BOOK TWENTY-FIRST.

Argument

OF THE END RESERVED FOR THE CITY OF THE DEVIL, NAMELY, THE ETERNAL
PUNISHMENT OF THE DAMNED; AND OF THE ARGUMENTS WHICH UNBELIEF
BRINGS AGAINST IT.

1. Of the order of the discussion, which requires that we first speak of the eternal
punishment of the lost in company with the devil, and then of the eternal
happiness of the saints.

I propose, with such ability as God may grant me, to
discuss in this book more thoroughly the nature of the
punishment which shall be assigned to the devil and all his
retainers, when the two cities, the one of God, the other of
the devil, shall have reached their proper ends through Jesus
Christ our Lord, the Judge of quick and dead. And I have
adopted this order, and preferred to speak, first of the punishment
of the devils, and afterwards of the blessedness of the
saints, because the body partakes of either destiny; and it
seems to be more incredible that bodies endure in everlasting
torments than that they continue to exist without any pain
in everlasting felicity. Consequently, when I shall have
demonstrated that that punishment ought not to be incredible,
this will materially aid me in proving that which is much
more credible, viz. the immortality of the bodies of the saints
which are delivered from all pain. Neither is this order out
of harmony with the divine writings, in which sometimes,
indeed, the blessedness of the good is placed first, as in the
words, “They that have done good, unto the resurrection of
life; and they that have done evil, unto the resurrection of
damnation;”[852] but sometimes also last, as, “The Son of man
shall send forth His angels, and they shall gather out of His
kingdom all things which offend, and shall cast them into a
furnace of fire: there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth.[Pg 414]
Then shall the righteous shine forth as the sun in the kingdom
of His Father;”[853] and that, “These shall go away into
everlasting punishment, but the righteous into life eternal.”[854]
And though we have not room to cite instances, any one who
examines the prophets will find that they adopt now the one
arrangement and now the other. My own reason for following
the latter order I have given.

2. Whether it is possible for bodies to last for ever in burning fire.

What, then, can I adduce to convince those who refuse to
believe that human bodies, animated and living, can not only
survive death, but also last in the torments of everlasting
fires? They will not allow us to refer this simply to the
power of the Almighty, but demand that we persuade them
by some example. If, then, we reply to them, that there
are animals which certainly are corruptible, because they are
mortal, and which yet live in the midst of flames; and likewise,
that in springs of water so hot that no one can put his
hand in it with impunity a species of worm is found, which
not only lives there, but cannot live elsewhere; they either
refuse to believe these facts unless we can show them, or, if
we are in circumstances to prove them by ocular demonstration
or by adequate testimony, they contend, with the same
scepticism, that these facts are not examples of what we seek
to prove, inasmuch as these animals do not live for ever, and
besides, they live in that blaze of heat without pain, the element
of fire being congenial to their nature, and causing it
to thrive and not to suffer,—just as if it were not more
incredible that it should thrive than that it should suffer in
such circumstances. It is strange that anything should suffer
in fire and yet live, but stranger that it should live in fire
and not suffer. If, then, the latter be believed, why not also
the former?

3. Whether bodily suffering necessarily terminates in the destruction of the flesh.

But, say they, there is no body which can suffer and cannot
also die. How do we know this? For who can say with
certainty that the devils do not suffer in their bodies, when[Pg 415]
they own that they are grievously tormented? And if it is
replied that there is no earthly body—that is to say, no solid
and perceptible body, or, in one word, no flesh—which can
suffer and cannot die, is not this to tell us only what men
have gathered from experience and their bodily senses? For
they indeed have no acquaintance with any flesh but that
which is mortal; and this is their whole argument, that what
they have had no experience of they judge quite impossible.
For we cannot call it reasoning to make pain a presumption
of death, while, in fact, it is rather a sign of life. For though
it be a question whether that which suffers can continue to
live for ever, yet it is certain that everything which suffers
pain does live, and that pain can exist only in a living subject.
It is necessary, therefore, that he who is pained be living, not
necessary that pain kill him; for every pain does not kill even
those mortal bodies of ours which are destined to die. And
that any pain kills them is caused by the circumstance that the
soul is so connected with the body that it succumbs to great
pain and withdraws; for the structure of our members and
vital parts is so infirm that it cannot bear up against that violence
which causes great or extreme agony. But in the life to
come this connection of soul and body is of such a kind, that
as it is dissolved by no lapse of time, so neither is it burst
asunder by any pain. And so, although it be true that in
this world there is no flesh which can suffer pain and yet
cannot die, yet in the world to come there shall be flesh such
as now there is not, as there will also be death such as
now there is not. For death will not be abolished, but
will be eternal, since the soul will neither be able to enjoy
God and live, nor to die and escape the pains of the body.
The first death drives the soul from the body against her will:
the second death holds the soul in the body against her will.
The two have this in common, that the soul suffers against
her will what her own body inflicts.

Our opponents, too, make much of this, that in this world
there is no flesh which can suffer pain and cannot die;
while they make nothing of the fact that there is something
which is greater than the body. For the spirit, whose presence
animates and rules the body, can both suffer pain and[Pg 416]
cannot die. Here then is something which, though it can
feel pain, is immortal. And this capacity, which we now see
in the spirit of all, shall be hereafter in the bodies of the
damned. Moreover, if we attend to the matter a little more
closely, we see that what is called bodily pain is rather to be
referred to the soul. For it is the soul, not the body, which
is pained, even when the pain originates with the body,—the
soul feeling pain at the point where the body is hurt. As then
we speak of bodies feeling and living, though the feeling and
life of the body are from the soul, so also we speak of bodies
being pained, though no pain can be suffered by the body
apart from the soul. The soul, then, is pained with the body
in that part where something occurs to hurt it; and it is
pained alone, though it be in the body, when some invisible
cause distresses it, while the body is safe and sound. Even
when not associated with the body it is pained; for certainly
that rich man was suffering in hell when he cried, “I am
tormented in this flame.”[855] But as for the body, it suffers no
pain when it is soulless; and even when animate it can
suffer only by the soul’s suffering. If, therefore, we might
draw a just presumption from the existence of pain to that of
death, and conclude that where pain can be felt death can
occur, death would rather be the property of the soul, for to
it pain more peculiarly belongs. But, seeing that that which
suffers most cannot die, what ground is there for supposing
that those bodies, because destined to suffer, are therefore
destined to die? The Platonists indeed maintained that these
earthly bodies and dying members gave rise to the fears, desires,
griefs, and joys of the soul. “Hence,” says Virgil (i.e. from
these earthly bodies and dying members),

“Hence wild desires and grovelling fears,

And human laughter, human tears.”[856]

But in the fourteenth book of this work[857] we have proved
that, according to the Platonists’ own theory, souls, even when
purged from all pollution of the body, are yet possessed by a
monstrous desire to return again into their bodies. But where
desire can exist, certainly pain also can exist; for desire
frustrated, either by missing what it aims at or losing what[Pg 417]
it had attained, is turned into pain. And therefore, if the
soul, which is either the only or the chief sufferer, has yet a
kind of immortality of its own, it is inconsequent to say that
because the bodies of the damned shall suffer pain, therefore
they shall die. In fine, if the body causes the soul to suffer,
why can the body not cause death as well as suffering, unless
because it does not follow that what causes pain causes death
as well? And why then is it incredible that these fires can
cause pain but not death to those bodies we speak of, just as
the bodies themselves cause pain, but not therefore death, to
the souls? Pain is therefore no necessary presumption of
death.

4. Examples from nature proving that bodies may remain unconsumed
and alive in fire.

If, therefore, the salamander lives in fire, as naturalists[858]
have recorded, and if certain famous mountains of Sicily have
been continually on fire from the remotest antiquity until
now, and yet remain entire, these are sufficiently convincing
examples that everything which burns is not consumed. As
the soul, too, is a proof that not everything which can suffer
pain can also die, why then do they yet demand that we
produce real examples to prove that it is not incredible that
the bodies of men condemned to everlasting punishment may
retain their soul in the fire, may burn without being consumed,
and may suffer without perishing? For suitable properties
will be communicated to the substance of the flesh by
Him who has endowed the things we see with so marvellous
and diverse properties, that their very multitude prevents our
wonder. For who but God the Creator of all things has given
to the flesh of the peacock its antiseptic property? This
property, when I first heard of it, seemed to me incredible;
but it happened at Carthage that a bird of this kind was
cooked and served up to me, and, taking a suitable slice of
flesh from its breast, I ordered it to be kept, and when it had
been kept as many days as make any other flesh stinking, it
was produced and set before me, and emitted no offensive[Pg 418]
smell. And after it had been laid by for thirty days and
more, it was still in the same state; and a year after, the
same still, except that it was a little more shrivelled, and
drier. Who gave to chaff such power to freeze that it preserves
snow buried under it, and such power to warm that it
ripens green fruit?

But who can explain the strange properties of fire itself,
which blackens everything it burns, though itself bright; and
which, though of the most beautiful colours, discolours almost
all it touches and feeds upon, and turns blazing fuel into
grimy cinders? Still this is not laid down as an absolutely
uniform law; for, on the contrary, stones baked in glowing
fire themselves also glow, and though the fire be rather of a
red hue, and they white, yet white is congruous with light,
and black with darkness. Thus, though the fire burns the
wood in calcining the stones, these contrary effects do not
result from the contrariety of the materials. For though
wood and stone differ, they are not contraries, like black and
white, the one of which colours is produced in the stones,
while the other is produced in the wood by the same action
of fire, which imparts its own brightness to the former, while
it begrimes the latter, and which could have no effect on the
one were it not fed by the other. Then what wonderful properties
do we find in charcoal, which is so brittle that a light
tap breaks it and a slight pressure pulverizes it, and yet is
so strong that no moisture rots it, nor any time causes it to
decay. So enduring is it, that it is customary in laying down
landmarks to put charcoal underneath them, so that if, after
the longest interval, any one raises an action, and pleads that
there is no boundary stone, he may be convicted by the charcoal
below. What then has enabled it to last so long without
rotting, though buried in the damp earth in which [its original]
wood rots, except this same fire which consumes all things?

Again, let us consider the wonders of lime; for besides
growing white in fire, which makes other things black, and
of which I have already said enough, it has also a mysterious
property of conceiving fire within it. Itself cold to the touch,
it yet has a hidden store of fire, which is not at once apparent
to our senses, but which experience teaches us, lies as it were[Pg 419]
slumbering within it even while unseen. And it is for this
reason called “quick lime,” as if the fire were the invisible
soul quickening the visible substance or body. But the marvellous
thing is, that this fire is kindled when it is extinguished.
For to disengage the hidden fire the lime is moistened or
drenched with water, and then, though it be cold before, it
becomes hot by that very application which cools what is hot.
As if the fire were departing from the lime and breathing its
last, it no longer lies hid, but appears; and then the lime
lying in the coldness of death cannot be requickened, and
what we before called “quick,” we now call “slaked.” What
can be stranger than this? Yet there is a greater marvel
still. For if you treat the lime, not with water, but with oil,
which is as fuel to fire, no amount of oil will heat it. Now
if this marvel had been told us of some Indian mineral which
we had no opportunity of experimenting upon, we should
either have forthwith pronounced it a falsehood, or certainly
should have been greatly astonished. But things that daily
present themselves to our own observation we despise, not
because they are really less marvellous, but because they are
common; so that even some products of India itself, remote
as it is from ourselves, cease to excite our admiration as soon
as we can admire them at our leisure.[859]

The diamond is a stone possessed by many among ourselves,
especially by jewellers and lapidaries, and the stone is so hard
that it can be wrought neither by iron nor fire, nor, they say,
by anything at all except goat’s blood. But do you suppose
it is as much admired by those who own it and are familiar
with its properties as by those to whom it is shown for the
first time? Persons who have not seen it perhaps do not
believe what is said of it, or if they do, they wonder as at a
thing beyond their experience; and if they happen to see it,
still they marvel because they are unused to it, but gradually
familiar experience [of it] dulls their admiration. We know[Pg 420]
that the loadstone has a wonderful power of attracting iron.
When I first saw it I was thunderstruck, for I saw an iron
ring attracted and suspended by the stone; and then, as if it
had communicated its own property to the iron it attracted,
and had made it a substance like itself, this ring was put
near another, and lifted it up; and as the first ring clung to
the magnet, so did the second ring to the first. A third and a
fourth were similarly added, so that there hung from the stone
a kind of chain of rings, with their hoops connected, not interlinking,
but attached together by their outer surface. Who
would not be amazed at this virtue of the stone, subsisting as
it does not only in itself, but transmitted through so many
suspended rings, and binding them together by invisible links?
Yet far more astonishing is what I heard about this stone
from my brother in the episcopate, Severus bishop of Milevis.
He told me that Bathanarius, once count of Africa, when the
bishop was dining with him, produced a magnet, and held it
under a silver plate on which he placed a bit of iron; then as
he moved his hand with the magnet underneath the plate, the
iron upon the plate moved about accordingly. The intervening
silver was not affected at all, but precisely as the magnet
was moved backwards and forwards below it, no matter how
quickly, so was the iron attracted above. I have related what
I myself have witnessed; I have related what I was told by
one whom I trust as I trust my own eyes. Let me further
say what I have read about this magnet. When a diamond
is laid near it, it does not lift iron; or if it has already lifted
it, as soon as the diamond approaches, it drops it. These
stones come from India. But if we cease to admire them
because they are now familiar, how much less must they
admire them who procure them very easily and send them
to us? Perhaps they are held as cheap as we hold lime,
which, because it is common, we think nothing of, though it
has the strange property of burning when water, which is
wont to quench fire, is poured on it, and of remaining cool
when mixed with oil, which ordinarily feeds fire.

5. That there are many things which reason cannot account for, and which
are nevertheless true.

Nevertheless, when we declare the miracles which God has[Pg 421]
wrought, or will yet work, and which we cannot bring under
the very eyes of men, sceptics keep demanding that we shall
explain these marvels to reason. And because we cannot do
so, inasmuch as they are above human comprehension, they
suppose we are speaking falsely. These persons themselves,
therefore, ought to account for all these marvels which we
either can or do see. And if they perceive that this is impossible
for man to do, they should acknowledge that it cannot
be concluded that a thing has not been or shall not be because
it cannot be reconciled to reason, since there are things now
in existence of which the same is true. I will not, then,
detail the multitude of marvels which are related in books,
and which refer not to things that happened once and passed
away, but that are permanent in certain places, where, if any
one has the desire and opportunity, he may ascertain their
truth; but a few only I recount. The following are some of
the marvels men tell us:—The salt of Agrigentum in Sicily,
when thrown into the fire, becomes fluid as if it were in
water, but in the water it crackles as if it were in the
fire. The Garamantæ have a fountain so cold by day that
no one can drink it, so hot by night no one can touch it.[860]
In Epirus, too, there is a fountain which, like all others,
quenches lighted torches, but, unlike all others, lights quenched
torches. There is a stone found in Arcadia, and called asbestos,
because once lit it cannot be put out. The wood of a certain
kind of Egyptian fig-tree sinks in water, and does not float
like other wood; and, stranger still, when it has been sunk
to the bottom for some time, it rises again to the surface,
though nature requires that when soaked in water it should
be heavier than ever. Then there are the apples of Sodom,
which grow indeed to an appearance of ripeness, but, when
you touch them with hand or tooth, the peel cracks, and they
crumble into dust and ashes. The Persian stone pyrites burns
the hand when it is tightly held in it, and so gets its name[Pg 422]
from fire. In Persia, too, there is found another stone called
selenite, because its interior brilliancy waxes and wanes with
the moon. Then in Cappadocia the mares are impregnated
by the wind, and their foals live only three years. Tilon,
an Indian island, has this advantage over all other lands,
that no tree which grows in it ever loses its foliage.

These and numberless other marvels recorded in the history,
not of past events, but of permanent localities, I have no time
to enlarge upon and diverge from my main object; but let
those sceptics who refuse to credit the divine writings give
me, if they can, a rational account of them. For their only
ground of unbelief in the Scriptures is, that they contain
incredible things, just such as I have been recounting. For,
say they, reason cannot admit that flesh burn and remain
unconsumed, suffer without dying. Mighty reasoners, indeed,
who are competent to give the reason of all the marvels that
exist! Let them then give us the reason of the few things
we have cited, and which, if they did not know they existed,
and were only assured by us they would at some future time
occur, they would believe still less than that which they now
refuse to credit on our word. For which of them would
believe us if, instead of saying that the living bodies of men
hereafter will be such as to endure everlasting pain and fire
without ever dying, we were to say that in the world to come
there will be salt which becomes liquid in fire as if it were
in water, and crackles in water as if it were in fire; or that
there will be a fountain whose water in the chill air of night
is so hot that it cannot be touched, while in the heat of day
it is so cold that it cannot be drunk; or that there will be a
stone which by its own heat burns the hand when tightly
held, or a stone which cannot be extinguished if it has been
lit in any part; or any of those wonders I have cited, while
omitting numberless others? If we were to say that these
things would be found in the world to come, and our sceptics
were to reply, “If you wish us to believe these things, satisfy
our reason about each of them,” we should confess that we
could not, because the frail comprehension of man cannot
master these and such-like wonders of God’s working; and
that yet our reason was thoroughly convinced that the[Pg 423]
Almighty does nothing without reason, though the frail
mind of man cannot explain the reason; and that while we
are in many instances uncertain what He intends, yet that it
is always most certain that nothing which He intends is impossible
to Him; and that when He declares His mind, we
believe Him whom we cannot believe to be either powerless
or false. Nevertheless these cavillers at faith and exactors
of reason, how do they dispose of those things of which a reason
cannot be given, and which yet exist, though in apparent contrariety
to the nature of things? If we had announced that
these things were to be, these sceptics would have demanded
from us the reason of them, as they do in the case of those
things which we are announcing as destined to be. And consequently,
as these present marvels are not non-existent, though
human reason and discourse are lost in such works of God, so
those things we speak of are not impossible because inexplicable;
for in this particular they are in the same predicament
as the marvels of earth.

6. That all marvels are not of nature’s production, but that some are due to
human ingenuity and others to diabolic contrivance.

At this point they will perhaps reply, “These things have
no existence; we don’t believe one of them; they are travellers’
tales and fictitious romances;” and they may add what has
the appearance of argument, and say, “If you believe such
things as these, believe what is recorded in the same books,
that there was or is a temple of Venus in which a candelabrum
set in the open air holds a lamp, which burns so strongly
that no storm or rain extinguishes it, and which is therefore
called, like the stone mentioned above, the asbestos or inextinguishable
lamp.” They may say this with the intention of
putting us into a dilemma: for if we say this is incredible,
then we shall impugn the truth of the other recorded marvels;
if, on the other hand, we admit that this is credible, we shall
avouch the pagan deities. But, as I have already said in the
eighteenth book of this work, we do not hold it necessary to
believe all that profane history contains, since, as Varro says,
even historians themselves disagree on so many points, that
one would think they intended and were at pains to do so;
but we believe, if we are disposed, those things which are not[Pg 424]
contradicted by these books, which we do not hesitate to say
we are bound to believe. But as to those permanent miracles
of nature, whereby we wish to persuade the sceptical of the
miracles of the world to come, those are quite sufficient for
our purpose which we ourselves can observe, or of which it is
not difficult to find trustworthy witnesses. Moreover, that
temple of Venus, with its inextinguishable lamp, so far from
hemming us into a corner, opens an advantageous field to
our argument. For to this inextinguishable lamp we add a
host of marvels wrought by men, or by magic,—that is, by
men under the influence of devils, or by the devils directly,—for
such marvels we cannot deny without impugning the truth
of the sacred Scriptures we believe. That lamp, therefore,
was either by some mechanical and human device fitted with
asbestos, or it was arranged by magical art in order that the
worshippers might be astonished, or some devil under the
name of Venus so signally manifested himself that this prodigy
both began and became permanent. Now devils are attracted to
dwell in certain temples by means of the creatures (God’s creatures,
not theirs), who present to them what suits their various
tastes. They are attracted not by food like animals, but, like
spirits, by such symbols as suit their taste, various kinds of
stones, woods, plants, animals, songs, rites. And that men
may provide these attractions, the devils first of all cunningly
seduce them, either by imbuing their hearts with a secret
poison, or by revealing themselves under a friendly guise, and
thus make a few of them their disciples, who become the instructors
of the multitude. For unless they first instructed men,
it were impossible to know what each of them desires, what
they shrink from, by what name they should be invoked or
constrained to be present. Hence the origin of magic and
magicians. But, above all, they possess the hearts of men, and
are chiefly proud of this possession when they transform themselves
into angels of light. Very many things that occur,
therefore, are their doing; and these deeds of theirs we ought
all the more carefully to shun as we acknowledge them to be
very surprising. And yet these very deeds forward my present
arguments. For if such marvels are wrought by unclean
devils, how much mightier are the holy angels! and what cannot[Pg 425]
that God do who made the angels themselves capable of
working miracles!

If, then, very many effects can be contrived by human art,
of so surprising a kind that the uninitiated think them divine,
as when, e.g., in a certain temple two magnets have been adjusted,
one in the roof, another in the floor, so that an iron
image is suspended in mid-air between them, one would suppose
by the power of the divinity, were he ignorant of the
magnets above and beneath; or, as in the case of that lamp of
Venus which we already mentioned as being a skilful adaptation
of asbestos; if, again, by the help of magicians, whom Scripture
calls sorcerers and enchanters, the devils could gain such
power that the noble poet Virgil should consider himself justified
in describing a very powerful magician in these lines:

“Her charms can cure what souls she please,

Rob other hearts of healthful ease,

Turn rivers backward to their source,

And make the stars forget their course,

And call up ghosts from night:

The ground shall bellow ‘neath your feet:

The mountain-ash shall quit its seat,

And travel down the height;”[861]—

if this be so, how much more able is God to do those things
which to sceptics are incredible, but to His power easy, since
it is He who has given to stones and all other things their
virtue, and to men their skill to use them in wonderful ways;
He who has given to the angels a nature more mighty than
that of all that lives on earth; He whose power surpasses all
marvels, and whose wisdom in working, ordaining, and permitting
is no less marvellous in its governance of all things
than in its creation of all!

7. That the ultimate reason for believing miracles is the omnipotence of the
Creator.

Why, then, cannot God effect both that the bodies of the
dead shall rise, and that the bodies of the damned shall be
tormented in everlasting fire,—God, who made the world full
of countless miracles in sky, earth, air, and waters, while itself
is a miracle unquestionably greater and more admirable than
all the marvels it is filled with? But those with whom or[Pg 426]
against whom we are arguing, who believe both that there is
a God who made the world, and that there are gods created
by Him who administer the world’s laws as His vicegerents,—our
adversaries, I say, who, so far from denying emphatically,
assert that there are powers in the world which effect marvellous
results (whether of their own accord, or because they
are invoked by some rite or prayer, or in some magical way),
when we lay before them the wonderful properties of other
things which are neither rational animals nor rational spirits,
but such material objects as those we have just cited, are
in the habit of replying, This is their natural property, their
nature; these are the powers naturally belonging to them.
Thus the whole reason why Agrigentine salt dissolves in fire
and crackles in water is that this is its nature. Yet this seems
rather contrary to nature, which has given not to fire but to
water the power of melting salt, and the power of scorching it
not to water but to fire. But this, they say, is the natural
property of this salt, to show effects contrary to these. The
same reason, therefore, is assigned to account for that Garamantian
fountain, of which one and the same runlet is chill
by day and boiling by night, so that in either extreme it cannot
be touched. So also of that other fountain which, though
it is cold to the touch, and though it, like other fountains,
extinguishes a lighted torch, yet, unlike other fountains, and
in a surprising manner, kindles an extinguished torch. So of
the asbestos stone, which, though it has no heat of its own, yet
when kindled by fire applied to it, cannot be extinguished.
And so of the rest, which I am weary of reciting, and in which,
though there seems to be an extraordinary property contrary
to nature, yet no other reason is given for them than this, that
this is their nature,—a brief reason truly, and, I own, a satisfactory
reply. But since God is the author of all natures,
how is it that our adversaries, when they refuse to believe
what we affirm, on the ground that it is impossible, are unwilling
to accept from us a better explanation than their own,
viz. that this is the will of Almighty God,—for certainly He
is called Almighty only because He is mighty to do all He
will,—He who was able to create so many marvels, not only
unknown, but very well ascertained, as I have been showing,[Pg 427]
and which, were they not under our own observation, or reported
by recent and credible witnesses, would certainly be
pronounced impossible? For as for those marvels which have
no other testimony than the writers in whose books we read
them, and who wrote without being divinely instructed, and are
therefore liable to human error, we cannot justly blame any
one who declines to believe them.

For my own part, I do not wish all the marvels I have
cited to be rashly accepted, for I do not myself believe them
implicitly, save those which have either come under my own
observation, or which any one can readily verify,—such as the
lime which is heated by water and cooled by oil; the magnet
which by its mysterious and insensible suction attracts the
iron, but has no effect on a straw; the peacock’s flesh which
triumphs over the corruption from which not the flesh of
Plato is exempt; the chaff so chilling that it prevents snow
from melting, so heating that it forces apples to ripen; the
glowing fire, which, in accordance with its glowing appearance,
whitens the stones it bakes, while, contrary to its glowing
appearance, it begrimes most things it burns (just as dirty
stains are made by oil, however pure it be, and as the lines
drawn by white silver are black); the charcoal, too, which by
the action of fire is so completely changed from its original,
that a finely marked piece of wood becomes hideous, the tough
becomes brittle, the decaying incorruptible. Some of these
things I know in common with many other persons, some of
them in common with all men; and there are many others
which I have not room to insert in this book. But of those
which I have cited, though I have not myself seen, but only
read about them, I have been unable to find trustworthy witnesses
from whom I could ascertain whether they are facts,
except in the case of that fountain in which burning torches
are extinguished and extinguished torches lit, and of the
apples of Sodom, which are ripe to appearance, but are filled
with dust. And indeed I have not met with any who said
they had seen that fountain in Epirus, but with some who
knew there was a similar fountain in Gaul not far from
Grenoble. The fruit of the trees of Sodom, however, is not
only spoken of in books worthy of credit, but so many persons[Pg 428]
say that they have seen it that I cannot doubt the fact.
But the rest of the prodigies I receive without definitely
affirming or denying them; and I have cited them because I
read them in the authors of our adversaries, and that I might
prove how many things many among themselves believe, because
they are written in the works of their own literary men,
though no rational explanation of them is given, and yet they
scorn to believe us when we assert that Almighty God will do
what is beyond their experience and observation; and this they
do even though we assign a reason for His work. For what
better and stronger reason for such things can be given than
to say that the Almighty is able to bring them to pass, and
will bring them to pass, having predicted them in those books
in which many other marvels which have already come to
pass were predicted? Those things which are regarded as
impossible will be accomplished according to the word, and by
the power of that God who predicted and effected that the
incredulous nations should believe incredible wonders.

8. That it is not contrary to nature that, in an object whose nature is known,
there should be discovered an alteration of the properties which have been
known as its natural properties.

But if they reply that their reason for not believing us
when we say that human bodies will always burn and yet never
die, is that the nature of human bodies is known to be quite
otherwise constituted; if they say that for this miracle we
cannot give the reason which was valid in the case of those
natural miracles, viz. that this is the natural property, the
nature of the thing,—for we know that this is not the nature
of human flesh,—we find our answer in the sacred writings,
that even this human flesh was constituted in one fashion
before there was sin,—was constituted, in fact, so that it
could not die,—and in another fashion after sin, being made
such as we see it in this miserable state of mortality, unable
to retain enduring life. And so in the resurrection of the
dead shall it be constituted differently from its present well-known
condition. But as they do not believe these writings
of ours, in which we read what nature man had in paradise,
and how remote he was from the necessity of death,—and
indeed, if they did believe them, we should of course have[Pg 429]
little trouble in debating with them the future punishment
of the damned,—we must produce from the writings of their
own most learned authorities some instances to show that it
is possible for a thing to become different from what it was
formerly known characteristically to be.

From the book of Marcus Varro, entitled, Of the Race Of
the Roman People, I cite word for word the following instance:
“There occurred a remarkable celestial portent; for
Castor records that, in the brilliant star Venus, called Vesperugo
by Plautus, and the lovely Hesperus by Homer, there
occurred so strange a prodigy, that it changed its colour, size,
form, course, which never happened before nor since. Adrastus
of Cyzicus, and Dion of Naples, famous mathematicians, said
that this occurred in the reign of Ogyges.” So great an
author as Varro would certainly not have called this a portent
had it not seemed to be contrary to nature. For we say
that all portents are contrary to nature; but they are not so.
For how is that contrary to nature which happens by the
will of God, since the will of so mighty a Creator is certainly
the nature of each created thing? A portent, therefore, happens
not contrary to nature, but contrary to what we know as
nature. But who can number the multitude of portents
recorded in profane histories? Let us then at present fix
our attention on this one only which concerns the matter in
hand. What is there so arranged by the Author of the nature
of heaven and earth as the exactly ordered course of the
stars? What is there established by laws so sure and inflexible?
And yet, when it pleased Him who with sovereignty
and supreme power regulates all He has created, a
star conspicuous among the rest by its size and splendour
changed its colour, size, form, and, most wonderful of all, the
order and law of its course! Certainly that phenomenon
disturbed the canons of the astronomers, if there were any
then, by which they tabulate, as by unerring computation, the
past and future movements of the stars, so as to take upon
them to affirm that this which happened to the morning star
(Venus) never happened before nor since. But we read in
the divine books that even the sun itself stood still when a
holy man, Joshua the son of Nun, had begged this from God[Pg 430]
until victory should finish the battle he had begun; and that
it even went back, that the promise of fifteen years added to
the life of king Hezekiah might be sealed by this additional
prodigy. But these miracles, which were vouchsafed to the
merits of holy men, even when our adversaries believe them,
they attribute to magical arts; so Virgil, in the lines I quoted
above, ascribes to magic the power to

“Turn rivers backward to their source,

And make the stars forget their course.”

For in our sacred books we read that this also happened,
that a river “turned backward,” was stayed above while the
lower part flowed on, when the people passed over under the
above-mentioned leader, Joshua the son of Nun; and also when
Elias the prophet crossed; and afterwards, when his disciple
Elisha passed through it: and we have just mentioned how,
in the case of king Hezekiah, the greatest of the “stars forgot
its course.” But what happened to Venus, according to Varro,
was not said by him to have happened in answer to any man’s
prayer.

Let not the sceptics then benight themselves in this knowledge
of the nature of things, as if divine power cannot
bring to pass in an object anything else than what their own
experience has shown them to be in its nature. Even the
very things which are most commonly known as natural
would not be less wonderful nor less effectual to excite surprise
in all who beheld them, if men were not accustomed to
admire nothing but what is rare. For who that thoughtfully
observes the countless multitude of men, and their similarity
of nature, can fail to remark with surprise and admiration the
individuality of each man’s appearance, suggesting to us, as it
does, that unless men were like one another, they would not
be distinguished from the rest of the animals; while unless,
on the other hand, they were unlike, they could not be distinguished
from one another, so that those whom we declare
to be like, we also find to be unlike? And the unlikeness is
the more wonderful consideration of the two; for a common
nature seems rather to require similarity. And yet, because
the very rarity of things is that which makes them wonderful,
we are filled with much greater wonder when we are introduced[Pg 431]
to two men so like, that we either always or frequently
mistake in endeavouring to distinguish between them.

But possibly, though Varro is a heathen historian, and a
very learned one, they may disbelieve that what I have cited
from him truly occurred; or they may say the example is invalid,
because the star did not for any length of time continue
to follow its new course, but returned to its ordinary orbit.
There is, then, another phenomenon at present open to their
observation, and which, in my opinion, ought to be sufficient
to convince them that, though they have observed and ascertained
some natural law, they ought not on that account
to prescribe to God, as if He could not change and turn it
into something very different from what they have observed.
The land of Sodom was not always as it now is; but once
it had the appearance of other lands, and enjoyed equal if
not richer fertility; for, in the divine narrative, it was compared
to the paradise of God. But after it was touched [by
fire] from heaven, as even pagan history testifies, and as is
now witnessed by those who visit the spot, it became unnaturally
and horribly sooty in appearance; and its apples,
under a deceitful appearance of ripeness, contain ashes within.
Here is a thing which was of one kind, and is of another.
You see how its nature was converted by the wonderful
transmutation wrought by the Creator of all natures into so
very disgusting a diversity,—an alteration which after so long
a time took place, and after so long a time still continues.

As therefore it was not impossible to God to create such
natures as He pleased, so it is not impossible to Him to
change these natures of His own creation into whatever He
pleases, and thus spread abroad a multitude of those marvels
which are called monsters, portents, prodigies, phenomena,[862]
and which if I were minded to cite and record, what end
would there be to this work? They say that they are called
“monsters,” because they demonstrate or signify something;
“portents,” because they portend something; and so forth.[Pg 432][863]
But let their diviners see how they are either deceived, or
even when they do predict true things, it is because they
are inspired by spirits, who are intent upon entangling the
minds of men (worthy, indeed, of such a fate) in the meshes
of a hurtful curiosity, or how they light now and then upon
some truth, because they make so many predictions. Yet,
for our part, these things which happen contrary to nature,
and are said to be contrary to nature (as the apostle, speaking
after the manner of men, says, that to graff the wild olive
into the good olive, and to partake of its fatness, is contrary
to nature), and are called monsters, phenomena, portents, prodigies,
ought to demonstrate, portend, predict that God will
bring to pass what He has foretold regarding the bodies of
men, no difficulty preventing Him, no law of nature prescribing
to Him His limit. How He has foretold what He
is to do, I think I have sufficiently shown in the preceding
book, culling from the sacred Scriptures, both of the New and
Old Testaments, not, indeed, all the passages that relate to
this, but as many as I judged to suffice for this work.

9. Of hell, and the nature of eternal punishments.

So then what God by His prophet has said of the everlasting
punishment of the damned shall come to pass—shall
without fail come to pass,—”their worm shall not die, neither
shall their fire be quenched.”[864] In order to impress this upon
us most forcibly, the Lord Jesus Himself, when ordering us to
cut off our members, meaning thereby those persons whom a
man loves as the most useful members of his body, says, “It
is better for thee to enter into life maimed, than having two
hands to go into hell, into the fire that never shall be quenched;
where their worm dieth not, and their fire is not quenched.”
Similarly of the foot: “It is better for thee to enter halt into
life, than having two feet to be cast into hell, into the fire
that never shall be quenched; where their worm dieth not,
and the fire is not quenched.” So, too, of the eye: “It is
better for thee to enter into the kingdom of God with one eye,
than having two eyes to be cast into hell fire; where their
worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched.”[865] He did not[Pg 433]
shrink from using the same words three times over in one
passage. And who is not terrified by this repetition, and by
the threat of that punishment uttered so vehemently by the
lips of the Lord Himself?

Now they who would refer both the fire and the worm to
the spirit, and not to the body, affirm that the wicked, who are
separated from the kingdom of God, shall be burned, as it were,
by the anguish of a spirit repenting too late and fruitlessly;
and they contend that fire is therefore not inappropriately used
to express this burning torment, as when the apostle exclaims,
“Who is offended, and I burn not?”[866] The worm, too, they
think, is to be similarly understood. For it is written, they
say, “As the moth consumes the garment, and the worm the
wood, so does grief consume the heart of a man.”[867] But they
who make no doubt that in that future punishment both body
and soul shall suffer, affirm that the body shall be burned with
fire, while the soul shall be, as it were, gnawed by a worm of
anguish. Though this view is more reasonable,—for it is absurd
to suppose that either body or soul will escape pain in the
future punishment,—yet, for my own part, I find it easier to
understand both as referring to the body than to suppose that
neither does; and I think that Scripture is silent regarding
the spiritual pain of the damned, because, though not expressed,
it is necessarily understood that in a body thus tormented the
soul also is tortured with a fruitless repentance. For we read
in the ancient Scriptures, “The vengeance of the flesh of the
ungodly is fire and worms.”[868] It might have been more briefly
said, “The vengeance of the ungodly.” Why, then, was it said,
“The flesh of the ungodly,” unless because both the fire and
the worm are to be the punishment of the flesh? Or if the
object of the writer in saying, “The vengeance of the flesh,”
was to indicate that this shall be the punishment of those who
live after the flesh (for this leads to the second death, as the
apostle intimated when he said, “For if ye live after the flesh,
ye shall die”[869]), let each one make his own choice, either
assigning the fire to the body and the worm to the soul,—the
one figuratively, the other really,—or assigning both really to[Pg 434]
the body. For I have already sufficiently made out that
animals can live in the fire, in burning without being consumed,
in pain without dying, by a miracle of the most omnipotent
Creator, to whom no one can deny that this is possible, if
he be not ignorant by whom has been made all that is wonderful
in all nature. For it is God Himself who has wrought all
these miracles, great and small, in this world which I have
mentioned, and incomparably more which I have omitted, and
who has enclosed these marvels in this world, itself the greatest
miracle of all. Let each man, then, choose which he will,
whether he thinks that the worm is real and pertains to the
body, or that spiritual things are meant by bodily representations,
and that it belongs to the soul. But which of these is
true will be more readily discovered by the facts themselves,
when there shall be in the saints such knowledge as shall not
require that their own experience teach them the nature of
these punishments, but as shall, by its own fulness and perfection,
suffice to instruct them in this matter. For “now we
know in part, until that which is perfect is come;”[870] only, this
we believe about those future bodies, that they shall be such
as shall certainly be pained by the fire.

10. Whether the fire of hell, if it be material fire, can burn the wicked spirits,
that is to say, devils, who are immaterial.

Here arises the question: If the fire is not to be immaterial,
analogous to the pain of the soul, but material, burning by
contact, so that bodies may be tormented in it, how can evil
spirits be punished in it? For it is undoubtedly the same
fire which is to serve for the punishment of men and of devils,
according to the words of Christ: “Depart from me, ye cursed,
into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels;”[871]
unless, perhaps, as learned men have thought, the devils have
a kind of body made of that dense and humid air which we
feel strikes us when the wind is blowing. And if this kind
of substance could not be affected by fire, it could not burn
when heated in the baths. For in order to burn, it is first
burned, and affects other things as itself is affected. But if
any one maintains that the devils have no bodies, this is not[Pg 435]
a matter either to be laboriously investigated, or to be debated
with keenness. For why may we not assert that even immaterial
spirits may, in some extraordinary way, yet really be
pained by the punishment of material fire, if the spirits of
men, which also are certainly immaterial, are both now contained
in material members of the body, and in the world to
come shall be indissolubly united to their own bodies? Therefore,
though the devils have no bodies, yet their spirits, that
is, the devils themselves, shall be brought into thorough contact
with the material fires, to be tormented by them; not
that the fires themselves with which they are brought into
contact shall be animated by their connection with these spirits,
and become animals composed of body and spirit, but, as I
said, this junction will be effected in a wonderful and ineffable
way, so that they shall receive pain from the fires, but give no
life to them. And, in truth, this other mode of union, by
which bodies and spirits are bound together and become
animals, is thoroughly marvellous, and beyond the comprehension
of man, though this it is which is man.

I would indeed say that these spirits will burn without any
body of their own, as that rich man was burning in hell when
he exclaimed, “I am tormented in this flame,”[872] were I not
aware that it is aptly said in reply, that that flame was of the
same nature as the eyes he raised and fixed on Lazarus, as the
tongue on which he entreated that a little cooling water might
be dropped, or as the finger of Lazarus, with which he asked
that this might be done,—all of which took place where souls
exist without bodies. Thus, therefore, both that flame in
which he burned and that drop he begged were immaterial,
and resembled the visions of sleepers or persons in an ecstasy,
to whom immaterial objects appear in a bodily form. For the
man himself who is in such a state, though it be in spirit
only, not in body, yet sees himself so like to his own body
that he cannot discern any difference whatever. But that
hell, which also is called a lake of fire and brimstone,[873] will be
material fire, and will torment the bodies of the damned,
whether men or devils,—the solid bodies of the one, aerial
bodies of the others; or if only men have bodies as well as[Pg 436]
souls, yet the evil spirits, though without bodies, shall be so
connected with the bodily fires as to receive pain without
imparting life. One fire certainly shall be the lot of both,
for thus the truth has declared.

11. Whether it is just that the punishments of sins last longer than the sins
themselves lasted.

Some, however, of those against whom we are defending the
city of God, think it unjust that any man be doomed to an
eternal punishment for sins which, no matter how great they
were, were perpetrated in a brief space of time; as if any law
ever regulated the duration of the punishment by the duration
of the offence punished! Cicero tells us that the laws recognise
eight kinds of penalty,—damages, imprisonment, scourging,
reparation,[874] disgrace, exile, death, slavery. Is there any one
of these which may be compressed into a brevity proportioned
to the rapid commission of the offence, so that no longer time
may be spent in its punishment than in its perpetration, unless,
perhaps, reparation? For this requires that the offender
suffer what he did, as that clause of the law says, “Eye for
eye, tooth for tooth.”[875] For certainly it is possible for an
offender to lose his eye by the severity of legal retaliation in
as brief a time as he deprived another of his eye by the
cruelty of his own lawlessness. But if scourging be a reasonable
penalty for kissing another man’s wife, is not the fault
of an instant visited with long hours of atonement, and the
momentary delight punished with lasting pain? What shall
we say of imprisonment? Must the criminal be confined only
for so long a time as he spent on the offence for which he is
committed? or is not a penalty of many years’ confinement
imposed on the slave who has provoked his master with a
word, or has struck him a blow that is quickly over? And
as to damages, disgrace, exile, slavery, which are commonly
inflicted so as to admit of no relaxation or pardon, do not these
resemble eternal punishments in so far as this short life allows
a resemblance? For they are not eternal only because the[Pg 437]
life in which they are endured is not eternal; and yet the
crimes which are punished with these most protracted sufferings
are perpetrated in a very brief space of time. Nor is
there any one who would suppose that the pains of punishment
should occupy as short a time as the offence; or that
murder, adultery, sacrilege, or any other crime, should be
measured, not by the enormity of the injury or wickedness,
but by the length of time spent in its perpetration. Then as
to the award of death for any great crime, do the laws reckon
the punishment to consist in the brief moment in which death
is inflicted, or in this, that the offender is eternally banished
from the society of the living? And just as the punishment
of the first death cuts men off from this present mortal city,
so does the punishment of the second death cut men off from
that future immortal city. For as the laws of this present
city do not provide for the executed criminal’s return to it, so
neither is he who is condemned to the second death recalled
again to life everlasting. But if temporal sin is visited with
eternal punishment, how, then, they say, is that true which
your Christ says, “With the same measure that ye mete
withal it shall be measured to you again?”[876] and they do not
observe that “the same measure” refers, not to an equal space
of time, but to the retribution of evil, or, in other words, to
the law by which he who has done evil suffers evil. Besides,
these words could be appropriately understood as referring to
the matter of which our Lord was speaking when He used
them, viz. judgments and condemnation. Thus, if he who
unjustly judges and condemns is himself justly judged and
condemned, he receives “with the same measure” though not
the same thing as he gave. For judgment he gave, and judgment
he receives, though the judgment he gave was unjust,
the judgment he receives just.

12. Of the greatness of the first transgression, on account of which eternal
punishment is due to all who are not within the pale of the Saviour’s
grace.

But eternal punishment seems hard and unjust to human
perceptions, because in the weakness of our mortal condition
there is wanting that highest and purest wisdom by which it[Pg 438]
can be perceived how great a wickedness was committed in
that first transgression. The more enjoyment man found in
God, the greater was his wickedness in abandoning Him;
and he who destroyed in himself a good which might have
been eternal, became worthy of eternal evil. Hence the
whole mass of the human race is condemned; for he who at
first gave entrance to sin has been punished with all his posterity
who were in him as in a root, so that no one is exempt
from this just and due punishment, unless delivered by mercy
and undeserved grace; and the human race is so apportioned
that in some is displayed the efficacy of merciful grace, in the
rest the efficacy of just retribution. For both could not be
displayed in all; for if all had remained[877] under the punishment
of just condemnation, there would have been seen in no
one the mercy of redeeming grace. And, on the other hand, if
all had been transferred from darkness to light, the severity of
retribution would have been manifested in none. But many
more are left under punishment than are delivered from it, in
order that it may thus be shown what was due to all. And
had it been inflicted on all, no one could justly have found
fault with the justice of Him who taketh vengeance; whereas,
in the deliverance of so many from that just award, there is
cause to render the most cordial thanks to the gratuitous
bounty of Him who delivers.

13. Against the opinion of those who think that the punishments of the wicked
after death are purgatorial.

The Platonists, indeed, while they maintain that no sins
are unpunished, suppose that all punishment is administered
for remedial purposes,[878] be it inflicted by human or divine law,
in this life or after death; for a man may be scathless here,
or, though punished, may yet not amend. Hence that passage[Pg 439]
of Virgil, where, when he had said of our earthly bodies and
mortal members, that our souls derive—

“Hence wild desires and grovelling fears,

And human laughter, human tears;

Immured in dungeon-seeming night,

They look abroad, yet see no light,”

goes on to say:

“Nay, when at last the life has fled,

And left the body cold and dead,

E’en then there passes not away

The painful heritage of clay;

Full many a long-contracted stain

Perforce must linger deep in grain.

So penal sufferings they endure

For ancient crime, to make them pure;

Some hang aloft in open view,

For winds to pierce them through and through,

While others purge their guilt deep-dyed

In burning fire or whelming tide.”[879]

They who are of this opinion would have all punishments
after death to be purgatorial; and as the elements of air, fire,
and water are superior to earth, one or other of these may be
the instrument of expiating and purging away the stain contracted
by the contagion of earth. So Virgil hints at the air
in the words, “Some hang aloft for winds to pierce;” at the
water in “whelming tide;” and at fire in the expression “in
burning fire.” For our part, we recognise that even in this
life some punishments are purgatorial,—not, indeed, to those
whose life is none the better, but rather the worse for them,
but to those who are constrained by them to amend their life.
All other punishments, whether temporal or eternal, inflicted
as they are on every one by divine providence, are sent either
on account of past sins, or of sins presently allowed in the
life, or to exercise and reveal a man’s graces. They may be
inflicted by the instrumentality of bad men and angels as well
as of the good. For even if any one suffers some hurt through
another’s wickedness or mistake, the man indeed sins whose
ignorance or injustice does the harm; but God, who by His
just though hidden judgment permits it to be done, sins not.
But temporary punishments are suffered by some in this life[Pg 440]
only, by others after death, by others both now and then; but
all of them before that last and strictest judgment. But of
those who suffer temporary punishments after death, all are
not doomed to those everlasting pains which are to follow
that judgment; for to some, as we have already said, what
is not remitted in this world is remitted in the next, that is,
they are not punished with the eternal punishment of the
world to come.

14. Of the temporary punishments of this life to which the human condition
is subject.

Quite exceptional are those who are not punished in this
life, but only afterwards. Yet that there have been some
who have reached the decrepitude of age without experiencing
even the slightest sickness, and who have had uninterrupted
enjoyment of life, I know both from report and from my own
observation. However, the very life we mortals lead is itself
all punishment, for it is all temptation, as the Scriptures
declare, where it is written, “Is not the life of man upon
earth a temptation?”[880] For ignorance is itself no slight
punishment, or want of culture, which it is with justice
thought so necessary to escape, that boys are compelled, under
pain of severe punishment, to learn trades or letters; and the
learning to which they are driven by punishment is itself so
much of a punishment to them, that they sometimes prefer the
pain that drives them to the pain to which they are driven by
it. And who would not shrink from the alternative, and
elect to die, if it were proposed to him either to suffer death
or to be again an infant? Our infancy, indeed, introducing
us to this life not with laughter but with tears, seems unconsciously
to predict the ills we are to encounter.[881] Zoroaster
alone is said to have laughed when he was born, and that
unnatural omen portended no good to him. For he is said to
have been the inventor of magical arts, though indeed they
were unable to secure to him even the poor felicity of this
present life against the assaults of his enemies. For, himself
king of the Bactrians, he was conquered by Ninus king of the[Pg 441]
Assyrians. In short, the words of Scripture, “An heavy yoke
is upon the sons of Adam, from the day that they go out of
their mother’s womb till the day that they return to the
mother of all things,”[882]—these words so infallibly find fulfilment,
that even the little ones, who by the laver of regeneration
have been freed from the bond of original sin in which
alone they were held, yet suffer many ills, and in some instances
are even exposed to the assaults of evil spirits. But
let us not for a moment suppose that this suffering is prejudicial
to their future happiness, even though it has so increased
as to sever soul from body, and to terminate their life
in that early age.

15. That everything which the grace of God does in the way of rescuing us from
the inveterate evils in which we are sunk, pertains to the future world, in
which all things are made new.

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 an admirable though painful monitor teaching
us to be sober-minded, 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;”[883] and “as many as are
led by the Spirit of God, they are sons of God,”[884] 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,[Pg 442]
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.”[885] Now, such a war as
this would have had no existence, if human nature had, in
the exercise of free will, continued stedfast 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 recognise 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 for
ever 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.

16. The laws of grace, which extend to all the epochs of the life of the regenerate.

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[Pg 443]
(because though this age has the power of speech,[886] 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.[887] 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 labour 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 dissolute
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[Pg 444]
transgressors of the law that they have received, and having
allowed vice to have the ascendency 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 subdue
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 deserts 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 every one’s merit, or
whether it be that the heat remains the same, but that all do
not feel it with equal intensity of torment.

17. Of those who fancy that no men shall be punished eternally.

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[Pg 445]
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 as seem 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 a wresting of God’s truth that is more perverse,
in proportion as his clemency of sentiment seems to be greater.[888]

18. Of those who fancy that, on account of the saints’ intercession, no man shall
be damned in the last judgment.

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[Pg 446]
enemies, should now, when they are freed from sin, withhold
from interceding for their suppliants. 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?”[889] 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 condemn 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 maintain, 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 suppliants 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 suppliants for whom all His saints shall
intercede? And they suppose that this conjecture of theirs[Pg 447]
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,”[890] 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 apostle said, “For God hath concluded
all men in unbelief, that He may have mercy upon all,”[891]
signifying 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.

19. Of those who promise impunity from all sins even to heretics, through
virtue of their participation of the body of Christ.

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.”[892] 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.

20. Of those who promise this indulgence not to all, but only to those who have
been baptized as catholics, though afterwards they have broken out into
many crimes and heresies.

There are others still who make this promise not even to[Pg 448]
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;”[893] 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.

21. Of those who assert that all catholics who continue in the faith, even though
by the depravity of their lives they have merited hell fire, shall be saved on
account of the “foundation” of their faith.

There are some, too, who found upon the expression of
Scripture, “He that endureth to the end shall be saved,”[894] 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.”[895] 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 up
wood, hay, stubble, upon it, they believe that he shall be[Pg 449]
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.

22. Of those who fancy that the sins which are intermingled with alms-deeds
shall not be charged at the day of judgment.

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.”[896] 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.[897] 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.”[898] 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.”[899] 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.

[Pg 450]

When, by God’s help, I have replied to all these errors, I
shall conclude this (twenty-first) book.

23. Against those who are of opinion that the punishment neither of the devil nor
of wicked men shall be eternal.

First of all, it behoves us to inquire and to recognise 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.”[900] 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.”[901] In the former
passage “everlasting” is used, in the latter “for ever;” and
by these words Scripture is wont to mean nothing else than
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 in hell,[902] 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 or some of those to
whom it shall be said, “Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting[Pg 451]
fire, prepared for the devil and his angels,”[903] 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!”[904] 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.

24. Against those who fancy that in the judgment of God all the accused will be
spared in virtue of the prayers of the saints.

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 purged from
all sin whatsoever. Why, then, if in that perfected holiness
their prayers be so pure and all-availing, will they not use[Pg 452]
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 some one 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 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?”[905]
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, i.e., 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[Pg 453]
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. As 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 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.”[906] 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,”[907] 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 Psalmist,
“Shall God forget to be gracious? shall He shut up in His
anger His tender mercies?”[908] 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 Psalmist’s words
refer 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[Pg 454]
the right hand of the Most High,”[909] 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.[910] Yet in this anger God does not forget to be
gracious, causing His sun to shine and His rain to descend on
the just and the unjust;[911] and thus He does not in His anger
cut short His tender mercies, and especially in what the
Psalmist 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 endurable
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.[912]

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;”[913] and “They shall be tormented for ever and
ever;”[914] and “Their worm shall not die, and their fire shall
not be quenched,”[915]—such persons, I say, are most emphatically
and abundantly refuted, not by me so much as by the divine[Pg 455]
Scripture itself. For the men of Nineveh repented in this
life, and therefore their repentance was fruitful, inasmuch 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,”[916] 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.”[917] Therefore to them
that hope in Him He perfecteth His sweetness, inspiring them
with His own love, so that with a 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:[Pg 456]
as it is written, He that glorieth, let him glory in the
Lord.”[918] 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.[919] 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.”[920] 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.”[921] 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 our 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,”[922]
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[Pg 457]
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.

25. Whether those who received heretical baptism, and have afterwards fallen
away to wickedness of life; or those who have received catholic baptism,
but have afterwards passed over to heresy and schism; or those who have
remained in the catholic Church in which they were baptized, but have
continued to live immorally,—may hope through the virtue of the sacraments
for the remission of eternal punishment.

But let us now reply to those who promise 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, envyings, drunkenness,
revellings, 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.”[923] Certainly
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[Pg 458]
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 for ever.”[924]
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.”[925] 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 wont 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 with sound
doctrine, to suppose that many, indeed, or almost all, who
have forsaken the Church catholic, and have originated impious[Pg 459]
heresies and become heresiarchs, 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 heresiarchs 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.”[926] And “love,” as he elsewhere says, “worketh no
evil.”[927] 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,”[928] 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[Pg 460]
dwell in us. So that it is as if He 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.

26. What it is to have Christ for a foundation, and who they are to whom
salvation as by fire is promised.

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 wood, hay, 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?”[929] And who then is it, they ask, of
whom the Apostle Paul says, “But he himself shall be saved,
yet so as by fire?”[930] 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, has 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[Pg 461]
Christ not first but last, since he has despised Him as his
ruler, and has preferred to fulfil 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 any one loves his own wife, and loves her as Christ would
have him love her, who can doubt that he has Christ for a
foundation? But 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 is bereavement,
and all those calamities which consume these joys. Consequently
the superstructure will be loss 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 persecutor demanded whether he
would retain Christ or these things, he would prefer Christ.
Would you hear, in the apostle’s 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.”[931] 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.”[932] “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.”[933] 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.”[934] And “The fire shall[Pg 462]
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;”[935] 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,”[936] 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 deserts, 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,”[937] 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.”[938] If, therefore, the fire shall
try both, in order that if any man’s work abide—i.e. if the
superstructure be not consumed by the fire—he may receive
a reward, 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[Pg 463]
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, “Come, 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, nor their fire be quenched, in which
they shall be tormented day and night for ever.

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 worldliness,
being venial, shall be consumed in the fire of tribulation
either here only, or here and hereafter both, or here that it may
not be hereafter,—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 colour
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 for ever are found in them. In the end of the world
there shall be in the time of Antichrist tribulation such as[Pg 464]
has never before been. 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, loss 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 Saviour, 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.”[939] But he who loves his relations carnally, 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 a structure of gold, silver, precious
stones. For how can a man love those more than Christ
whom he loves only for Christ’s sake?

27. Against the belief of those who think that the sins which have been accompanied
with almsgiving will do them no harm.

It remains to reply to those who maintain that those only
shall burn in eternal fire who neglect alms-deeds proportioned
to their sins, resting this opinion on the words of the
Apostle James, “He shall have judgment without mercy that
hath showed no mercy.”[940] Therefore, they say, he that hath
showed mercy, though he has not reformed his dissolute conduct,
but has lived wickedly and iniquitously even while
abounding in alms, 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[Pg 465]
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 endeavour 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 alms-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 fulfil what follows, “as we forgive our debtors.”[941] 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.” Therefore,
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 alms-deeds.

But they are right to inculcate the giving of alms proportioned
to past sins; for if they said that any kind of alms
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 alms of ten paltry coins. And
if it be most absurd and insane to make such an acknowledgment,
and if we still ask what are those fitting alms of
which even the forerunner of Christ said, “Bring forth therefore
fruits meet for repentance,”[942] 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 impunity
commit the most damnable sins, in the persuasion that they[Pg 466]
have bought from Him a licence 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 alms-deeds proportioned to his sins must
first begin with himself. For it is not reasonable that a man
who exercises charity towards his neighbour should not do so
towards himself, since he hears the Lord saying, “Thou shalt
love thy neighbour as thyself,”[943] and again, “Have compassion
on thy soul, and please God.”[944] He then who has not compassion
on his own soul that he may please God, how can he
be said to do alms-deeds proportioned to his sins? To the
same purpose is that written, “He who is bad to himself, to
whom can he be good?”[945] We ought therefore to do alms
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 licence for wickedness by
alms-deeds.

The reason, therefore, of our predicting that He will impute
to those on His right hand the alms-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 ye did it not to one of the least of these, ye did it
not to me.”[946] 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 alms to him in the same spirit in which he
draws near to Christ, not in that spirit which would abandon[Pg 467]
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,”[947] say also, “Except your righteousness shall
exceed the righteousness of the scribes and Pharisees, ye shall
not enter into the kingdom of heaven?”[948] 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 hell fire,—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 aught 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.”[949] 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;”[950] 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[Pg 468]
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,”[951] 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[Pg 469]
ye forgive not men their trespasses, neither will your Father
forgive your trespasses?”[952] For this is the purport of the saying
of the Apostle James also, “He shall have judgment without
mercy that hath showed no mercy.”[953] 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.[954] The words which the Apostle
James subjoins, “And mercy rejoiceth against judgment,”[955]
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,[956] 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.”[957]

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 wants 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[Pg 470]
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;”[958] 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.”[959] For when that
poet described the Elysian fields, in which they suppose 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;”[960]

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. For 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[Pg 471]
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 an hundred fold,
is to be referred to the saints, so that in proportion to their
merits some of them shall deliver thirty men, some sixty,
some an 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,
some one 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 have
very happily remarked, that we should rather endeavour 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 every one who has vainly
and rashly promised himself the fruit of another’s labour. 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.

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[Pg 472]