Augustine: Earlier Writings
TO SIMPLICIAN—ON VARIOUS QUESTIONS
should be made apparent by being committed against the law. That is what he is saying here. "Sin, that it might be shown to be sin, worked death in me through that which is good." He does not say that there should be sin, but that it should be shown to be sin.
7. Then he gives the cause why it should be so. "We know that the law is spiritual but I am carnal." Thus he clearly shows that the law cannot be fulfilled except by spiritual persons, and there cannot be such save by grace. The more one is assimilated to the spiritual law, the more one attains to a spiritual disposition, the more one fulfils the law. The more one delights in it, the less one is aflflicted by its burdensomeness, and the more one is quickened by its light. "For the commandment of the Lord is pure, enlightening the eyes; and the law of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul" (Ps. 19:8). When grace forgives sins and infuses a spirit of charity, righteousness ceases to be hard and becomes even pleasant. When he said "I am carnal," he raised the question of what carnal means. People are called carnal in some degree who are already under grace, redeemed by the blood of the Lord and regenerated by faith. To such the apostle writes: "I could not speak to you, brethren, as to spiritual but as carnal. As babes in Christ I have given you milk to drink not meat." In so saying he shows that they had been regenerated by grace, for they were babes in Christ, and had to be given milk to drink, and he still calls them carnal. He who is not yet under grace but is under the law, is carnal in the sense that he is not yet regenerate from sin but is still sold under sin. The price of deadly pleasure includes the sweetness which deceives, and gives delight in doing contrary to the law, which is all the more pleasant the less it is lawful. No one can enjoy that sweetness as the price of his condition without being compelled to serve lust as a chattel-slave. He who knows that an act is prohibited and rightly prohibited, and yet does it, knows that he is the slave of an overmastering desire.
8. "That which I do I know not." This does not mean that he does not know that he is sinning, for that would contradict what he said above. "Sin, that it might be shown to be sin, worked death in me through that which is good." "I had not known sin save by the law." Obviously when he can use expressions like these he cannot mean that he is ignorant of having sinned. He uses the word as the Lord is going to use it when he will say to the impious "I know you not." Nothing escapes the notice of God, "for the face of the Lord is against them that do evil, to
destroy the memory of them from the earth." Sometimes we say we do not know, meaning that we do not approve. So when he says "That which I do I know not" he means "I approve not." And he makes this clear in what follows, "Not what I would, that do I practise, but what I hate that I do." Here he says he hates what he had just said he did not know. Now of those to whom the Lord will say "I know you not" it is also said "Thou, O Lord, dost hate all the workers of iniquity" (Ps. 5:5).
9. "Ifwhat I would not, that I do, I consent unto the law that it is good." What he would not is what is also forbidden by the law. Therefore, he consents unto the law, not of course in so far as he does what the law prohibits, but in so far as he does not will to do what he in fact does. He is overcome because he is not yet free by grace, but he already knows through the law that he is doing wrong, and he does not really want to do that. And he continues: "So now it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me." He does not mean that he did not consent to do the wrong, but that he consented to the law's disapprobation of the wrong. He is still speaking in the person of a man under the law and not yet under grace, who is brought to do wrong by some dominant desire, and by some deceptive sweetness associated with prohibited sin. But he disapproves of this because of his knowledge of the law. "It is no more I that do it," he says, because he is overcome when he does it. It is a desire that does it, when we yield to an overmastering one. Grace brings it about that we do not yield, and that the human mind is strengthened to resist desire. Of grace he will be speaking later.
10. "For I know that in me, that is, in my flesh, dwelleth no good thing." So far as knowledge goes he consents unto the law, but so far as action is concerned he yields to sin. If it is asked how he knows that in his flesh dwelleth no good thing, which means that sin dwells there, how but from his inherited mortality and from his addiction to pleasure? The former is the penalty of original sin, the latter of repeated sinning. We are born into this life with the former, and add to the latter as we live. These two things, nature and custom conjoined, render cupidity strong and unconquerable. This is what he calls sin which, he says, dwells in his flesh, obtaining a certain domination and kingdom, so to speak there. Hence the Psalmist says, "I would rather be a slave in the house of the Lord, than dwell in the tents of sinners" (Ps. 84:10), as if a slave does not dwell in the place where he is a slave. He no doubt means that "to dwell" must be understood as implying a certain rank. Ifby grace we achieve the condition described in another passage in these words, "That sin may not reign in our mortal body that wc should obey the lusts thereof," then sin cannot be said properly to dwell there.
11. "To will is present with me, but to do that which is good I find not." To those who do not rightly understand these words he seems by them to take away free will. Yet how does he do that when he says "To will is present with me"? If that is so, actual willing is certainly within our power; that it is not in our power to do that which is good is part of the deserts of original sin. This is not the original nature of man, but the penalty of his guilt, whereby mortality was brought in as a second nature, from which the grace of our Creator sets us free, if we submit ourselves to him by faith. These are the words of a man set under the law and not yet under grace. He who is not yet under grace does not do the good he wills but the evil which he does not will, being overcome by concupiscence which derives its strength from the fact, not simply that he is mortal, but also that he is burdened by the weight of custom. But if he does what he wills not, it is no longer he that does it, but the sin that dwells in him, as has been said and explained above.
12. "I find then a law, that, when I would do good, evil is present with me." That is, I find the law is good for me when I wish to do what the law commands, though it is easier to do evil, which is present with me. When he said above "To will is present with me" he was referring to its facility. There is nothing easier for a man under the law than to will to do good and yet to do evil. He has no difficulty in willing, but it is not so easy to do what he wills. It is easy to do what he hates even against his will; just as a man thrown headlong has no difficulty in reaching the bottom, though he does not want to and indeed hates it. So I interpret the word "is present." So the man set under the law and not yet liberated by grace gives testimony to the law that it is good. He does so by the very fact that he blames himself for acting contrary to the law. He finds it a good thing for him, because he wants to do what it commands, but cannot because he is overcome by concupiscence. Thus he sees himself involved in the guilt of transgression, so that he may implore the grace of the Liberator.
13. "I delight in the law of God after the inward man" that is, the law which says, "Thou shalt not covet." "But I sec another law in my members warring against the law of my mind,