have defined it thus: Wisdom is the knowl- YET ATTAIN TO BEING PROPERLY AN IMAGE
THE WORKS OF ST. AUGUSTIN. [Book XIV.
respecting the things temporal which He that is eternal did and suffered for us as man, which manhood He bare in time and carried on to things eternal, is profitable also for the obtaining of things eternal; and that the virtues themselves, whereby in this temporal and mortal life men live prudently, bravely, temperately, and justly, are not true virtues, unless they are referred to that same faith, temporal though it is, which leads on nevertheless to things eternal.
such as these, dared to profess himself a wise man, —because they imagined that a wise man was one without sin? But our Scriptures do not say this, which say, ** Rebuke a wise man, and he will love thee.''* For doubtless he who thinks a man ought to be rebuked, judges him to have sin. However, for my part, I dare not profess myself a wise man even in this sense; it is enough for me to assume, what they themselves cannot deny, that to dispute of wisdom belongs also to the philosopher, z.e., the lover of wisdom. For they have not given over so disputing who have professed to be lovers of wisdom rather than wise men.
CHAP. 2.—-THERE IS A KIND OF TRINITY IN THE
HOLDING, CONTEMPLATING, AND LOVING OF FAITH TEMPORAL, BUT ONE THAT DOES NOT YET ATTAIN TO BEING PROPERLY AN IMAGE
3. In disputing, then, about wisdom, they have defined it thus: Wisdom is the knowledge of things human and divine. And hence, in the last book, I have not withheld the admission, that the cognizance of both subjects, whether divine or human, may be called both knowledge and wisdom.? But according to the distinction made in the apostle's words, '' To one is given the word of wisdom, to another the word of knowledge,'' 3 this definition is to be divided, so that the knowledge of things divine shall be called
OF GOD,
4. Wherefore since, as it is written, '* While we are in the body, we are absent from the Lord; for we walk by faith, not by sight;'' 5 undoubtedly, so long as the just man lives by faith,® howsoever he lives according to the inner man, although he aims at truth and reaches on to things eternal by this same temporal faith, nevertheless in the holding, contemplating, and loving this temporal faith, we have not yet reached such a trinity as is to be called an image of God; lest that should seem to be constituted in things temporal which ought to be so in things eternal. For when the human mind sees its own faith, whereby it believes what it does not see, it does not see a thing eternal. For that will not always exist, which certainly will not then exist, when this pilgrimage, whereby we are absent from God, in such way that we must needs walk by faith, shall be ended, and that sight shall have succeeded it whereby we shall see face to face;7 just as now, because we believe although we do not see, we shall deserve to see, and shall rejoice at having been brought through faith to sight. For then it will be no longer faith, by which that is believed which is not seen; but sight, by which that is seen which is believed. And then, therefore, although we remember this past mortal life, and call to mind by recollection that we once believed what we did not see, yet that faith will be reckoned among things past and done with, not among things present and always continuing. And hence also that trinity which now consists in the remembering, contemplating, and loving this same faith while present and continuing, will | then be found to be done with and past, and | not still enduring. And hence it is to be gathered, that if that trinity is indeed an im-
wisdom, and that of things human appropriate to itself the name of knowledge; and of the latter I have treated in the thirteenth book, not indeed so as to attribute to this knowledge everything whatever that can be known by man about things human, wherein there is exceeding much of empty vanity and mischievous curiosity, but only those things by which that most wholesome faith, which leads to true blessedness, is begotten, nourished, defended, strengthened; and in this knowledge most of the faithful are not strong, however exceeding strong in the faith itself. For it is one thing to know only what man ought to believe in order to attain to a blessed life, which must needs be an eternal one; but another to know in what way this belief itself may both help the pious, and be defended against the impious, which last the apostle seems to call by the special name of knowledge. And when I was speaking of this knowledge before, my especial business was to commend faith, first briefly distinguishing things eternal from things temporal, and there discoursing of things temporal; but while deferring things eternal to the present book, I showed also that faith respecting things eternal is itself a thing temporal, and dwells in time in the hearts of believers, and yet is necessary in order to attain the things eternal themselves.' I argued also, that faith
I Prov. 1x. 8. 2 Bk, xiii. cc. 1, 19.
3) DOr exit Pz, 4 Bk. xili. c. 7.
572 Cor, vo6, 7; 6 Rom. i. 17. 7 1 Cor, xiii. 12,
CuHap. IV.] ON THE TRINITY. 185 age of God, then this image itself would have to be reckoned, not among things that exist always, but among things transient.
both. Let us assume a trinity like this, when the faith which is now in ourselves is so established in our memory as the bodily object we spoke of was in place, from which faith is formed the conception in recollection, as from that bodily object was formed the vision of
CHAP. 3.——A DIFFICULTY REMOVED, WHICH LIES
IN THE WAY OF WHAT HAS JUST BEEN SAID.
the beholder; and to these two, to complete the trinity, will is to be reckoned as a third, which connects and combines the faith established in the memory, and a sort of effigy of that faith impressed upon the vision of recollection; just as in that trinity of corporeal vision, the form of the bodily object that is seen, and the corresponding form wrought in the vision of the beholder, are combined
But far be it from us to think, that while the nature of the soul is immortal, and from the first beginning of its creation thenceforth never ceases to be, yet that that which is the best thing it has should not endure for ever with its own immortality. Yet what is there in its nature as created, better than that it is made after the image of its Creator?! We must find then what may be fittingly called the image of God, not in the holding, contemplating, and loving that faith which will not exist always, but in that which will exist always.
by the purpose of the will. that this bodily object which was beheld was dissolved and had perished, and that nothing
Suppose, then, at all of it remained anywhere, to the vision "pof which the gaze might have recourse; are
5. Shall we then scrutinize somewhat more carefully and deeply whether the case is really thus? For it may be said that this trinity does not perish even when faith itself shall we then to say, that because the image of the bodily object thus now past and done with reains in the memory, whence to form the onception in recollecting, and to have the wo united by will as a third, therefore it is the same trinity as that former one, when the appearance of the bodily object posited in place was seen? Certainly not, but altogether a different one: for, not to say that that was from without, while this is from within; the former certainly was produced by the appearance of a present bodily object, the latter by the image of that object now past. So, too, in the case of which we are now treating, to illustrate which we have thought good to adduce this example, the faith which is even now in our mind, as that bodily obhave passed away; because, as now we both hold it by memory, and discern it by thought, and love it by will; so then also, when we shall both hold in memory, and shall recollect, that we once had it, and shall unite these two by the third, namely will, the same trinity will still continue. Since, if it have left in its passage as it were no trace in us, doubtless we shall not have ought of it even in our mem-|}. ory, whereto to recur when recollecting it as past, and by the third, vz. purpose, coupling both these, to wit, what was in our memory though we were not thinking about it, and what is formed thence by conception. But he who speaks thus, does not perceive, that when we hold, see, and love in ourselves our present faith, we are concerned with a different trinity as now existing, from that trinity which will exist, when we shall contemplate by recollection, notthe faith itself, but as it were the imagined trace of it laid up in the memory, and shall unite by the will, as by a third, these two things, vzz. that which was in the memory of him who retains, and that which is impressed thence upon the vision of the mind of him who recollects. And that we may understand this, let us take an example from things corporeal, of which we have sufficiently spoken in the eleventh book.' For as we ascend from lower to higher things, or pass inward from outer to inner things, we first find a trinity in the bodily object which is seen, and in the vision of the seer, which, when he sees it, is informed thereby, and in the purpose of the will which combines ject was in place, while held, looked at, loved, produces a sort of trinity; but that trinity will exist no more, when this faith in the mind, like that bodily object in place, shall no longer exist. But that which will then exist, when we shall remember it to have been, but not now to be, in us, will doubtless be a different one. For that which now is, is wrought by the thing itself, actually present and attached to the mind of one who believes; but that which shall then be, will be wrought by the imagination of a past thing left in the memory of one who recollects.
CHAP. 4.—THE IMAGE OF GOD IS TO BE SOUGHT
IN THE IMMORTALITY OF THE RATIONAL SOUL. HOW A TRINITY IS DEMONSTRATED IN THE MIND.
6, Therefore neither is that trinity an image of God, which is not now, nor is that other an image of God, which then will not be; but we must find in the soul of man, 2.e., t Gen. i. 27. 2 Ce..2'5q.