Introduction to the Philosophy of Saint Augustine
it can make an end of its vices? The wisdom of God extends from end to end with might. By wisdom the great Artificer knit his works together with one glorious end in view. His goodness has no grudging envy against any beauty from the highest to the lowest, for none can have being except from him alone. So that no one is utterly cast away from the truth who has in him the slightest vestige of truth. \What is it about bodily pleasure that holds us fast? You will find that it is agreeableness. Disagreeable things beget grief and agreeable things beget pleasure. Seek therefore the highest agreeableness. Do not go abroad. Return within yourself. /In the inward man dwells truth. |I£ you find that you are by nature mutable, transcend yourself.'.But remember in doing so that you"must also transcend yourself even as a reasoning soul. Make for the place where the light of reason is kindled. What does every good reasoner attain but truth? And yet truth is not reached by reasoning but is itself the goal of all who reason. There is an agreeableness than which there can be no greater. Agree, then, with it. Confess that you are not as it is. It has to do no seeking, but you reach it by seeking, not in space but by a disposition of mind,'so that the inward man may agree with the indwelling truth in a pleasure that is not low and carnal but supremely spiritual.
73. If you do not grasp what I say and doubt whether it is true, at least make up your mind whether you have any doubt about your doubts. If it is certain that you do indeed have doubts, inquire whence comes that' certainty. It will never occur to you to imagine that it comes from the light of the sun, but rather from that "true light which lighteth every man that cometh into the world." It cannot be seen with these eyes, nor with the eyes which seem to see the phantasms of the brain, but with those that can say to phantasms: You are not the thing I am seeking. Nor are you the standard by which I put you in your rightful place, disapproving of all that is base in you, and approving of all that is beautiful. The standard according to which I approve and disapprove is still more beautiful, so I approve more highly of it and prefer it not only to you but to all those bodily shapes from which you spring. Now think of the rule in this way. Everyone who knows that he has doubts knows with certainty something that is true, namely, that he doubts. He is certain, therefore, about a truth. Therefore everyone who doubts whether there be such a thing as the truth has at least a truth to set a limit to his doubt; . and nothing can be true except truth be in it. Accordingly, ought to have doubts about the existence of the truth, no one even if doubts arise for him from every possible quarter. Wherever this is seen, there is light that transcends space and time and all phantasms that spring from spatial and temporal things. Could this be in the least destroyed even if every reasoner should perish or grow old among inferior carnal things?) Reasoning does not ,_ create truth but discovers it. Before it is discovered it abides in v itself; and when it is discovered it renews us. |
Fes OF THE WILL ** BOOK II + CHAPTER 2: 5...A. At least you are certain that God exists? E. Even that I do not hold by reason but by steadfast faith.
A. If then one of those fools of whom it is written: The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God (Ps. 13:1) should say this to you and not be willing to believe what you believe but want to know whether you were believing the truth would you leave the man, or would you think that in some way he should be persuaded of what you so firmly believe, especially if he had the will not to oppose it obstinately but wished eagerly to know?
E. What you said last advises me well enough as to how I should answer him. For however unreasonable he might be, he would admit that nothing whatever, and least of all so great a matter, should be argued about insincerely or with obstinacy. This granted, he would first try to convince me that he was asking in good faith, and that he had no hidden guile or obstinacy about the matter.
Then I should show (as I think anyone could easily do) that since he himself was demanding that matters hidden in his own mind be believed by another who did not know them, that it would be only reasonable for him to believe that God exists, from the books of those great men who have left written testimony that they lived with the Son of God and who have written also of things seen by them which could not possibly be if there were no God: and he would be a simple fellow indeed to criticize me for believing those men when he wanted me to believe him. But that which he could not rightly object to he could in no wise make an excuse for his unwillingness to imitate.
A. If then, as to whether God exists, it is enough for you that it should not seem unreasonable to believe those great men, why, pray, do you not think we should likewise take on the authority