Augustine: Earlier Writings (continued)
infirmity. But he would justly punish them because they would rather abide in ignorance and difficulty than reach truth and a life free from struggle by zeal in seeking and learning, and by humility in prayer and confession. xxi, 59. Now there are these four opinions about the origin of the soul, viz., that it comes by propagation, that it is newly created with each individual who is born, that it exists somewhere beforehand and comes into the body of the newly-born either being divinely sent or gliding in of its own accord. None of these views may be rashly affirmed. Either that question, because of its obscurity and perplexity, has not been handled and illumined by catholic commentators on Holy Writ. Or, if it has been done, their writings have not come into our hands. God give us a true faith that will hold no false or unworthy opinion concerning the substance of the Creator. For by the path of piety we are wending our way towards him. If we hold any other opinion concerning him than the true one, our zeal will drive us not to beatitude but to vanity. There is no danger if we hold a wrong opinion about the creature, provided we do not hold it as if it were assured knowledge. We are not bidden to turn to the creature in order to be happy, but to the Creator himself. If we are persuaded to think otherwise of him than wc ought to think or otherwise than what is true we are deceived by most deadly error. No man can reach the happy life by making for that which is not, or, if it does exist, does not make men happy.
60. That we may be able to enjoy and cleave to eternal truth in contemplation, a way out of temporalities has been prepared for our weakness, so that we may trust the past and the future so far as is sufficient for our journey towards eternal things. The discipline of faith is governed by the divine mercy, so that it may have supreme authority. Things present are perceived as transient so far as the creature is concerned. They consist in the mobility and mutability of body and soul. Of these things we cannot have any kind of knowledge unless they enter into our experience. If we are told on divine authority about the past or the future of any created thing we are to believe it without hesitation. No doubt some of this was past before we could have perceived it. Some of it has not yet reached our senses. Nevertheless we are to believe it, for it helps to strengthen our hope and call forth our love, inasmuch as it reminds us, through the ordered temporal series, that God does not neglect our liberation. If any error assumes the role of divine authority
ON FREE WILL 20J it is most reasonably refuted, if it is shown to hold or to affirm that there is any mutable form that is not the creation of God, or that there is any mutability in the substance of God; or if it contends that the substance of God is more or less than a Trinity. To understand that Trinity soberly and piously occupies all the watchful care of Christians, and that is the goal of every advance. Concerning the unity of the Trinity and the cquahty of persons and the properties of each, this is not the place to discourse. To relate some things which pertain to saving faith and which concern the Lord our God, Author and Maker and Governor of all things, may give useful support to a childlike incipient purpose to rise from earthly to heavenly things. That is easy to do and it has already been done by many. But to handle the whole question so as to bring all human intelligence into the light of clear reason, as far as possible in this life, does not seem an easy task for any man's eloquence or even for any man's thought, much less ours. It is therefore not to be lightly attempted. Let us go on with what we have begun, so far as we have the permission and the help of God. All that we are told of past events concerning the creation, and all that is foretold concerning the future is to be believed without hesitation, because it helps to commend pure religion by stimulating in us sincere love to God and our neighbour. It is to be defended against unbelievers, either by wearing down their unbelief with the weight of authority, or by showing them, as far as possible, first, that it is not foolish to believe it, and, secondly, that it is foolish not to be Heve it. But false doctrine, not about past or future events so much as about the present and above all about unchangeable things, must be convincingly refuted by clear reasoning, so far as it is granted to us.
6i. Of course when we are thinking of the series of temporal things, expectation of things to come is more important than research into things past. In the divine books also past events are narrated, but they carry with them the forecast or promise or attestation of things to come. In fact no one pays much attention to temporal prosperity or adversity when they are past.
All anxiety and care are bestowed on what is hoped for in the future. By some intimate and natural mechanism of the mind things which have happened to us, after they arc past, are accounted, in any reckoning of felicity and misery, as if they had never happened. What disadvantage is it to me not to know when I began to be, when I know that I exist now and do not cease to hope that I shall continue to exist? I am not so
interested in the past as to dread as deadly error any false opinion
I may entertain as to what actually transpired. But as to my future I direct my course, guided by the mercy of my Maker. But if I have any false belief or opinion about my future, or about him with whom I am to be for ever, I must with all my might beware of that error. Otherwise I shall not make the necessary preparation, or I shall not be able to reach him who is the objective of my enterprise, because my outlook has been confused. If I were buying a garment it would be no disadvantage to me to have forgotten last winter, but it would be a disadvantage if I did not believe that cold weather was coming on. So it would be no disadvantage to my soul to forget anything that it may perhaps have endured, so long as it diligently observes and remembers all that may warn it to make preparation for the future. For example, it will do no harm to a man who is sailing to Rome to forget from what shore he set sail, so long as he knows all the time whither he is directing his course. It will do him no good to remember the shore from which he began his voyage, if he has made some false calculation about the port of Rome and runs upon rocks. So it is no disadvantage to me not to remember the beginning of my life, so long as I know the end where I am to find rest. Nor would any memory or guess concerning life's commencement be of any advantage to me if, holding unworthy opinions of God who is the sole end of the soul's labours, I should run upon the reefs of error.
62. ^Vhat I have said is not to be taken to mean that I forbid those who have the ability to inquire whether, according to the divinely inspired Scriptures, soul is propagated from soul, or whether souls are created separately for all animate beings; whether they are sent at the divine behest from some place where they abide to animate and rule the body, or whether they insinuate themselves of their own accord. Such inquiries and discussions are justifiable if reason demands them in order to answer some necessary question, or if leisure from more necessary matters is available. I spoke as I did rather that no one in so great a problem should rashly become angry with another because he will not yield to his opinion, having grounds for hesitation based perhaps on a broader cuhure; or even that no one who has clear and certain understanding of these matters from Scripture should suppose that another has lost all hope for the future because he does not remember the soul's origin in the past. xxii, 63. However that may be, whether that question is to