 21. CHAPTER XV-XIV. Nevertheless, in the heavy yoke that is laid upon the sons of Adam from the day that they go out of their mother's womb to the day that they return to the mother of all things, there is found and admirable, though painful, monitor teaching us to be so reminded and convincing us that this life has become penal in consequence of that outrageous wickedness which was perpetrated in paradise, and that all to which the New Testament invites belongs to that future inheritance which awaits us in the world to come and is offered for our acceptance as the earnest that we may, in its own due time, obtain that of which it is the pledge. Now therefore let us walk in hope, and let us by the Spirit mortify the deeds of the flesh, and so make progress from day to day. For the Lord knoweth them that are his, and as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God, but by grace, not by nature. For there is but one son of God by nature, who in his compassion became son of man for our sakes, that we, by nature sons of men, might by grace become through him sons of God. For he, abiding unchangeable, took upon him our nature, that thereby he might take us to himself. And, holding fast his own divinity, he became partaker of our infirmity, that we, being changed into some better thing, might, by participating in his righteousness and immortality, lose our own properties of sin and mortality, and preserve whatever good quality he had implanted in our nature, perfected now by sharing in the goodness of his nature. For as by the sin of one man we have fallen into a misery so deplorable, so by the righteousness of one man, who also is God, shall we come to a blessedness inconceivably exalted. Nor ought any one to trust that he has passed from the one man to the other, until he shall have reached that place where there is no temptation, and have entered into the peace which he seeks in the many and various conflicts of this war, in which the flesh lusteth against the spirit, and the spirit against the flesh. Now, such a war as this would have had no existence if human nature had, in the exercise of free will, continued steadfast in the uprightness in which it was created. But now, in its misery, it makes war upon itself, because in its blessedness it would not continue at peace with God. And this, though it be a miserable calamity, is better than the earlier stages of this life, which do not recognize that a war is to be maintained. For better is it to contend with vices than without conflict to be subdued by them. Better, I say, is war with the hope of peace everlasting than captivity without any thought of deliverance. We long, indeed, for the cessation of this war, and kindled by the flame of divine love, we burn for entrance on that well-ordered peace in which whatever is inferior is forever subordinated to what is above it. But if, which God forbid, there had been no hope of so blessed a consummation, we should still have preferred to endure the hardness of this conflict rather than, by our non-resistance, to yield ourselves to the dominion of vice. CHAPTER XVI But such is God's mercy towards the vessels of mercy which he has prepared for glory, that even the first age of man, that is, infancy, which submits without any resistance to the flesh, and the second age, which is called boyhood, and which has not yet understanding enough to undertake this warfare, and therefore yields to almost every vicious pleasure, because, though this age has the power of speech, and may therefore seem to have passed infancy, the mind is still too weak to comprehend the commandment. Yet, if either of these ages has received the sacraments of the mediator, then, although the present life be immediately brought to an end, the child, having been translated from the power of darkness to the kingdom of Christ, shall not only be saved from eternal punishments, but shall not even suffer purgatorial torments after death. For spiritual regeneration of itself suffices to prevent any evil consequences resulting after death, from the connection with death which carnal generation forms. But when we reach that age which can now comprehend the commandment and submit to the dominion of law, we must declare war upon vices, and wage this war keenly, lest we be landed in damnable sins. And if vices have not gathered strength by habitual victory, they are more easily overcome and subdued. But if they have been used to conquer, and rule, it is only with difficulty and labor they are mastered. And indeed this victory cannot be sincerely and truly gained, but by delighting in true righteousness, and it is faith in Christ that gives this. For if the law be present with its command, and the spirit be absent with his help, the presence of the prohibition serves only to increase the desire to sin, and adds the guilt of transgression. Sometimes indeed patent vices are overcome by other and hidden vices, which are reckoned virtues, though pride and a kind of ruinous self-sufficiency are their informing principles. Accordingly vices are then only to be considered overcome when they are conquered by the love of God, which God himself alone gives, and which he gives only through the mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, who became a partaker of our mortality that he might make us partakers of his divinity. But few indeed are they who are so happy as to have passed their youth without committing any damnable sins, either by disillute or violent conduct, or by following some godless and unlawful opinions, but have subdued by their greatness of soul everything in them which could make them the slaves of carnal pleasures. The greater number having first become transgressors of the law that they have received, and having allowed vice to have the ascendancy in them, then flee to grace for help, and so, by a penitence more bitter and a struggle more violent than it would otherwise have been, they subdued the soul to God, and thus give it its lawful authority over the flesh and become victors. Whoever therefore desires to escape eternal punishment, let him not only be baptized, but also justified in Christ, and so let him in truth pass from the devil to Christ, and let him not fancy that there are any purgatorial pains except before that final and dreadful judgment. We must not, however, deny that even the eternal fire will be proportioned to the desserts of the wicked, so that to some it will be more, and to others less painful, whether this result be accomplished by a variation in the temperature of the fire itself, graduated according to everyone's merit, or whether it be that the heat remains the same, but that all do not feel it with equal intensity of torment. CHAPTER XVII. I must now, I see, enter the lists of amicable controversy with those tender-hearted Christians who decline to believe that any or that all of those whom the infallibly just judge may pronounce worthy of the punishment of hell shall suffer eternally, and who suppose that they shall be delivered after a fixed term of punishment, longer or shorter according to the amount of each man's sin. In respect of this matter, Origen was even more indulgent, for he believed that even the devil himself and his angels, after suffering those more severe and prolonged pains which their sins deserved, should be delivered from their torments and associated with the holy angels. But the church, not without reason, condemned him for this and other errors, especially for his theory of the ceaseless alternation of happiness and misery, and the interminable transitions from the one state to the other at fixed periods of ages. For in this theory he lost even the credit of being merciful by allotting to the saints real miseries for the expiation of their sins and false happiness which brought them no true and secure joy, that is, no fearless assurance of eternal blessedness. Very different, however, is the error we speak of which is dictated by the tenderness of these Christians who suppose that the sufferings of those who are condemned in the judgment will be temporary, while the blessedness of all who are sooner or later set free will be eternal. Which opinion, if it is good and true because it is merciful, will be so much the better and truer in proportion as it becomes more merciful? Let then this fountain of mercy be extended and flow forth even to the lost angels and let them also be set free at least after as many and long ages has seen fit. Why does this stream of mercy flow to all the human race and dry up as soon as it reaches the angelic? And yet they dare not extend their pity further and propose the deliverance of the devil himself. Or, if any one is bold enough to do so, he does indeed put to shame their charity, but is himself convicted of error that is more unsightly and arresting of God's truth that is more perverse in proportion as his clemency of sentiment seems to be greater. CHAPTER 18 There are others again with whose opinions I have become acquainted in conversation who, though they seem to reverence the holy Scriptures, are yet of reprehensible life, and who accordingly, in their own interest, attribute to God a still greater compassion towards men. For they acknowledge that it is truly predicted in the Divine Word that the wicked and unbelieving are worthy of punishment, but they assert that when the judgment comes mercy will prevail. For, say they, God, having compassion on them, will give them up to the prayers and intercessions of his saints. For if the saints used to pray for them when they suffered from their cruel hatred, how much more will they do so when they see them prostrate and humble suppliants? For we cannot, they say, believe that the saints shall lose their bowels of compassion when they have attained the most perfect and complete holiness, so that they who, when still sinners prayed for their enemies, should now, when they are freed from sin, withhold from interceding for their suppliance. Or shall God refuse to listen to so many of his beloved children when their holiness has purged their prayers of all hindrance to his answering them? And the passage of the Psalm which is cited by those who admit that wicked men and infidels shall be punished for a long time, though in the end delivered from all sufferings, is claimed also by the persons we are now speaking of as making much more for them. The verse runs, Shall God forget to be gracious? Shall he in anger shut up his tender mercies? His anger, they say, would condemn all that are unworthy of everlasting happiness to endless punishment, but if he suffer them to be punished for a long time, or even at all, must he not shut up his tender mercies which the psalmist implies he will not do? For he does not say, Shall he in anger shut up his tender mercies for a long period, but he implies that he will not shut them up at all. And they deny that thus God's threat of judgment is proved to be false even though he condemned no man any more than we can say that his threat to overthrow Nineveh was false, though the destruction which was absolutely predicted was not accomplished. For he did not say, Nineveh shall be overthrown if they do not repent and amend their ways, but without any such condition he foretold that the city should be overthrown. And this prediction they maintained was true because God predicted the punishment which they deserved, although he was not to inflict it. For though he spared them on their repentance, yet he was certainly aware that they would repent, and notwithstanding absolutely and definitely predicted that the city should be overthrown. This was true, they say, in the truth of severity because they were worthy of it, but in respect of the compassion which checked his anger so that he spared the suppliance from the punishment with which he had threatened the rebellious it was not true. If then he spared those whom his own holy prophet was provoked at his sparing, how much more shall he spare those more wretched suppliance for whom all his saints shall intercede? And they suppose that this conjecture of theirs is not hinted at in Scripture for the sake of stimulating many to reformation of life through fear of very protracted or eternal sufferings, and of stimulating others to pray for those who have not reformed. However, they think that the divine oracles are not altogether silent on this point, for they ask to what purpose is it said, How great is thy goodness which thou hast hidden for them that fear thee, if it be not to teach us that the great and hidden sweetness of God's mercy is concealed in order that men may fear. To the same purpose they think the apostles said, for God hath concluded all men in unbelief that he may have mercy upon all,ifying that no one should be condemned by God. And yet they who hold this opinion do not extend it to the acquittal or liberation of the devil and his angels. Their human tenderness is moved only towards men, and they plead chiefly their own cause, holding out false hopes of impunity to their own depraved lives by means of this quasi-compassion of God to the whole race. Consequently they who promise this impunity even to the prince of the devils and his satellites make a still fuller exhibition of the mercy of God. CHAPTER XIX So, too, there are others who promise this deliverance from eternal punishment not indeed to all men, but only to those who have been washed in Christian baptism, and who become partakers of the body of Christ, no matter how they have lived, or what heresy or impiety they have fallen into. They ground this opinion on the saying of Jesus, This is the bread which cometh down from heaven, that if any man eat thereof he shall not die. I am the living bread which came down from heaven. If a man eat of this bread he shall live for ever. Therefore, say they, it follows that these persons must be delivered from death eternal, and at one time or other be introduced to everlasting life. CHAPTER XX There are others still who make this promise not even to all who have received the sacraments of the baptism of Christ and of his body, but only to the Catholics, however badly they have lived. For these have eaten the body of Christ not only sacramentally, but really, being incorporated in his body, as the apostle says, We being many are one bread, one body. So that, though they have afterwards lapsed into some heresy, or even into heathenism and idolatry, yet by virtue of this one thing that they have received the baptism of Christ and eaten the body of Christ, in the body of Christ, that is to say, in the Catholic church, they shall not die eternally, but at one time or other obtain eternal life, and all that wickedness of theirs shall not avail to make their punishment eternal, but only proportionately long and severe. CHAPTER XXI There are some too who found upon the expression of Scripture he that endureth to the end shall be saved, and who promise salvation only to those who continue in the church Catholic, and though such persons have lived badly, yet, say they, they shall be saved as by fire through virtue of the foundation, of which the apostle says, For other foundation hath no man laid than that which is laid, which is Christ Jesus. Now, if any man build upon this foundation, gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, stubble, every man's work shall be made manifest, for the day of the Lord shall declare it, for it shall be revealed by fire, and each man's work shall be proved of what sort it is. If any man's work shall endure which he hath built thereupon, he shall receive a reward. But if any man's work shall be burned, he shall suffer loss, but he himself shall be saved yet so as through fire. They say accordingly that the Catholic Christian, no matter what his life be, has Christ as his foundation, while this foundation is not possessed by any heresy which is separated from the unity of his body. And therefore, through virtue of this foundation, even though the Catholic Christian, by the inconsistency of his life, has been as one building upward, hay, stubble upon it, they believe that he shall be saved by fire, in other words, that he shall be delivered after tasting the pain of that fire to which the wicked shall be condemned at the last judgment. CHAPTER XXII I have also met with some who are of opinion that such only as neglect to cover their sins with alms-deeds shall be punished in everlasting fire, and they cite the words of the Apostle James. He shall have judgment without mercy who hath shown no mercy. Therefore say they, he who has not amended his ways, but yet has intermingled his profligate and wicked actions with works of mercy shall receive mercy in the judgment, so that he shall either quite escape condemnation, or shall be liberated from his doom after some time, shorter or longer. They suppose that this was the reason why the judge himself, of quick and dead, declined to mention anything else than works of mercy done or omitted, when awarding to those on his right hand life eternal and to those on his left everlasting punishment. To the same purpose, they say, is the daily petition we make in the Lord's prayer, forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors. For no doubt whoever pardons the person who has wronged him does a charitable action, and this has been so highly commended by the Lord himself that he says, for if ye forgive men their trespasses your heavenly Father will also forgive you, but if ye forgive not men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses. And so it is to this kind of alms-deeds that the saying of the Apostle James refers, he shall have judgment without mercy that hath shown no mercy. And our Lord, they say, made no distinction of great and small sins, but your Father will forgive your sins if ye forgive men theirs. Consequently, they conclude that though a man has led an abandoned life up to the last day of it, yet whatsoever his sins have been, they are all remitted by virtue of this daily prayer if only he has been mindful to attend to this one thing that when they who have done him any injury ask his pardon he forgive them from his heart. When by God's help I have replied to all these errors I shall conclude this twenty-first book. First of all it behooves us to inquire and to recognize why the church has not been able to tolerate the idea that promises cleansing or indulgence to the devil even after the most severe and protracted punishment, for so many holy men imbued with the spirit of the Old and New Testament did not grudge to angels of any rank or character that they should enjoy the blessedness of the heavenly kingdom after being cleansed by suffering, but rather they perceived that they could not invalidate nor evacuate the divine sentence which the Lord predicted that he would pronounce in the judgment, saying, depart from me ye cursed into everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels. For here it is evident that the devil and his angels shall burn in everlasting fire, and there is also that declaration in the apocalypse the devil their deceiver was cast into the lake of fire and brimstone where also are the beast and the false prophet and they shall be tormented day and night for ever. In the former passage everlasting is used in the latter for ever, and by these words scripture is want to mean nothing else, their endless duration. And therefore no other reason, no reason more obvious and just, can be found for holding it as the fixed and immovable belief of the truest piety that the devil and his angels shall never return to the justice and life of the saints, than that scripture which deceives no man says that God spared them not and that they were condemned beforehand by him and cast into prisons of darkness and hell being reserved to the judgment of the last day when eternal fire shall receive them in which they shall be tormented world without end. And if this be so, how can it be believed that all men or even some shall be withdrawn from the endurance of punishment after some time has been spent in it? How can this be believed without enervating our faith in the eternal punishment of the devils? For if all whore some of those to whom it shall be said, depart from me ye cursed into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels, are not to be always in that fire, then what reason is there for believing that the devil and his angels shall always be there? Or is perhaps the sentence of God which is to be pronounced on wicked men and angels alike to be true in the case of the angels, false in that of men? Plainly it will be so if the conjectures of men are to weigh more than the word of God. But because this is absurd, they who desire to be rid of eternal punishment ought to abstain from arguing against God, and rather, while yet there is opportunity, obey the divine commands. Then what a fond fancy is it to suppose that eternal punishment means long continued punishment, while eternal life means life without end, since Christ in the very same passage spoke of both in similar terms in one and the same sentence, these shall go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into life eternal. If both destinies are eternal, then we must either understand both as long continued, but at last terminating, or both as endless. For they are correlative, on the one hand punishment eternal, on the other hand life eternal, and to say in one and the same sense life eternal shall be endless, punishment eternal shall come to an end, is the height of absurdity. Wherefore, as the eternal life of the saints shall be endless, so too the eternal punishment of those who are doomed to it shall have no end. Chapter 24 And this reasoning is equally conclusive against those who, in their own interest, but under the guise of a greater tenderness of spirit, attempt to invalidate the words of God, and who assert that these words are true, not because men shall suffer those things which are threatened by God, but because they deserve to suffer them. For God, they say, will yield them to the prayers of his saints, who will then the more earnestly pray for their enemies, as they shall be more perfect in holiness, and whose prayers will be the more efficacious and the more worthy of God's ear, because now purge from all sin whatsoever. Why, then, if in that perfected holiness their prayers be so pure and all availing, will they not use them in behalf of the angels for whom eternal fire is prepared, that God may mitigate his sentence and alter it, and extricate them from that fire? Or will there perhaps be someone hardy enough to affirm that even the holy angels will make common cause with holy men, then become the equals of God's angels, and will intercede for the guilty both men and angels that mercy may spare them the punishment which truth has pronounced them to deserve? But this has been asserted by no one's sound in the faith, nor will be. Otherwise there is no reason why the Church should not even now pray for the devil and his angels, since God, her Master, has ordered her to pray for her enemies. The reason, then, which prevents the Church from now praying for the wicked angels whom she knows to be her enemies, is the identical reason which shall prevent her, however perfected in holiness, from praying at the last judgment for those men who are to be punished in eternal fire. At present she prays for her enemies among men, because they have yet opportunity for fruitful repentance. For what does she especially beg for them, but that God would grant them repentance, as the Apostle says, that they may return to soberness out of the snare of the devil by whom they are held captive according to his will. But if the Church were certified who those are, who, though they are still abiding in this life, are yet predestinated to go with the devil into eternal fire, then for them she could no more pray than for him. But since she has this certainty regarding no man, she prays for all her enemies who yet live in this world, and yet she is not heard in behalf of all. But she is heard in the case of those only who, though they oppose the Church, are yet predestinated to become her sons through her intercession. But if any retain an impenitent heart until death, and are not converted from enemies into sons, does the Church continue to pray for them for the spirits, that is, of such persons deceased? And why does she cease to pray for them unless because the man who was not translated into Christ's Kingdom while he was in the body is now judged to be of Satan's following? It is then I say the same reason which prevents the Church at any time from praying for the wicked angels which prevents her from praying hereafter for those men who are to be punished in eternal fire. And this also is the reason why, though she prays even for the wicked so long as they live, she yet does not even in this world pray for the unbelieving and godless who are dead. For some of the dead indeed the prayer of the Church, or of pious individuals, is heard. But it is for those who, having been regenerated in Christ, did not spend their life so wickedly that they can be judged unworthy of such compassion nor so well that they can be considered to have no need of it. Because also, after the resurrection, there will be some of the dead to whom, after they have endured the pains proper to the spirits of the dead, mercy shall be accorded and acquittal from the punishment of the eternal fire. For were there not some whose sins though not remitted in this life shall be remitted in that which is to come, it could not be truly said they shall not be forgiven, neither in this world, neither in that which is to come. But when the judge of quick and dead has said, Come ye blessed of my father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world, and to those on the other side, depart from me, ye cursed, into the eternal fire which is prepared for the devil and his angels, and these shall go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous, into eternal life. It were excessively presumptuous to say that the punishment of any of those whom God has said shall go away into eternal punishment shall not be eternal, and so bring either despair or doubt upon the corresponding promise of life eternal. Let no man then so understand the words of the solmist shall God forget to be gracious, shall he shut up in his anger his tender mercies, as if the sentence of God were true of good men, false of bad men, or true of good men and wicked angels, but false of bad men. For the solmist's words referred to the vessels of mercy and the children of the promise of whom the prophet himself was one, for when he had said shall God forget to be gracious shall he shut up in his anger his tender mercies, and then immediately subjoins, and I said, now I begin, this is the change wrought by the right hand of the most high. He manifestly explained what he meant by the words shall he shut up in his anger his tender mercies. For God's anger is this mortal life in which man is made like to vanity, and his days pass as a shadow. Yet in this anger God does not forget to be gracious, causing his son to shine and his reign to descend on the just and the unjust, and thus he does not in his anger cut short his tender mercies, and especially in what the solmist speaks of in the words, now I begin, this change is from the right hand of the most high. For he changes for the better the vessels of mercy, even while they are still in this most wretched life which is God's anger, and even while his anger is manifesting itself in this miserable corruption, for in his anger he does not shut up his tender mercies. And since the truth of this divine canticle is quite satisfied by this application of it, there is no need to give it a reference to that place in which those who do not belong to the city of God are punished in eternal fire. But if any persist in extending its application to the torments of the wicked, let them at least understand it so that the anger of God which has threatened the wicked with eternal punishment shall abide, but shall be mixed with mercy to the extent of alleviating the torments which might justly be inflicted, so that the wicked shall neither wholly escape nor only for a time endure these threatened pains, but that they shall be less severe and more durable than they deserve. Thus the anger of God shall continue, and at the same time he will not in this anger shut up his tender mercies. But even this hypothesis I am not to be supposed to affirm because I do not positively oppose it. As for those who find an empty threat rather than a truth in such passages as these, depart from me ye cursed into everlasting fire, and these shall go away into eternal punishment, and they shall be tormented for ever and ever, and their worm shall not die, and their fire shall not be quenched. Such persons, I say, are most emphatically and abundantly refuted, not by me so much as by the divine scripture itself. For the men of Nineveh repented in this life, and therefore their repentance was fruitful in as much as they sowed in that field which the Lord meant to be sown in tears that it might afterwards be reaped in joy. And yet who will deny that God's prediction was fulfilled in their case if at least he observes that God destroys sinners not only in anger but also in compassion. For sinners are destroyed in two ways, either like the Sodomites the men themselves are punished for their sins, or like the Ninevites the men's sins are destroyed by repentance. God's prediction, therefore, was fulfilled. The wicked Nineveh was overthrown and a good Nineveh built up. For its walls and houses remained standing, the city was overthrown in its depraved manners. And thus, though the prophet was provoked, that the destruction which the inhabitants dreaded because of his prediction did not take place, yet that which God's foreknowledge had predicted did take place, for he who foretold the destruction knew how it should be fulfilled in a less calamitous sense. But that these perversely compassionate persons may see what is the purport of these words, how great is the abundance of thy sweetness, Lord, which thou hast hidden for them that fear thee. Let them read what follows, and thou hast perfected it for them that hope in thee. For what means thou hast hidden it for them that fear thee, thou hast perfected it for them that hope in thee, unless this, that to those who, through fear of punishment, seek to establish their own righteousness by the law, the righteousness of God is not sweet because they are ignorant of it. They have not tasted it, for they hope in themselves, not in him, and therefore God's abundant sweetness is hidden from them. They fear God, indeed, but it is with that servile fear which is not in love, for perfect love casteth out fear. Therefore to them that hope in him he perfecteth his sweetness, inspiring them with his own love, so that with the holy fear which love does not cast out, but which endureth for ever, they may, when they glory, glory in the Lord. For the righteousness of God is Christ, who is of God made unto us, as the apostle says, wisdom and righteousness and sanctification and redemption, as it is written, he that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord. This righteousness of God, which is the gift of grace without merits, is not known by those who go about to establish their own righteousness, and are therefore not subject to the righteousness of God, which is Christ. But it is in this righteousness that we find the great abundance of God's sweetness, of which the Psalm says, taste and see how sweet the Lord is. And this we rather taste than partake of to satiety in this, our pilgrimage. We hunger and thirst for it now, that hereafter we may be satisfied with it when we see him as he is, and that is fulfilled which is written, I shall be satisfied when thy glory shall be manifested. It is thus that Christ perfects the great abundance of his sweetness to them that hope in him. But if God conceals his sweetness from them that fear him in the sense that these are objectors fancy, so that men's ignorance of his purpose of mercy towards the wicked may lead them to fear him and live better, and so that there may be prayer made for those who are not living as they ought, how then does he perfect his sweetness to them that hope in him, since if their dreams be true it is this very sweetness which will prevent him from punishing those who do not hope in him. Let us then seek that sweetness of his which he perfects to them that hope in him, not that which he is supposed to perfect to those who despise and blaspheme him, for in vain after this life does a man seek for what he has neglected to provide while in this life. Then, as to that saying of the apostle, for God hath concluded all in unbelief that he may have mercy upon all, it does not mean that he will condemn no one, but the foregoing context shows what is meant. The apostle composed the epistle for the Gentiles who were already believers, and when he was speaking to them of the Jews who were yet to believe, he says, for as ye in times past believed not God, yet have now obtained mercy through their unbelief, even so have these also now not believed, that through your mercy they also may obtain mercy. Then he added the words in question with which these persons beguile themselves, for God concluded all in unbelief that he might have mercy upon all, all whom, if not all those of whom he was speaking, just as if he had said, both you and them. God then concluded all those in unbelief, both Jews and Gentiles, whom he foreknew and predestinated to be conformed to the image of his son, in order that they might be confounded by the bitterness of unbelief, and might repent and believingly turn to the sweetness of God's mercy, and might take up that exclamation of the psalm, how great is the abundance of thy sweetness, O Lord, which thou hast hidden for them that fear thee, but hast perfected to them that hope, not in themselves, but in thee. He has mercy, then, on all the vessels of mercy. And what means all? Both those of the Gentiles, and those of the Jews whom he predestinated, called, justified, glorified, none of these will be condemned by him, but we cannot say none of all men whatever. End of book twenty-one, chapters fifteen through twenty-four. Recording by Darren L. Slider, Fort Worth, Texas, www.logoslibrary.org. Book twenty-one, chapters twenty-five through twenty-seven of the City of God. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Darren L. Slider, www.logoslibrary.org. The City of God by St. Augustine of Hippo. Book twenty-one, chapter twenty-five. But let us now reply to those who promised deliverance from eternal fire not to the devil and his angels, as neither do they of whom we have been speaking, nor even to all men whatever, but only to those who have been washed by the baptism of Christ and have become partakers of his body and blood, no matter how they have lived, no matter what heresy or impiety they have fallen into. But they are contradicted by the Apostle, where he says, Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are these, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variances, emulations, wrath, strife, heresies, envies, drunkenness, revelings, and the like, of the which I tell you before as I have also told you in time past, for they which do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God. Finally this sentence of the Apostle is false, if such persons shall be delivered after any lapse of time, and shall then inherit the kingdom of God. But as it is not false, they shall certainly never inherit the kingdom of God. And if they shall never enter that kingdom, then they shall always be retained in eternal punishment, for there is no middle place where he may live unpunished who has not been admitted into that kingdom. And therefore we may reasonably inquire how we are to understand these words of the Lord Jesus. This is the bread which cometh down from heaven that a man may eat thereof and not die. I am the living bread which came down from heaven. If any man eat of this bread he shall live forever. And those indeed whom we are now answering are refuted in their interpretation of this passage by those whom we are shortly to answer and who do not promise this deliverance to all who have received the sacraments of baptism and the Lord's body, but only to the Catholics, however wickedly they live. For these, say they, have eaten the Lord's body not only sacramentally, but really, being constituted members of his body, of which the apostle says, We being many are one bread, one body. He then who is in the unity of Christ's body, that is to say, in the Christian membership, of which body the faithful have been want to receive the sacrament at the altar, that man is truly said to eat the body and drink the blood of Christ. And consequently heretics and schismatics being separate from the unity of this body, are able to receive the same sacrament but with no profit to themselves, nay rather to their own hurt, so that they are rather more severely judged than liberated after some time, for they are not in that bond of peace which is symbolized by that sacrament. But again, even those who sufficiently understand that he who is not in the body of Christ cannot be said to eat the body of Christ, are in error when they promise liberation from the fire of eternal punishment to persons who fall away from the unity of that body into heresy, or even into heathenish superstition. For in the first place they ought to consider how intolerable it is, and how discordant would sound doctrine to suppose that many indeed, or almost all, who have forsaken the church-catholic and have originated impious heresies and become heresy-archs, should enjoy a destiny superior to those who never were Catholics, but have fallen into the snares of these others. That is to say, if the fact of their Catholic baptism and original reception of the sacrament of the body of Christ in the true body of Christ is sufficient to deliver these heresy-archs from eternal punishment. For certainly he who deserts the faith, and from a deserter becomes an assailant, is worse than he who has not deserted the faith he never held. And in the second place they are contradicted by the apostle, who, after enumerating the works of the flesh, says with reference to heresies, they who do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God. And therefore neither ought such persons as lead an abandoned and damnable life to be confident of salvation, though they persevere to the end in the communion of the church-catholic and comfort themselves with the words, He that endureth to the end shall be saved. By the iniquity of their life they abandon that very righteousness of life which Christ is to them, whether it be by fornication or by perpetrating in their body the other uncleannesses which the apostle would not so much as mention, or by a dissolute luxury, or by doing any one of those things of which he says, they who do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God. Consequently they who do such things shall not exist anywhere but in eternal punishment since they cannot be in the kingdom of God. For while they continue in such things to the very end of life they cannot be said to abide in Christ to the end, for to abide in Him is to abide in the faith of Christ. And this faith, according to the apostle's definition of it, worketh by love, and love, as he elsewhere says, worketh no evil. Neither can these persons be said to eat the body of Christ, for they cannot even be reckoned among his members. For not to mention other reasons they cannot be at once the members of Christ and the members of a harlot. In fine he himself, when he says, he that eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood, dwelleth in me, and I in him, shows what it is in reality, and not sacramentally, to eat his body and drink his blood. For this is to dwell in Christ that he also may dwell in us. So that it is as if he had said, he that dwelleth not in me, and in whom I do not dwell, let him not say or think that he eateth my body, or drinketh my blood. Accordingly they who are not Christ's members do not dwell in him. And they who make themselves members of a harlot are not members of Christ unless they have penitently abandoned that evil and have returned to this good to be reconciled to it. CHAPTER XXVI. But say they, the Catholic Christians have Christ for a foundation, and they have not fallen away from union with him, no matter how depraved a life they have built on this foundation, as would, hey, stubble. And accordingly the well-directed faith by which Christ is their foundation will suffice to deliver them some time from the continuance of that fire, though it be with loss, since those things they have built on it shall be burned. Let the apostle James summarily reply to them. If any man say he has faith and have not works, can faith save him? And who then is it, they ask, of whom the apostle Paul says, that he himself shall be saved, yet so as by fire? Let us join them in their inquiry, and one thing is very certain that it is not he of whom James speaks, else we should make the two apostles contradict one another, if the one says, though a man's works be evil, his faith will save him as by fire, while the other says, if he have not good works, can his faith save him? We shall then ascertain who it is who can be saved by fire if we first discover what it is to have Christ for a foundation. And this we may very readily learn from the image itself. In a building the foundation is first. Whoever then has Christ in his heart so that no earthly or temporal things, not even those that are legitimate and allowed, are preferred to him as Christ as a foundation. But if these things be preferred, then even though a man seem to have faith in Christ, yet Christ is not the foundation to that man. And much more, if he, in contempt of wholesome precepts, seek forbidden gratifications, is he clearly convicted of putting Christ not first but last, since he has despised him as his ruler, and has preferred to fulfill his own wicked lusts in contempt of Christ's commands and allowances. Accordingly, if any Christian man loves a harlot and attaching himself to her becomes one body, he has not now Christ for a foundation. But if anyone loves his own wife and loves her as Christ would have him love her, who can doubt that he has Christ for a foundation? Even if he loves her in the world's fashion, carnally, as the disease of lust prompts him, and as the Gentiles' love, who know not God, even this the apostle, or rather Christ, by the apostle, allows as a venial fault. And therefore even such a man may have Christ for a foundation. For so long as he does not prefer such an affection or pleasure to Christ, Christ is his foundation, though on it he builds wood, hay, stubble, and therefore he shall be saved as by fire. For the fire of affliction shall burn such luxurious pleasures and earthly loves, though they be not damnable, because enjoyed in lawful wedlock. And of this fire the fuel his bereavement and all those calamities which consume these joys. Consequently the superstructure will be lost to him who has built it, for he shall not retain it, but shall be agonized by the loss of those things in the enjoyment of which he found pleasure. But by this fire he shall be saved through virtue of the foundation, because even if a precursor demanded whether he would retain Christ or these things he would prefer Christ. Would you hear in the Apostles own words who he is who builds on the foundation gold, silver, precious stones? He that is unmarried, he says, careth for the things that belong to the Lord, how he may please the Lord. Would you hear who he is that buildeth wood, hay, stubble? But he that is married careth for the things that are of the world, how he may please his wife. Every man's work shall be made manifest, for the day shall declare it, the day no doubt of tribulation, because says he it shall be revealed by fire. He calls tribulation fire just as it is elsewhere said the furnace proves the vessels of the potter and the trial of affliction righteous men. And the fire shall try every man's work of what sort it is. If any man's work abide, for a man's care for the things of the Lord, how he may please the Lord abides, which he hath built thereupon, he shall receive a reward, that is, he shall reap the fruit of his care. But if any man's work shall be burned, he shall suffer loss. For what he loved he shall not retain, but he himself shall be saved, for no tribulation shall have moved him from that stable foundation, yet so as by fire, for that which he possessed with the sweetness of love he does not lose without the sharp sting of pain. Here then, as seems to me, we have a fire which destroys neither, but enriches the one, brings loss to the other, proves both. But if this passage of Corinthians is to interpret that fire of which the Lord shall say to those on his left hand, depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, so that among these we are to believe there are those who build on the foundation wood, hay, stubble, and that they, through virtue of the good foundation, shall after a time be liberated from the fire that is the award of their evil desserts, what then shall we think of those on the right hand, to whom it shall be said, Come, ye blessed of my father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you, unless that they are those who have built on the foundation gold, silver, precious stones. But if the fire of which our Lord speaks is the same as that of which the apostle says, yet so as by fire, then both, that is to say, both those on the right as well as those on the left, are to be cast into it. For that fire is to try both, since it is said, for the day of the Lord shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire, and the fire shall try every man's work of what sort it is. If therefore the fire shall try both, in order that if any man's work abide, that is, if the superstructure be not consumed by the fire, he may receive her award, and that if his work is burned, he may suffer loss, certainly that fire is not the eternal fire itself. For into this latter fire only those on the left hand shall be cast, and that with final and everlasting doom. But that former fire proves those on the right hand. But some of them it so proves that it does not burn and consume the structure which is found to have been built by them, on Christ as the foundation. While others of them it proves in another fashion, so as to burn what they have built up, and thus cause them to suffer loss, while they themselves are saved because they have retained Christ, who was laid as their sure foundation, and have loved him above all. But if they are saved, then certainly they shall stand at the right hand, and shall with the rest hear the sentence, From ye blessed of my father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you, and not at the left hand, where those shall be who shall not be saved, and shall therefore hear the doom depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire. For from that fire no man shall be saved, because they all shall go away into eternal punishment, where their worms shall not die, for their fire be quenched, in which they shall be tormented, day and night, forever. But if it be said that in the interval of time between the death of this body and that last day of judgment and retribution which shall follow the resurrection, the bodies of the dead shall be exposed to a fire of such a nature that it shall not affect those who have not, in this life, indulged in such pleasures and pursuits, as shall be consumed like wood, hay, stubble, but shall affect those others who have carried with them structures of that kind. If it be said that such wildliness, being venial, shall be consumed in the fire of tribulation, either here only, or here and here after both, or here that it may not be here after, this I do not contradict, because possibly it is true. For perhaps even the death of the body is itself a part of this tribulation, for it results from the first transgression, so that the time which follows death takes its color, in each case, from the nature of the man's building. The persecutions, too, which have crowned the martyrs, and which Christians of all kinds suffer, try both buildings like a fire, consuming some, along with the builders themselves, if Christ is not found in them as their foundation, while others they consume without the builders, because Christ is found in them, and they are saved, though with loss, and other buildings still they do not consume because such materials as abide forever are found in them. In the end of the world there shall be, in the time of Antichrist, tribulation such as has never been before. How many edifices there shall then be, of gold or of hay, built on the best foundation, Christ Jesus, which that fire shall prove bringing joy to some, lost to others, but without destroying either sort, because of this stable foundation? But whosoever prefers, I do not say his wife, with whom he lives for carnal pleasure, but any of those relatives who afford no delight of such a kind, and whom it is right to love. Whosoever prefers these to Christ, and loves them after a human and carnal fashion, has not Christ as a foundation, and will therefore not be saved by fire, nor indeed at all. For he shall not possibly dwell with the Savior, who says very explicitly concerning this very matter, he that loveth father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and he that loveth son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. But he who loves his relations carnaly, and yet so that he does not prefer them to Christ, but would rather want them than Christ, if he were put to the proof, shall be saved by fire, because it is necessary that by the loss of these relations he suffer pain in proportion to his love. And he who loves father, mother, sons, daughters, according to Christ, so that he aids them in obtaining his kingdom and cleaving to him, or loves them because they are members of Christ, God forbid that this love should be consumed as wood, hay, stubble, and not rather be reckoned as structure of gold, silver, precious stones. For how can a man love those more than Christ whom he loves only for Christ's sake? CHAPTER 27 It remains to reply to those who maintain that those only shall burn in eternal fire, who neglect Olm's deeds proportion to their sins, resting this opinion on the words of the Apostle James, he shall have judgment without mercy that hath showed no mercy. Therefore they say, he that hath showed mercy, though he has not reformed his disillute conduct, but has lived wickedly and iniquitously even while abounding in Olm's shall have a merciful judgment, so that he shall either be not condemned at all, or shall be delivered from final judgment after a time. And for the same reason they suppose that Christ will discriminate between those on the right hand and those on the left, and will send the one party into his kingdom, the other into eternal punishment on the sole ground of their attention to, or neglect of, works of charity. Moreover, they endeavor to use the prayer which the Lord himself taught as a proof and bulwark of their opinion that daily sins which are never abandoned can be expiated through Olm's deeds no matter how offensive or of what sort they be. For say they, as there is no day on which Christians ought not to use this prayer, so there is no sin of any kind which, though committed every day, is not remitted when we say, forgive us our debts, if we take care to fulfill what follows as we forgive our debtors. For they go on to say, the Lord does not say, if ye forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will forgive you your little daily sins, but will forgive you your sins. For be they of any kind, or magnitude whatever, be they perpetrated daily, and never abandoned, or subdued in this life, they can be pardoned, they presume, through Olm's deeds. But they are right to inculcate the giving of Olm's proportioned to past sins, for if they said that any kind of Olm's could obtain the divine pardon of great sins committed daily, and with habitual enormity, if they said that such sins could thus be daily remitted, they would see that their doctrine was absurd and ridiculous. For they would thus be driven to acknowledge that it were possible for a very wealthy man to buy absolution from murders, adulteries, and all manner of wickedness by paying a daily Olm's of ten paltry coins. And if it be most absurd and insane to make such an acknowledgement, and if we still ask what are those fitting Olm's, of which even the forerunner of Christ said, bring forth therefore fruits, meat, for repentance, undoubtedly it will be found that they are not such as are done by men who undermine their life by daily enormities even to the very end. For they suppose that by giving to the poor a small fraction of the wealth they acquire by extortion and spoliation they can propitiate Christ, so that they may with impurity commit the most damnable sins in the persuasion that they have bought from him a license to transgress, or rather do buy, a daily indulgence. And if they for one crime have distributed all their goods to Christ's needy members, that could profit them nothing unless they desisted from all similar actions and attained charity which worketh no evil. He therefore who does Olm's deeds proportion to his sins must first begin with himself, for it is not reasonable that a man who exercises charity towards his neighbor should not do so towards himself since he hears the Lord saying, Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself, and again have compassion on thy soul and please God. He, then, who has not compassion on his own soul that he may please God, how can he be said to do Olm's deeds proportioned to his sins? To the same purpose is that written, he who is bad to himself, to whom can he be good? We ought therefore to do Olm's that we may be heard when we pray that our past sins may be forgiven, not that while we continue in them we may think to provide ourselves with a license for wickedness by Olm's deeds. The reason therefore of our predicting that he will impute to those on his right hand the Olm's deeds they have done, and charge those on his left with omitting the same, is that he may thus show the efficacy of charity for the deletion of past sins not for impunity in their perpetual commission. And such persons, indeed, as decline to abandon their evil habits of life for a better course cannot be said to do charitable deeds. For this is the purport of the saying, inasmuch as he did it not to one of the least of these he did it not to me. He shows them that they do not perform charitable actions even when they think they are doing so. For if they gave bread to a hungering Christian because he is a Christian, assuredly they would not deny to themselves the bread of righteousness, that is, Christ himself, for God considers not the person to whom the gift is made, but the spirit in which it is made. He, therefore, who loves Christ in a Christian, extends Olm's to him in the same spirit in which he draws near to Christ, not in that spirit which would abandon Christ if it could do so with impunity. For in proportion, as a man loves what Christ disapproves, does he himself abandon Christ? For what does it profit a man that he is baptized if he is not justified? Did not he who said, except a man be born of water and of the spirit, he shall not enter into the kingdom of God, say also, except your righteousness shall exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, he shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven. Why do many, through fear of the first saying, run to baptism, while few, through fear of the second, seek to be justified? As, therefore, it is not to his brother a man says, Thou fool, if, when he says it, he is indignant not at the brotherhood, but at the sin of the offender, for otherwise, he were guilty of hellfire. So he who extends charity to a Christian does not extend it to a Christian if he does not love Christ in him. Now he does not love Christ who refuses to be justified in him. Or again, if a man has been guilty of this sin of calling his brother fool, unjustly reviling him without any desire to remove his sin, his alms-deeds go a small way towards expiating this fault, unless he adds to this the remedy of reconciliation which the same passage enjoins. For it is there said, Therefore, if thou bring thy gift to the altar, and there rememberest that thy brother hath ought against thee, leave there thy gift before the altar and go thy way, first be reconciled to thy brother, and then come and offer thy gift. Just so it is a small matter to do alms-deeds, no matter how great they be, for any sin so long as the offender continues in the practice of sin. Then as to the daily prayer which the Lord himself taught, and which is therefore called the Lord's prayer, it obliterates indeed the sins of the day when day by day we say, Forgive us our debts, and when we not only say but act out that which follows as we forgive our debtors, but we utter this petition because sins have been committed and not that they may be. For by it our Saviour designed to teach us that, however righteously we live in this life of infirmity and darkness, we still commit sins for the remission of which we ought to pray, while we must pardon those who sin against us that we ourselves also may be pardoned. The Lord then did not utter the words, If ye forgive men their trespasses, your Father will also forgive you your trespasses in order that we might contract from this petition such confidence as should enable us to sin securely from day to day, either putting ourselves above the fear of human laws or craftily deceiving men concerning our conduct, but in order that we might thus learn not to suppose that we are without sins even though we should be free from crimes, as also God admonished the priests of the old law to this same effect regarding their sacrifices which he commanded them to offer first for their own sins and then for the sins of the people. For even the very words of so great a master and Lord are to be intently considered, for he does not say, If ye forgive men their sins, your Father will also forgive you your sins, no matter of what sort they be, but he says your sins, for it was a daily prayer he was teaching, and it was certainly to disciples already justified he was speaking. What then does he mean by your sins, but those sins from which not even you who are justified and sanctified can be free? While then those who seek occasion from this petition to indulge in habitual sin maintain that the Lord meant to include great sins, because he did not say he will forgive you your small sins, but your sins, we on the other hand, taking into account the character of the persons he was addressing, cannot see our way to interpret the expression your sins of anything but small sins, because such persons are no longer guilty of great sins. Nevertheless, not even great sins themselves, sins from which we must flee with a total reformation of life, are forgiven to those who pray unless they observe the appended precept as ye also forgive your debtors. For if the very small sins which attach even to the life of the righteous be not remitted without that condition, how much further from obtaining indulgence shall those be who are involved in many great crimes, if, while they cease from perpetrating such enormities, they still inexorably refuse to remit any debt incurred to themselves, since the Lord says, But if ye forgive not men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses. For this is the purport of the saying of the Apostle James also, He shall have judgment without mercy that hath showed no mercy. For we should remember that servant whose debt of ten thousand talents his Lord cancelled, but afterwards ordered him to pay up, because the servant himself had no pity for his fellow servant who owed him an hundred pence. The words which the Apostle James subjoins and mercy rejoiceeth against judgment find their application among those who are the children of the promise and vessels of mercy. For even those righteous men who have lived with such holiness that they receive into the eternal habitations others also who have won their friendship with the mammon of unrighteousness became such only through the merciful deliverance of him who justifies the ungodly, imputing to him a reward according to grace, not according to debt. For among this number is the Apostle who says, I obtained mercy to be faithful. But it must be admitted that those who are thus received into the eternal habitations are not of such a character that their own life would suffice to rescue them without the aid of the saints, and consequently in their case especially does mercy rejoice against judgment. And yet we are not on this account to suppose that every abandoned profligate who has made no amendment of his life is to be received into the eternal habitations if only he has assisted the saints with the mammon of unrighteousness. That is to say with money or wealth which has been unjustly acquired, or if rightfully acquired, is yet not the true riches but only what iniquity counts riches because it knows not the true riches in which those persons abound who even receive others also into eternal habitations. There is then a certain kind of life which is neither on the one hand so bad that those who adopt it are not helped towards the kingdom of heaven by any bountiful almsgiving by which they may relieve the want of the saints, and make friends who could receive them into eternal habitations, nor on the other hand so good that it of itself suffices to win for them that great blessedness if they do not obtain mercy through the merits of those whom they have made their friends. And I frequently wonder that even Virgil should give expression to this sentence of the Lord in which he says, Make to yourselves friends of the mammon of unrighteousness that they may receive you into everlasting habitations, and this very similar saying, He that receiveth a prophet in the name of a prophet shall receive a prophet's reward, and he that receiveth a righteous man in the name of a righteous man shall receive a righteous man's reward. For when that poet described the Elysian fields in which they supposed that the souls of the blessed dwell, he placed there not only those who had been able by their own merit to reach that abode, but added, and they who grateful memory won by services to others done, that is, they who had served others and thereby merited to be remembered by them. Just as if they used the expression so common in Christian lips where some humble person commends himself to one of the saints, and says, Remember me, and secures that he do so by deserving well at his hand. But what that kind of life we have been speaking of is, and what those sins are which prevent a man from winning the kingdom of God by himself, but yet permit him to avail himself of the merits of the saints, it is very difficult to ascertain, very perilous to define. For my own part, in spite of all investigation, I have been up to the present hour unable to discover this. And possibly it is hidden from us lest we should become careless in avoiding such sins, and so cease to make progress. But if it were known what these sins are, which, though they continue, and be not abandoned for a higher life, do yet not prevent us from seeking and hoping for the intercession of the saints, human sloth would presumptuously wrap itself in these sins, and would take no steps to be disentangled from such wrappings by the deft energy of any virtue, but would only desire to be rescued by the merits of other people whose friendship had been won by a bountiful use of the mammon of unrighteousness. But now that we are left in ignorance of the precise nature of that iniquity which is venial, even though it be persevered in, certainly we are both more vigilant in our prayers and efforts for progress, and more careful to secure with the mammon of unrighteousness friends for ourselves among the saints. But this deliverance which is effected by one's own prayers or the intercession of holy men, secures that a man be not cast into eternal fire, but not that, when once he has been cast into it, he should after a time be rescued from it. For even those who fancy that what is said of the good ground bringing forth abundant fruit, some thirty, some sixty, some and hundredfold, is to be referred to the saints, so that in proportion to their merits some of them shall deliver thirty men, some sixty, some and hundred, even those who maintain this are yet commonly inclined to suppose that this deliverance will take place at and not after the day of judgment. Under this impression someone who observed the unseemly folly with which men promise themselves impunity on the ground that all will be included in this method of deliverance is reported to a very happily remarked that we should rather endeavor to live so well that we shall be all found among the number of those who are to intercede for the liberation of others, lest these should be so few in number that, after they have delivered one thirty, another sixty, another a hundred, there should still remain many who could not be delivered from punishment by their intercessions, and among them everyone who has vainly had rashly promised himself the fruit of another's labor. But enough has been said in reply to those who acknowledge the authority of the same sacred scriptures as ourselves, but who, by a mistaken interpretation of them, conceive of the future rather as they themselves wish than as the scriptures teach. And, having given this reply, I now, according to promise, close this book. Book twenty-one, chapters twenty-five through twenty-seven. Recording by Darren L. Slider, Fort Worth, Texas, www.logoslibrary.org. Book twenty-two, chapters one through seven of The City of God. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Darren L. Slider, www.logoslibrary.org. The City of God by St. Augustine of Hippo. Book twenty-two, chapter one. As we promised in the immediately preceding book, this, the last of the whole work shall contain a discussion of the eternal blessedness of the City of God. This blessedness is named eternal, not because it shall endure for many ages, though it last it shall come to an end, but because, according to the words of the Gospel, of his kingdom there shall be no end. Neither shall it enjoy the mere appearance of perpetuity which is maintained by the rise of fresh generations to occupy the place of those that have died out, as in an evergreen the same freshness seems to continue permanently, and the same appearance of dense foliage is preserved by the growth of fresh leaves in the room of those that have withered and fallen. But in that city all the citizens shall be immortal, men now for the first time enjoying what the holy angels have never lost. And this shall be accomplished by God, the most almighty founder of the city. For he has promised it and cannot lie, and has already performed many of his promises, and has done many unpromised kindnesses to those whom he now asks to believe that he will do this also. For it is he who in the beginning created the world full of all visible and intelligible beings, among which he created nothing better than those spirits whom he endowed with intelligence, and made capable of contemplating and enjoying him, and united in our society, which we call the holy and heavenly city, and in which the material of their substance and blessedness is God himself, as it were their common food and nourishment. It is he who gave to this intellectual nature free will of such a kind that if he wished to forsake God, that is, his blessedness, misery should forthwith result. It is he who, when he foreknew that certain angels would, in their pride, desire to suffice for their own blessedness, and would forsake their great good, did not deprive them of this power, deeming it to be more befitting his power and goodness, to bring good out of evil than to prevent the evil from coming into existence. And indeed evil had never been, had not the mutable nature, mutable though good, and created by the Most High God, and immutable good, who created all things good, brought evil upon itself by sin. And this its sin is itself proof that its nature was originally good. For had it not been very good, though not equal to its creator, the desertion of God as its light could not have been an evil to it. For as blindness is a vice of the eye, and this very fact indicates that the eye was created to see the light, and as consequently vice itself proves that the eye is more excellent than the other members because it is capable of light, for on no other supposition would it be a vice of the eye to want light. So the nature which once enjoyed God teaches, even by its very vice, that it was created the best of all since it is now miserable because it does not enjoy God. It is he who with very just punishment doomed the angels who voluntarily fell to everlasting misery and rewarded those who continued in their attachment to the supreme good with the assurance of endless stability as the mead of their fidelity. It is he who made also man himself upright with the same freedom of will, an earthly animal indeed but fit for heaven if he remained faithful to his creator, but destined to the misery appropriate to such a nature if he forsook him. It is he who when he foreknew that man would in his turn sin by abandoning God and breaking his law did not deprive him of the power of free will, because he at the same time foresaw what good he himself would bring out of the evil, and how from this mortal race deservedly and justly condemned he would by his grace collect as now he does a people so numerous that he thus fills up and repairs the blank made by the fallen angels, and that thus that beloved and heavenly city is not defrauded of the full number of its citizens, but perhaps may even rejoice in a still more overflowing 2 It is true that wicked men do many things contrary to God's will, but so great is his wisdom and power that all things which seem adverse to his purpose do still tend towards those just and good ends and issues which he himself has foreknown. And consequently when God is said to change his will, as when for example he becomes angry with those to whom he was gentle, it is rather they than he who are changed, and they find him changed in so far as their experience of suffering at his hand is new, as the sun is changed to injure the eyes, and becomes, as it were, fierce from being mild, and hurtful from being delightful, though in itself it remains the same as it was. That also is called the will of God which he does in the hearts of those who obey his commandments, and of this the apostle says, for it is God that worketh in you both to will. As God's righteousness is used not only of the righteousness wherewith he himself is righteous, but also of that which he produces in the man whom he justifies, so also that is called his law which, though given by God, is rather the law of men. For certainly they were men to whom Jesus said, it is written in your law, though in another place we read, the law of his God is in his heart. According to this will which God works in men, he is said also to will what he himself does not will, but causes his people to will, as he is said to know what he has caused those to know who were ignorant of it. For when the apostle says, but now after that he have known God, or rather are known of God, we cannot suppose that God there for the first time knew those who were foreknown by him before the foundation of the world. But he is said to have known them then, because then he caused them to know. But I remember that I discussed these modes of expression in the preceding books. According to this will, then, by which we say that God wills what he causes to be willed by others from whom the future is hidden, he wills many things which he does not perform. Thus his saints, inspired by his holy will, desire many things which never happen. They pray, for example, for certain individuals, they pray in a pious and holy manner, but what they request he does not perform, though he himself, by his own holy spirit, has wrought in them this will to pray. And consequently when the saints, in conformity with God's mind, will and pray that all men be saved, we can use this mode of expression, God wills and does not perform, meaning that he who causes them to will these things himself wills them. But if we speak of that will of his which is eternal as his foreknowledge, certainly he has already done all things in heaven and on earth that he has willed, and not only past and present things, but even things still future. But before the arrival of that time in which he has willed the occurrence of what he foreknew and arranged before all time, we say, it will happen when God wills. But if we are ignorant not only of the time in which it is to be, but even whether it shall be at all, we say, it will happen if God wills. Not because God will then have a new will, which he had not before, but because that event which from eternity has been prepared in his unchangeable will shall then come to pass. CHAPTER III Therefore not to mention many other instances besides, as we now see in Christ, the fulfilment of that which God promised to Abraham when he said, In thy seed shall all nations be blessed. So this also shall be fulfilled which he promised to the same race, when he said by the prophet, They that are in their sepulchres shall rise again, and also there shall be a new heaven and a new earth, and the former shall not be mentioned nor come into mind, but they shall find joy and rejoicing in it, for I will make Jerusalem a rejoicing, and my people a joy, and I will rejoice in Jerusalem and joy in my people, and the voice of weeping shall be no more heard in her. And by another prophet he uttered the same prediction. At that time thy people shall be delivered, every one that shall be found written in the book, and many of them that sleep in the dust, or as some interpret it in the mound, of the earth shall awake some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt. And in another place by the same prophet the saints of the most high shall take the kingdom and shall possess the kingdom for ever, even for ever and ever. And a little after he says, his kingdom is an everlasting kingdom. Other prophecies referring to the same subject I have advanced in the twentieth book, and others still which I have not advanced are found written in the same scriptures, and these predictions shall be fulfilled as those also have been which unbelieving men supposed would be frustrate, for it is the same God who promised both and predicted that both would come to pass, the God whom the pagan deities trembled before as even porphyry the noblest of pagan philosophers testifies. But men who use their learning and intellectual ability to resist the force of that great authority which in fulfillment of what was so long before predicted has converted all races of men to faith and hope in its promises seem to themselves to argue acutely against the resurrection of the body while they cite what Cicero mentions in the third book, De Repubblica. For when he was asserting the apotheosis of Hercules and Romulus, he says, whose bodies were not taken up into heaven, for nature would not permit a body of earth to exist anywhere except upon earth. This forsooth is the profound reasoning of the wise men whose thoughts God knows that they are vain. For if we were only souls, that is, spirits, without any body, and if we dwelt in heaven, and had no knowledge of earthly animals, and were told that we should be bound to earthly bodies by some wonderful bond of union, and should animate them, should we not much more vigorously refuse to believe this and maintain that nature would not permit an incorporeal substance to be held by a corporeal bond. And yet the earth is full of living spirits to which terrestrial bodies are bound, and with which they are in a wonderful way implicated. If then the same God who has created such beings wills this also, what is to hinder the earthly body from being raised to a heavenly body, since a spirit which is more excellent than all bodies, and consequently than even a heavenly body has been tied to an earthly body. If so small an earthly particle has been able to hold in union with itself something better than a heavenly body, so as to receive sensation and life, will heaven disdain to receive, or at least retain, this sentient and living particle which derives its life and sensation from a substance more excellent than any heavenly body. If this does not happen now, it is because the time is not yet come which has been determined by him who has already done a much more marvelous thing than that which these men refuse to believe. For why do we not more intensely wonder that incorporeal souls which are of higher rank than heavenly bodies are bound to earthly bodies rather than that bodies, although earthly, are exalted to an abode which, though heavenly, is yet corporeal, except because we have been accustomed to see this, and indeed are this, while we are not as yet that other marvel nor have as yet ever seen it? Certainly if we consult sober reason the more wonderful of the two divine works is found to be to attach somehow corporeal things to incorporeal and not to connect earthly things with heavenly which, though diverse, are yet both of them corporeal. CHAPTER 5 But granting that this was once incredible, behold now the world has come to the belief that the earthly body of Christ was received up into heaven. Already both the learned and unlearned have believed in the resurrection of the flesh and its ascension to the heavenly places, while only a very few, either of the educated or uneducated, are still staggered by it. If this is a credible thing which is believed, then let those who do not believe see how stolid they are, and if it is incredible then this also is an incredible thing that what is incredible should have received such credit. Here then we have two incredibles, to wit the resurrection of our body to eternity, and that the world should believe so incredible a thing, and both these incredibles the same God predicted should come to pass before either had as yet occurred. We see that already one of the two has come to pass, for the world has believed what was incredible. Why should we despair that the remaining one shall also come to pass, and that this which the world believed, though it was incredible, shall itself occur? For already that which was equally incredible has come to pass in the world's believing an incredible thing. Both were incredible. The one we see accomplished, the other we believe shall be. For both were predicted in those same scriptures by means of which the world believed. And the very manner in which the world's faith was one is found to be even more incredible if we consider it. Men uninstructed in any branch of a liberal education without any of the refinement of heathen learning, unskilled in grammar, not armed with dialectic, not adorned with rhetoric, but plain fisherman, and very few in number. These were the men whom Christ sent with the nets of faith to the sea of this world, and thus took out of every race so many fishes, and even the philosophers themselves wonderful as they are rare. Let us add if you please, or because you ought to be pleased, this third incredible thing to the two former. And now we have three incredibles all of which have yet come to pass. It is incredible that Jesus Christ should have risen in the flesh and ascended with flesh into heaven. It is incredible that the world should have believed so incredible a thing. It is incredible that a very few men of mean birth and the lowest rank and no education should have been able so effectually to persuade the world and even its learned men of so incredible a thing. Of these three incredibles the parties with whom we are debating refuse to believe the first. They cannot refuse to see the second which they are unable to account for if they do not believe the third. It is indubitable that the resurrection of Christ and his ascension into heaven with the flesh in which he rose is already preached and believed in the whole world. If it is not credible how is it that it has already received credence in the whole world? If a number of noble, exalted, and learned men had said that they had witnessed it and had been at pains to publish what they had witnessed, it were not wonderful that the world should have believed it, but it were very stubborn to refuse credence. But if, as is true, the world has believed a few obscure, inconsiderable, uneducated persons who state and write that they witnessed it, is it not unreasonable that a handful of wrong-headed men should oppose themselves to the creed of the whole world and refuse their belief? And if the world has put faith in a small number of men of mean birth in the lowest rank and no education, it is because the divinity of the thing itself appeared all the more manifestly in such contemptible witnesses. The eloquence indeed which lent persuasion to their message consisted of wonderful works, not words. For they who had not seen Christ risen in the flesh, nor ascending into heaven with his risen body, believed those who related how they had seen these things, and who testified not only with words, but wonderful signs. For men whom they knew to be acquainted with only one or at most two languages, they marveled to hear speaking in the tongues of all nations. They saw a man lame from his mother's womb after forty years, stand up, sound at their word in the name of Christ, that handkerchiefs taken from their bodies had virtue to heal the sick, that countless persons, sick of various diseases, were laid in a row in the road where they were to pass, that their shadow might fall on them as they walked, and that they forthwith received health, that many others stupendous miracles were wrought by them in the name of Christ, and finally that they even raised the dead. If it be admitted that these things occurred as they are related, then we have a multitude of incredible things to add to those three incredibles, that the one incredibility of the resurrection and ascension of Jesus Christ may be believed we accumulate the testimonies of countless incredible miracles, but even so we do not bend the frightful obstinacy of these skeptics. But if they do not believe that these miracles were wrought by Christ's apostles to gain credence to their preaching of his resurrection and ascension, this one grand miracle suffices for us that the whole world has believed without any miracles. CHAPTER 6 Let us here recite the passage in which Tully expresses his astonishment that the apotheosis of Romulus should have been credited. I shall insert his words as they stand. It is most worthy of remark in Romulus that other men who are said to have become gods lived in less educated ages when there was a greater propensity to the fabulous and when the uninstructed were easily persuaded to believe anything. But the age of Romulus was barely six hundred years ago, and already literature and science had dispelled the errors that are attached to an uncultured age. And a little after he says of the same Romulus words to this effect. From this we may perceive that Homer had flourished long before Romulus, and that there was now so much learning in individuals and so generally diffused in enlightenment that scarcely any room was left for fable. For antiquity admitted fables and sometimes even very clumsy ones, but this age of Romulus was sufficiently enlightened to reject whatever had not the air of truth. Thus one of the most learned men, and certainly the most eloquent, Marcus Tullyus Cicero, says that it is surprising that the divinity of Romulus was believed in because the times were already so enlightened that they would not accept a fabulous fiction. But who believed that Romulus was a god except Rome which was itself small and in its infancy? Then afterwards it was necessary that succeeding generations should preserve the tradition of their ancestors, that drinking in this superstition with their mother's milk the state might grow and come to such power that it might dictate this belief, as from a point of vantage to all the nations over whom its sway extended. And these nations though they might not believe that Romulus was a god, at least said so that they might not give offence to their sovereign state by refusing to give its founder that title which was given him by Rome, which had adopted this belief not by a love of error, but an error of love. But though Christ is the founder of the heavenly and eternal city, yet it did not believe him to be God because it was founded by him, but rather it is founded by him in virtue of its belief. Rome, after it had been built and dedicated, worshipped its founder in a temple as a god, but this Jerusalem laid Christ its god as its foundation that the building and dedication might proceed. The former city loved its founder and therefore believed him to be a god. The latter believed Christ to be God and therefore loved him. There was an antecedent cause for the love of the former city and for its believing that even a false dignity attached to the object of its love. So there was an antecedent cause for the belief of the latter and for its loving the true dignity which a proper faith, not a rash surmise, ascribed to its object. For not to mention the multitude of very striking miracles which proved that Christ is God, there were also divine prophecies heralding him, prophecies most worthy of belief which, being already accomplished, we have not, like the fathers, to wait for their verification. Of Romulus, on the other hand, and of his building Rome and reigning in it, we read or hear the narrative of what did take place, not prediction which beforehand said that such things should be. And so far as his reception among the gods is concerned, history only records that this was believed and does not state it as a fact, for no miraculous signs testified to the truth of this. For as to that wolf which is said to have nursed the twin brothers, and which is considered a great marvel, how does this prove him to have been divine? For even supposing that this nurse was a real wolf and not a mere cartisan, she yet nursed both brothers, and Remus is not reckoned a God. Besides, what was there to hinder anyone from asserting that Romulus, or Hercules, or any such man was a God? Or who would rather choose to die than profess belief in his divinity? And did a single nation worship Romulus among its gods unless it were forced through fear of the Roman name? But who can number the multitudes who have chosen death in the most cruel shapes rather than deny the divinity of Christ? And thus the dread of some slight indignation, which it was supposed, perhaps groundlessly, might exist in the minds of the Romans, constrained some states who were subject to Rome to worship Romulus as a God. Whereas the dread, not of a slight mental shock, but of severe and various punishments, and of death itself, the most formidable of all, could not prevent an immense multitude of martyrs throughout the world from not merely worshipping, but also confessing Christ as God. The city of Christ, which, although as yet a stranger upon earth, had countless hosts of citizens, did not make war upon its godless persecutors for the sake of temporal security, but preferred to win eternal salvation by abstaining from war. They were bound, imprisoned, beaten, tortured, burned, torn in pieces, massacred, and yet they multiplied. It was not given to them to fight for their eternal salvation except by despising their temporal salvation for their Saviour's sake. I am aware that Cicero, in the third book of his De Repubblica, if I mistake not, argues that a first-rate power will not engage in war except either for honour or for safety. What he has to say about the question of safety, and what he means by safety, he explains in another place, saying, private persons frequently evade by a speedy death, destitution, exile, bonds, the scourge, and the other pains which even the most insensible feel. But to states, which seems to emancipate individuals from all punishments, is itself a punishment. For a state should be so constituted as to be eternal. And thus death is not natural to a republic as to a man to whom death is not only necessary, but often even desirable. But when a state is destroyed, obliterated, annihilated, it is as if to compare great things with small this whole world perished and collapsed. Cicero said this because he, with the Platonists, believed that the world would not perish. It is therefore agreed that according to Cicero, a state should engage in war for the safety which preserves the state permanently in existence, though its citizens change. As the foliage of an olive, or laurel, or any tree of this kind is perennial, the old leaves being replaced by fresh ones. For death, as he says, is no punishment to individuals, but rather delivers them from all other punishments, but it is a punishment to the state. And therefore it is reasonably asked what the saguntines did right when they chose that their whole state should perish rather than that they should break faith with the Roman Republic, for this deed of theirs is applauded by the citizens of the earthly Republic. But I do not see how they could follow the advice of Cicero who tell us that no war is to be undertaken safe for safety or for honor. Now there does he say which of these two is to be preferred if a case should occur in which the one could not be preserved without the loss of the other. For manifestly, if the saguntines chose safety, they must break faith. If they kept faith they must reject safety as also it fell out. But the safety of the city of God is such that it can be retained or rather required by faith and with faith, but if faith be abandoned no one can attain it. It is this thought of a most steadfast and patient spirit that has made so many noble martyrs while Romulus has not had and could not have so much as one to die for his divinity. CHAPTER VII But it is thoroughly ridiculous to make mention of the false divinity of Romulus as any way comparable to that of Christ. Nevertheless, if Romulus lived about six hundred years before Cicero in an age which already was so enlightened that it rejected all impossibilities, how much more in an age which certainly was more enlightened, being six hundred years later the age of Cicero himself and of the emperors Augustus and Tiberius, would the human mind have refused to listen to or believe in the resurrection of Christ's body and its ascension into heaven and have scouted it as an impossibility, had not the divinity of the truth itself or the truth of the divinity and corroborating miraculous signs proved that it could happen and had happened. Through virtue of these testimonies and notwithstanding the opposition and terror of so many cruel persecutions, the resurrection and immortality of the flesh first in Christ and subsequently in all in the New World was believed, was intrepidly proclaimed, and was sewn over the whole world to be fertilized richly with the blood of the martyrs. For the predictions of the prophets that had preceded the events were read, they were corroborated by powerful signs and the truth was seen to be not contradictory to reason but only different from customary ideas, so that at length the world embraced the faith it had furiously persecuted.