby comprehend,—unless he has preferred

to imitate such gods rather than by divine grace to withdraw himself from their fellowship,—who does not see how eagerly these evil spirits strive by their example to lend, as it were, divine authority to crime? Is not t

Chapter 87

2. We have been forced to bring forward these facts, because their

authors have not scrupled to say and to write that the Roman -- 106 of 1136 -- republic had already been ruined by the depraved moral habits of the citizens, and had ceased to exist before the advent of our Lord Jesus

Chapter 88

1. Seeing that this is so,—seeing that the filthy and cruel deeds, the

disgraceful and criminal actions of the gods, whether real or feigned, were at their own request published, and were consecrated, and dedicated in their honor as sacred and stated solemnities; seeing they vowed vengeance

Chapter 89

2. Where and when those initiated in the mysteries of Cœlestis

received any good instructions, we know not. What we do know is, that before her shrine, in which her image is set, and amidst a vast crowd gathering from all quarters, and standing closely packed together, we were inten

Chapter 90

1. Cicero, a weighty man, and a philosopher in his way, when about

to be made edile, wished the citizens to understand that, among the other duties of his magistracy, he must propitiate Flora by the celebration of games. And these games are reckoned devout in proportion to their lewdnes

Chapter 91

1. They, then, are but abandoned and ungrateful wretches, in deep

and fast bondage to that malign spirit, who complain and murmur that men are rescued by the name of Christ from the hellish thraldom of these unclean spirits, and from a participation in their punishment, and are brought

Chapter 92

1. This, rather, is the religion worthy of your desires, O admirable

Roman race,—the progeny of your Scævolas and Scipios, of Regulus, and of Fabricius. This rather covet, this distinguish from that foul vanity and crafty malice of the devils. If there is in your nature any eminent virtue

Chapter 93

2. No longer, then, follow after false and deceitful gods; abjure them

rather, and despise them, bursting forth into true liberty. Gods they are not, but malignant spirits, to whom your eternal happiness will be a sore punishment. Juno, from whom you deduce your origin according to the fles

Chapter 94

BOOK III

ARGUMENT AS IN THE FOREGOING BOOK AUGUSTIN HAS PROVED REGARDING MORAL AND SPIRITUAL CALAMITIES, SO IN THIS BOOK HE PROVES REGARDING EXTERNAL AND BODILY DISASTERS, THAT SINCE THE FOUNDATION OF THE CITY THE ROMANS HAVE BEE

Chapter 95

1. OF moral and spiritual evils, which are above all others to be

deprecated, I think enough has already been said to show that the -- 113 of 1136 -- false gods took no steps to prevent the people who worshipped them from being overwhelmed by such calamities, but rather aggravated th

Chapter 96

1. First, then, why was Troy or Ilium, the cradle of the Roman people

(for I must not overlook nor disguise what I touched upon in the first book), conquered, taken and destroyed by the Greeks, though it esteemed and worshipped the same gods as they? Priam, some answer, paid the penalty of

Chapter 97

1. There is no ground, then, for representing the gods (by whom, as

they say, that empire stood, though they are proved to have been conquered by the Greeks) as being enraged at the Trojan perjury. Neither, as others again plead in their defence, was it indignation at the adultery of Par

Chapter 98

1. Some one will say, But do you believe all this? Not I indeed. For

even Varro, a very learned heathen, all but admits that these stories are false, though he does not boldly and confidently say so. But he maintains it is useful for states that brave men believe, though falsely, that the

Chapter 99

1. But whether Venus could bear Æneas to a human father Anchises,

or Mars beget Romulus of the daughter of Numitor, we leave as unsettled questions. For our own Scriptures suggest the very similar question, whether the fallen angels had sexual intercourse with the daughters of men, by

Chapter 100

1. I add another instance: If the sins of men so greatly incensed those

divinities, that they abandoned Troy to fire and sword to punish the crime of Paris, the murder of Romulus' brother ought to have incensed them more against the Romans than the cajoling of a Greek husband moved them agai

Chapter 101

1. And surely we may ask what wrong poor Ilium had done, that, in

the first heat of the civil wars of Rome, it should suffer at the hand of Fimbria, the veriest villain among Marius' partisans, a more fierce and cruel destruction than the Grecian sack. For when the Greeks took it many

Chapter 102

1. Where, then, was the wisdom of entrusting Rome to the Trojan

gods, who had demonstrated their weakness in the loss of Troy? Will some one say that, when Fimbria stormed Troy, the gods were already resident in Rome? How, then, did the image of Minerva remain standing? Besides, if t

Chapter 103

1. It is also believed that it was by the help of the gods that the

successor of Romulus, Numa Pompilius, enjoyed peace during his entire reign, and shut the gates of Janus, which are customarily kept open during war. And it is supposed he was thus requited for appointing many religious

Chapter 104

1. Do they reply that the Roman empire could never have been so

widely extended, nor so glorious, save by constant and unintermitting wars? A fit argument, truly! Why must a kingdom be distracted in order to be great? In this little world of man's body, is it not better to have a mod

Chapter 105

1. And it is still this weakness of the gods which is confessed in the

story of the Cuman Apollo, who is said to have wept for four days during the war with the Achæans and King Aristonicus. And when the augurs were alarmed at the portent, and had determined to cast the statue into the sea,

Chapter 106

1. But though Pompilius introduced so ample a ritual, yet did not

Rome see fit to be content with it. For as yet Jupiter himself had not his chief temple,—it being King Tarquin who built the Capitol. And Æsculapius left Epidaurus for Rome, that in this foremost city he might have a fin

Chapter 107

1. How is it that neither Juno, who with her husband Jupiter even

then cherished "Rome's sons, the nation of the gown," nor Venus herself, could assist the children of the loved Aeneas to find wives by some right and equitable means? For the lack of this entailed upon the Romans the la

Chapter 108

1. But what happened after Numa's reign, and under the other kings,

when the Albans were provoked into war, with sad results not to themselves alone, but also to the Romans? The long peace of Numa had become tedious; and with what endless slaughter and detriment of both states did the Ro

Chapter 109

2. Why allege to me the mere names and words of "glory" and

"victory?" Tear off the disguise of wild delusion, and look at the naked deeds: weigh them naked, judge them naked. Let the charge be brought against Alba, as Troy was charged with adultery. There is no such charge, none

Chapter 110

3. Yet those gods, guardians of the Roman empire, and, as it were,

theatric spectators of such contests as these, were not satisfied until the sister of the Horatii was added by her brother's sword as a third victim from the Roman side, so that Rome herself, though she won the day, shou

Chapter 111

1. And what was the end of the kings themselves? Of Romulus, a

flattering legend tells us that he was assumed into heaven. But certain Roman historians relate that he was torn in pieces by the senate for his ferocity, and that a man, Julius Proculus, was suborned to give out that Ro

Chapter 112

2. The other kings of Rome, too, with the exception of Numa

Pompilius and Ancus Marcius, who died natural deaths, what horrible ends they had! Tullus Hostilius, the conqueror and destroyer of Alba, was, as I said, himself and all his house consumed by lightning. Priscus Tarquiniu

Chapter 113

1. To this epoch let us add also that of which Sallust says, that it was

ordered with justice and moderation, while the fear of Tarquin and of a war with Etruria was impending. For so long as the Etrurians aided the efforts of Tarquin to regain the throne, Rome was convulsed with distressing

Chapter 114

1. After this, when their fears were gradually diminished,—not

because the wars ceased, but because they were not so furious,—that period in which things were "ordered with justice and moderation" drew to an end, and there followed that state of matters which Sallust thus briefly sk

Chapter 115

2. Where, then, were those gods who are supposed to be justly

worshipped for the slender and delusive prosperity of this world, when the Romans, who were seduced to their service by lying wiles, were harassed by such calamities? Where were they when Valerius the consul was killed w

Chapter 116

3. At that time, indeed, so many wars were everywhere engaged in,

that through scarcity of soldiers they enrolled for military service the proletarii, who received this name, because, being too poor to equip for military service, they had leisure to beget offspring. Pyrrhus, king of Gr

Chapter 117

1. In the Punic wars, again, when victory hung so long in the balance

between the two kingdoms, when two powerful nations were straining every nerve and using all their resources against one another, how many smaller kingdoms were crushed, how many large and flourishing cities were demolis

Chapter 118

2. Nor were there wanting at that time very heavy disasters within

the city itself. For the Tiber was extraordinarily flooded, and destroyed almost all the lower parts of the city; some buildings being carried away by the violence of the torrent, while others were soaked to rottenness b

Chapter 119

1. As to the second Punic war, it were tedious to recount the disasters

it brought on both the nations engaged in so protracted and shifting a war, that (by the acknowledgment even of those writers who have made it their object not so much to narrate the wars as to eulogize the dominion of R

Chapter 120

1. But among all the disasters of the second Punic war, there

occurred none more lamentable, or calculated to excite deeper complaint, than the fate of the Saguntines. This city of Spain, eminently friendly to Rome, was destroyed by its fidelity to the Roman people. For when Hannib

Chapter 121

1. Omitting many things, that I may not exceed the limits of the work

I have proposed to myself, I come to the epoch between the second and last Punic wars, during which, according to Sallust, the Romans lived with the greatest virtue and concord. Now, in this period of virtue and harmony,

Chapter 122

numbers of them were following their private business) should be

put to death: and this order was executed. How miserable a spectacle was then presented, when each man was suddenly and treacherously murdered wherever he happened to be, in the field or on the road, in the town, in his

Chapter 123

1. But let us now mention, as succinctly as possible, those disasters

which were still more vexing, because nearer home; I mean those discords which are erroneously called civil, since they destroy civil interests. The seditions had now become urban wars, in which blood was freely shed, an

Chapter 124

1. The civil wars originated in the seditions which the Gracchi excited

regarding the agrarian laws; for they were minded to divide among the people the lands which were wrongfully possessed by the nobility. But to reform an abuse of so long standing was an enterprise full of peril, or rathe

Chapter 125

1. A pretty decree of the senate it was, truly, by which the temple of

Concord was built on the spot where that disastrous rising had taken place, and where so many citizens of every rank had fallen. I suppose it was that the monument of the Gracchi's punishment might strike the eye and aff

Chapter 126

1. But they supposed that, in erecting the temple of Concord within

the view of the orators, as a memorial of the punishment and death of the Gracchi, they were raising an effectual obstacle to sedition. How much effect it had, is indicated by the still more deplorable wars that followed

Chapter 127

1. But when Marius, stained with the blood of his fellow-citizens,

whom the rage of party had sacrificed, was in his turn vanquished and driven from the city, it had scarcely time to breathe freely, when, to use the words of Cicero, "Cinna and Marius together returned and took possessio

Chapter 128

1. Then followed the victory of Sylla, the so-called avenger of the

cruelties of Marius. But not only was his victory purchased with great bloodshed; but when hostilities were finished, hostility survived, and the subsequent peace was bloody as the war. To the former and still recent mas

Chapter 129

1. What fury of foreign nations, what barbarian ferocity, can compare

with this victory of citizens over citizens? Which was more disastrous, more hideous, more bitter to Rome: the recent Gothic and the old Gallic invasion, or the cruelty displayed by Marius and Sylla and their partisans a

Chapter 130

1. With what effrontery, then, with what assurance, with what

impudence, with what folly, or rather insanity, do they refuse to impute these disasters to their own gods, and impute the present to our Christ! These bloody civil wars, more distressing, by the avowal of their own hist

Chapter 131

1. Let those who have no gratitude to Christ for His great benefits,

blame their own gods for these heavy disasters. For certainly when these occurred the altars of the gods were kept blazing, and there rose the mingled fragrance of "Sabæan incense and fresh garlands;" the priests were cl

Chapter 132

BOOK IV

ARGUMENT IN THIS BOOK IT IS PROVED THAT THE EXTENT AND LONG DURATION OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE IS TO BE ASCRIBED, NOT TO JOVE OR THE GODS OF THE HEATHEN, TO WHOM INDIVIDUALLY SCARCE EVEN SINGLE THINGS AND THE VERY BASEST FUNCT

Chapter 133

1. HAVING begun to speak of the city of God, I have thought it

necessary first of all to reply to its enemies, who, eagerly pursuing earthly joys and gaping after transitory things, throw the blame of all the sorrow they suffer in them—rather through the compassion of God in admonis

Chapter 134

1. We had promised, then, that we would say something against

those who attribute the calamities of the Roman republic to our religion, and that we would recount the evils, as many and great as we could remember or might deem sufficient, which that city, or the provinces belonging

Chapter 135

1. Now, therefore, let us see how it is that they dare to ascribe the

very great extent and duration of the Roman empire to those gods whom they contend that they worship honorably, even by the obsequies of vile games and the ministry of vile men: although I should like first to inquire fo

Chapter 136

1. Justice being taken away, then, what are kingdoms but great

robberies? For what are robberies themselves, but little kingdoms? The band itself is made up of men; it is ruled by the authority of a -- 163 of 1136 -- prince, it is knit together by the pact of the confederacy; the

Chapter 137

1. I shall not therefore stay to inquire what sort of men Romulus

gathered together, seeing he deliberated much about them,—how, being assumed out of that life they led into the fellowship of his city, they might cease to think of the punishment they deserved, the fear of which had dri

Chapter 138

1. Justinus, who wrote Greek or rather foreign history in Latin, and

briefly, like Trogus Pompeius whom he followed, begins his work thus: "In the beginning of the affairs of peoples and nations the government was in the hands of kings, who were raised to the height of this majesty not by

Chapter 139

1. If this kingdom was so great and lasting without the aid of the

gods, why is the ample territory and long duration of the Roman empire to be ascribed to the Roman gods? For whatever is the cause in it, the same is in the other also. But if they contend that the prosperity of the othe

Chapter 140

1. Next let us ask, if they please, out of so great a crowd of gods which

the Romans worship, whom in especial, or what gods they believe to have extended and preserved that empire. Now, surely of this work, which is so excellent and so very full of the highest dignity, they dare not ascribe a

Chapter 141

1. Therefore omitting, or passing by for a little, that crowd of petty

gods, we ought to inquire into the part performed by the great gods, whereby Rome has been made so great as to reign so long over so many nations. Doubtless, therefore, this is the work of love. For they will have it tha

Chapter 142

1. Why, also, is Juno united to him as his wife, who is called at once

"sister and yoke-fellow?" Because, say they, we have Jove in the ether, Juno in the air; and these two elements are united, the one being superior, the other inferior. It is not he, then, of whom it is said, "All things

Chapter 143

1. Let them therefore assert as many things as ever they please in

physical reasonings and disputations. One while let Jupiter be the soul of this corporeal world, who fills and moves that whole mass, constructed and compacted out of four, or as many elements as they please; another whi

Chapter 144

1. Ought not men of intelligence, and indeed men of every kind, to be

stirred up to examine the nature of this opinion? For there is no need of excellent capacity for this task, that putting away the desire of contention, they may observe that if God is the soul of the world, and the world

Chapter 145

1. But if they contend that only rational animals, such as men, are

parts of God, I do not really see how, if the whole world is God, they can separate beasts from being parts of Him. But what need is there of striving about that? Concerning the rational animal himself,—that is, man,—wha

Chapter 146

1. Here, first of all, I ask, why even the kingdom itself is not some

god. For why should not it also be so, if Victory is a goddess? Or what need is there of Jove himself in this affair, if Victory favors and is propitious, and always goes to those whom she wishes to be victorious? With t

Chapter 147

1. Let them ask, then, whether it is quite fitting for good men to

rejoice in extended empire. For the iniquity of those with whom just wars are carried on favors the growth of a kingdom, which would certainly have been small if the peace and justice of neighbors had not by any wrong pr

Chapter 148

1. But I wonder very much, that while they assigned to separate gods

single things, and (well nigh) all movements of the mind; that while they invoked the goddess Agenoria, who should excite to action; the goddess Stimula, who should stimulate to unusual action; the goddess Murcia, who sh

Chapter 149

1. Or do they say, perhaps, that Jupiter sends the goddess Victoria,

and that she, as it were acting in obedience to the king of the gods, comes to those to whom he may have despatched her, and takes up her quarters on their side? This is truly said, not of Jove, whom they, according to t

Chapter 150

1. What shall we say, besides, of the idea that Felicity also is a

goddess? She has received a temple; she has merited an altar; suitable rites of worship are paid to her. She alone, then, should be -- 179 of 1136 -- worshipped. For where she is present, what good thing can be absent?

Chapter 151

1. To this supposed deity, whom they call Fortuna, they ascribe so

much, indeed, that they have a tradition that the image of her, which was dedicated by the Roman matrons, and called Fortuna Muliebris, has spoken, and has said, once and again, that the matrons pleased her by their homa

Chapter 152

1. They have made Virtue also a goddess, which, indeed, if it could be

a goddess, had been preferable to many. And now, because it is not a goddess, but a gift of God, let it be obtained by prayer from Him, by whom alone it can be given, and the whole crowd of false gods vanishes. But why i

Chapter 153

1. These, not verity but vanity has made goddesses. For these are gifts

of the true God, not themselves goddesses. However, where virtue and felicity are, what else is sought for? What can suffice the man whom virtue and felicity do not suffice? For surely virtue comprehends all things we ne

Chapter 154

1. What is it, then, that Varro boasts he has bestowed as a very great

benefit on his fellow-citizens, because he not only recounts the gods who ought to be worshipped by the Romans, but also tells what pertains to each of them? "Just as it is of no advantage," he says, "to know the name an

Chapter 155

1. But how does it happen, if their books and rituals are true, and

Felicity is a goddess, that she herself is not appointed as the only one to be worshipped, since she could confer all things, and all at once make men happy? For who wishes anything for any other reason than that he may

Chapter 156

4. Thus the goddess Felicity being established in the largest and

loftiest place, the citizens should learn whence the furtherance of every good desire should be sought. And so, by the persuasion of nature herself, the superfluous multitude of other gods being abandoned, Felicity alone

Chapter 157

1. We may, however, consider their reasons. Is it to be believed, say

they, that our forefathers were besotted even to such a degree as not to know that these things are divine gifts, and not gods? But as they knew that such things are granted to no one, except by some god -- 188 of 1136

Chapter 158

1. Having had that reason rendered to us, we shall perhaps much

more easily persuade, as we wish, those whose heart has not become too much hardened. For if now human infirmity has perceived that felicity cannot be given except by some god; if this was perceived by those who worshipp

Chapter 159

1. It is recorded that the very learned pontiff Scævola had

distinguished about three kinds of gods—one introduced by the poets, another by the philosophers, another by the statesmen. The first kind he declares to be trifling, because many unworthy things have been invented by th

Chapter 160

1. Therefore such gods, who are propitiated by such honors, or rather

are impeached by them (for it is a greater crime to delight in having such things said of them falsely, than even if they could be said truly), could never by any means have been able to increase and preserve the Roman e

Chapter 161

1. For what kind of augury is that which they have declared to be

most beautiful, and to which I referred a little ago, that Mars, and Terminus, and Juventas would not give place even to Jove, the king of the gods? For thus, they say, it was signified that the nation dedicated to Mars,

Chapter 162

1. Cicero the augur laughs at auguries, and reproves men for

regulating the purposes of life by the cries of crows and jackdaws. But it will be said that an academic philosopher, who argues that all things are uncertain, is unworthy to have any authority in these matters. In the s

Chapter 163

1. What says Varro himself, whom we grieve to have found, although

not by his own judgment, placing the scenic plays among things divine? When in many passages he is exhorting, like a religious man, to the worship of the gods, does he not in doing so admit that he does not in his own ju

Chapter 164

2. The same most acute and learned author also says, that those

alone seem to him to have perceived what God is, who have believed Him to be the soul of the world, governing it by design and reason. And by this, it appears, that although he did not attain to the truth,— for the true

Chapter 165

1. Varro says also, concerning the generations of the gods, that the

people have inclined to the poets rather than to the natural philosophers; and that therefore their forefathers,—that is, the ancient Romans,—believed both in the sex and the generations of the gods, and settled their ma

Chapter 166

1. Therefore that God, the author and giver of felicity, because He

alone is the true God, Himself gives earthly kingdoms both to good and bad. Neither does He do this rashly, and, as it were, fortuitously, —because He is God not fortune,—but according to the order of things and times, w

Chapter 167

1. Therefore, that it might be known that these earthly good things,

after which those pant who cannot imagine better things, remain in the power of the one God Himself, not of the many false gods whom the Romans have formerly believed worthy of worship, He multiplied His people in Egypt

Chapter 168

BOOK V

ARGUMENT AUGUSTIN FIRST DISCUSSES THE DOCTRINE OF FATE, FOR THE SAKE OF CONFUTING THOSE WHO ARE DISPOSED TO REFER TO FATE THE POWER AND INCREASE OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE, WHICH COULD NOT BE ATTRIBUTED TO FALSE GODS, AS HAS BE

Chapter 169

1. The cause, then, of the greatness of the Roman empire is neither

fortuitous nor fatal, according to the judgment or opinion of those who call those things fortuitous which either have no causes, or such causes as do not proceed from some intelligible order, and those things fatal whic

Chapter 170

1. Cicero says that the famous physician Hippocrates has left in

writing that he had suspected that a certain pair of brothers were twins, from the fact that they both took ill at once, and their disease advanced to its crisis and subsided in the same time in each of them. Posidonius

Chapter 171

1. It is to no purpose, therefore, that that famous fiction about the

potter's wheel is brought forward, which tells of the answer which Nigidius is said to have given when he was perplexed with this -- 206 of 1136 -- question, and on account of which he was called Figulus. For, having w

Chapter 172

1. In the time of the ancient fathers, to speak concerning illustrious

persons, there were born two twin brothers, the one so immediately after the other, that the first took hold of the heel of the second. So great a difference existed in their lives and manners, so great a dissimilarity i

Chapter 173

1. Do not those very persons whom the medical sagacity of

Hippocrates led him to suspect to be twins, because their disease was -- 208 of 1136 -- observed by him to develop to its crisis and to subside again in the same time in each of them,—do not these, I say, serve as a su

Chapter 174

1. But even in the very conception of twins, which certainly occurs at

the same moment in the case of both, it often happens that the one is conceived a male, and the other a female. I know two of different sexes who are twins. Both of them are alive, and in the flower of their age; and tho

Chapter 175

1. Now, will any one bring forward this, that in choosing certain

particular days for particular actions, men bring about certain new destinies for their actions? That man, for instance, according to this doctrine, was not born to have an illustrious son, but rather a contemptible one,

Chapter 176

1. But, as to those who call by the name of fate, not the disposition of

the stars as it may exist when any creature is conceived, or born, or commences its existence, but the whole connection and train of causes which makes everything become what it does become, there is no need that I shoul

Chapter 177

1. The manner in which Cicero addresses himself to the task of

refuting the Stoics, shows that he did not think he could effect anything against them in argument unless he had first demolished divination. And this he attempts to accomplish by denying that there is any knowledge of f

Chapter 178

3. Now, against the sacrilegious and impious darings of reason, we

assert both that God knows all things before they come to pass, and that we do by our free will whatsoever we know and feel to be done by us only because we will it. But that all things come to pass by fate, we do not sa

Chapter 179

1. Wherefore, neither is that necessity to be feared, for dread of

which the Stoics labored to make such distinctions among the causes of things as should enable them to rescue certain things from the dominion of necessity and to subject others to it. Among those things which they wishe

Chapter 180

1. Therefore God supreme and true, with His Word and Holy Spirit

(which three are one), one God omnipotent, creator and maker of every soul and of every body; by whose gift all are happy who are happy through verity and not through vanity; who made man a rational animal consisting of

Chapter 181

1. Wherefore let us go on to consider what virtues of the Romans they

were which the true God, in whose power are also the kingdoms of the earth, condescended to help in order to raise the empire, and also for what reason He did so. And, in order to discuss this question on clearer ground,

Chapter 182

3. These arts they exercised with the more skill the less they gave

themselves up to pleasures, and to enervation of body and mind in coveting and amassing riches, and through these corrupting morals, by extorting them from the miserable citizens and lavishing them on base stage-players.

Chapter 183

5. But, of the two great Romans of that time, Cato was he whose

virtue was by far the nearest to the true idea of virtue. Wherefore, let us refer to the opinion of Cato himself, to discover what was the judgment he had formed concerning the condition of the state both then and in for

Chapter 184

6. He who hears these words of Cato or of Sallust probably thinks

that such praise bestowed on the ancient Romans was applicable to all of them, or, at least, to very many of them. It is not so; otherwise the things which Cato himself writes, and which I have quoted in the second book

Chapter 185

1. Wherefore, when the kingdoms of the East had been illustrious for

a long time, it pleased God that there should also arise a Western empire, which, though later in time, should be more illustrious in extent and greatness. And, in order that it might overcome the grievous evils which ex

Chapter 186

1. It is, therefore, doubtless far better to resist this desire than to

yield to it, for the purer one is from this defilement, the liker is he to God; and, though this vice be not thoroughly eradicated from his heart,—for it does not cease to tempt even the minds of those who are making goo

Chapter 187

1. Now, therefore, with regard to those to whom God did not purpose

to give eternal life with His holy angels in His own celestial city, to the society of which that true piety which does not render the service of religion, which the Greeks call λατρεία, to any save the true God conducts

Chapter 188

1. But the reward of the saints is far different, who even here endured

reproaches for that city of God which is hateful to the lovers of this world. That city is eternal. There none are born, for none die. There is true and full felicity,—not a goddess, but a gift of God. Thence we receive

Chapter 189

1. For, as far as this life of mortals is concerned, which is spent and

ended in a few days, what does it matter under whose government a dying man lives, if they who govern do not force him to impiety and iniquity? Did the Romans at all harm those nations, on whom, when subjugated, they imp

Chapter 190

1. What great thing, therefore, is it for that eternal and celestial city

to despise all the charms of this world, however pleasant, if for the sake of this terrestrial city Brutus could even put to death his son,—a sacrifice which the heavenly city compels no one to make? But certainly it is

Chapter 191

3. How could these, and whatever like things are found in the Roman

history, have become so widely known, and have been proclaimed by so great a fame, had not the Roman empire, extending far and wide, been raised to its greatness by magnificent successes? Wherefore, through that empire,

Chapter 192

1. There is assuredly a difference between the desire of human glory

and the desire of domination; for, though he who has an overweening delight in human glory will be also very prone to aspire earnestly after domination, nevertheless they who desire the true glory even of human praise st

Chapter 193

1. Philosophers,—who place the end of human good in virtue itself, in

order to put to shame certain other philosophers, who indeed approve of the virtues, but measure them all with reference to the end of bodily pleasure, and think that this pleasure is to be sought for its own sake, but t

Chapter 194

1. These things being so, we do not attribute the power of giving

kingdoms and empires to any save to the true God, who gives happiness in the kingdom of heaven to the pious alone, but gives kingly power on earth both to the pious and the impious, as it may please Him, whose good pleas

Chapter 195

1. Thus also the durations of wars are determined by Him as He may

see meet, according to His righteous will, and pleasure, and mercy, to afflict or to console the human race, so that they are sometimes of longer, sometimes of shorter duration. The war of the Pirates and the third Punic

Chapter 196

1. Nevertheless they do not mention with thanksgiving what God has

very recently, and within our own memory, wonderfully and mercifully done, but as far as in them lies they attempt, if possible, to bury it in universal oblivion. But should we be silent about these things, we should be

Chapter 197

1. For neither do we say that certain Christian emperors were

therefore happy because they ruled a long time, or, dying a peaceful death, left their sons to succeed them in the empire, or subdued the enemies of the republic, or were able both to guard against and to suppress the at

Chapter 198

1. For the good God, lest men, who believe that He is to be

worshipped with a view to eternal life, should think that no one could attain to all this high estate, and to this terrestrial dominion, unless he should be a worshipper of the demons,—supposing that these spirits have g

Chapter 199

1. And on this account, Theodosius not only preserved during the

lifetime of Gratian that fidelity which was due to him, but also, after his death, he, like a true Christian, took his little brother Valentinian under his protection, as joint emperor, after he had been expelled by Maxi

Chapter 200

BOOK VI

-- 255 of 1136 -- ARGUMENT HITHERTO THE ARGUMENT HAS BEEN CONDUCTED AGAINST THOSE WHO BELIEVE THAT THE GODS ARE TO BE WORSHIPPED FOR THE SAKE OF TEMPORAL ADVANTAGES, NOW IT IS DIRECTED AGAINST THOSE WHO BELIEVE THAT THE

Chapter 201

1. Now, as, in the next place (as the promised order demands), those

are to be refuted and taught who contend that the gods of the nations, which the Christian truth destroys, are to be worshipped not on account of this life, but on account of that which is to be after death, I shall do w

Chapter 202

3. Wherefore, if, when we were inquiring what gods or goddesses are

to be believed to be able to confer earthly kingdoms upon men, all things having been discussed, it was shown to be very far from the truth to think that even terrestrial kingdoms are established by any of those many fal

Chapter 203

4. And more than this, if, according to the opinion of those with

whom we are now arguing, the gods are to be worshipped, not on account of the present life, but of that which is to be after death, then, certainly, they are not to be worshipped on account of those particular things whi

Chapter 204

1. Who has investigated those things more carefully than Marcus

Varro? Who has discovered them more learnedly? Who has considered them more attentively? Who has distinguished them more acutely? Who has written about them more diligently and more fully?—who, though he is less pleasing

Chapter 205

1. He wrote forty-one books of antiquities. These he divided into

human and divine things. Twenty-five he devoted to human things, sixteen to divine things; following this plan in that division,—namely, to give six books to each of the four divisions of human things. For he directs his

Chapter 206

1. In this whole series of most beautiful and most subtle distributions

and distinctions, it will most easily appear evident from the things we have said already, and from what is to be said hereafter, to any man who is not, in the obstinacy of his heart, an enemy to himself, that it is vain

Chapter 207

2. The following is the reason Varro gives when he confesses that he

had written first concerning human things, and afterwards of divine things, because these divine things were instituted by men:—"As the painter is before the painted tablet, the mason before the edifice, so states are be

Chapter 208

1. Now what are we to say of this proposition of his, namely, that

there are three kinds of theology, that is, of the account which is given of the gods; and of these, the one is called mythical, the other physical, and the third civil? Did the Latin usage permit, we should call the kin

Chapter 209

2. Let us see, now, what he says concerning the second kind. "The

second kind which I have explained," he says, "is that concerning which philosophers have left many books, in which they treat such questions as these: what gods there are, where they are, of what kind and character they

Chapter 210

3. But some one may say, Let us distinguish these two kinds of

theology, the mythical and the physical,—that is, the fabulous and the natural,—from this civil kind about which we are now speaking. Anticipating this, he himself has distinguished them. Let us see now how he explains t

Chapter 211

1. O Marcus Varro! thou art the most acute, and without doubt the

most learned, but still a man, not God,—now lifted up by the Spirit of God to see and to announce divine things, thou seest, indeed, that -- 268 of 1136 -- divine things are to be separated from human trifles and lies,

Chapter 212

2. That theology, therefore, which they call natural, being put aside

for a moment, as it is afterwards to be discussed, we ask if any one is really content to seek a hope for eternal life from poetical, theatrical, scenic gods? Perish the thought! The true God avert so wild and sacrilegio

Chapter 213

3. When we say these things, it may perchance seem to some one

who is very ignorant of these matters that only those things concerning the gods which are sung in the songs of the poets and acted on the stage are unworthy of the divine majesty, and ridiculous, and too detestable to b

Chapter 214

1. That theology, therefore, which is fabulous, theatrical, scenic, and

full of all baseness and unseemliness, is taken up into the civil theology; and part of that theology, which in its totality is deservedly judged to be worthy of reprobation and rejection, is pronounced worthy to be cult

Chapter 215

2. For also malign spirits were not so wanting to their own business

as not to confirm noxious opinions in the minds of men by converting them into sport. Whence also is that story about the sacristan of Hercules, which says that, having nothing to do, he took to playing at dice as a past

Chapter 216

3. Now had these things been feigned by the poets and acted by the

mimics, they would without any doubt have been said to pertain to the fabulous theology, and would have been judged worthy to be separated from the dignity of the civil theology. But when these shameful things,—not of th

Chapter 217

1. But all these things, they say, have certain physical, that is, natural

interpretations, showing their natural meaning; as though in this disputation we were seeking physics and not theology, which is the account, not of nature, but of God. For although He who is the true God is God, not by

Chapter 218

2. And, nevertheless, it is called the fabulous theology, and is

censured, cast off, rejected, together with all such interpretations belonging to it. And not only by the natural theology, which is that of the philosophers, but also by this civil theology, concerning which we are spea

Chapter 219

1. And as to those very offices of the gods, so meanly and so minutely

portioned out, so that they say that they ought to be supplicated, each one according to his special function,—about which we have spoken much already, though not all that is to be said concerning it, —are they not more

Chapter 220

2. But what kind of distinction is this which he makes between the

religious and the superstitious man, saying that the gods are feared by the superstitious man, but are reverenced2 as parents by the religious man, not feared as enemies; and that they are all so good that they will more

Chapter 221

3. When a male and a female are united, the god Jugatinus presides.

Well, let this be borne with. But the married woman must be brought home: the god Domiducus also is invoked. That she may be in the house, the god Domitius is introduced. That she may remain with her husband, the goddess

Chapter 222

4. Let them go on, and let them attempt with all the subtlety they can

to distinguish the civil theology from the fabulous, the cities from the theatres, the temples from the stages, the sacred things of the priests from the songs of the poets, as honorable things from base things, truthful

Chapter 223

5. In fine, even Varro himself, in his account and enumeration of the

gods, starts from the moment of a man's conception. He commences the series of those gods who take charge of man with Janus, carries it on to the death of the man decrepit with age, and terminates it with the goddess Næn

Chapter 224

1. That liberty, in truth, which this man wanted, so that he did not

dare to censure that theology of the city, which is very similar to the theatrical, so openly as he did the theatrical itself, was, though not fully, yet in part possessed by Annæus Seneca, whom we have some evidence to

Chapter 225

2. He next relates those things which are wont to be done in the

Capitol, and with the utmost intrepidity insists that they are such things as one could only believe to be done by men making sport, or by madmen. For having spoken with derision of this, that in the Egyptian sacred rite

Chapter 226

3. This liberty Varro did not enjoy. It was only the poetical theology

he seemed to censure. The civil, which this man cuts to pieces, he was not bold enough to impugn. But if we attend to the truth, the temples where these things are performed are far worse than the theatres where they are

Chapter 227

1. Seneca, among the other superstitions of civil theology, also found

fault with the sacred things of the Jews, and especially the sabbaths, affirming that they act uselessly in keeping those seventh days, whereby they lose through idleness about the seventh part of their life, and also ma

Chapter 228

1. Now, since there are three theologies, which the Greeks call

respectively mythical, physical, and political, and which may be called in Latin fabulous, natural, and civil; and since neither from the fabulous, which even the worshippers of many and false gods have themselves most f

Chapter 229

BOOK VII

ARGUMENT IN THIS BOOK IT IS SHOWN THAT ETERNAL LIFE IS NOT OBTAINED BY THE WORSHIP OF JANUS, JUPITER, SATURN, AND THE OTHER "SELECT GODS" OF THE CIVIL THEOLOGY. PREFACE IT will be the duty of those who are endowed with q

Chapter 230

1. If there is any one whom the sixth book, which I have last finished,

has not persuaded that this divinity, or, so to speak, deity—for this -- 287 of 1136 -- word also our authors do not hesitate to use, in order to translate more accurately that which the Greeks call θεότης;—if there is

Chapter 231

1. The following gods, certainly, Varro signalizes as select, devoting

one book to this subject: Janus, Jupiter, Saturn, Genius, Mercury, Apollo, Mars, Vulcan, Neptune, Sol, Orcus, father Liber, Tellus, Ceres, Juno, Luna, Diana, Minerva, Venus, Vesta; of which twenty gods, twelve are males,

Chapter 232

1. What is the cause, therefore, which has driven so many select gods

to these very small works, in which they are excelled by Vitumnus and Sentinus, though little known and sunk in obscurity, inasmuch as they confer the munificent gifts of life and sensation? For the select Janus bestows

Chapter 233

2. Since, therefore, we see that even the select gods themselves work

together with the others, like a senate with the people, in all those minute works which have been minutely portioned out among many gods; and since we find that far greater and better things are administered by certain

Chapter 234

1. However, any one who eagerly seeks for celebrity and renown,

might congratulate those select gods, and call them fortunate, were it not that he saw that they have been selected more to their injury than to their honor. For that low crowd of gods have been protected by their very m

Chapter 235

1. But let us hear their own physical interpretations by which they

attempt to color, as with the appearance of profounder doctrine, the baseness of most miserable error. Varro, in the first place, commends these interpretations so strongly as to say, that the ancients invented the image

Chapter 236

1. The same Varro, then, still speaking by anticipation, says that he

thinks that God is the soul of the world (which the Greeks call κόσμος), and that this world itself is God; but as a wise man, though he consists of body and mind, is nevertheless called wise on account of his mind, so t

Chapter 237

1. Who, then, is Janus, with whom Varro commences? He is the

world. Certainly a very brief and unambiguous reply. Why, then, do they say that the beginnings of things pertain to him, but the ends to another whom they call Terminus? For they say that two months have been dedicated

Chapter 238

1. But now let the interpretation of the two-faced image be produced.

For they say that it has two faces, one before and one behind, because our gaping mouths seem to resemble the world: whence the Greeks call the palate οὐρανός, and some Latin poets, he says, have called the heavens palat

Chapter 239

1. But they also show whom they would have Jove (who is also called

Jupiter) understood to be. He is the god, say they, who has the power of the causes by which anything comes to be in the world. And how great a thing this is, that most noble verse of Virgil testifies: -- 299 of 1136 --

Chapter 240

2. Next, I ask what place they find any longer for this Jupiter among

the gods, if Janus is the world; for Varro defined the true gods to be the soul of the world, and the parts of it. And therefore whatever falls not within this definition, is certainly not a true god, according to them.

Chapter 241

1. Since, therefore, Janus is the world, and Jupiter is the world,

wherefore are Janus and Jupiter two gods, while the world is but one? Why do they have separate temples, separate altars, different rites, dissimilar images? If it be because the nature of beginnings is one, and the natu

Chapter 242

1. They have called him Victor, Invictus, Opitulus, Impulsor, Stator,

Centumpeda, Supinalis, Tigillus, Almus, Ruminus, and other names which it were long to enumerate. But these surnames they have given to one god on account of diverse causes and powers, but yet have not compelled him to b

Chapter 243

1. How elegantly they have accounted for this name! "He is also

called Pecunia," say they, "because all things belong to him." Oh how grand an explanation of the name of a deity! Yes; he to whom all things belong is most meanly and most contumeliously called Pecunia. In comparison of

Chapter 244

1. But why speak more of this Jupiter, with whom perchance all the

rest are to be identified; so that, he being all, the opinion as to the existence of many gods may remain as a mere opinion, empty of all truth? And they are all to be referred to him, if his various parts and powers are

Chapter 245

1. But they have not found how to refer Mercury and Mars to any

parts of the world, and to the works of God which are in the elements; and therefore they have set them at least over human works, making them assistants in speaking and in carrying on wars. Now Mercury, if he has also t

Chapter 246

1. But possibly these stars which have been called by their names are

these gods. For they call a certain star Mercury, and likewise a certain other star Mars. But among those stars which are called by the names of gods, is that one which they call Jupiter, and yet with them Jupiter is the

Chapter 247

1. Although they would have Apollo to be a diviner and physician,

they have nevertheless given him a place as some part of the world. They have said that he is also the sun; and likewise they have said that Diana, his sister, is the moon, and the guardian of roads. Whence also they wil

Chapter 248

1. And the same is true with respect to all the rest, as is true with

respect to those things which I have mentioned for the sake of -- 309 of 1136 -- example. They do not explain them, but rather involve them. They rush hither and thither, to this side or to that, according as they are

Chapter 249

1. A far more credible account of these gods is given, when it is said

that they were men, and that to each one of them sacred rites and solemnities were instituted, according to his particular genius, manners, actions, circumstances; which rites and solemnities, by gradually creeping throu

Chapter 250

1. They said, says Varro, that Saturn was wont to devour all that

sprang from him, because seeds returned to the earth from whence they sprang. And when it is said that a lump of earth was put before Saturn to be devoured instead of Jupiter, it is signified, he says, that -- 311 of 11

Chapter 251

1. Now among the rites of Ceres, those Eleusinian rites are much

famed which were in the highest repute among the Athenians, of which Varro offers no interpretation except with respect to corn, which Ceres discovered, and with respect to Proserpine, whom Ceres lost, Orcus having carri

Chapter 252

1. Now as to the rites of Liber, whom they have set over liquid seeds,

and therefore not only over the liquors of fruits, among which wine holds, so to speak, the primacy, but also over the seeds of animals:— as to these rites, I am unwilling to undertake to show to what excess of turpitude

Chapter 253

1. Now Neptune had Salacia to wife, who they say is the nether

waters of the sea. Wherefore was Venilia also joined to him? Was it not simply through the lust of the soul desiring a greater number of demons to whom to prostitute itself, and not because this goddess was necessary to

Chapter 254

1. Surely the earth, which we see full of its own living creatures, is

one; but for all that, it is but a mighty mass among the elements, and the lowest part of the world. Why, then, would they have it to be a goddess? Is it because it is fruitful? Why, then, are not men rather held to be g

Chapter 255

2. Let him return from this, which he thinks to be natural theology,

back to that from which he went out, in order to rest from the fatigue occasioned by the many turnings and windings of his path. Let him return, I say, let him return to the civil theology. I wish to detain him there a w

Chapter 256

1. The one earth, then, on account of this fourfold virtue, ought to

have had four surnames, but not to have been considered as four gods,—as Jupiter and Juno, though they have so many surnames, are for all that only single deities,—for by all these surnames it is -- 318 of 1136 -- sign

Chapter 257

2. These are the famous mysteries of Tellus and the Great Mother, all

of which are shown to have reference to mortal seeds and to agriculture. Do these things, then,—namely, the tympanum, the towers, the Galli, the tossing to and fro of limbs, the noise of cymbals, the images of lions,—do

Chapter 258

1. Varro has not spoken of that Atys, nor sought out any

interpretation for him, in memory of whose being loved by Ceres the Gallus is mutilated. But the learned and wise Greeks have by no means been silent about an interpretation so holy and so illustrious. The celebrated phi

Chapter 259

1. Concerning the effeminates consecrated to the same Great Mother,

in defiance of all the modesty which belongs to men and women, Varro has not wished to say anything, nor do I remember to have read anywhere aught concerning them. These effeminates, no later than yesterday, were going t

Chapter 260

1. We see that these select gods have, indeed, become more famous

than the rest; not, however, that their merits may be brought to light, but that their opprobrious deeds may not be hid. Whence it is more credible that they were men, as not only poetic but also historical literature ha

Chapter 261

1. To what purpose, then, is it that this most learned and most acute

man Varro attempts, as it were, with subtle disputation, to reduce and refer all these gods to heaven and earth? He cannot do it. They go out of his hands like water; they shrink back; they slip down and fall. For when a

Chapter 262

1. For all those things which, according to the account given of those

gods, are referred to the world by so-called physical interpretation, may, without any religious scruple, be rather assigned to the true God, who made heaven and earth, and created every soul and every body; and the foll

Chapter 263

1. And now, to begin to go over those works of the one true God, on

account of which these have made to themselves many and false gods, whilst they attempt to give an honorable interpretation to their many most abominable and most infamous mysteries,—we worship that God who has appointed

Chapter 264

1. For, besides such benefits as, according to this administration of

nature of which we have made some mention, He lavishes on good and bad alike, we have from Him a great manifestation of great love, which belongs only to the good. For although we can never sufficiently give thanks to Hi

Chapter 265

1. This mystery of eternal life, even from the beginning of the human

race, was, by certain signs and sacraments suitable to the times, announced through angels to those to whom it was meet. Then the Hebrew people was congregated into one republic, as it were, to perform this mystery; and

Chapter 266

1. This, the only true religion, has alone been able to manifest that

the gods of the nations are most impure demons, who desire to be thought gods, availing themselves of the names of certain defunct souls, or the appearance of mundane creatures, and with proud impurity rejoicing in thing

Chapter 267

1. But, on the other hand, we find, as the same most learned man has

related, that the causes of the sacred rites which were given from the books of Numa Pompilius could by no means be tolerated, and were considered unworthy, not only to become known to the religious by being read, but ev

Chapter 268

1. For Numa himself also, to whom no prophet of God, no holy angel

was sent, was driven to have recourse to hydromancy, that he might see the images of the gods in the water (or, rather, appearances whereby the demons made sport of him), and might learn from them what he ought to ordain

Chapter 269

BOOK VIII

ARGUMENT AUGUSTIN COMES NOW TO THE THIRD KIND OF THEOLOGY, THAT IS, THE NATURAL, AND TAKES UP THE QUESTION, WHETHER THE WORSHIP OF THE GODS OF THE NATURAL THEOLOGY IS OF ANY AVAIL TOWARDS SECURING BLESSEDNESS IN THE LIFE

Chapter 270

1. WE shall require to apply our mind with far greater intensity to the

present question than was requisite in the solution and unfolding of the questions handled in the preceding books; for it is not with ordinary men, but with philosophers that we must confer concerning the theology which

Chapter 271

1. As far as concerns the literature of the Greeks, whose language

holds a more illustrious place than any of the languages of the other nations, history mentions two schools of philosophers, the one called the Italic school, originating in that part of Italy which was formerly called M

Chapter 272

1. Socrates is said to have been the first who directed the entire effort

of philosophy to the correction and regulation of manners, all who went before him having expended their greatest efforts in the -- 338 of 1136 -- investigation of physical, that is, natural phenomena. However, it seem

Chapter 273

1. But, among the disciples of Socrates, Plato was the one who shone

with a glory which far excelled that of the others, and who not unjustly eclipsed them all. By birth, an Athenian of honorable parentage, he far surpassed his fellow-disciples in natural endowments, of which he was posse

Chapter 274

1. If, then, Plato defined the wise man as one who imitates, knows,

loves this God, and who is rendered blessed through fellowship with Him in His own blessedness, why discuss with the other philosophers? It is evident that none come nearer to us than the Platonists. To them, therefore,

Chapter 275

1. These philosophers, then, whom we see not undeservedly exalted

above the rest in fame and glory, have seen that no material body is God, and therefore they have transcended all bodies in seeking for God. They have seen that whatever is changeable is not the most high God, and theref

Chapter 276

1. Then, again, as far as regards the doctrine which treats of that

which they call logic, that is, rational philosophy, far be it from us to compare them with those who attributed to the bodily senses the -- 346 of 1136 -- faculty of discriminating truth, and thought, that all we lear

Chapter 277

1. The remaining part of philosophy is morals, or what is called by

the Greeks ἠθική, in which is discussed the question concerning the chief good,—that which will leave us nothing further to seek in order to be blessed, if only we make all our actions refer to it, and seek it not for th

Chapter 278

1. Whatever philosophers, therefore, thought concerning the

supreme God, that He is both the maker of all created things, the light by which things are known, and the good in reference to which things are to be done; that we have in Him the first principle of nature, the truth of

Chapter 279

1. For although a Christian man instructed only in ecclesiastical

literature may perhaps be ignorant of the very name of Platonists, and may not even know that there have existed two schools of -- 349 of 1136 -- philosophers speaking the Greek tongue, to wit, the Ionic and Italic, he

Chapter 280

1. Certain partakers with us in the grace of Christ, wonder when they

hear and read that Plato had conceptions concerning God, in which they recognize considerable agreement with the truth of our religion. -- 351 of 1136 -- Some have concluded from this, that when he went to Egypt he had

Chapter 281

1. But we need not determine from what source he learned these

things,—whether it was from the books of the ancients who preceded him, or, as is more likely, from the words of the apostle: "Because that which is known of God, has been manifested among them, for God hath manifested i

Chapter 282

1. Therefore, although in many other important respects they differ

from us, nevertheless with respect to this particular point of difference, which I have just stated, as it is one of great moment, and the question on hand concerns it, I will first ask them to what gods they think that

Chapter 283

1. There is, say they, a threefold division of all animals endowed with

a rational soul, namely, into gods, men, and demons. The gods occupy the loftiest region, men the lowest, the demons the middle region. For the abode of the gods is heaven, that of men the earth, that of the demons the a

Chapter 284

2. Of these things many have written: among others Apuleius, the

Platonist of Madaura, who composed a whole work on the subject, entitled, Concerning the God of Socrates. He there discusses and explains of what kind that deity was who attended on Socrates, a sort of familiar, by whom

Chapter 285

1. Wherefore let not the mind truly religious, and submitted to the

true God, suppose that demons are better than men, because they have better bodies. Otherwise it must put many beasts before itself which are superior to us both in acuteness of the senses, in ease and quickness of movem

Chapter 286

2. But now, as regards loftiness of place, it is altogether ridiculous to

be so influenced by the fact that the demons inhabit the air, and we the earth, as to think that on that account they are to be put before us; for in this way we put all the birds before ourselves. But the birds, when th

Chapter 287

1. The same Apuleius, when speaking concerning the manners of

demons, said that they are agitated with the same perturbations of mind as men; that they are provoked by injuries, propitiated by services and by gifts, rejoice in honors, are delighted with a variety of sacred rites, a

Chapter 288

1. Wherefore, to omit other things, and confine our attention to that

which he says is common to the demons with us, let us ask this question: If all the four elements are full of their own animals, the fire and the air of immortal, and the water and the earth of mortal ones, why are the s

Chapter 289

1. In vain, therefore, have Apuleius, and they who think with him,

conferred on the demons the honor of placing them in the air, between the ethereal heavens and the earth, that they may carry to the gods the prayers of men, to men the answers of the gods: for Plato held, they say, that

Chapter 290

1. Moreover, against those magic arts, concerning which some men,

exceedingly wretched and exceedingly impious, delight to boast, may not public opinion itself be brought forward as a witness? For why are those arts so severely punished by the laws, if they are the works of deities who

Chapter 291

1. But does any urgent and most pressing cause compel the demons

to mediate between the gods and men, that they may offer the prayers of men, and bring back the answers from the gods? and if so, what, pray, is that cause, what is that so great necessity? Because, say they, no god has

Chapter 292

1. But herein, no doubt, lies the great necessity for this absurdity, so

unworthy of the gods, that the ethereal gods, who are concerned about human affairs, would not know what terrestrial men were doing unless the aerial demons should bring them intelligence, because the ether is suspended

Chapter 293

1. None of these four alternatives, then, is to be chosen; for we dare

not suppose such unbecoming things concerning the gods as the adoption of any one of them would lead us to think. It remains, therefore, that no credence whatever is to be given to the opinion of Apuleius and the other p

Chapter 294

1. The Egyptian Hermes, whom they call Trismegistus, had a

different opinion concerning those demons. Apuleius, indeed, denies that they are gods; but when he says that they hold a middle place between the gods and men, so that they seem to be necessary for men as mediators betw

Chapter 295

2. Hermes then follows out at great length the statements of this

passage, in which he seems to predict the present time, in which the Christian religion is overthrowing all lying figments with a vehemence and liberty proportioned to its superior truth and holiness, in order that the g

Chapter 296

3. For these vain, deceitful, pernicious, sacrilegious things did the

Egyptian Hermes sorrow, because he knew that the time was coming when they should be removed. But his sorrow was as impudently expressed as his knowledge was imprudently obtained; for it was not the Holy Spirit who revea

Chapter 297

1. After a long interval, Hermes again comes back to the subject of

the gods which men have made, saying as follows: "But enough on this subject. Let us return to man and to reason, that divine gift on account of which man has been called a rational animal. For the things which have been

Chapter 298

2. For if he had only said, without mentioning the cause, that his

forefathers had discovered the art of making gods, it would have been our duty, if we paid any regard to what is right and pious, to consider and to see that they could never have attained to this art if they had not err

Chapter 299

3. Wherefore he who sorrowed because a time was coming when the

worship of idols should be abolished, and the domination of the demons over those who worshipped them, wished, under the influence of a demon, that that captivity should always continue, at the cessation of which that ps

Chapter 300

1. Wherefore we must by no means seek, through the supposed

mediation of demons, to avail ourselves of the benevolence or beneficence of the gods, or rather of the good angels, but through resembling them in the possession of a good will, through which we are with them, and live

Chapter 301

1. It is certainly a remarkable thing how this Egyptian, when

expressing his grief that a time was coming when those things would be taken away from Egypt, which he confesses to have been invented by men erring, incredulous, and averse to the service of divine religion, says, among

Chapter 302

3. Hermes goes on to say, "But do we know how many good things

Isis, the wife of Osiris, bestows when she is propitious, and what great opposition she can offer when enraged?" Then, in order to show that there were gods made by men through this art, he goes on to say, "For it is eas

Chapter 303

1. But, nevertheless, we do not build temples, and ordain priests,

rites, and sacrifices for these same martyrs; for they are not our gods, but their God is our God. Certainly we honor their reliquaries, as the memorials of holy men of God who strove for the truth even to the death of t

Chapter 304

BOOK IX

ARGUMENT HAVING IN THE PRECEDING BOOK SHOWN THAT THE WORSHIP OF DEMONS MUST BE ABJURED, SINCE THEY IN A THOUSAND WAYS PROCLAIM THEMSELVES TO BE WICKED SPIRITS, AUGUSTIN IN THIS BOOK MEETS THOSE WHO ALLEGE A DISTINCTION A

Chapter 305

1. SOME have advanced the opinion that there are both good and bad

gods; but some, thinking more respectfully of the gods, have attributed to them so much honor and praise as to preclude the supposition of any god being wicked. But those who have maintained that there are wicked gods as

Chapter 306

1. This book, then, ought, according to the promise made in the end

of the preceding one, to contain a discussion, not of the difference which exists among the gods, who, according to the Platonists, are all good, nor of the difference between gods and demons, the former of whom they sep

Chapter 307

1. What, then, is the difference between good and evil demons? For

the Platonist Apuleius, in a treatise on this whole subject, while he says a great deal about their aerial bodies, has not a word to say of the spiritual virtues with which, if they were good, they must have been endowed

Chapter 308

1. Among the philosophers there are two opinions about these

mental emotions, which the Greeks call παθη, while some of our own writers, as Cicero, call them perturbations, some affections, and some, to render the Greek word more accurately, passions. Some say that even the wise m

Chapter 309

1. We need not at present give a careful and copious exposition of the

doctrine of Scripture, the sum of Christian knowledge, regarding these passions. It subjects the mind itself to God, that He may rule and aid it, and the passions, again, to the mind, to moderate and bridle them, and tur

Chapter 310

1. Deferring for the present the question about the holy angels, let us

examine the opinion of the Platonists, that the demons who mediate between gods and men are agitated by passions. For if their mind, though exposed to their incursion, still remained free and superior to them, Apuleius c

Chapter 311

1. But if any one says that it is not of all the demons, but only of the

wicked, that the poets, not without truth, say that they violently love or hate certain men,—for it was of them Apuleius said that they were driven about by strong currents of emotion,—how can we accept this interpretati

Chapter 312

1. The definition which Apuleius gives of demons, and in which he of

course includes all demons, is that they are in nature animals, in soul subject to passion, in mind reasonable, in body aerial, in duration eternal. Now in these five qualities he has named absolutely nothing -- 392 of

Chapter 313

1. How, then, can men hope for a favorable introduction to the

friendship of the gods by such mediators as these, who are, like men, defective in that which is the better part of every living creature, viz., the soul, and who resemble the gods only in the body, which is the inferior

Chapter 314

1. Plotinus, whose memory is quite recent, enjoys the reputation of

having understood Plato better than any other of his disciples. In speaking of human souls, he says, "The Father in compassion made their bonds mortal;"3 that is to say, he considered it due to the Father's mercy that me

Chapter 315

1. He says, indeed, that the souls of men are demons, and that men

become Lares if they are good, Lemures or Larvæ if they are bad, and Manes if it is uncertain whether they deserve well or ill. Who does not see at a glance that this is a mere whirlpool sucking men to moral destruction?

Chapter 316

1. But at present we are speaking of those beings whom he described

as being properly intermediate between gods and men, in nature animals, in mind rational, in soul subject to passion, in body aerial, in duration eternal. When he had distinguished the gods, whom he placed in the highest

Chapter 317

1. If, now, we endeavor to find between these opposites the mean

occupied by the demons, there can be no question as to their local position; for, between the highest and lowest place, there is a place which is rightly considered and called the middle place. The other two qualities re

Chapter 318

2. According to the Platonists, then, the gods, who occupy the highest

place, enjoy eternal blessedness, or blessed eternity; men, who occupy the lowest, a mortal misery, or a miserable mortality; and the demons, who occupy the mean, a miserable eternity, or an eternal misery. As to those f

Chapter 319

3. If, then, the blessed are rightly styled eudemons, the demons

intermediate between gods and men are not eudemons. What, then, is the local position of those good demons, who, above men but beneath the gods, afford assistance to the former, minister to the latter? For if they are go

Chapter 320

1. It is a great question among men, whether man can be mortal and

blessed. Some, taking the humbler view of his condition, have denied that he is capable of blessedness so long as he continues in this mortal life; others, again, have spurned this idea, and have been bold enough to main

Chapter 321

1. But if, as is much more probable and credible, it must needs be

that all men, so long as they are mortal, are also miserable, we must seek an intermediate who is not only man, but also God, that, by the interposition of His blessed mortality, He may bring men out of their mortal mise

Chapter 322

2. Man, then, mortal and miserable, and far removed from the

immortal and the blessed, what medium shall he choose by which he may be united to immortality and blessedness? The immortality of the demons, which might have some charm for man, is miserable; the mortality of Christ, w

Chapter 323

1. That opinion, which the same Platonist avers that Plato uttered, is

not true, "that no god holds intercourse with men." And this, he says, is the chief evidence of their exaltation, that they are never contaminated by contact with men. He admits, therefore, that the demons are contaminat

Chapter 324

2. There is, then, nothing to hinder the gods from mingling in a

bodily form with men, from seeing and being seen, from speaking and hearing. And if the demons do thus mix with men, as I said, and are not polluted, while the gods, were they to do so, should be polluted, then the demon

Chapter 325

1. I am considerably surprised that such learned men, men who

pronounce all material and sensible things to be altogether inferior to those that are spiritual and intelligible, should mention bodily contact in connection with the blessed life. Is that sentiment of Plotinus forgotte

Chapter 326

1. As to the demons, these false and deceitful mediators, who, though

their uncleanness of spirit frequently reveals their misery and malignity, yet, by virtue of the levity of their aerial bodies and the nature of the places they inhabit, do contrive to turn us aside and hinder our spirit

Chapter 327

1. But as some of these demonolators, as I may call them, and among

them Labeo, allege that those whom they call demons are by others called angels, I must, if I would not seem to dispute merely about words, say something about the good angels. The Platonists do not deny their existence,

Chapter 328

1. However, the very origin of the name suggests something worthy

of consideration, if we compare it with the divine books. They are called demons from a Greek word meaning knowledge. Now the apostle, speaking with the Holy Spirit, says, "Knowledge puffeth up, but charity buildeth up."

Chapter 329

1. The devils themselves knew this manifestation of God so well, that

they said to the Lord, though clothed with the infirmity of flesh, "What have we to do with Thee, Jesus of Nazareth? Art Thou come to destroy us before the time?" From these words, it is clear that they had great knowled

Chapter 330

1. The good angels, therefore, hold cheap all that knowledge of

material and transitory things which the demons are so proud of possessing,—not that they are ignorant of these things, but because the love of God, whereby they are sanctified, is very dear to them, and because, in comp

Chapter 331

1. If the Platonists prefer to call these angels gods rather than

demons, and to reckon them with those whom Plato, their founder and master, maintains were created by the supreme God, they are welcome to do so, for I will not spend strength in fighting about words. For if they say tha

Chapter 332

2. Nevertheless, some one may say, if men are called gods because

they belong to God's people, whom He addresses by means of men and angels, are not the immortals, who already enjoy that felicity -- 410 of 1136 -- which men seek to attain by worshipping God, much more worthy of the t

Chapter 333

3. We need not, therefore, laboriously contend about the name, since

the reality is so obvious as to admit of no shadow of doubt. That which we say, that the angels who are sent to announce the will of God to men belong to the order of blessed immortals, does not satisfy the Platonists, b

Chapter 334

BOOK X

ARGUMENT IN THIS BOOK AUGUSTIN TEACHES THAT THE GOOD ANGELS WISH GOD ALONE, WHOM THEY THEMSELVES SERVE, TO RECEIVE THAT DIVINE HONOR WHICH IS RENDERED BY SACRIFICE, AND WHICH IS CALLED "LATREIA." HE THEN GOES ON TO DISPU

Chapter 335

1. IT is the decided opinion of all who use their brains, that all men

desire to be happy. But who are happy, or how they become so, these are questions about which the weakness of human understanding stirs endless and angry controversies, in which philosophers have wasted their strength an

Chapter 336

2. For this is the worship which is due to the Divinity, or, to speak

more accurately, to the Deity; and, to express this worship in a single word as there does not occur to me any Latin term sufficiently exact, I shall avail myself, whenever necessary, of a Greek word. Λατρεία, whenever i

Chapter 337

3. The word "religion" might seem to express more definitely the

worship due to God alone, and therefore Latin translators have used this word to represent θρησκεία; yet, as not only the uneducated, but also the best instructed, use the word religion to express human ties, and relatio

Chapter 338

1. But with these more estimable philosophers we have no dispute in

this matter. For they perceived, and in various forms abundantly expressed in their writings, that these spirits have the same source of happiness as ourselves,—a certain intelligible light, which is their God, and is di

Chapter 339

1. This being so, if the Platonists, or those who think with them,

knowing God, glorified Him as God and gave thanks, if they did not become vain in their own thoughts, if they did not originate or yield to the popular errors, they would certainly acknowledge that neither could the bles

Chapter 340

1. But, putting aside for the present the other religious services with

which God is worshipped, certainly no man would dare to say that sacrifice is due to any but God. Many parts, indeed, of divine worship are unduly used in showing honor to men, whether through an excessive humility or pe

Chapter 341

1. And who is so foolish as to suppose that the things offered to God

are needed by Him for some uses of His own? Divine Scripture in many places explodes this idea. Not to be wearisome, suffice it to quote this brief saying from a psalm: "I have said to the Lord, Thou art my God: for Thou

Chapter 342

1. Thus a true sacrifice is every work which is done that we may be

united to God in holy fellowship, and which has a reference to that supreme good and end in which alone we can be truly blessed. And therefore even the mercy we show to men, if it is not shown for God's sake, is not a sa

Chapter 343

1. It is very right that these blessed and immortal spirits, who inhabit

celestial dwellings, and rejoice in the communications of their Creator's fullness, firm in His eternity, assured in His truth, holy by His grace, since they compassionately and tenderly regard us miserable mortals, and

Chapter 344

1. I should seem tedious were I to recount all the ancient miracles,

which were wrought in attestation of God's promises which He made to Abraham thousands of years ago, that in his seed all the nations of the earth should be blessed. For who can but marvel that Abraham's barren wife shou

Chapter 345

1. These miracles, and many others of the same nature, which it were

tedious to mention, were wrought for the purpose of commending the worship of the one true God, and prohibiting the worship of a multitude of false gods. Moreover, they were wrought by simple faith and godly confidence,

Chapter 346

2. For even Porphyry promises some kind of purgation of the soul by

the help of theurgy, though he does so with some hesitation and shame, and denies that this art can secure to any one a return to God; so teat you can detect his opinion vacillating between the profession of philosophy a

Chapter 347

1. But here we have another and a much more learned Platonist than

Apuleius, Porphyry, to wit, asserting that, by I know not what theurgy, even the gods themselves are subjected to passions and perturbations; for by adjurations they were so bound and terrified that they could not confer

Chapter 348

1. It was a better tone which Porphyry adopted in his letter to Anebo

the Egyptian, in which, assuming the character of an inquirer consulting him, he unmasks and explodes these sacrilegious arts. In that letter, indeed, he repudiates all demons, whom he maintains to be so foolish as to be

Chapter 349

2. However, he pursues this subject, and, still in the character of an

inquirer, mentions some things which no sober judgment could -- 429 of 1136 -- attribute to any but malicious and deceitful powers. He asks why, after the better class of spirits have been invoked, the worse should be

Chapter 350

1. Since by means of these arts wonders are done which quite surpass

human power, what choice have we but to believe that these predictions and operations, which seem to be miraculous and divine, and which at the same time form no part of the worship of the one God, in adherence to whom,

Chapter 351

1. Neither need we be surprised that God, invisible as He is, should

often have appeared visibly to the patriarchs. For as the sound which communicates the thought conceived in the silence of the mind is not the thought itself, so the form by which God, invisible in His own nature, became

Chapter 352

1. The education of the human race, represented by the people of

God, has advanced, like that of an individual, through certain epochs, or, as it were, ages, so that it might gradually rise from earthly to heavenly things, and from the visible to the invisible. This object was kept so

Chapter 353

1. And so it has pleased Divine Providence, as I have said, and as we

read in the Acts of the Apostles, that the law enjoining the worship of one God should be given by the disposition of angels. But among them the person of God Himself visibly appeared, not, indeed, in His proper substanc

Chapter 354

1. What angels, then, are we to believe in this matter of blessed and

eternal life?—those who wish to be worshipped with religious rites and observances, and require that men sacrifice to them; or those who say that all this worship is due to one God, the Creator, and teach us to render it

Chapter 355

2. As for those miracles which history ascribes to the gods of the

heathen,—I do not refer to those prodigies which at intervals happen from some unknown physical causes, and which are arranged and appointed by Divine Providence, such as monstrous births, and unusual meteorological phen

Chapter 356

1. On this account it was that the law of God, given by the disposition

of angels, and which commanded that the one God of gods alone receive sacred worship, to the exclusion of all others, was deposited in the ark, called the ark of the testimony. By this name it is sufficiently indicated,

Chapter 357

1. Will some one say that these miracles are false, that they never

happened, and that the records of them are lies? Whoever says so, and asserts that in such matters no records whatever can be credited, may also say that there are no gods who care for human affairs. For they have induce

Chapter 358

1. As to those who think that these visible sacrifices are suitably

offered to other gods, but that invisible sacrifices, the graces of purity of mind and holiness of will, should be offered, as greater and better, to the invisible God, Himself greater and better than all others, they mu

Chapter 359

1. And hence that true Mediator, in so far as, by assuming the form of

a servant, He became the Mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, though in the form of God He received sacrifice together with the Father, with whom He is one God, yet in the form of a servant He chose rather

Chapter 360

1. The power delegated to the demons at certain appointed and well-

adjusted seasons, that they may give expression to their hostility to the city of God by stirring up against it the men who are under their influence, and may not only receive sacrifice from those who willingly offer it,

Chapter 361

1. It is by true piety that men of God cast out the hostile power of the

air which opposes godliness; it is by exorcising it, not by propitiating it; and they overcome all the temptations of the adversary by praying, not to him, but to their own God against him. For the devil cannot conquer o

Chapter 362

1. Even Porphyry asserts that it was revealed by divine oracles that

we are not purified by any sacrifices to sun or moon, meaning it to be inferred that we are not purified by sacrificing to any gods. For what mysteries can purify, if those of the sun and moon, which are esteemed the chi

Chapter 363

1. Accordingly, when we speak of God, we do not affirm two or three

principles, no more than we are at liberty to affirm two or three gods; although, speaking of each, of the Father, or of the Son, or of the Holy Ghost, we confess that each is God: and yet we do not say, as the Sabellian

Chapter 364

1. It was by faith in this mystery, and godliness of life, that

purification was attainable even by the saints of old, whether before the law was given to the Hebrews (for God and the angels were even then present as instructors), or in the periods under the law, although the promise

Chapter 365

1. I know not how it is so, but it seems to me that Porphyry blushed

for his friends the theurgists; for he knew all that I have adduced, but -- 449 of 1136 -- did not frankly condemn polytheistic worship. He said, in fact, that there are some angels who visit earth, and reveal divine t

Chapter 366

1. How much more tolerable and accordant with human feeling is the

error of your Platonist co-sectary Apuleius! for he attributed the diseases and storms of human passions only to the demons who occupy a grade beneath the moon, and makes even this avowal as by constraint regarding gods

Chapter 367

1. You drive men, therefore, into the most palpable error. And yet

you are not ashamed of doing so much harm, though you call yourself a lover of virtue and wisdom. Had you been true and faithful in this profession, you would have recognized Christ, the virtue of God and the wisdom of G

Chapter 368

1. You proclaim the Father and His Son, whom you call the Father's

intellect or mind, and between these a third, by whom we suppose you mean the Holy Spirit, and in your own fashion you call these three Gods. In this, though your expressions are inaccurate, you do in some sort, and as t

Chapter 369

2. But in order to your acquiescence in this truth, it is lowliness that

is requisite, and to this it is extremely difficult to bend you. For what is there incredible, especially to men like you, accustomed to speculation, which might have predisposed you to believe in this,— what is there in

Chapter 370

1. If it is considered unseemly to emend anything which Plato has

touched, why did Porphyry himself make emendations, and these not a few? for it is very certain that Plato wrote that the souls of men return after death to the bodies of beasts. Plotinus also, Porphyry's teacher, held t

Chapter 371

1. Why, then, do we not rather believe the divinity in those matters,

which human talent cannot fathom? Why do we not credit the assertion of divinity, that the soul is not co-eternal with God, but is created, and once was not? For the Platonists seemed to themselves to allege an adequate

Chapter 372

1. This is the religion which possesses the universal way for

delivering the soul; for, except by this way, none can be delivered. This is a kind of royal way, which alone leads to a kingdom which does not totter like all temporal dignities, but stands firm on eternal foundations.

Chapter 373

2. This, then, is the universal way of the soul's deliverance, the way

that is granted by the divine compassion to the nations universally. And no nation to which the knowledge of it has already come, or may hereafter come, ought to demand, Why so soon? or, Why so late?— for the design of H

Chapter 374

3. As to Porphyry's statement that the universal way of the soul's

deliverance had not yet come to his knowledge by any acquaintance he had with history, I would ask, what more remarkable history can be found than that which has taken possession of the whole world by its authoritative v

Chapter 375

4. And therefore, in these ten books, though not meeting, I dare say,

the expectation of some, yet I have, as the true God and Lord has vouchsafed to aid me, satisfied the desire of certain persons, by refuting the objections of the ungodly, who prefer their own gods to the Founder of the

Chapter 376

BOOK XI

ARGUMENT HERE BEGINS THE SECOND PART OF THIS WORK, WHICH TREATS OF THE ORIGIN, HISTORY, AND DESTINIES OF THE TWO CITIES, THE EARTHLY AND THE HEAVENLY. IN THE FIRST PLACE, AUGUSTIN SHOWS IN THIS BOOK HOW THE TWO CITIES WE

Chapter 377

1. THE city of God we The city of God we speak of is the same to

which testimony is borne by that Scripture, which excels all the writings of all nations by its divine authority, and has brought under its influence all kinds of minds, and this not by a casual intellectual movement, bu

Chapter 378

1. It is a great and very rare thing for a man, after he has

contemplated the whole creation, corporeal and incorporeal, and has discerned its mutability, to pass beyond it, and, by the continued soaring of his mind, to attain to the unchangeable substance of God, and, in that hei

Chapter 379

1. This Mediator, having spoken what He judged sufficient first by

the prophets, then by His own lips, and afterwards by the apostles, has besides produced the Scripture which is called canonical, which has paramount authority, and to which we yield assent in all matters of which we oug

Chapter 380

1. Of all visible things, the world is the greatest; of all invisible, the

greatest is God. But, that the world is, we see; that God is, we believe. That God made the world, we can believe from no one more safely than from God Himself. But where have we heard Him? Nowhere more distinctly than i

Chapter 381

2. But why did God choose then to create the heavens and earth

which up to that time He had not made? If they who put this question wish to make out that the world is eternal and without beginning, and that consequently it has not been made by God, they are strangely deceived, and r

Chapter 382

1. Next, we must see what reply can be made to those who agree that

God is the Creator of the world, but have difficulties about the time of its creation, and what reply, also, they can make to difficulties we might raise about the place of its creation. For, as they demand why the world

Chapter 383

1. For if eternity and time are rightly distinguished by this, that time

does not exist without some movement and transition, while in eternity there is no change, who does not see that there could have been no time had not some creature been made, which by some motion could give birth to cha

Chapter 384

1. We see, indeed, that our ordinary days have no evening but by the

setting, and no morning but by the rising, of the sun; but the first three days of all were passed without sun, since it is reported to have been made on the fourth day. And first of all, indeed, light was made by the wo

Chapter 385

1. When it is said that God rested on the seventh day from all His

works, and hallowed it, we are not to conceive of this in a childish fashion, as if work were a toil to God, who "spake and it was done,"— spake by the spiritual and eternal, not audible and transitory word. But God's re

Chapter 386

1. At present, since I have undertaken to treat of the origin of the holy

city, and first of the holy angels, who constitute a large part of this city, and indeed the more blessed part, since they have never been expatriated, I will give myself to the task of explaining, by God's help, and as

Chapter 387

1. There is, accordingly, a good which is alone simple, and therefore

alone unchangeable, and this is God. By this Good have all others been created, but not simple, and therefore not unchangeable. "Created," I say,—that is, made, not begotten. For that which is begotten of the simple Good

Chapter 388

2. It is for this reason, then, that the nature of the Trinity is called

simple, because it has not anything which it can lose, and because it is not one thing and its contents another, as a cup and the liquor, or a body and its color, or the air and the light or heat of it, or a mind and its

Chapter 389

3. According to this, then, those things which are essentially and

truly divine are called simple, because in them quality and substance are identical, and because they are divine, or wise, or blessed in themselves, and without extraneous supplement. In Holy Scripture, it is true, the S

Chapter 390

1. And since these things are so, those spirits whom we call angels

were never at any time or in any way darkness, but, as soon as they were made, were made light; yet they were not so created in order that they might exist and live in any way whatever, but were enlightened that they mig

Chapter 391

1. And the angels are not the only members of the rational and

intellectual creation whom we call blessed. For who will take upon him to deny that those first men in Paradise were blessed previously to sin, although they were uncertain how long their blessedness was to last, and whe

Chapter 392

1. From all this, it will readily occur to any one that the blessedness

which an intelligent being desires as its legitimate object results from a combination of these two things, namely, that it uninterruptedly enjoy the unchangeable good, which is God; and that it be delivered from all dub

Chapter 393

1. Moreover, as if we had been inquiring why the devil did not abide

in the truth, our Lord subjoins the reason, saying, "because the truth is not in him." Now, it would be in him had he abode in it. But the phraseology is unusual. For, as the words stand, "He abode not in the truth, beca

Chapter 394

1. As for what John says about the devil, "The devil sinneth from the

beginning" they7 who suppose it is meant hereby that the devil was made with a sinful nature, misunderstand it; for if sin be natural, it is not sin at all. And how do they answer the prophetic proofs,—either what Isaiah

Chapter 395

1. For, among those beings which exist, and which are not of God the

Creator's essence, those which have life are ranked above those which have none; those that have the power of generation, or even of desiring, above those which want this faculty. And, among things that have life, the se

Chapter 396

1. It is with reference to the nature, then, and not to the wickedness

of the devil, that we are to understand these words, "This is the beginning of God's handiwork;" for, without doubt, wickedness can be a flaw or vice4 only where the nature previously was not vitiated. Vice, too, is so c

Chapter 397

1. For God would never have created any, I do not say angel, but even

man, whose future wickedness He foreknew, unless He had equally known to what uses in behalf of the good He could turn him, thus embellishing the course of the ages, as it were an exquisite poem set off with antitheses.

Chapter 398

1. Accordingly, though the obscurity of the divine word has certainly

this advantage, that it causes many opinions about the truth to be started and discussed, each reader seeing some fresh meaning in it, yet, whatever is said to be meant by an obscure passage should be either confirmed by

Chapter 399

1. Then, we must not pass from this passage of Scripture without

noticing that when God said, "Let there be light, and there was light," it was immediately added, "And God saw the light that it was good." No such expression followed the statement that He separated the light from the d

Chapter 400

1. For what else is to be understood by that invariable refrain, "And

God saw that it was good," than the approval of the work in its design, which is the wisdom of God? For certainly God did not in the actual achievement of the work first learn that it was good, but, on the contrary, noth

Chapter 401

1. This cause, however, of a good creation, namely, the goodness of

God,—this cause, I say, so just and fit, which, when piously and carefully weighed, terminates all the controversies of those who inquire into the origin of the world, has not been recognized by some heretics, because th

Chapter 402

1. But it is much more surprising that some even of those who, with

ourselves, believe that there is one only source of all things, and that no nature which is not divine can exist unless originated by that Creator, have yet refused to accept with a good and simple faith this so good and

Chapter 403

2. In the second place, Origen, and all who think with him, ought to

have seen that if it were the true opinion that the world was created in order that souls might, for their sins, be accommodated with bodies in which they should be shut up as in houses of correction, the more venial sin

Chapter 404

1. We believe, we maintain, we faithfully preach, that the Father

begat the Word, that is, Wisdom, by which all things were made, the only-begotten Son, one as the Father is one, eternal as the Father is eternal, and, equally with the Father, supremely good; and that the Holy Spirit is

Chapter 405

1. As far as one can judge, it is for the same reason that philosophers

have aimed at a threefold division of science, or rather, were enabled to see that there was a threefold division (for they did not invent, but only discovered it), of which one part is called physical, another logical,

Chapter 406

1. And we indeed recognize in ourselves the image of God, that is, of

the supreme Trinity, an image which, though it be not equal to God, or rather, though it be very far removed from Him,—being neither co-eternal, nor, to say all in a word, consubstantial with Him,—is yet nearer to Him in

Chapter 407

1. And truly the very fact of existing is by some natural spell so

pleasant, that even the wretched are, for no other reason, unwilling to perish; and, when they feel that they are wretched, wish not that they themselves be annihilated, but that their misery be so. Take even those who,

Chapter 408

2. And how much human nature loves the knowledge of its existence,

and how it shrinks from being deceived, will be sufficiently understood from this fact, that every man prefers to grieve in a sane mind, rather than to be glad in madness. And this grand and wonderful instinct belongs to

Chapter 409

1. We have said as much as the scope of this work demands regarding

these two things, to wit, our existence, and our knowledge of it, and how much they are loved by us, and how there is found even in the lower creatures a kind of likeness of these things, and yet with a difference. We ha

Chapter 410

1. Those holy angels come to the knowledge of God not by audible

words, but by the presence to their souls of immutable truth, i.e., of the only-begotten Word of God; and they know this Word Himself, and the Father, and their Holy Spirit, and that this Trinity is indivisible, and that

Chapter 411

1. These works are recorded to have been completed in six days (the

same day being six times repeated), because six is a perfect number, —not because God required a protracted time, as if He could not at once create all things, which then should mark the course of time by the movements p

Chapter 412

numbers, which, in many passages of holy Scripture, is found to be of

eminent service to the careful interpreter.2 Neither has it been without reason numbered among God's praises, "Thou hast ordered all things in number, and measure, and weight." CHAP. 31.—OF THE SEVENTH DAY, IN WHICH COMP

Chapter 413

1. But, on the seventh day (i.e., the same day repeated seven times,

which number is also a perfect one, though for another reason), the rest of God is set forth, and then, too, we first hear of its being hallowed. So that God did not wish to hallow this day by His works, but by His rest,

Chapter 414

1. But if some one oppose our opinion, and say that the holy angels

are not referred to when it is said, "Let there be light, and there was light;" if he suppose or teach that some material light, then first created, was meant, and that the angels were created, not only before the firmam

Chapter 415

1. That certain angels sinned, and were thrust down to the lowest

parts of this world, where they are, as it were, incarcerated till their final damnation in the day of judgment, the Apostle Peter very plainly declares, when he says that "God spared not the angels that sinned, but cast

Chapter 416

1. Some, however, have supposed that the angelic hosts are somehow

referred to under the name of waters, and that this is what is meant by "Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters:"2 that the waters above should be understood of the angels, and those below either of the visi

Chapter 417

BOOK XII

ARGUMENT AUGUSTIN FIRST INSTITUTES TWO INQUIRIES REGARDING THE ANGELS; NAMELY, WHENCE IS THERE IN SOME A GOOD, AND IN OTHERS AN EVIL WILL? AND, WHAT IS THE REASON OF THE BLESSEDNESS OF THE GOOD, AND THE MISERY OF THE EVI

Chapter 418

1. IT has already, in the preceding book, been shown how the two

cities originated among the angels. Before I speak of the creation of man, and show how the cities took their rise so far as regards the race of rational mortals, I see that I must first, so far as I can, adduce what may

Chapter 419

2. That the contrary propensities in good and bad angels have arisen,

not from a difference in their nature and origin, since God, the good Author and Creator of all essences, created them both, but from a difference in their wills and desires, it is impossible to doubt. While some steadfa

Chapter 420

3. Accordingly we say that there is no unchangeable good but the

one, true, blessed God; that the things which He made are indeed good because from Him, yet mutable because made not out of Him, but out of nothing. Although, therefore, they are not the supreme good, for God is a greate

Chapter 421

1. This may be enough to prevent any one from supposing, when we

speak of the apostate angels, that they could have another nature, derived, as it were, from some different origin, and not from God. From the great impiety of this error we shall disentangle ourselves the more readily a

Chapter 422

1. In Scripture they are called God's enemies who oppose His rule,

not by nature, but by vice; having no power to hurt Him, but only themselves. For they are His enemies, not through their power to hurt, but by their will to oppose Him. For God is unchangeable, and wholly proof against

Chapter 423

1. But it is ridiculous to condemn the faults of beasts and trees, and

other such mortal and mutable things as are void of intelligence, sensation, or life, even though these faults should destroy their corruptible nature; for these creatures received, at their Creator's will, an existence

Chapter 424

1. All natures, then, inasmuch as they are, and have therefore a rank

and species of their own, and a kind of internal harmony, are certainly good. And when they are in the places assigned to them by the order of their nature, they preserve such being as they have received. And those thing

Chapter 425

1. Thus the true cause of the blessedness of the good angels is found

to be this, that they cleave to Him who supremely is. And if we ask the cause of the misery of the bad, it occurs to us, and not unreasonably, that they are miserable because they have forsaken Him who supremely is, and

Chapter 426

1. Let no one, therefore, look for an efficient cause of the evil will; for

it is not efficient, but deficient, as the will itself is not an effecting of something, but a defect. For defection from that which supremely is, to that which has less of being,—this is to begin to have an evil will. N

Chapter 427

1. This I do know, that the nature of God can never, nowhere, nowise

be defective, and that natures made of nothing can. These latter, however, the more being they have, and the more good they do (for then they do something positive), the more they have efficient causes; but in so far as

Chapter 428

1. There is, then, no natural efficient cause, or, if I may be allowed

the expression, no essential cause, of the evil will, since itself is the origin of evil in mutable spirits, by which the good of their nature is diminished and corrupted; and the will is made evil by nothing else than d

Chapter 429

2. Besides, this too has to be inquired into, whether, if the good

angels made their own will good, they did so with or without will? If without, then it was not their doing. If with, was the will good or bad? If bad, how could a bad will give birth to a good one? If good, then already

Chapter 430

1. Let us, then, omit the conjectures of men who know not what they

say, when they speak of the nature and origin of the human race. For some hold the same opinion regarding men that they hold regarding the world itself, that they have always been. Thus Apuleius says when he is describin

Chapter 431

numbers, and from these, again, the population was restored to its

former numbers, and that thus there was at intervals a new beginning made, and though those things which had been -- 525 of 1136 -- interrupted and checked by the severe devastations were only renewed, yet they seemed

Chapter 432

2. They are deceived, too, by those highly mendacious documents

which profess to give the history of many thousand years, though, reckoning by the sacred writings, we find that not 6000 years have yet passed. And, not to spend many words in exposing the baselessness of these document

Chapter 433

1. There are some, again, who, though they do not suppose that this

world is eternal, are of opinion either that this is not the only world, but that there are numberless worlds, or that indeed it is the only one, but that it dies, and is born again at fixed intervals, and this times wit

Chapter 434

1. As to those who are always asking why man was not created during

these countless ages of the infinitely extended past, and came into being so lately that, according to Scripture, less than 6000 years have elapsed since He began to be, I would reply to them regarding the creation of ma

Chapter 435

numbers, the same question could still be put, Why was he not made

before? For the past and boundless eternity during which God abstained from creating man is so great, that, compare it with what vast and untold number of ages you please, so long as there is a definite conclusion of thi

Chapter 436

1. This controversy some philosophers have seen no other approved

means of solving than by introducing cycles of time, in which there should be a constant renewal and repetition of the order of nature; and they have therefore asserted that these cycles will ceaselessly recur, one passi

Chapter 437

2. Some, too, in advocating these recurring cycles that restore all

things to their original cite in favor of their supposition what Solomon says in the book of Ecclesiastes: "What is that which hath been? It is that which shall be. And what is that which is done? It is that which shall

Chapter 438

1. What wonder is it if, entangled in these circles, they find neither

entrance nor egress? For they know not how the human race, and this mortal condition of ours, took its origin, nor how it will be brought to an end, since they cannot penetrate the inscrutable wisdom of God. For, though

Chapter 439

1. For my own part, indeed, as I dare not say that there ever was a

time when the Lord God was not Lord, so I ought not to doubt that man had no existence before time, and was first created in time. But when I consider what God could be the Lord of, if there was not always some creature,

Chapter 440

2. But if I make such a reply, it will be said to me, How, then, are they

not co-eternal with the Creator, if He and they always have been? How even can they be said to have been created, if we are to understand that they have always existed? What shall we reply to this? Shall we say that both

Chapter 441

1. I own that I do not know what ages passed before the human race

was created, yet I have no doubt that no created thing is co-eternal with the Creator. But even the apostle speaks of time as eternal, and this with reference, not to the future, but, which is more surprising, to the pas

Chapter 442

1. Of this, too, I have no doubt, that before the first man was created,

there never had been a man at all, neither this same man himself recurring by I know not what cycles, and having made I know not how many revolutions, nor any other of similar nature. From this belief I am not frightened

Chapter 443

1. As for their other assertion, that God's knowledge cannot

comprehend things infinite, it only remains for them to affirm, in order that they may sound the depths of their impiety, that God does not know all numbers. For it is very certain that they are infinite; since, no matte

Chapter 444

1. I do not presume to determine whether God does so, and whether

these times which are called "ages of ages" are joined together in a continuous series, and succeed one another with a regulated diversity, and leave exempt from their vicissitudes only those who are freed from their mis

Chapter 445

1. What pious ears could bear to hear that after a life spent in so

many and severe distresses (if, indeed, that should be called a life at all which is rather a death, so utter that the love of this present death makes us fear that death which delivers us from it,) that after evils so d

Chapter 446

2. And if they maintain that no one can attain to the blessedness of

the world to come, unless in this life he has been indoctrinated in those cycles in which bliss and misery relieve one another, how do they avow that the more a man loves God, the more readily he attains to blessedness,—

Chapter 447

3. But these things are declared to be false by the loud testimony of

religion and truth; for religion truthfully promises a true blessedness, of which we shall be eternally assured, and which cannot be interrupted by any disaster. Let us therefore keep to the straight path, which is Chris

Chapter 448

4. And now that we have exploded these cycles which were supposed

to bring back the soul at fixed periods to the same miseries, what can seem more in accordance with godly reason than to believe that it is possible for God both to create new things never before created, and in doing so

Chapter 449

1. Now that we have solved, as well as we could, this very difficult

question about the eternal God creating new things, without any novelty of will, it is easy to see how much better it is that God was pleased to produce the human race from the one individual whom He created, than if He

Chapter 450

1. And God was not ignorant that man would sin, and that, being

himself made subject now to death, he would propagate men doomed to die, and that these mortals would run to such enormities in sin, that even the beasts devoid of rational will, and who were created in numbers from the

Chapter 451

1. God, then, made man in His own image. For He created for him a

soul endowed with reason and intelligence, so that he might excel all the creatures of earth, air, and sea, which were not so gifted. And when He had formed the man out of the dust of the earth, and had willed that his s

Chapter 452

1. But in this book we have nothing to do with those who do not

believe that the divine mind made or cares for this world. As for those who believe their own Plato, that all mortal animals—among whom man holds the pre-eminent place, and is near to the gods themselves—were created not

Chapter 453

1. For whereas there is one form which is given from without to every

bodily substance,—such as the form which is constructed by potters and smiths, and that class of artists who paint and fashion forms like the body of animals,—but another and internal form which is not itself constructed

Chapter 454

1. It is obvious, that in attributing the creation of the other animals to

those inferior gods who were made by the Supreme, he meant it to be understood that the immortal part was taken from God Himself, and that these minor creators added the mortal part; that is to say, he meant them to be c

Chapter 455

1. With good cause, therefore, does the true religion recognize and

proclaim that the same God who created the universal cosmos, created also all the animals, souls as well as bodies. Among the terrestrial animals man was made by Him in His own image, and, for the reason I have given, wa

Chapter 456

1. HAVING disposed of the very difficult questions concerning the

origin of our world and the beginning of the human race, the natural order requires that we now discuss the fall of the first man (we may say of the first men), and of the origin and propagation of human death. For God h

Chapter 457

1. But I see I must speak a little more carefully of the nature of death.

For although the human soul is truly affirmed to be immortal, yet it also has a certain death of its own. For it is therefore called immortal, because, in a sense, it does not cease to live and to feel; while the body is

Chapter 458

1. But a question not to be shirked arises: Whether in very truth

death, which separates soul and body, is good to the good? For if it be, how has it come to pass that such a thing should be the punishment of sin? For the first men would not have suffered death had they not sinned. How

Chapter 459

1. If, moreover, any one is solicitous about this point, how, if death be

the very punishment of sin, they whose guilt is cancelled by grace do -- 555 of 1136 -- yet suffer death, this difficulty has already been handled and solved in our other work which we have written on the baptism of in

Chapter 460

1. The apostle, wishing to show how hurtful a thing sin is, when grace

does not aid us, has not hesitated to say that the strength of sin is that very law by which sin is prohibited. "The sting of death is sin, and the strength of sin is the law." Most certainly true; for prohibition increa

Chapter 461

1. Wherefore, as regards bodily death, that is, the separation of the

soul from the body, it is good unto none while it is being endured by those whom we say are in the article of death. For the very violence with which body and soul are wrenched asunder, which in the living had been conjo

Chapter 462

1. For whatever unbaptized persons die confessing Christ, this

confession is of the same efficacy for the remission of sins as if they were washed in the sacred font of baptism. For He who said, "Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of Go

Chapter 463

1. For if we look at the matter a little more carefully, we shall see that

even when a man dies faithfully and laudably for the truth's sake, it is still death he is avoiding. For he submits to some part of death, for the very purpose of avoiding the whole, and the second and eternal death over

Chapter 464

1. The point of time in which the souls of the good and evil are

separated from the body, are we to say it is after death, or in death rather? If it is after death, then it is not death which is good or evil, since death is done with and past, but it is the life which the soul has now

Chapter 465

1. For no sooner do we begin to live in this dying body, than we begin

to move ceaselessly towards death. For in the whole course of this life (if life we must call it) its mutability tends towards death. Certainly there is no one who is not nearer it this year than last year, and to- morro

Chapter 466

1. But if it is absurd to say that a man is in death before he reaches

death (for to what is his course running as he passes through life, if already he is in death?), and if it outrage common usage to speak of a man being at once alive and dead, as much as it does so to speak of him as at

Chapter 467

2. Let us, then, speak in the customary way,—no man ought to speak

otherwise,—and let us call the time before death come, "before death;" as it is written, "Praise no man before his death." And when it has happened, let us say that "after death" this or that took place. And of the prese

Chapter 468

1. When, therefore, it is asked what death it was with which God

threatened our first parents if they should transgress the -- 564 of 1136 -- commandment they had received from Him, and should fail to preserve their obedience,—whether it was the death of soul, or of body, or of the

Chapter 469

1. For, as soon as our first parents had transgressed the

commandment, divine grace forsook them, and they were confounded at their own wickedness; and therefore they took fig- leaves (which were possibly the first that came to hand in their troubled state of mind), and covered

Chapter 470

1. For God, the author of natures, not of vices, created man upright;

but man, being of his own will corrupted, and justly condemned, begot corrupted and condemned children. For we all were in that one man, since we all were that one man, who fell into sin by the woman who was made from hi

Chapter 471

1. It may perhaps be supposed that because God said, "Ye shall die

the death," and not "deaths," we should understand only that death which occurs when the soul is deserted by God, who is its life; for it was not deserted by God, and so deserted Him, but deserted Him, and so was deserte

Chapter 472

1. But the philosophers against whom we are defending the city of

God, that is, His Church, seem to themselves to have good cause to deride us, because we say that the separation of the soul from the body is to be held as part of man's punishment. For they suppose that the blessedness

Chapter 473

2. Whether this opinion of Plato's about the stars is true or not, is

another question. For we cannot at once grant to him that these luminous bodies or globes, which by day and night shine on the earth with the light of their bodily substance, have also intellectual and blessed souls whic

Chapter 474

1. These same philosophers further contend that terrestrial bodies

cannot be eternal, though they make no doubt that the whole earth, -- 569 of 1136 -- which is itself the central member of their god,—not, indeed, of the greatest, but yet of a great god, that is, of this whole world,—

Chapter 475

2. But they should not have been so led astray, I will not say by their

ignorance, but by their obstinacy, as to contradict themselves so frequently; for they maintain, with all their vaunted might, that in order to the happiness of the soul, it must abandon not only its earthly body, but ev

Chapter 476

1. But it is necessary, they say, that the natural weight of earthly

bodies either keeps them on earth or draws them to it; and therefore they cannot be in heaven. Our first parents were indeed on earth, in a well-wooded and fruitful spot, which has been named Paradise. But let our advers

Chapter 477

1. At present let us go on, as we have begun, to give some explanation

regarding the bodies of our first parents. I say then, that, except as the just consequence of sin, they would not have been subjected even to this death, which is good to the good,—this death, which is not exclusively k

Chapter 478

1. Thus the souls of departed saints are not affected by the death

which dismisses them from their bodies, because their flesh rests in -- 575 of 1136 -- hope, no matter what indignities it receives after sensation is gone. For they do not desire that their bodies be forgotten, as Pla

Chapter 479

1. On this account some allegorize all that concerns Paradise itself,

where the first men, the parents of the human race, are, according to the truth of holy Scripture, recorded to have been; and they understand all its trees and fruit-bearing plants as virtues and habits of life, as if th

Chapter 480

1. The bodies of the righteous, then, such as they shall be in the

resurrection, shall need neither any fruit to preserve them from dying of disease or the wasting decay of old age, nor any other physical nourishment to allay the cravings of hunger or of thirst; for they shall be invest

Chapter 481

1. For as those bodies of ours, that have a living soul, though not as

yet a quickening spirit, are called soul-informed bodies, and yet are not souls but bodies, so also those bodies are called spiritual,—yet God forbid we should therefore suppose them to be spirits and not bodies,—which,

Chapter 482

2. Thus the apostle states that the first man was made in an animal

body. For, wishing to distinguish the animal body which now is from -- 580 of 1136 -- the spiritual, which is to be in the resurrection, he says, "It is sown in corruption, it is raised in incorruption: it is sown in d

Chapter 483

3. Then the apostle subjoins a notable difference between these two

men, saying, "The first man is of the earth, earthy; the second man is the Lord from heaven. As is the earthy, such are they also that are earthy, and as is the heavenly, such are they also that are heavenly. And as we h

Chapter 484

1. Some have hastily supposed from the words, "God breathed into

Adam's nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living soul,"that a soul was not then first given to man, but that the soul already given was quickened by the Holy Ghost. They are encouraged in this supposition by t

Chapter 485

2. They say, Already he had a soul, else he would not be called a man;

for man is not a body alone, nor a soul alone, but a being composed of both. This, indeed, is true, that the soul is not the whole man, but the better part of man; the body not the whole, but the inferior part of man; an

Chapter 486

3. Wherefore, when our Lord breathed on His disciples, and said,

"Receive ye the Holy Ghost," He certainly wished it to be understood that the Holy Ghost was not only the Spirit of the Father, but of the only begotten Son Himself. For the same Spirit is, indeed, the Spirit of the Fath

Chapter 487

4. But, say they, when the Scripture used the word "spirit," it would

not have added "of life" unless it meant us to understand the Holy Spirit; nor, when it said, "Man became a soul," would it also have inserted the word "living" unless that life of the soul were signified which is impart

Chapter 488

5. But, again, they object that breath is understood to have been

emitted from the mouth of God; and if we believe that is the soul, we must consequently acknowledge it to be of the same substance, and equal to that wisdom, which says, "I come out of the mouth of the Most High." Wisdom

Chapter 489

6. There is no ground, then, for our objecting, when the apostle so

expressly distinguishes the animal body from the spiritual—that is to say, the body in which we now are from that in which we are to be. He says, "It is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body. There is a natu

Chapter 490

7. There remains a question which must be discussed, and, by the

help of the Lord God of truth, solved: If the motion of concupiscence in the unruly members of our first parents arose out of their sin, and only when the divine grace deserted them; and if it was on that occasion that t

Chapter 491

BOOK XIV

ARGUMENT AUGUSTIN AGAIN TREATS OF THE SIN OF THE FIRST MAN, AND TEACHES THAT IT IS THE CAUSE OF THE CARNAL LIFE AND VICIOUS AFFECTIONS OF MAN. ESPECIALLY HE PROVES THAT THE SHAME WHICH ACCOMPANIES LUST IS THE JUST PUNISH

Chapter 492

1. WE have already stated in the preceding books that God, desiring

not only that the human race might be able by their similarity of nature to associate with one another, but also that they might be bound together in harmony and peace by the ties of relationship, was pleased to derive a

Chapter 493

1. First, we must see what it is to live after the flesh, and what to live

after the spirit. For any one who either does not recollect, or does not sufficiently weigh, the language of sacred Scripture, may, on first hearing what we have said, suppose that the Epicurean philosophers live after t

Chapter 494

2. Since, then, Scripture uses the word flesh in many ways, which

there is not time to collect and investigate, if we are to ascertain what it is to live after the flesh (which is certainly evil, though the nature of flesh is not itself evil), we must carefully examine that passage of

Chapter 495

1. But if any one says that the flesh is the cause of all vices and ill

conduct, inasmuch as the soul lives wickedly only because it is moved by the flesh, it is certain he has not carefully considered the whole nature of man. For "the corruptible body, indeed, weigheth down the soul." Whenc

Chapter 496

2. Virgil, indeed, seems to express the sentiments of Plato in the

beautiful lines, where he says,— "A fiery strength inspires their lives, An essence that from heaven derives, Though clogged in part by limbs of clay And the dull 'vesture of decay;' " but though he goes on to mention th

Chapter 497

1. When, therefore, man lives according to man, not according to

God, he is like the devil. Because not even an angel might live according to an angel, but only according to God, if he was to abide in the truth, and speak God's truth and not his own lie. And of man, too, the same apos

Chapter 498

2. In enunciating this proposition of ours, then, that because some

live according to the flesh and others according to the spirit, there have arisen two diverse and conflicting cities, we might equally well have said, "because some live according to man, others according to God." For Pa

Chapter 499

1. There is no need, therefore, that in our sins and vices we accuse the

nature of the flesh to the injury of the Creator, for in its own kind and degree the flesh is good; but to desert the Creator good, and live according to the created good, is not good, whether a man choose to live accord

Chapter 500

1. But the character of the human will is of moment; because, if it is

wrong, these motions of the soul will be wrong, but if it is right, they will be not merely blameless, but even praiseworthy. For the will is in them all; yea, none of them is anything else than will. For what are desire

Chapter 501

1. He who resolves to love God, and to love his neighbor as himself,

not according to man but according to God, is on account of this love said to be of a good will; and this is in Scripture more commonly called charity, but it is also, even in the same books, called love. For the apostle

Chapter 502

2. I have judged it right to mention this, because some are of opinion

that charity or regard (dilectio) is one thing, love (amor) another. They say that dilectio is used of a good affection, amor of an evil love. But it is very certain that even secular literature knows no such distinction

Chapter 503

1. Those emotions which the Greeks call εὐπαθείαι, and which Cicero

calls constantiœ, the Stoics would restrict to three; and, instead of three "perturbations" in the soul of the wise man, they substituted severally, in place of desire, will; in place of joy, contentment; and for fear, c

Chapter 504

2. Yet though we may sometimes avail ourselves of these precise

proprieties of language, we are not to be always bridled by them; and when we read those writers against whose authority it is unlawful to reclaim, we must accept the meanings above mentioned in passages where a right se

Chapter 505

1. But so far as regards this question of mental perturbations, we

have answered these philosophers in the ninth book of this work, showing that it is rather a verbal than a real dispute, and that they seek contention rather than truth. Among ourselves, according to the sacred Scripture

Chapter 506

2. And not only on their own account do they experience these

emotions, but also on account of those whose deliverance they desire and whose perdition they fear, and whose loss or salvation affects them with grief or with joy. For if we who have come into the Church from among the

Chapter 507

3. If these emotions and affections, arising as they do from the love

of what is good and from a holy charity, are to be called vices, then let us allow these emotions which are truly vices to pass under the -- 605 of 1136 -- name of virtues. But since these affections, when they are exe

Chapter 508

4. But we must further make the admission, that even when these

affections are well regulated, and according to God's will, they are peculiar to this life, not to that future life we look for, and that often we yield to them against our will. And thus sometimes we weep in spite of ou

Chapter 509

5. For that fear of which the Apostle John says, "There is no fear in

love; but perfect love casteth out fear, because fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love,"—that fear is not of the same kind as the Apostle Paul felt lest the Corinthians should be seduced by the s

Chapter 510

6. And since this is so,—since we must live a good life in order to

attain to a blessed life,—a good life has all these affections right, a bad life has them wrong. But in the blessed life eternal there will be love and joy, not only right, but also assured; but fear and grief there will

Chapter 511

1. But it is a fair question, whether our first parent or first parents

(for there was a marriage of two), before they sinned, experienced in their animal body such emotions as we shall not experience in the spiritual body when sin has been purged and finally abolished. For if they did, then

Chapter 512

1. But because God foresaw all things, and was therefore not ignorant

that man also would fall, we ought to consider this holy city in connection with what God foresaw and ordained, and not according to our own ideas, which do not embrace God's ordination. For man, by his sin, could not di

Chapter 513

2. Man then lived with God for his rule in a paradise at once physical

and spiritual. For neither was it a paradise only physical for the advantage of the body, and not also spiritual for the advantage of the mind; nor was it only spiritual to afford enjoyment to man by his internal sensati

Chapter 514

1. If any one finds a difficulty in understanding why other sins do not

alter human nature as it was altered by the transgression of those first human beings, so that on account of it this nature is subject to the great corruption we feel and see, and to death, and is distracted and tossed w

Chapter 515

1. Our first parents fell into open disobedience because already they

were secretly corrupted; for the evil act had never been done had not an evil will preceded it. And what is the origin of our evil will but pride? For "pride is the beginning of sin." And what is pride but the craving fo

Chapter 516

2. The devil, then, would not have ensnared man in the open and

manifest sin of doing what God had forbidden, had man not already begun to live for himself. It was this that made him listen with pleasure to the words, "Ye shall be as gods," which they would much more readily have acc

Chapter 517

1. But it is a worse and more damnable pride which casts about for

the shelter of an excuse even in manifest sins, as these our first parents did, of whom the woman said, "The serpent beguiled me, and I did eat;" and the man said, "The woman whom Thou gavest to be with me, she gave me o

Chapter 518

1. Therefore, because the sin was a despising of the authority of God,

—who had created man; who had made him in His own image; who had set him above the other animals; who had placed him in Paradise; who had enriched him with abundance of every kind and of safety; who had laid upon him nei

Chapter 519

2. In short, to say all in a word, what but disobedience was the

punishment of disobedience in that sin? For what else is man's -- 617 of 1136 -- misery but his own disobedience to himself, so that in consequence of his not being willing to do what he could do, he now wills to do wh

Chapter 520

1. Although, therefore, lust may have many objects, yet when no

object is specified, the word lust usually suggests to the mind the lustful excitement of the organs of generation. And this lust not only takes possession of the whole body and outward members, but also makes itself fel

Chapter 521

1. Justly is shame very specially connected with this lust; justly, too,

these members themselves, being moved and restrained not at our will, but by a certain independent autocracy, so to speak, are called "shameful." Their condition was different before sin. For as it is written, "They were

Chapter 522

1. Lust requires for its consummation darkness and secrecy; and this

not only when unlawful intercourse is desired, but even such fornication as the earthly city has legalized. Where there is no fear of punishment, these permitted pleasures still shrink from the public eye. Even where pro

Chapter 523

1. Hence it is that even the philosophers who have approximated to

the truth have avowed that anger and lust are vicious mental emotions, because, even when exercised towards objects which wisdom does not prohibit, they are moved in an ungoverned and inordinsate manner, and consequently

Chapter 524

1. It is this which those canine or cynic philosophers have

overlooked, when they have, in violation of the modest instincts of men, boastfully proclaimed their unclean and shameless opinion, worthy indeed of dogs, viz., that as the matrimonial act is legitimate, no one should be

Chapter 525

1. Far be it, then, from us to suppose that our first parents in

Paradise felt that lust which caused them afterwards to blush and -- 624 of 1136 -- hide their nakedness, or that by its means they should have fulfilled the benediction of God, "Increase and multiply and replenish the

Chapter 526

1. But we, for our part, have no manner of doubt that to increase and

multiply and replenish the earth in virtue of the blessing of God, is a gift of marriage as God instituted it from the beginning before man -- 625 of 1136 -- sinned, when He created them male and female,—in other words

Chapter 527

1. But he who says that there should have been neither copulation

nor generation but for sin, virtually says that man's sin was necessary to complete the number of the saints. For if these two by not sinning should have continued to live alone, because, as is supposed, they could not h

Chapter 528

2. And therefore that marriage, worthy of the happiness of Paradise,

should have had desirable fruit without the shame of lust, had there been no sin. But how that could be, there is now no example to teach us. Nevertheless, it ought not to seem incredible that one member might serve the

Chapter 529

3. But so long as the will retains under its authority the other

members, without which the members excited by lust to resist the will cannot accomplish what they seek, chastity is preserved, and the delight of sin foregone. And certainly, had not culpable disobedience been visited wi

Chapter 530

1. The man, then, would have sown the seed, and the woman received

it, as need required, the generative organs being moved by the will, not excited by lust. For we move at will not only those members which are furnished with joints of solid bone, as the hands, feet, and fingers, but we

Chapter 531

2. We know, too, that some men are differently constituted from

others, and have some rare and remarkable faculty of doing with their body what other men can by no effort do, and, indeed, scarcely believe when they hear of others doing. There are persons who can move their ears, eith

Chapter 532

1. However, if we look at this a little more closely, we see that no one

lives as he wishes but the blessed, and that no one is blessed but the righteous. But even the righteous himself does not live as he wishes, until he has arrived where he cannot die, be deceived, or injured, and until he

Chapter 533

1. In Paradise, then, man lived as he desired so long as he desired

what God had commanded. He lived in the enjoyment of God, and was good by God's goodness; he lived without any want, and had it in his power so to live eternally. He had food that he might not hunger, drink that he might

Chapter 534

1. The sins of men and angels do nothing to impede the "great works

of the Lord which accomplish His will." For He who by His providence and omnipotence distributes to every one his own portion, is able to make good use not only of the good, but also of the wicked. And thus making a good

Chapter 535

1. Accordingly, two cities have been formed by two loves: the earthly

by the love of self, even to the contempt of God; the heavenly by the love of God, even to the contempt of self. The former, in a word, glories in itself, the latter in the Lord. For the one seeks glory from men; but the

Chapter 536

BOOK XV

ARGUMENT HAVING TREATED IN THE FOUR PRECEDING BOOKS OF THE ORIGIN OF THE TWO CITIES, THE EARTHLY AND THE HEAVENLY, AUGUSTIN EXPLAINS THEIR GROWTH AND PROGRESS IN THE FOUR BOOKS WHICH FOLLOW; AND, IN ORDER TO DO SO, HE EX

Chapter 537

1. OF the bliss of Paradise, of Paradise itself, and of the life of our

first parents there, and of their sin and punishment, many have thought much, spoken much, written much. We ourselves, too, have spoken of these things in the foregoing books, and have written either what we read in the

Chapter 538

2. Of these two first parents of the human race, then, Cain was the

first-born, and he belonged to the city of men; after him was born Abel, who belonged to the city of God. For as in the individual the truth of the apostle's statement is discerned, "that is not first which is spiritual,

Chapter 539

1. There was indeed on earth, so long as it was needed, a symbol and

foreshadowing image of this city, which served the purpose of reminding men that such a city was to be, rather than of making it present; and this image was itself called the holy city, as a symbol of the future city, th

Chapter 540

1. Sarah, in fact, was barren; and, despairing of offspring, and being

resolved that she would have at least through her handmaid that blessing she saw she could not in her own person procure, she gave her handmaid to her husband, to whom she herself had been unable to bear children. From h

Chapter 541

1. But the earthly city, which shall not be everlasting (for it will no

longer be a city when it has been committed to the extreme penalty), has its good in this world, and rejoices in it with such joy as such things can afford. But as this is not a good which can discharge its -- 640 of 11

Chapter 542

1. Thus the founder of the earthly city was a fratricide. Overcome

with envy, he slew his own brother, a citizen of the eternal city, and a sojourner on earth. So that we cannot be surprised that this first -- 641 of 1136 -- specimen, or, as the Greeks say, archetype of crime, should,

Chapter 543

1. This sickliness—that is to say, that disobedience of which we spoke

in the fourteenth book—is the punishment of the first disobedience. It is therefore not nature, but vice; and therefore it is said to the good who are growing in grace, and living in this pilgrimage by faith, "Bear ye on

Chapter 544

1. But though God made use of this very mode of address which we

have been endeavoring to explain, and spoke to Cain in that form by which He was wont to accommodate Himself to our first parents and converse with them as a companion, what good influence had it on Cain? Did he not fulf

Chapter 545

2. Yet He does not dismiss him without counsel, holy, just, and good.

"Fret not thyself," He says, "for unto thee shall be his turning, and thou shall rule over him." Over his brother, does He mean? Most certainly not. Over what, then, but sin? For He had said, "Thou hast sinned," and then

Chapter 546

1. At present it is the history which I aim at defending, that Scripture

may not be reckoned incredible when it relates that one man built a city at a time in which there seem to have been but four men upon earth, or rather indeed but three, after one brother slew the other,— to wit, the firs

Chapter 547

2. Therefore, although it is written, "And Cain knew his wife, and she

conceived and bare Enoch, and he builded a city and called the name of the city after the name of his son Enoch," it does not follow that we are to believe this to have been his first-born; for we cannot suppose that thi

Chapter 548

1. Wherefore no one who considerately weighs facts will doubt that

Cain might have built a city, and that a large one, when it is observed how prolonged were the lives of men, unless perhaps some sceptic take exception to this very length of years which our authors ascribe to the antedi

Chapter 549

1. Wherefore, although there is a discrepancy for which I cannot

account between our manuscripts and the Hebrew, in the very number of years assigned to the antediluvians, yet the discrepancy is not so great that they do not agree about their longevity. For the very first man, Adam, b

Chapter 550

1. From this discrepancy between the Hebrew books and our own

arises the well-known question as to the age of Methuselah; for it is computed that he lived for fourteen years after the deluge, though Scripture relates that of all who were then upon the earth only the eight souls in

Chapter 551

1. For they are by no means to be listened to who suppose that in

those times years were differently reckoned, and were so short that -- 654 of 1136 -- one of our years may be supposed to be equal to ten of theirs. So that they say, when we read or hear that some man lived 900 years,

Chapter 552

2. By these plausible arguments certain persons, with no desire to

weaken the credit of this sacred history, but rather to facilitate belief in it by removing the difficulty of such incredible longevity, have been themselves persuaded, and think they act wisely in persuading others, tha

Chapter 553

1. But if I say this, I shall presently be answered, It is one of the Jews'

lies. This, however, we have disposed of above, showing that it cannot be that men of so just a reputation as the seventy translators should have falsified their version. However, if I ask them which of the two is more c

Chapter 554

2. Accordingly, that diversity of numbers which distinguishes the

Hebrew from the Greek and Latin copies of Scripture, and which consists of a uniform addition and deduction of 100 years in each -- 657 of 1136 -- lifetime for several consecutive generations, is to be attributed neith

Chapter 555

3. This is corroborated still further by the fact that in the eighth

generation, while the Hebrew books assign 182 years to Methuselah before Lamech's birth, ours assign to him twenty less, though usually 100 years are added to this period; then, after Lamech's birth, the twenty years are

Chapter 556

1. Let us now see how it can be plainly made out that in the

enormously protracted lives of those men the years were not so short that ten of their years were equal to only one of ours, but were of as great length as our own, which are measured by the course of the sun. It is prov

Chapter 557

2. But that discrepancy of numbers which is found to exist between

our own and the Hebrew text does not touch the longevity of the ancients; and if there is any diversity so great that both versions cannot be true, we must take our ideas of the real facts from that text out of which our

Chapter 558

1. Some one, then, will say, Is it to be believe that a man who

intended to beget children, and had no intention of continence, abstained from sexual intercourse a hundred years and more, or even, according to the Hebrew version, only a little less, say eighty, seventy, or sixty year

Chapter 559

2. Let me make this clearer by here inserting an example, in regard

to which no one can have any doubt that what I am asserting is true. The evangelist Matthew, where he designs to commit to our memories the generation of the Lord's flesh by a series of parents, beginning from Abraham an

Chapter 560

1. As, therefore, the human race, subsequently to the first marriage of

the man who was made of dust, and his wife who was made out of his side, required the union of males and females in order that it might multiply, and as there were no human beings except those who had been born of these

Chapter 561

2. And we see that, since the human race has increased and

multiplied, this is so strictly observed even among the profane worshippers of many and false gods, that though their laws perversely allow a brother to marry his sister, yet custom, with a finer morality, prefers to for

Chapter 562

3. The sexual intercourse of man and woman, then, is in the case of

mortals a kind of seedbed of the city; but while the earthly city needs for its population only generation, the heavenly needs also regeneration to rid it of the taint of generation. Whether before the deluge there was a

Chapter 563

1. Since, then, Adam was the father of both lines,—the father, that is

to say, both of the line which belonged to the earthly, and of that which belonged to the heavenly city,—when Abel was slain, and by his death exhibited a marvellous mystery, there were henceforth two lines proceeding fr

Chapter 564

1. For that line also of which Seth is the father has the name

"Dedication" in the seventh generation from Adam, counting Adam. For the seventh from him is Enoch, that is, Dedication. But this is that man who was translated because he pleased God, and who held in the order of the ge

Chapter 565

1. Some one will say, If the writer of this history intended, in

enumerating the generations from Adam through his son Seth, to descend through them to Noah, in whose time the deluge occurred, and from him again to trace the connected generations down to Abraham, with whom Matthew beg

Chapter 566

2. Why, then, is so small a number of Cain's generations registered, if

it was proper to trace them to the deluge, and if there was no such delay of the date of puberty as to preclude the hope of offspring for a hundred or more years? For if the author of this book had not in view some one t

Chapter 567

3. But let any one who is moved by this call to mind that when I

discussed the question, how it is credible that those primitive men could abstain for so many years from begetting children, two modes of solution were found,—either a puberty late in proportion to their longevity, or th

Chapter 568

4. But in whatever manner the generations of Cain's line are traced

downwards, whether it be by first-born sons or by the heirs to the throne, it seems to me that I must by no means omit to notice that, when Lamech had been set down as the seventh from Adam, there were named, in addition

Chapter 569

1. We must first see why, in the enumeration of Cain's posterity, after

Enoch, in whose name the city was built, has been first of all mentioned, the rest are at once enumerated down to that terminus of which I have spoken, and at which that race and the whole line was destroyed in the delug

Chapter 570

1. When the human race, in the exercise of this freedom of will,

increased and advanced, there arose a mixture and confusion of the two cities by their participation in a common iniquity. And this calamity, as well as the first, was occasioned by woman, though not in the same way; for

Chapter 571

1. In the third book of this work (c. 5) we made a passing reference to

this question, but did not decide whether angels, inasmuch as they -- 678 of 1136 -- are spirits, could have bodily intercourse with women. For it is written, "Who maketh His angels spirits," that is, He makes those wh

Chapter 572

2. But some are moved by the fact that we have read that the fruit of

the connection between those who are called angels of God and the -- 679 of 1136 -- women they loved were not men like our own breed, but giants; just as if there were not born even in our own time (as I have mentioned

Chapter 573

3. But that those angels were not angels in the sense of not being

men, as some suppose, Scripture itself decides, which unambiguously declares that they were men. For when it had first been stated that "the angels of God saw the daughters of men that they were fair, and they took them

Chapter 574

4. Let us omit, then, the fables of those scriptures which are called

apocryphal, because their obscure origin was unknown to the fathers from whom the authority of the true Scriptures has been transmitted to us by a most certain and well-ascertained succession. For though there is some tr

Chapter 575

1. But that which God said, "Their days shall be a hundred and

twenty years," is not to be understood as a prediction that henceforth men should not live longer than 120 years,—for even after the deluge we find that they lived more than 500 years,—but we are to understand that God s

Chapter 576

1. The anger of God is not a disturbing emotion of His mind, but a

judgment by which punishment is inflicted upon sin. His thought and reconsideration also are the unchangeable reason which changes things; for He does not, like man, repent of anything He has done, because in all matters

Chapter 577

1. Moreover, inasmuch as God commanded Noah, a just man, and, as

the truthful Scripture says, a man perfect in his generation,—not indeed with the perfection of the citizens of the city of God in that immortal condition in which they equal the angels, but in so far as they can be perf

Chapter 578

2. But we have not now time to pursue this subject; and, indeed, we

have already dwelt upon it in the work we wrote against Faustus the Manichean, who denies that there is anything prophesied of Christ in the Hebrew books. It may be that one man's exposition excels another's, and that ou

Chapter 579

1. Yet no one ought to suppose either that these things were written

for no purpose, or that we should study only the historical truth, apart from any allegorical meanings; or, on the contrary, that they are only allegories, and that there were no such facts at all, or that, whether it be

Chapter 580

2. But they who contend that these things never happened, but are

only figures setting forth other things, in the first place suppose that there could not be a flood so great that the water should rise fifteen cubits above the highest mountains, because it is said that clouds cannot ri

Chapter 581

3. They say, too, that the area of that ark could not contain so many

kinds of animals of both sexes, two of the unclean and seven of the clean. But they seem to me to reckon only one area of 300 cubits long and 50 broad, and not to remember that there was another similar in the story abov

Chapter 582

4. As to another customary inquiry of the scrupulous about the very

minute creatures, not only such as mice and lizards, but also locusts, beetles, flies, fleas, and so forth, whether there were not in the ark a larger number of them than was determined by God in His command, those perso

Chapter 583

5. Another question is commonly raised regarding the food of the

carnivorous animals,—whether, without transgressing the command which fixed the number to be preserved, there were necessarily others included in the ark for their sustenance; or, as is more probable, there might be some

Chapter 584

BOOK XVI

ARGUMENT IN THE FORMER PART OF THIS BOOK, FROM THE FIRST TO THE TWELFTH CHAPTER, THE PROGRESS OF THE TWO CITIES, THE EARTHLY AND THE HEAVENLY, FROM NOAH TO ABRAHAM, IS EXHIBITED FROM HOLY SCRIPTURE: IN THE LATTER PART, T

Chapter 585

1. IT is difficult to discover from Scripture, whether, after the deluge,

traces of the holy city are continuous, or are so interrupted by intervening seasons of godlessness, that not a single worshipper of the one true God was found among men; because from Noah, who, with his wife, three sons

Chapter 586

1. The things which then were hidden are now sufficiently revealed

by the actual events which have followed. For who can carefully and intelligently consider these things without recognizing them accomplished in Christ? Shem, of whom Christ was born in the flesh, means "named." And what

Chapter 587

2. But the wicked brother is, in the person of his son (i.e., his work),

the boy, or slave, of his good brothers, when good men make a skillful use of bad men, either for the exercise of their patience or for their advancement in wisdom. For the apostle testifies that there are some who preac

Chapter 588

3. These secrets of divine Scripture we investigate as well as we can.

All will not accept our interpretation with equal confidence, but all hold it certain that these things were neither done nor recorded without some foreshadowing of future events, and that they are to be referred only to

Chapter 589

1. We must therefore introduce into this work an explanation of the

generations of the three sons of Noah, in so far as that may illustrate the progress in time of the two cities. Scripture first mentions that of the youngest son, who is called Japheth: he had eight sons, and by two of t

Chapter 590

2. It remains to mention the sons of Shem, Noah's eldest son; for to

him this genealogical narrative gradually ascends from the youngest. But in the commencement of the record of Shem's sons there is an obscurity which calls for explanation, since it is closely connected with the object o

Chapter 591

3. But nations are expressly mentioned among the sons of Ham, as I

showed above. "Mizraim begat those who are called Ludim;" and so also of the other seven nations. And after enumerating all of them, it concludes, "These are the sons of Ham, in their families, according to their languag

Chapter 592

1. But though these nations are said to have been dispersed according

to their languages, yet the narrator recurs to that time when all had but one language, and explains how it came to pass that a diversity of languages was introduced. "The whole earth," he says, "was of one lip, and all

Chapter 593

1. We read, "The Lord came down to see the city and the tower which

the sons of men built:" it was not the sons of God, but that society which lived in a merely human way, and which we call the earthly city. God, who is always wholly everywhere, does not move locally; but He is said to d

Chapter 594

1. We might have supposed that the words uttered at the creation of

man, "Let us," and not Let me, "make man," were addressed to the -- 700 of 1136 -- angels, had He not added "in our image;" but as we cannot believe that man was made in the image of angels, or that the image of God is

Chapter 595

2. The words, "Nothing will be restrained from them which they have

imagined to do," are assuredly not meant as an affirmation, but as an -- 701 of 1136 -- interrogation, such as is used by persons threatening, as e.g., when Dido exclaims, "They will not take arms and pursue?" We are t

Chapter 596

1. There is a question raised about all those kinds of beasts which are

not domesticated, nor are produced like frogs from the earth, but are propagated by male and female parents, such as wolves and animals of that kind; and it is asked how they could be found in the islands after the delug

Chapter 597

1. It is also asked whether we are to believe that certain monstrous

races of men, spoken of in secular history, have sprung from Noah's sons, or rather, I should say, from that one man from whom they themselves were descended. For it is reported that some have one eye in the middle of th

Chapter 598

2. The same account which is given of monstrous births in individual

cases can be given of monstrous races. For God, the Creator of all, knows where and when each thing ought to be, or to have been created, because He sees the similarities and diversities which can contribute to the beaut

Chapter 599

1. But as to the fable that there are Antipodes, that is to say, men on

the opposite side of the earth, where the sun rises when it sets to us, men who walk with their feet opposite ours, that is on no ground credible. And, indeed, it is not affirmed that this has been learned by historical

Chapter 600

1. It is necessary, therefore, to preserve the series of generations

descending from Shem, for the sake of exhibiting the city of God after the flood; as before the flood it was exhibited in the series of generations descending from Seth. And therefore does divine Scripture, after exhibit

Chapter 601

2. But to avoid needless prolixity, we shall mention not the number

of years each member of this series lived, but only the year of his life in which he begat his heir, that we may thus reckon the number of years from the flood to Abraham, and may at the same time leave room to touch bri

Chapter 602

3. When, therefore, we look for the city of God in these seventy-two

nations, we cannot affirm that while they had but one lip, that is, one language, the human race had departed from the worship of the true God, and that genuine godliness had survived only in those generations which desc

Chapter 603

1. Wherefore, as the fact of all using one language did not secure the

absence of sin-infected men from the race,—for even before the deluge there was one language, and yet all but the single family of just Noah were found worthy of destruction by the flood,—so when the nations, by a proude

Chapter 604

2. Some one will say: If the earth was divided by languages in the

days of Peleg, Heber's son, that language, which was formerly common to all, should rather have been called after Peleg. But we are to understand that Heber himself gave to his son this name Peleg, which means Division;

Chapter 605

3. But yet another question is mooted: How did Heber and his son

Peleg each found a nation, if they had but one language? For no doubt the Hebrew nation propagated from Heber through Abraham, and becoming through him a great people, is one nation. How, then, are all the sons of the th

Chapter 606

1. Let us now survey the progress of the city of God from the era of

the patriarch Abraham, from whose time it begins to be more conspicuous, and the divine promises which are now fulfilled in Christ are more fully revealed. We learn, then, from the intimations of holy Scripture, that Abr

Chapter 607

1. Next it is related how Terah with his family left the region of the

Chaldeans and came into Mesopotamia, and dwelt in Haran. But nothing is said about one of his sons called Nahor, as if he had not taken him along with him. For the narrative runs thus: "And Terah took Abram his son, and

Chapter 608

1. On Terah's death in Mesopotamia, where he is said to have lived

205 years, the promises of God made to Abraham now begin to be -- 713 of 1136 -- pointed out; for thus it is written: "And the days of Terah in Haran were two hundred and five years, and he died in Haran." This is not

Chapter 609

1. When, after the record of the death of Terah, the father of

Abraham, we next read, "And the Lord said to Abram, Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father's house," etc., it is not to be supposed, because this follows in the order of the narrative, tha

Chapter 610

2. Now the blessed Stephen, in narrating these things in the Acts of

the Apostles, says: "The God of glory appeared unto our father Abraham, when he was in Mesopotamia, before he dwelt in Charran, and said unto him, Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father's

Chapter 611

1. God's promises made to Abraham are now to be considered; for in

these the oracles of our God, that is, of the true God, began to appear more openly concerning the godly people, whom prophetic authority foretold. The first of these reads thus: "And the Lord said unto Abram, Get thee o

Chapter 612

1. During the same period there were three famous kingdoms of the

nations, in which the city of the earth-born, that is, the society of men living according to man under the domination of the fallen angels, chiefly flourished, namely, the three kingdoms of Sicyon, Egypt, and Assyria. O

Chapter 613

1. Abraham, then, having departed out of Haran in the seventy-fifth

year of his own age, and in the hundred and forty-fifth of his father's, went with Lot, his brother's son, and Sarah his wife, into the land of Canaan, and came even to Sichem, where again he received the divine oracle,

Chapter 614

1. Having built an altar there, and called upon God, Abraham

proceeded thence and dwelt in the desert, and was compelled by pressure of famine to go on into Egypt. There he called his wife his sister, and told no lie. For she was this also, because she was near of blood; just as L

Chapter 615

1. On Abraham's return out of Egypt to the place he had left, Lot, his

brother's son, departed from him into the land of Sodom, without breach of charity. For they had grown rich, and began to have many herdmen of cattle, and when these strove together, they avoided in this way the pugnacio

Chapter 616

1. Now, when Abraham and Lot had separated, and dwelt apart,

owing to the necessity of supporting their families, and not to vile discord, and Abraham was in the land of Canaan, but Lot in Sodom, the Lord said to Abraham in a third oracle, "Lift up thine eyes, and look from the pl

Chapter 617

1. Having received this oracle of promise, Abraham migrated, and

remained in another place of the same land, that is, beside the oak of Mamre, which was Hebron. Then on the invasion of Sodom, when five kings carried on war against four, and Lot was taken captive with the conquered Sod

Chapter 618

1. The word of the Lord came to Abraham in a vision also. For when

God promised him protection and exceeding great reward, he, being solicitous about posterity, said that a certain Eliezer of Damascus, born in his house, would be his heir. Immediately he was promised -- 722 of 1136 --

Chapter 619

1. In the same vision, God in speaking to him also says, "I am God

that brought thee out of the region of the Chaldees, to give thee this land to inherit it." And when Abram asked whereby he might know that he should inherit it, God said to him, "Take me an heifer of three years old, an

Chapter 620

2. All these things were said and done in a vision from God; but it

would take long, and would exceed the scope of this work, to treat of them exactly in detail. It is enough that we should know that, after it was said Abram believed in God, and it was counted to him for righteousness, h

Chapter 621

3. But what is said to Abraham, "Know of a surety that thy seed shall

be a stranger in a land not theirs, and they shall reduce them to servitude, and shall afflict them 400 years," is most clearly a prophecy about the people of Israel which was to be in servitude in Egypt. Not that this p

Chapter 622

4. When it is added, "And when the sun was now setting there was a

flame, and lo, a smoking furnace, and lamps of fire, which passed through between those pieces," this signifies that at the end of the world the carnal shall be judged by fire. For just as the affliction of the city of G

Chapter 623

1. And here follow the times of Abraham's sons, the one by Hagar the

bond maid, the other by Sarah the free woman, about whom we have already spoken in the previous book. As regards this transaction, Abraham is in no way to be branded as guilty concerning this concubine, for he used her f

Chapter 624

1. After these things Ishmael was born of Hagar; and Abraham might

think that in him was fulfilled what God had promised him, saying, when he wished to adopt his home-born servant, "This shall not be thine heir: but he that shall come forth of thee, he shall be thine heir." Therefore, l

Chapter 625

2. Here there are more distinct promises about the calling of the

nations in Isaac, that is, in the son of the promise, by which grace is signified, and not nature; for the son is promised from an old man and a barren old woman. For although God effects even the natural course of procr

Chapter 626

1. When it is said, "The male who is not circumcised in the flesh of

his foreskin, that soul shall be cut off from his people, because he hath broken my covenant," some may be troubled how that ought to be understood, since it can be no fault of the infant whose life it is said must peris

Chapter 627

1. Now when a promise so great and clear was made to Abraham, in

which it was so plainly said to him, "I have made thee a father of many nations, and I will increase thee exceedingly, and I will make nations of thee, and kings shall go forth of thee. And I will give thee a son of Sara

Chapter 628

1. God appeared again to Abraham at the oak of Mature in three men,

who it is not to be doubted were angels, although some think that one of them was Christ, and assert that He was visible before He put on flesh. Now it belongs to the divine power, and invisible, incorporeal, and incommu

Chapter 629

1. After this promise Lot was delivered out of Sodom, and a fiery rain

from heaven turned into ashes that whole region of the impious city, where custom had made sodomy as prevalent as laws have elsewhere made other kinds of wickedness. But this punishment of theirs was a specimen of the di

Chapter 630

1. After these things a son was born to Abraham, according to God's

promise, of Sarah, and was called Isaac:, which means laughter. For his father had laughed when he was promised to him, in wondering delight, and his mother, when he was again promised by those three men, had laughed, do

Chapter 631

1. Among other things, of which it would take too long time to

mention the whole, Abraham was tempted about the offering up of -- 734 of 1136 -- his well-beloved son Isaac, to prove his pious obedience, and so make it known to the world, not to God. Now every temptation is not bla

Chapter 632

2. But let us rather hear the divine words spoken through the angel.

For the Scripture says, "And Abraham stretched forth his hand to take the knife, that he might slay his son. And the Angel of the Lord called unto him from heaven, and said, Abraham. And he said, Here am I. And he said,

Chapter 633

3. After these things Sarah died, in the 127th year of her life, and the

137th of her husband; for he was ten years older than she, as he himself says, when a son is promised to him by her: "Shall a son be born to me that am an hundred years old? and shall Sarah, that is ninety years old, bea

Chapter 634

1. Isaac married Rebecca, the grand-daughter of Nahor, his father's

brother, when he was forty years old, that is, in the 140th year of his father's life, three years after his mother's death. Now when a servant was sent to Mesopotamia by his father to fetch her, and when Abraham said to

Chapter 635

1. What did Abraham mean by marrying Keturah after Sarah's death?

Far be it from us to suspect him of incontinence, especially when he had reached such an age and such sanctity of faith. Or was he still seeking to beget children, though he held fast, with most approved faith, the promi

Chapter 636

1. Let us now see how the times of the city of God run on from this

point among Abraham's descendants. In the time from the first year of Isaac's life to the seventieth, when his sons were born, the only -- 738 of 1136 -- memorable thing is, that when he prayed God that his wife, who w

Chapter 637

1. Isaac also received such an oracle as his father had often received.

Of this oracle it is thus written: "And there was a famine over the land, beside the first famine that was in the days of Abraham. And Isaac went unto Abimelech king of the Philistines unto Gerar. And -- 739 of 1136 --

Chapter 638

1. Isaac's two sons, Esau and Jacob, grew up together. The primacy of

the elder was transferred to the younger by a bargain and agreement between them, when the elder immoderately lusted after the lentiles the younger had prepared for food, and for that price sold his birthright to him, co

Chapter 639

1. Jacob was sent by his parents to Mesopotamia that he might take a

wife there. These were his father's words on sending him: "Thou shall not take a wife of the daughters of the Canaanites. Arise, fly to Mesopotamia, to the house of Bethuel, thy mother's father, and take thee a wife from

Chapter 640

2. When Jacob was going to Mesopotamia, he received in a dream an

oracle, of which it is thus written. "And Jacob went out from the well of the oath, and went to Haran. And he came to a place, and slept there, for the sun was set; and he took of the stones of the place, and put them at

Chapter 641

3. Jacob went on to Mesopotamia to take a wife from thence. And the

divine Scripture points out how, without unlawfully desiring any of them, he came to have four women, of whom he begat twelve sons and one daughter; for he had come to take only one. But when one was falsely given him in

Chapter 642

1. As I said a little ago, Jacob was also called Israel, the name which

was most prevalent among the people descended from him. Now this name was given him by the angel who wrestled with him on the way back from Mesopotamia, and who was most evidently a type of Christ. For when Jacob overcam

Chapter 643

1. Seventy-five men are reported to have entered Egypt along with

Jacob, counting him with his children. In this number only two women are mentioned, one a daughter, the other a grand-daughter. But when the thing is carefully considered, it does not appear that Jacob's offspring was so

Chapter 644

1. If, on account of the Christian people in whom the city of God

sojourns in the earth, we look for the flesh of Christ in the seed of Abraham, setting aside the sons of the concubines, we have Isaac; if in the seed of Isaac, setting aside Esau, who is also Edom, we have Jacob, who al

Chapter 645

1. Now, as Isaac's two sons, Esau and Jacob, furnished a type of the

two people, the Jews and the Christians (although as pertains to carnal descent it was not the Jews but the Idumeans who came of the seed of Esau, nor the Christian nations but rather the Jews who came of Jacob's; for th

Chapter 646

1. Jacob being dead, and Joseph also, during the remaining 144 years

until they went out of the land of Egypt, that nation increased to an incredible degree, even although wasted by so great persecutions, that at one time the male children were murdered at their birth, because the wonderi

Chapter 647

2. On the death of Moses, Joshua the son of Nun ruled the people,

and led them into the land of promise, and divided it among them. By these two wonderful leaders wars were also carried on most prosperously and wonderfully, God calling to witness that they had got these victories not s

Chapter 648

3. We come next to the times of the kings. The first who reigned was

Saul; and when he was rejected and laid low in battle, and his offspring rejected so that no kings should arise out of it, David succeeded to the kingdom, whose son Christ is chiefly called. He was made a kind of startin

Chapter 649

BOOK XVII

ARGUMENT IN THIS BOOK THE HISTORY OF THE CITY OF GOD IS TRACED DURING THE PERIOD OF THE KINGS AND PROPHETS FROM SAMUEL TO DAVID, EVEN TO CHRIST; AND THE PROPHECIES WHICH ARE RECORDED IN THE BOOKS OF KINGS, PSALMS, AND TH

Chapter 650

1. BY the favor of God we have treated distinctly of His promises

made to Abraham, that both the nation of Israel according to the flesh, and all nations according to faith, should be his seed, and the City of God, proceeding according to the order of time, will point out how they were

Chapter 651

1. In the preceding book we said, that in the promise of God to

Abraham two things were promised from the beginning, the one, namely, that his seed should possess the land of Canaan, which was intimated when it was said, "Go into a land that I will show thee, and I will make of thee

Chapter 652

1. Wherefore just as that divine oracle to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob,

and all the other prophetic signs or sayings which are given in the earlier sacred writings, so also the other prophecies from this time of the kings pertain partly to the nation of Abraham's flesh, and partly to that se

Chapter 653

2. Therefore prophetic utterances of three kinds are to be found;

forasmuch as there are some relating to the earthly Jerusalem, some to the heavenly, and some to both. I think it proper to prove what I say by examples. The prophet Nathan was sent to convict king David of heinous sin,

Chapter 654

1. Therefore the advance of the city of God, where it reached the

times of the kings, yielded a figure, when, on the rejection of Saul, David first obtained the kingdom on such a footing that thenceforth his descendants should reign in the earthly Jerusalem in continual succession; for

Chapter 655

2. Do you say that these are the words of a single weak woman giving

thanks for the birth of a son? Can the mind of men be so much averse to the light of truth as not to perceive that the sayings this woman pours forth exceed her measure? Moreover, he who is suitably interested in these t

Chapter 656

3. Therefore let the Church of Christ, the city of the great King, full of

grace, prolific of offspring, let her say what the prophecy uttered about her so long before by the mouth of this pious mother confesses, "My heart is made strong in the Lord, and my horn is exalted in my God." Her heart

Chapter 657

6. Farther, what is added, "He raiseth up the poor from the earth," I

understand of none better than of Him who, as was said a little ago, "was made poor for us, when He was rich, that by His poverty we might be made rich." For He raised Him from the earth so quickly that His flesh did not

Chapter 658

7. But whence do they receive this, except from Him of whom it is

here immediately said, "Giving the vow to him that voweth?" Otherwise they would be of those mighty ones whose bow is weakened. "Giving," she saith, "the vow to him that voweth." For no one could vow anything acceptable

Chapter 659

9. Then after Hannah has prophesied in these words, that he who

glorieth ought to glory not in himself at all, but in the Lord, she says, on account of the retribution which is to come on the day of judgment, "The Lord hath ascended into the heavens, and hath thundered: He shall judg

Chapter 660

1. But this is said more plainly by a man of God sent to Eli the priest

himself, whose name indeed is not mentioned, but whose office and -- 766 of 1136 -- ministry show him to have been indubitably a prophet. For it is thus written: "And there came a man of God unto Eli, and said, Thus sa

Chapter 661

2. We cannot say that this prophecy, in which the change of the

ancient priesthood is foretold with so great plainness, was fulfilled in Samuel; for although Samuel was not of another tribe than that which had been appointed by God to serve at the altar, yet he was not of the sons of

Chapter 662

3. But what follows belongs properly to the house of Eli, to whom

these things were said: "And every one of thine house that is left shall fall by the sword of men. And this shall be a sign unto thee that shall come upon these thy two sons, Hophni and Phinehas; in one day they shall di

Chapter 663

4. But what is added, "And it shall come to pass that he who is left in

thine house shall come to worship him," is not said properly of the house of this Eli, but of that Aaron, the men of which remained even -- 769 of 1136 -- to the advent of Jesus Christ, of which race there are not want

Chapter 664

5. What then does he say who comes to worship the priest of God,

even the Priest who is God? "Put me into one part of Thy priesthood, to eat bread." I do not wish to be set in the honor of my fathers, which is none; put me in a part of Thy priesthood. For "I have chosen to be mean in

Chapter 665

1. While, therefore, these things now shine forth as clearly as they

were loftily foretold, still some one may not vainly be moved to ask, How can we be confident that all things are to come to pass which are predicted in these books as about to come, if this very thing which is there div

Chapter 666

2. In this way, too, the kingdom of Saul himself, who certainly was

reprobated and rejected, was the shadow of a kingdom yet to come which should remain to eternity. For, indeed, the oil with which he was anointed, and from that chrism he is called Christ, is to be taken in a mystical se

Chapter 667

1. Again Saul sinned through disobedience, and again Samuel says to

him in the word of the Lord, "Because thou hast despised the word of the Lord, the Lord hath despised thee, that thou mayest not be king over Israel." And again for the same sin, when Saul confessed it, and prayed for pa

Chapter 668

2. But the Scripture has not what is read in most Latin copies, "The

Lord hath rent the kingdom of Israel out of thine hand this day," but just as we have set it down it is found in the Greek copies, "The Lord hath rent the kingdom from Israel out of thine hand;" that the words "out of th

Chapter 669

3. Of which thing I do not doubt what follows is to be understood,

"And will divide Israel in twain," to wit, into Israel pertaining to the bond woman, and Israel pertaining to the free. For these two kinds were at first together, as Abraham still clave to the bond woman, until the barr

Chapter 670

4. We see that this sentence concerning this division of the people of

Israel, divinely uttered in these words, has been altogether irremediable and quite perpetual. For whoever have turned, or are turning, or shall turn thence to Christ, it has been according to the foreknowledge of God, n

Chapter 671

1. And now I see I must show what, pertaining to the matter I treat

of, God promised to David himself, who succeeded Saul in the kingdom, whose change prefigured that final change on account of which all things were divinely spoken, all things were committed to writing. When many things

Chapter 672

2. He who thinks this grand promise was fulfilled in Solomon greatly

errs; for he attends to the saying, "He shall build me an house," but he does not attend to the saying, "His house shall be faithful, and his kingdom for evermore before me." Let him therefore attend and behold the house

Chapter 673

3. Nor was it for any other reason that, while his father David was

still living, Solomon began to reign, which happened to none other of their kings, except that from this also it might be clearly apparent that it was not himself this prophecy spoken to his father signified beforehand,

Chapter 674

1. Wherefore also in the 89th Psalm, of which the title is, "An

instruction for himself by Ethan the Israelite," mention is made of the promises God made to king David, and some things are there added similar to those found in the Book of Samuel, such as this, "I have sworn to David

Chapter 675

1. That it might not be supposed that a promise so strongly expressed

and confirmed was fulfilled in Solomon, as if he hoped for, yet did not find it, he says, "But Thou hast cast off, and hast brought to nothing, O Lord." This truly was done concerning the kingdom of Solomon among his pos

Chapter 676

1. But after having prophesied these things, the prophet betakes him

to praying to God; yet even the very prayer is prophecy: "How long, Lord, dost Thou turn away in the end?" "Thy face" is understood, as it is elsewhere said, "How long dost Thou turn away Thy face from me?"6 For therefor

Chapter 677

1. But the rest of this psalm runs thus: "Where are Thine ancient

compassions, Lord, which Thou swarest unto David in Thy truth? Remember, Lord, the reproach of Thy servants, which I have borne in my bosom of many nations; wherewith Thine enemies have reproached, O Lord, wherewith they

Chapter 678

1. Whoever hopes for this so great good in this world, and in this

earth, his wisdom is but folly. Can any one think it was fulfilled in the peace of Solomon's reign? Scripture certainly commends that peace with excellent praise as a shadow of that which is to come. But this opinion is

Chapter 679

1. In the progress of the city of God through the ages, therefore,

David first reigned in the earthly Jerusalem as a shadow of that which was to come. Now David was a man skilled in songs, who dearly loved musical harmony, not with a vulgar delight, but with a believing disposition, and

Chapter 680

1. And now I see it may be expected of me that I shall open up in this

part of this book what David may have prophesied in the Psalms concerning the Lord Jesus Christ or His Church. But although I have already done so in one instance, I am prevented from doing as that expectation seems to d

Chapter 681

1. For whatever direct and manifest prophetic utterances there may

be about anything, it is necessary that those which are tropical -- 788 of 1136 -- should be mingled with them; which, chiefly on account of those of slower understanding, thrust upon the more learned the laborious tas

Chapter 682

2. Then let him look upon His Church, joined to her so great

Husband in spiritual marriage and divine love, of which it is said in these words which follow, "The queen stood upon Thy right hand in gold-embroidered vestments, girded about with variety. Hearken, O daughter, and look

Chapter 683

1. Just as in that psalm also where Christ is most openly proclaimed

as Priest, even as He is here as King, "The Lord said unto my Lord, Sit Thou at my right hand, until I make Thine enemies Thy -- 791 of 1136 -- footstool." That Christ sits on the right hand of God the Father is believ

Chapter 684

1. About His resurrection also the oracles of the Psalms are by no

means silent. For what else is it that is sung in His person in the 3d Psalm, "I laid me down and took a sleep, [and] I awaked, for the Lord shall sustain me?" Is there perchance any one so stupid as to believe that the

Chapter 685

2. But the Jews do not expect that the Christ whom they expect will

die; therefore they do not think ours to be Him whom the law and the prophets announced, but feign to themselves I know not whom of their own, exempt from the suffering of death. Therefore, with wonderful emptiness and b

Chapter 686

1. But when the Jews will not in the least yield to the testimonies of

this prophecy, which are so manifest, and are also brought by events to so clear and certain a completion, certainly that is fulfilled in them which is written in that psalm which here follows. For when the things which

Chapter 687

1. David therefore reigned in the earthly Jerusalem, a son of the

heavenly Jerusalem, much praised by the divine testimony; for even his faults are overcome by great piety, through the most salutary humility of his repentance, that he is altogether one of those of whom he himself says,

Chapter 688

2. But as regards those three books which it is evident are Solomon's

and held canonical by the Jews, to show what of this kind may be found in them pertaining to Christ and the Church demands a laborious discussion, which, if now entered on, would lengthen this -- 797 of 1136 -- work un

Chapter 689

1. The other kings of the Hebrews after Solomon are scarcely found

to have prophesied, "through certain enigmatic words or actions of theirs, what may pertain to Christ and the Church, either in Judah or Israel; for so were the parts of that people styled, when, on account of Solomon's

Chapter 690

1. But Jeroboam king of Israel, with perverse mind, not believing in

God, whom he had proved true in promising and giving him the kingdom, was afraid lest, by coming to the temple of God which was in Jerusalem, where, according to the divine law, that whole nation was to come in order to

Chapter 691

1. So also in the kingdom of Judah pertaining to Jerusalem prophets

were not lacking even in the times of succeeding kings, just as it pleased God to send them, either for the prediction of what was needful, or for correction of sin and instruction in righteousness; for there, too, altho

Chapter 692

1. But in that whole time after they returned from Babylon, after

Malachi, Haggai, and Zechariah, who then prophesied, and Ezra, -- 802 of 1136 -- they had no prophets down to the time of the Saviour's advent except another Zechariah, the father of John, and Elisabeth his wife, when

Chapter 693

BOOK XVIII

ARGUMENT -- 803 of 1136 -- AUGUSTIN TRACES THE PARALLEL COURSES OF THE EARTHLY AND HEAVENLY CITIES FROM THE TIME OF ABRAHAM TO THE END OF THE WORLD; AND ALLUDES TO THE ORACLES REGARDING CHRIST, BOTH THOSE UTTERED BY TH

Chapter 694

1. I PROMISED to write of the rise, progress, and appointed end of

the two cities, one of which is God's, the other this world's, in which, so far as mankind is concerned, the former is now a stranger. But first of all I undertook, so far as His grace should enable me, to refute the ene

Chapter 695

1. The society of mortals spread abroad through the earth

everywhere, and in the most diverse places, although bound together by a certain fellowship of our common nature, is yet for the most part divided against itself, and the strongest oppress the others, because all follow

Chapter 696

2. Ninus, then, who succeeded his father Belus, the first king of

Assyria, was already the second king of that kingdom when Abraham was born in the land of the Chaldees. There was also at that time a very small kingdom of Sicyon, with which, as from an ancient date, that most universal

Chapter 697

3. At Abraham's birth, then, the second kings of Assyria and Sicyon

respectively were Ninus and Europs, the first having been Belus and Ægialeus. But when God promised Abraham, on his departure from Babylonia, that he should become a great nation, and that in his seed all nations of the

Chapter 698

1. In his times also, by the promise of God, Isaac, the son of

Abraham, was born to his father when he was a hundred years old, of Sarah his wife, who, being barren and old, had already lost hope of issue. Aralius was then the fifth king of the Assyrians. To Isaac himself, in his si

Chapter 699

1. In the reign of Balæus, the ninth king of Assyria, and Mesappus,

the eighth of Sicyon, who is said by some to have been also called Cephisos (if indeed the same man had both names, and those who put the other name in their writings have not rather confounded him with another man), whi

Chapter 700

1. In these times Apis king of Argos crossed over into Egypt in ships,

and, on dying there, was made Serapis, the chief god of all the -- 809 of 1136 -- Egyptians. Now Varro gives this very ready reason why, after his death, he was called, not Apis, but Serapis. The ark in which he was pl

Chapter 701

1. Apis, then, who died in Egypt, was not the king of Egypt, but of

Argos. He was succeeded by his son Argus, from whose name the land was called Argos and the people Argives, for under the earlier kings neither the place nor the nation as yet had this name. While he then reigned over Ar

Chapter 702

1. In the reign of Mamitus, the twelfth king of Assyria, and

Plemnæus, the eleventh of Sicyon, while Argus still reigned over the Argives, Joseph died in Egypt a hundred and ten years old. After his death, the people of God, increasing wonderfully, remained in Egypt a hundred and

Chapter 703

1. When Saphrus reigned as the fourteenth king of Assyria, and

Orthopolis as the twelfth of Sicyon, and Criasus as the fifth of Argos, Moses was born in Eygpt, by whom the people of God were liberated from the Egyptian slavery, in which they behoved to be thus tried that they might

Chapter 704

1. Athens certainly derived its name from Minerva, who in Greek is

called ʼΑθηνη, and Varro points out the following reason why it was so called. When an olive-tree suddenly appeared there, and water burst forth in another place, these prodigies moved the king to send to the Delphic Apo

Chapter 705

1. Marcus Varro, however, is not willing to credit lying fables against

the gods, lest he should find something dishonoring to their majesty; and therefore he will not admit that the Areopagus, the place where the Apostle Paul disputed with the Athenians, got this name because Mars, who in G

Chapter 706

1. Moses led the people out of Egypt in the last time of Cecrops king

of Athens, when Ascatades reigned in Assyria, Marathus in Sicyon, Triopas in Argos; and having led forth the people, he gave them at Mount Sinai the law he received from God, which is called the Old Testament, because it

Chapter 707

1. During this period, that is, from Israel's exodus from Egypt down

to the death of Joshua the son of Nun, through whom that people received the land of promise, rituals were instituted to the false gods by the kings of Greece, which, by stated celebration, recalled the memory of the flo

Chapter 708

1. After the death of Joshua the son of Nun, the people of God had

judges, in whose times they were alternately humbled by afflictions on account of their sins, and consoled by prosperity through the compassion of God. In those times were invented the fables about Triptolemus, who, at t

Chapter 709

1. During the same period of time arose the poets, who were also

called theologues, because they made hymns about the gods; yet about such gods as, although great men, were yet but men, or the elements of this world which the true God made, or creatures who were ordained as principali

Chapter 710

1. During those times the kingdom of Argos came to an end; being

transferred to Mycene, from which Agamemnon came, and the kingdom of Laurentum arose, of which Picus son of Saturn was the first king, when the woman Deborah judged the Hebrews; but it was the Spirit of God who used her

Chapter 711

1. Troy was overthrown, and its destruction was everywhere sung

and made well known even to boys; for it was signally published and spread abroad, both by its own greatness and by writers of excellent style. And this was done in the reign of Latinus the son of Faunus, from whom the k

Chapter 712

1. In support of this story, Varro relates others no less incredible

about that most famous sorceress Circe, who changed the companions of Ulysses into beasts, and about the Arcadians, who, by lot, swam across a certain pool, and were turned into wolves there, and lived in the deserts of

Chapter 713

1. Perhaps our readers expect us to say something about this so great

delusion wrought by the demons; and what shall we say but that men must fly out of the midst of Babylon? For this prophetic precept is to be understood spiritually in this sense, that by going forward in the living God,

Chapter 714

2. These things are either false, or so extraordinary as to be with

good reason disbelieved. But it is to be most firmly believed that Almighty God can do whatever He pleases, whether in punishing or favoring, and that the demons can accomplish nothing by their natural power (for their c

Chapter 715

3. These things have not come to us from persons we might deem

unworthy of credit, but from informants we could not suppose to be deceiving us. Therefore what men say and have committed to writing about the Arcadians being often changed into wolves by the Arcadian gods, or demons ra

Chapter 716

1. After the capture and destruction of Troy, Æneas, with twenty

ships laden with the Trojan relics, came into Italy, when Latinus reigned there, Menestheus in Athens, Polyphidos in Sicyon, and Tautanos in Assyria, and Abdon was judge of the Hebrews. On the death of Latinus, Æneas rei

Chapter 717

1. While these kings reigned in the places mentioned, the period of

the judges being ended, the kingdom of Israel next began with king Saul, when Samuel the prophet lived. At that date those Latin kings began who were surnamed Silvii, having that surname, in addition to their proper name

Chapter 718

1. After Æneas, whom they deified, Latium had eleven kings, none of

whom was deified. But Aventinus, who was the twelfth after Æneas, -- 827 of 1136 -- having been laid low in war, and buried in that hill still called by his name, was added to the number of such gods as they made for t

Chapter 719

1. To be brief, the city of Rome was founded, like another Babylon,

and as it were the daughter of the former Babylon, by which God was pleased to conquer the whole world, and subdue it far and wide by bringing it into one fellowship of government and laws. For there were already powerfu

Chapter 720

1. Some say the Erythræan sibyl prophesied at this time. Now Varro

declares there were many sibyls, and not merely one. This sibyl of Erythræ certainly wrote some things concerning Christ which are quite manifest, and we first read them in the Latin tongue in verses of bad Latin, and un

Chapter 721

2. But this sibyl, whether she is the Erythræan, or, as some rather

believe, the Cumæan, in her whole poem, of which this is a very small portion, not only has nothing that can relate to the worship of the false or feigned gods, but rather speaks against them and their -- 833 of 1136 --

Chapter 722

1. When Zedekiah reigned over the Hebrews, and Tarquinius Priscus,

the successor of Ancus Martius, over the Romans, the Jewish people was led captive into Babylon, Jerusalem and the temple built by Solomon being overthrown. For the prophets, in chiding them for their iniquity and impiet

Chapter 723

1. At this time, Cyrus king of Persia, who also ruled the Chaldeans

and Assyrians, having somewhat relaxed the captivity of the Jews, made fifty thousand of them return in order to rebuild the temple. They only began the first foundations and built the altar; but, owing to hostile invasi