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Letter LV.
Or Book II. of Replies to Questions of Januarius.
(a.d. 400.)
Chap. I.
1. Having read the letter in which you have put me
in mind of my obligation to give answers to the remainder of those
questions which you submitted to me a long time ago, I cannot bear
to defer any longer the gratification of that desire for
instruction which it gives me so much pleasure and comfort to see
in you; and although encompassed by an accumulation of engagements,
I have given the first place to the work of supplying you with the
answers desired. I will make no further comment on the contents of
your letter, lest my doing so should prevent me from paying at
length what I owe.
2. You ask, “Wherefore does the anniversary
on which we celebrate the Passion of the Lord not fall, like the
day which tradition has handed down as the day of His birth, on the
same day every year?” and you add, “If the reason of this is
connected with the week and the month, what have we to do with the
day of the week or the state of the moon in this solemnity?” The
first thing which you must know and remember here is, that the
observance of the Lord’s natal day is not sacramental, but only
commemorative of His birth, and that therefore no more was in this
case necessary, than that the return of the day on which the event
took place should be marked by an annual religious festival. The
celebration of an event becomes sacramental in its nature, only
when the commemoration of the event is so ordered that it is
understood to be significant of something which is to be received
with reverence as sacred.1731
Therefore we observe Easter1732
in such a
manner as not only to recall the facts of the death and
resurrection of Christ to remembrance, but also to find a place for
all the other things which, in connection with these events, give
evidence as to the import of the sacrament. For since, as the
apostle wrote, “He was delivered for our offences, and was raised
again for our justification,”1733
a certain transition from death to
life has been consecrated in that Passion and Resurrection of the
Lord. For the word Pascha itself is not, as is commonly thought, a
Greek word: those who are acquainted with both languages affirm it
to be a Hebrew word. It is not derived, therefore, from the
Passion, because of the Greek word πάσχειν, signifying to suffer, but it takes
its name from the transition, of which I have spoken, from death to
life; the meaning of the Hebrew word Pascha being, as those who are
acquainted with it assure us,1734
| 1734 Had Augustin not been obliged to take his Hebrew
at second hand, he might have seen that the word
חסַפ does not bear out his interpretation. Ex. xii.
13; 27. | a passing over or transition. To
this the Lord Himself designed to allude, when He said,” He that
believeth in Me is passed from death to life.”1735
And the same evangelist who
records that saying is to be understood as desiring to give
emphatic testimony to this, when, speaking of the Lord as about to
celebrate with His disciples the passover, at which He instituted
the sacramental supper, he says, “When Jesus knew that His hour
was come, that He should depart1736
from this world unto the
Father.”1737
This
passing over from this mortal life to the other, the immortal life,
that is, from death to life, is set forth in the Passion and
Resurrection of the Lord.
Chap. II.
3. This passing from death to life is
meanwhile wrought in us by faith, which we have for the pardon of
our sins and the hope of eternal life, when we love God and our
neighbour; “for faith worketh by love,”1738
and “the just shall live by his
faith;”1739
“and
hope that is seen is not hope: for what a man seeth, why doth he
yet hope for? But if we hope for that we see not, then do we with
patience wait for it.”1740
According to this faith and hope
and love, by which we have begun to be “under grace,” we are
already dead together with Christ, and buried together with Him by
baptism into death;1741
as the apostle hath said, “Our
old man is crucified with Him;”1742
and we have risen with Him, for
“He hath raised us up together, and made us sit with Him in
heavenly places.”1743
Whence also he gives this
exhortation: “If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things
which are above, where Christ sitteth on the right hand of God. Set
your affection on things above, not on things on the earth.”1744
In the
next words, “For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in
God; when Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall ye also
appear with Him in glory,”1745
he plainly gives us to understand
that our passing in this present time from death to life by faith
is accomplished in the hope of that future final resurrection and
glory, when “this corruptible,” that is, this flesh in which we
now groan, “shall put on incorruption, and this mortal shall put
on immortality.”1746
For now, indeed, we have by faith
“the first-fruits of the Spirit;” but still we “groan within
ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of the
body: for we are saved by hope.” While we are in this hope,
“the body indeed is dead because of sin, but the spirit is life
because of righteousness.” Now mark what follows: “But if the
Spirit of Him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, He
that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal
bodies by His Spirit that dwelleth in you.”1747
| 1747 Rom. viii. 23, 24, 10, 11. | The whole Church, therefore, while
here in the conditions of pilgrimage and mortality, expects that to
be accomplished in her at the end of the world which has been shown
first in the body of our Lord Jesus Christ, who is “the
first-begotten from the dead,” seeing that the body of which He
is the Head is none other than the Church.1748
Chap. III.
4. Some, indeed, studying the words so
frequently used by the apostle, about our being dead with Christ
and raised together with Him, and misunderstanding the sense in
which they are used, have thought that the resurrection is already
past, and that no other is to be hoped for at the end of time:
“Of whom,” he says, “are Hymenæus and Philetus; who
concerning the truth have erred, saying that the resurrection is
past already; and overthrow the faith of some.”1749
The same
apostle who thus reproves and testifies against them, teaches
nevertheless that we are risen with Christ. How is the apparent
contradiction to be removed, unless he means that this is
accomplished in us by faith and hope and love, according to the
first-fruits of the Spirit? But because “hope which is seen is
not hope,” and therefore “if we hope for that we see not, we do
with patience wait for it,” it is beyond question that there
remains, as still future, the redemption of the body, in longing
for which we “groan within ourselves.” Hence also that saying,
“Rejoicing in hope, patient in tribulation.”1750
5. This renewal, therefore, of our life is a
kind of transition from death to life which is made first by faith,
so that we rejoice in hope and are patient in tribulation, while
still “our outward man perisheth, but the inward man is renewed
day by day.”1751
It is
because of this beginning of a new life, because of the new man
which we are commanded to put on, putting off the old man,1752
“purging
out the old leaven, that we may be a new lump, because Christ our
passover is sacrificed for us;”1753
it is, I say, because of this
newness of life in us, that the first of the months of the year has
been appointed as the season of this solemnity. This very name is
given to it, the month Abib, or beginning of
months.1754
Again, the
resurrection of the Lord was upon the third day, because with it
the third epoch of the world began. The first Epoch was before the
Law, the second under the Law, the third under Grace, in which
there is now the manifestation of the mystery,1755
which was formerly hidden under
dark prophetic sayings. This is accordingly signified also in the
part of the month appointed for the celebration; for, since the
number seven is usually employed in Scripture as a mystical number,
indicating perfection of some kind, the day of the celebration of
Easter is within the third week of the month, namely, between the
fourteenth and the twenty-first day.
Chap. IV.
6. There is in this another mystery,1756
and you
are not to be distressed if perhaps it be not so readily perceived
by you, because of your being less versed in such studies; nor are
you to think me any better than you, because I learned these things
in early years: for the Lord saith, “Let him that glorieth glory
in this, that he understandeth and knoweth Me, that I am the
Lord.”1757
Some men
who give attention to such studies, have investigated many things
concerning the numbers and motions of the heavenly bodies. And
those who have done this most ably have found that the waxing and
waning of the moon are due to the turning of its globe, and not to
any such actual addition to or diminution of its substance as is
supposed by the foolish Manichæans, who say that as a ship is
filled, so the moon is filled with a fugitive portion of the Divine
Being, which they, with impious heart and lips, do not hesitate to
believe and to declare to have become mingled with the rulers of
darkness, and contaminated with their pollution. And they account
for the waxing of the moon by saying that it takes place when that
lost portion of the Deity, being purified from contamination by
great labours, escaping from the whole world,1758
and from all foul abominations,1759
is
restored to the Deity, who mourns till it returns; that by this the
moon is filled up till the middle of the month, and that in the
latter half of the month this is poured back into the sun as into
another ship. Amid these execrable blasphemies, they have never
succeeded in devising any way of explaining why the moon in the
beginning or end of its brightness shines with its light in the
shape of a horn, or why it begins at the middle of the month to
wane, and does not go on full until it pour back its increase into
the sun.
7. Those, however, to whom I refer have
inquired into these things with trustworthy calculations, so that
they can not only state the reason of eclipses, both solar and
lunar, but also predict their occurrence long before they take
place, and are able to determine by mathematical computation the
precise intervals at which these must happen, and to state the
results in treatises, by reading and understanding which any others
may foretell as well as they the coming of these eclipses, and find
their prediction verified by the event. Such men,—and they
deserve censure, as Holy Scripture teaches, because “though they
had wisdom enough to measure the periods of this world, they did
not much more easily come,” as by humble piety they might have
done, “to the knowledge of its Lord,”1760
—such men, I say, have inferred
from the horns of the moon, which both in waxing and in waning are
turned from the sun, either that the moon is illuminated by the
sun, and that the farther it recedes from the sun the more fully
does it lie exposed to its rays on the side which is visible from
the earth; but that the more it approaches the sun, after the
middle of the month, on the other half of its orbit, it becomes
more fully illuminated on the upper part, and less and less open to
receive the sun’s rays on the side which is turned to the earth,
and seems to us accordingly to decrease: or, that if the moon has
light in itself, it has this light in the hemisphere on one side
only, which side it gradually turns more to the earth as it recedes
from the sun, until it is fully displayed, thereby exhibiting an
apparent increase, not by the addition of what was deficient, but
by disclosing what was already there; and that, in like manner,
going towards the sun, the moon again gradually turns from our view
that which had been disclosed, and so appears to decrease.
Whichever of these two theories be correct, this at least is plain,
and is easily discovered by any careful observer, that the moon
does not to our eyes increase except when it is receding from the
sun, nor decrease except when returning towards the sun.
Chap. V.
8. Now mark what is said in Proverbs: “The
wise man is fixed like the sun; but the fool changes like the
moon.”1761
And who is
the wise that has no changes, but that Sun of Righteousness of whom
it is said, “The Sun of righteousness has risen upon me,” and
of which the wicked shall say, when mourning in the day of judgment
that it has not risen upon them, “The light of righteousness hath
not shone upon us, and the sun hath not risen upon us”?1762
For that
sun which is visible to the eye of sense, God makes to rise upon
the evil and the good alike, as He sendeth rain upon the just and
the unjust;1763
but apt
similitudes are often borrowed from things visible to explain things
invisible. Again, who is the “fool” who “changes like the
moon,” if not Adam, in whom all have sinned? For the soul of man,
receding from the Sun of righteousness, that is to say, from the
internal contemplation of unchangeable truth, turns all its
strength towards external things, and becomes more and more
darkened in its deeper and nobler powers; but when the soul begins
to return to that unchangeable wisdom, the more it draws near to it
with pious desire, the more does the outward man perish, but the
inward man is renewed day by day, and all that light of the soul
which was inclining to things that are beneath is turned to the
things that are above, and is thus withdrawn from the things of
earth; so that it dies more and more to this world, and its life is
hid with Christ in God.
9. It is therefore for the worse that the soul
is changed when it moves in the direction of external things, and
throws aside that which pertains to the inner life; and to the
earth, i.e. to those who mind earthly things, the soul looks
better in such a case, for by them the wicked is commended for his
heart’s desire, and the unrighteous is blessed.1764
But it is
for the better that the soul is changed, when it gradually turns
away its aims and ambition from earthly things, which appear
important in this world, and directs them to things nobler and
unseen; and to the earth, i.e. to men who mind earthly
things, the soul in such a case seems worse. Hence those wicked men
who at last shall in vain repent of their sins, will say this among
other things: “These are the men whom once we derided and
reproached; we in our folly esteemed their way of life to be
madness.”1765
Now the
Holy Spirit, drawing a comparison from things visible to things
invisible, from things corporeal to spiritual mysteries, has been
pleased to appoint that the feast symbolical of the passing from
the old life to the new, which is signified by the name Pascha,
should be observed between the 14th and 21st days of the
month,—after the 14th, in order that a twofold illustration of
spiritual realities might be gained, both with respect to the third
epoch of the world, which is the reason of its occurrence in the
third week, as I have already said, and with respect to the turning
of the soul from external to internal things,—a change
corresponding to the change in the moon when on the wane; not later
than the 21st, because of the number 7 itself, which is often used
to represent the notion of the universe, and is also applied to the
Church on the ground of her likeness to the universe.
Chap. VI.
10. For this reason the Apostle John writes in
the Apocalypse to seven churches. The Church, moreover,
while it remains under the conditions of our mortal life in the
flesh, is, on account of her liability to change, spoken of
Scripture by the name of the moon; e.g., “They have made
ready their arrows in the quiver, that they may, while the moon is
obscured, wound those who are upright in heart.”1766
| 1766 Ps. xi. 3; in the LXX. version, τοῦ κατατοξεῦσαι ἐν σκοτομήνῃ τοὺς εὐθεῖς τῇ
καρδίᾳ. | For before
that comes to pass of which the apostle says, “When Christ, who
is our life, shall appear, then shall ye also appear with Him in
glory,”1767
the Church
seems in the time of her pilgrimage obscured, groaning under many
iniquities; and at such a time, the snares of those who deceive and
lead astray are to be feared, and these are intended by the word
“arrows” in this passage. Again, we have another instance in
Psalm lxxxix.,1768
where,
because of the faithful witnesses which she everywhere brings forth
on the side of truth, the Church is called “the moon, a faithful
witness in heaven.” And when the Psalmist sang of the Lord’s
kingdom, he said, “In His days shall be righteousness and
abundance of peace, until the moon be destroyed;”1769
| 1769 Ps. lxxii. 7, Septuagint version. |
i.e. abundance of peace shall increase so greatly, until He
shall at length take away all the changeableness incidental to this
mortal condition. Then shall death, the last enemy, be destroyed;
and whatever obstacle to the perfection of our peace is due to the
infirmity of our flesh shall be utterly consumed when this
corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal shall
have put on immortality.1770
| 1770 1 Cor. xv. 26, 53, 54. | We have another instance in this,
that the walls of the town named Jericho—which in the Hebrew
tongue is said to signify “moon”—fell when they had been
compassed for the seventh time by the ark of the covenant borne
round the city. For what else is conveyed by the promise of the
coming of the heavenly kingdom, which was symbolized in the
carrying of the ark round Jericho, than that all the strongholds of
this mortal life, i.e. every hope pertaining to this world
which resists the hope of the world to come, must be destroyed,
with the soul’s free consent, by the sevenfold gift of the Holy
Spirit. Therefore it was, that when the ark was going round, those
walls fell, not by violent assault, but of themselves. There are,
besides these, other passages in Scripture which, speaking of the
moon, impress upon us under that figure the condition of the Church
while here, amid cares and labours, she is a pilgrim under the lot
of mortality, and far from that Jerusalem of which the holy angels
are the citizens.
11. These foolish men who refuse to be changed for
the better have no reason, however, to imagine
that worship is due to those
heavenly luminaries because a similitude is occasionally borrowed
from them for the representation of divine mysteries; for such are
borrowed from every created thing. Nor is there any reason for our
incurring the sentence of condemnation which is pronounced by the
apostle on some who worshipped and served the creature more than
the Creator, who is blessed for ever.1771
We do not adore sheep or cattle,
although Christ is called both a Lamb,1772
and by the prophet a young
bullock;1773
nor any
beast of prey, though He is called the Lion of the tribe of
Judah;1774
nor a
stone, although Christ is called a Rock;1775
nor Mount Zion, though in it there
was a type of the Church.1776
And, in like manner, we do not
adore the sun or the moon, although, in order to convey instruction
in holy mysteries, figures of sacred things are borrowed from these
celestial works of the Creator, as they are also from many of the
things which He hath made on earth.
Chap. VII.
12. We are therefore bound to denounce with
abhorrence and contempt the ravings of the astrologers, who, when
we find fault with the empty inventions by which they cast other
men down into the delusions where into they themselves have fallen,
imagine that they answer well when they say, “Why, then, do you
regulate the time of the observance of Easter by calculation of the
positions of the sun and moon?”—as if that with which we find
fault was the arrangements of the heavenly bodies, or the
succession of the seasons, which are appointed by God in His
infinite power and goodness, and not their perversity in abusing,
for the support of the most absurd opinions, those things which God
has ordered in perfect wisdom. If the astrologer may on this ground
forbid us from drawing comparisons from the heavenly bodies for the
mystical representation of sacramental realities, then the augurs
may with equal reason prevent the use of these words of Scripture,
“Be harmless as doves;” and the snake-charmers may forbid that
other exhortation, “Be wise as serpents;”1777
while the play-actors may
interfere with our mentioning the harp in the book of Psalms. Let
them therefore say, if they please, that, because similitudes for
the exhibition of the mysteries of God’s word are taken from the
things which I have named, we are chargeable either with consulting
the omens given by the flight of birds, or with concocting the
poisons of the charmer, or with taking pleasure in the excesses of
the theatre,—a statement which would be the clime of
absurdity.
13. We do not forecast the issues of our
enterprises by studying the sun and moon, and the times of the year
or of the month, lest in the most trying emergencies of life, we,
being dashed against the rocks of a wretched bondage, shall make
shipwreck of our freedom of will; but with the most pious
devoutness of spirit, we accept similitudes adapted to the
illustration of holy things, which these heavenly bodies furnish,
just as from all other works of creation, the winds, the sea, the
land, birds, fishes, cattle, trees, men, etc., we borrow in our
discourses manifold figures; and in the celebration of sacraments,
the very few things which the comparative liberty of the Christian
dispensation has prescribed, such as water, bread, wine, and oil.
Under the bondage, however, of the ancient dispensation many rites
were prescribed, which are made known to us only for our
instruction as to their meaning. We do not now observe years, and
months, and seasons, lest the words of the apostle apply to us,
“I am afraid of you, lest I have bestowed upon you labour in
vain.”1778
For he
blames those who say, “I will not set out to-day, because it is
an unlucky day, or because the moon is so and so;” or, “I will
go to-day, that things may prosper with me, because the position of
the stars is this or that; I will do no business this month,
because a particular star rules it;” or, “I will do business,
because another star has succeeded in its place; I will not plant a
vineyard this year, because it is leap year.” No man of ordinary
sense would, however, suppose that those men deserve reproof for
studying the seasons, who say, e.g., “I will not set out
to-day, because a storm has begun;” or, “I will not put to sea,
because the winter is not yet past;” or, “It is time to sow my
seed, for the earth has been saturated with the showers of
autumn;” and so on, in regard to any other natural effects of the
motion and moisture of the atmosphere which have been observed in
connection with that consummately ordered revolution of the
heavenly bodies concerning which it was said when they were made,
“Let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days, and for
years.”1779
And in
like manner, whensoever illustrative symbols are borrowed, for the
declaration of spiritual mysteries, from created things, not only
from the heaven and its orbs, but also from meaner creatures, this
is done to give to the doctrine of salvation an eloquence adapted
to raise the affections of those who receive it from things seen,
corporeal and temporal, to things unseen, spiritual and
eternal.
Chap. VIII.
14. None of us gives any consideration to the
circumstance that, at the time at which we observe Easter, the sun
is in the Ram, as
they call a certain region of the heavenly bodies, in which the sun
is, in fact, found at the beginning of the months; but whether
they, choose to call that part of the heavens the Ram or anything
else, we have learned this from the Sacred Scriptures, that God
made all the heavenly bodies, and appointed their places as it
pleased Him; and whatever the parts may be into which astronomers
divide the regions set apart and ordained for the different
constellations, and whatever the names by which they distinguish
them, the place occupied by the sun in the first month is that in
which the celebration of this sacrament behoved to find that
luminary, because of the illustration of a holy mystery in the
renovation of life, of which I have already spoken sufficiently.
If, however, the name of Ram could be given to that portion of the
heavenly bodies because of some correspondence between their form
and the name, the word of God would not hesitate to borrow from
anything of this kind an illustration of a holy mystery, as it has
done not only from other celestial bodies, but also from
terrestrial things, e.g. from Orion and the Pleiades, Mount
Zion, Mount Sinai, and the rivers of which the names are given,
Gihon, Pison, Tigris, Euphrates, and particularly from the river
Jordan, which is so often named in the sacred mysteries.
15. But who can fail to perceive how great is the
difference between useful observations of the heavenly bodies in
connection with the weather, such as farmers or sailors make; or in
order to mark the part of the world in which they are, and the
course which they should follow, such as are made by pilots of
ships or men going through the trackless sandy deserts of southern
Africa; or in order to present some useful doctrine under a figure
borrowed from some facts concerning heavenly bodies;—and the vain
hallucinations of men who observe the heavens not to know the
weather, or their course, or to make scientific calculations, or to
find illustrations of spiritual things, but merely to pry into the
future and learn now what fate has decreed?
Chap. IX.
16. Let us now direct our minds to observe the
reason why, in the celebration of Easter, care is taken to appoint
the day so that Saturday precedes it: for this is peculiar to the
Christian religion. The Jews keep the Passover from the 14th to the
21st of the first month, on whatever day that week begins. But
since at the Passover at which the Lord suffered, it was the case
that the Jewish Sabbath came in between His death and His
resurrection, our fathers have judged it right to add this
specialty to their celebration of Easter, both that our feast might
be distinguished from the Jewish Passover, and that succeeding
generations might retain in their annual commemoration of His
Passion that which we must believe to have been done for some good
reason, by Him who is before the times, by whom also the times have
been made, and who came in the fulness of the times, and who when
He said, Mine hour is not yet come, had the power of laying down
His life and taking it again, and was therefore waiting for an hour
not fixed by blind fate, but suitable to the holy mystery which He
had resolved to commend to our observation.
17. That which we here hold in faith and hope,
and to which by love we labour to come, is, as I have said above, a
certain holy and perpetual rest from the whole burden of every kind
of care; and from this life unto that rest we make a transition
which our Lord Jesus Christ condescended to exemplify and
consecrate in His Passion. This rest, however, is not a slothful
inaction, but a certain ineffable tranquillity caused by work in
which there is no painful effort. For the repose on which one
enters at the end of the toils of this life is of such a nature as
consists with lively joy in the active exercises of the better
life. Forasmuch, however, as this activity is exercised in praising
God without bodily toil or mental anxiety, the transition to that
activity is not made through a repose which is to be followed by
labour, i.e. a repose which, at the point where activity
begins, ceases to be repose: for in these exercises there is no
return to toil and care; but that which constitutes rest—namely,
exemption from weariness in work and from uncertainty in
thought—is always found in them. Now, since through rest we get
back to that original life which the soul lost by sin, the emblem
of this rest is the seventh day of the week. But that original life
itself which is restored to those who return from their wanderings,
and receive in token of welcome the robe which they had at first,1780
is
represented by the first day of the week, which we call the
Lord’s day. If, in reading Genesis, you search the record of the
seven days, you will find that there was no evening of the seventh
day, which signified that the rest of which it was a type was
eternal. The life originally bestowed was not eternal, because man
sinned; but the final rest, of which the seventh day was an emblem,
is eternal, and hence the eighth day also will have eternal
blessedness, because that rest, being eternal, is taken up by the
eighth day, not destroyed by it; for if it were thus destroyed, it
would not be eternal. Accordingly the eighth day, which is the
first day of the week, represents to us that original life, not
taken away, but made eternal.
Chap. X.
18. Nevertheless the seventh day was appointed to
the Jewish nation as a day to be observed by rest of the body, that
it might be a
type of sanctification to which men attain through rest in the Holy
Spirit. We do not read of sanctification in the history given in
Genesis of all the earlier days: of the Sabbath alone it is said
that “God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it.”1781
Now the
souls of men, whether good or bad, love rest, but how to attain to
that which they love is to the greater part unknown: and that which
bodies seek for their weight, is precisely what souls seek for
their love, namely, a resting-place. For as, according to its
specific gravity, a body descends or rises until it reaches a place
where it can rest,—oil, for example, falling if poured into the
air, but rising if poured into water,—so the soul of man
struggles towards the things which it loves, in order that, by
reaching them, it may rest. There are indeed many things which
please the soul through the body, but its rest in these is not
eternal, nor even long continued; and therefore they rather debase
the soul and weigh it down, so as to be a drag upon that pure
imponderability by which it tends towards higher things. When the
soul finds pleasure from itself, it is not yet seeking delight in
that which is unchangeable; and therefore it is still proud,
because it is giving to itself the highest place, whereas God is
higher. In such sin the soul is not left unpunished, for “God
resisteth the proud, but giveth grace to the humble.”1782
When,
however, the soul delights in God, there it finds the true, sure,
and eternal rest, which in all other objects was sought in vain.
Therefore the admonition is given in the book of Psalms, “Delight
thyself in the Lord, and He shall give thee the desires of thine
heart.”1783
19. Because, therefore, “the love of God1784
| 1784 Augustin interprets the “love of God” here as
meaning our love to Him, and equivalent to delighting in Him. | is shed
abroad in our hearts by the Holy Spirit which is given to us,”1785
sanctification was associated with the seventh day, the day in
which rest was enjoined. But inasmuch as we neither are able to do
any good work, except as helped by the gift of God, as the apostle
says, “For it is God that worketh in you both to will and to do
of His good pleasure,”1786
nor will be able to rest, after
all the good works which engage us in this life, except as
sanctified and perfected by the same gift to eternity; for this
reason it is said of God Himself, that when He had made all things
“very good,” He rested “on the seventh day from all His works
which He had made.”1787
For He, in so doing, presented a
type of that future rest which He purposed to bestow on us men
after our good works are done. For as in our good works He is said
to work in us, by whose gift we are enabled to work what is good,
so in our rest He is said to rest by whose gift we rest.
Chap. XI.
20. This, moreover, is the reason why the law
of the Sabbath is placed third among the three commandments of the
Decalogue which declare our duty to God (for the other seven relate
to our neighbour, that is, to man; the whole law hanging on these
two commandments).1788
The first commandment, in which we
are forbidden to worship any likeness of God made by human
contrivance, we are to understand as referring to the Father: this
prohibition being made, not because God has no image, but because
no image of Him but that One which is the same with Himself, ought
to be worshipped; and this One not in His stead, but along with
Him. Then, because a creature is mutable, and therefore it is said,
“The whole creation is subject to vanity,”1789
since the nature of the whole is
manifested also in any part of it, lest any one should think that
the Son of God, the Word by whom all things were made, is a
creature, the second commandment is, “Thou shalt not take the
name of the Lord thy God in vain.”1790
And because God sanctified the
seventh day, on which He rested, the Holy Spirit—in whom is given
to us that rest which we love everywhere, but find only in loving
God, when “His love is shed abroad in us, by the Holy Ghost given
unto us”1791
—is
presented to our minds in the third commandment, which was written
concerning the observance of the Sabbath, not to make us suppose
that we attain to rest in this present life, but that all our
labours in what is good may point towards nothing else than that
eternal rest. For I would specially charge you to remember the
passage quoted above: “We are saved by hope; but hope that is
seen is not hope.”1792
21. For the feeding and fanning of that ardent love
by which, under a law like that of gravitation, we are borne
upwards or inwards to rest, the presentation of truth by emblems
has a great power: for, thus presented, things move and kindle our
affection much more than if they were set forth in bald statements,
not clothed with sacramental symbols. Why this should be, it is
hard to say; but it is the fact that anything which we are taught
by allegory or emblem affects and pleases us more, and is more
highly esteemed by us, than it would be if most clearly stated in
plain terms. I believe that the emotions are less easily kindled
while the soul is wholly involved in earthly things; but if it be
brought to those
corporeal things which are emblems of spiritual things, and then
taken from these to the spiritual realities which they represent,
it gathers strength by the mere act of passing from the one to the
other, and, like the flame of a lighted torch, is made by the
motion to burn more brightly, and is carried away to rest by a more
intensely glowing love.
Chap. XII.
22. It is also for this reason, that of all
the ten commandments, that which related to the Sabbath was the
only one in which the thing commanded was typical;1793
| 1793 Figurate observandum præcipitur. | the bodily
rest enjoined being a type which we have received as a means of our
instruction, but not as a duty binding also upon us. For while in
the Sabbath a figure is presented of the spiritual rest, of which
it is said in the Psalm, “Be still, and know that I am God,”1794
and unto
which men are invited by the Lord Himself in the words, “Come
unto Me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give
you rest. Take My yoke upon you, and learn of Me; for I am meek and
lowly in heart: so shall ye find rest unto your souls;”1795
as to all
the things enjoined in the other commandments, we are to yield to
them an obedience in which there is nothing typical. For we have
been taught literally not to worship idols; and the precepts
enjoining us not to take God’s name in vain, to honour our father
and mother, not to commit adultery, or kill, or steal, or bear
false witness, or covet our neighbour’s wife, or covet anything
that is our neighbour’s,1796
are all devoid of typical or
mystical meaning, and are to be literally observed. But we are not
commanded to observe the day of the Sabbath literally, in resting
from bodily labour, as it is observed by the Jews; and even their
observance of the rest as prescribed is to be deemed worthy of
contempt, except as signifying another, namely, spiritual rest.
From this we may reasonably conclude, that all those things which
are figuratively set forth in Scripture, are powerful in
stimulating that love by which we tend towards rest; since the only
figurative or typical precept in the Decalogue is the one in which
that rest is commended to us, which is desired everywhere, but is
found sure and sacred in God alone.
Chap. XIII.
23. The Lord’s day, however, has been made
known not to the Jews, but to Christians, by the resurrection of
the Lord, and from Him it began to have the festive character which
is proper to it.1797
| 1797 Ex illo habere cæpit festivitatem
suam. | For the souls of the pious dead
are, indeed, in a state of repose before the resurrection of the
body, but they are not engaged in the same active exercises as
shall engage the strength of their bodies when restored. Now, of
this condition of active exercise the eighth day (which is also the
first of the week) is a type, because it does not put an end to
that repose, but glorifies it. For with the reunion of the body no
hindrance of the soul’s rest returns, because in the restored
body there is no corruption: for “this corruptible must put on
incorruption, and this mortal must put on immortality.”1798
Wherefore,
although the sacramental import of the 8th number, as signifying
the resurrection, was by no means concealed from the holy men of
old who were filled with the spirit of prophecy (for in the title
of Psalms [vi. and xii.] we find the words “for the eighth,”
and infants were circumcised on the eighth day; and in Ecclesiastes
it is said, with allusion to the two covenants, “Give a portion
to seven, and also to eight”1799
| 1799 Eccles. xi. 2; which Aug. translates, “Da
illis septem, et illis octo.” | ); nevertheless before the
resurrection of the Lord, it was reserved and hidden, and the
Sabbath alone was appointed to be observed, because before that
event there was indeed the repose of the dead (of which the Sabbath
rest was a type), but there was not any instance of the
resurrection of one who, rising from the dead, was no more to die,
and over whom death should no longer have dominion; this being done
in order that, from the time when such a resurrection did take
place in the Lord’s own body (the Head of the Church being the
first to experience that which His body, the Church, expects at the
end of time), the day upon which He rose, the eighth day namely
(which is the same with the first of the week), should begin to be
observed as the Lord’s day. The same reason enables us to
understand why, in regard to the day of keeping the passover, on
which the Jews were commanded to kill and eat a lamb, which was
most clearly a foreshadowing of the Lord’s Passion, there was no
injunction given to them that they should take the day of the week
into account, waiting until the Sabbath was past, and making the
beginning of the third week of the moon coincide with the beginning
of the third week of the first month; the reason being, that the
Lord might rather in His own Passion declare the significance of
that day, as He had come also to declare the mystery of the day now
known as the Lord’s day, the eighth namely, which is also the
first of the week.
Chap. XIV.
24. Consider now with attention these three most
sacred days, the days signalized by the Lord’s crucifixion, rest
in the grave, and resurrection. Of these three, that of which the
cross is the symbol is the business of our present life: those
things which are symbolized by His rest in the grave and His
resurrection we hold by faith and hope. For now the
command is given to each man, “Take up thy cross, and follow
me.”1800
But the
flesh is crucified, when our members which are upon the earth are
mortified, such as fornication, uncleanness, luxury, avarice, etc.,
of which the apostle says in another passage: “If ye live after
the flesh, ye shall die; but if ye through the Spirit do mortify
the deeds of the body, ye shall live.”1801
Hence also he says of himself:
“The world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world.”1802
And again:
“Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with Him, that the
body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve
sin.”1803
The period
during which our labours tend to the weakening and destruction of
the body of sin, during which the outward man is perishing, that
the inward man may be renewed day by day,—that is the period of
the cross.
25. These are, it is true, good works, having
rest for their recompense, but they are meanwhile laborious and
painful: therefore we are told to be “rejoicing in hope,” that
while we contemplate the future rest, we may labour with
cheerfulness in present toil. Of this cheerfulness the breadth of
the cross in the transverse beam to which the hands were nailed is
an emblem: for the hands we understand to be symbolical of working,
and the breadth to be symbolical of cheerfulness in him who works,
for sadness straitens the spirit. In the height of the cross,
against which the head is placed, we have an emblem of the
expectation of recompense from the sublime justice of God, “who
will render to every man according to his deeds; to them who, by
patient continuance in well-doing, seek for glory, and honour, and
immortality, eternal life.”1804
Therefore the length of the cross,
along which the whole body is extended, is an emblem of that
patient continuance in the will of God, on account of which those
who are patient are said to be long-suffering. The depth also,
i.e. the part which is fixed in the ground, represents the
occult nature of the holy mystery. For you remember, I suppose, the
words of the apostle, which in this description of the cross I aim
at expounding: “That ye, being rooted and grounded in love, may
be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and
length, and depth, and height.”1805
Those things which we do not yet see or
possess, but hold in faith and hope, are the things represented in
the events by which the second and third of the three memorable
days above mentioned were signalized [viz. the Lord’s rest in the
grave, and His resurrection]. But the things which keep us occupied
in this present life, while we are held fast in the fear of God by
the commandments, as by nails driven through the flesh (as it is
written, “Make my flesh fast with nails by fear of Thee”1806
| 1806 Ps. cxix. 120; Septuagint version, καθήλωσον ἐκ τοῦ φόβου σου τὰς σάρκας
μου. | ), are to
be reckoned among things necessary, not among those which are for
their own sakes to be desired and coveted. Hence Paul says that he
desired, as something far better, to depart and to be with Christ:
“nevertheless,” he adds, “to remain in the flesh is expedient
for you”1807
—necessary for your welfare. This
departing and being with Christ is the beginning of the rest which
is not interrupted, but glorified by the resurrection; and this
rest is now enjoyed by faith, “for the just shall live by
faith.”1808
“Know ye
not,” saith the same apostle, “that so many of us as were
baptized into Jesus Christ, were baptized into His death? Therefore
we are buried with Him by baptism unto death.”1809
How? By faith. For this is not
actually completed in us so long as we are still “groaning within
ourselves, and waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of
our body: for we are saved by hope; but hope that is seen is not
hope: for what a man seeth why doth he yet hope for? But if we hope
for that we see not, then do we with patience wait for it.”1810
26. Remember how often I repeat this to you,
that we are not to think that we ought to be made happy and free
from all difficulties in this present life, and are therefore at
liberty to murmur profanely against God when we are straitened in
the things of this world, as if He were not performing what He
promised. He hath indeed promised the things which are necessary
for this life, but the consolations which mitigate the misery of
our present lot are very different from the joys of those who are
perfect in blessedness. “In the multitude of my thoughts within
me,” saith the believer, “Thy comforts, O Lord, delight my
soul.”1811
Let us not
therefore murmur because of difficulties; let us not lose that
breadth of cheerfulness, of which it is written, “Rejoicing in
hope,” because this follows,—“patient in tribulation.”1812
The new
life, therefore, is meanwhile begun in faith, and maintained by
hope: for it shall only then be perfect when this mortal shall be
swallowed up in life, and death swallowed up in victory; when the
last enemy, death, shall be destroyed; when we shall be changed,
and made like the angels: for “we shall all rise again, but we
shall not all be changed.”1813
| 1813 1 Cor. xv. 54, 26, 51—the last of these verses
being rendered by Augustin here, not as in the English version, but
as given above. | Again, the Lord saith, “They
shall be equal unto the angels.”1814
We now are apprehended by Him in
fear by faith: then we shall apprehend Him in love by sight. For
“whilst we are at home in the body, we are absent from the Lord:
for we walk by faith, not by sight.”1815
Hence the apostle himself, who
says, “I follow after, if that I may apprehend that for which
also I am apprehended of Christ Jesus,” confesses frankly that he
has not attained to it. “Brethren,” he says, “I count not
myself to have apprehended.”1816
Since, however, our hope is sure,
because of the truth of the promise, when he said elsewhere,
“Therefore we are buried with Him by baptism into death,” he
adds these words, “that like as Christ was raised up from the
dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in
newness of life.”1817
We walk, therefore, in actual
labour, but in hope of rest, in the flesh of the old life, but in
faith of the new. For he says again: “The body is dead because of
sin; but the spirit is life because of righteousness. But if the
Spirit of Him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, He
that raised up Christ from the dead shall also quicken your mortal
bodies by His Spirit that dwelleth in you.”
27. Both the authority of the Divine Scriptures and
the consent of the whole Church spread throughout the world have
combined to ordain the annual commemoration of these things at
Easter, by observances which are, as you now see, full of spiritual
significance. From the Old Testament Scriptures we are not taught
as to the precise day of holding Easter, beyond the limitation to
the period between the 14th and 21st days of the first month; but
because we know from the Gospel beyond doubt which days of the week
were signalized in succession by the Lord’s crucifixion, His
resting in the grave, and His resurrection, the observance of these
days has been enjoined in addition by Councils of the Fathers, and
the whole Christian world has arrived unanimously at the persuasion
that this is the proper mode of observing Easter.
Chap. XV.
28.1818
| 1818 In translating, we have ventured to take this
title of Chap. xv. out of the place which the Benedictines have
given to it, in the middle of a sentence of the preceding
paragraph. There it almost hopelessly bewildered the reader. Here
it prepares him for a new topic. | The Fast of Forty Days has its
warrant both in the Old Testament, from the fasting of Moses1819
and of
Elijah,1820
and in the
Gospel from the fact that our Lord fasted the same number of
days;1821
proving
thereby that the Gospel is not at variance with the Law and the
Prophets. For the Law and the Prophets are represented in the
persons of Moses and Elijah respectively; between whom also He
appeared in glory on the Mount, that what the apostle says of Him,
that He is “witnessed unto both by the Law and the Prophets,”1822
might be
made more clearly manifest. Now, in what part of the year could the
observance of the Fast of Forty Days be more appropriately placed,
than in that which immediately precedes and borders on the time of
the Lord’s Passion? For by it is signified this life of toil, the
chief work in which is to exercise self-control, in abstaining from
the world’s friendship, which never ceases deceitfully caressing
us, and scattering profusely around us its bewitching allurements.
As to the reason why this life of toil and self-control is
symbolized by the number 40, it seems to me that the number ten (in
which is the perfection of our blessedness, as in the number eight,
because it returns to the unit) has a like place in this number [as
the unit has in giving its significance to eight];1823
| 1823 Compare “octavus qui et primus,” and the
remarks on the meaning of the number 8 in § 23. | and
therefore I regard the number forty as a fit symbol for this life,
because in it the creature (of which the symbolical number is
seven) cleaves to the Creator, in whom is revealed that unity of
the Trinity which is to be published while time lasts throughout
this whole world,—a world swept by four winds, constituted of
four elements, and experiencing the changes of four seasons in the
year. Now four times ten [seven added to three] are forty; but the
number forty reckoned in along with [one of] its parts adds the
number ten, [as seven reckoned in along with one of its parts adds
the unit,] and the total is fifty,—the symbol, as it were, of the
reward of the toil and self-control.1824
| 1824 We give the original of this very obscure
paragraph:—“Numero autem quadragenario vitam istam propter ea
figurari arbitror, quia denarius in quo est perfectio beatitudinis
nostræ, sicut in octonario, quia redit ad primum, ita in hoc mihi
videtur exprimi: quia creatura, quæ septenario figuratur adhæret
Creatori in quo declaratur unitas Trinitatis per universum mundum
temporaliter annuntianda; qui mundus et a quatuor ventis delimatur
et quatuor elementis erigitur, et quatuor anni temporum vicibus
variatur. Decem autem quater in quadraginta consummantur,
quadragenarius autem partibus suis computatus, addit ipsum denarium
et fiunt quinquaginta tanquam merces laboris et
continentiæ.” | For it is not without reason that
the Lord Himself continued for forty days on this earth and in this
life in fellowship with His disciples after His resurrection, and,
when He ascended into heaven, sent the promised Holy Spirit, after
an interval of ten days more, when the day of Pentecost was fully
come. This fiftieth day, moreover, has wrapped up in it another
holy mystery:1825
for 7
times 7 days are 49. And when we return to the beginning of another
seven, and add the eighth, which is also the first day of the week,
we have the 50 days complete; which period of fifty days we
celebrate after the Lord’s resurrection, as representing not toil,
but rest and gladness. For this reason we do not fast in them; and
in praying we stand upright, which is an emblem of resurrection.
Hence, also, every Lord’s day during the fifty days, this usage
is observed at the altar, and the Alleluia is sung, which signifies
that our future exercise shall consist wholly in praising God, as
it is written: “Blessed are they who dwell in Thy house, O Lord:
they will be still (i.e. eternally) praising Thee.”1826
Chap. XVI.
29. The fiftieth day is also commended to us
in Scripture; and not only in the Gospel, by the fact that on that
day the Holy Spirit descended, but also in the books of the Old
Testament. For in them we learn, that after the Jews observed the
first passover with the slaying of the lamb as appointed, 50 days
intervened between that day and the day on which upon Mount Sinai
there was given to Moses the Law written with the finger of God;1827
| 1827 Ex. xii. xix. xx. xxxi. | and this
“finger of God” is in the Gospels most plainly declared to
signify the Holy Spirit: for where one evangelist quotes our
Lord’s words thus, “I with the finger of God cast out
devils,”1828
another
quotes them thus, “I cast out devils by the Spirit of God.”1829
Who would
not prefer the joy which these divine mysteries impart, when the
light of healing truth beams from them on the soul to all the
kingdoms of this world, even though these were held in perfect
prosperity and peace? May we not say, that as the two seraphim
answer each other in singing the praise of the Most High, “Holy,
holy, holy is the Lord God of Hosts,”1830
so the Old Testament and the New,
in perfect harmony, give forth their testimony to sacred truth? The
lamb is slain, the passover is celebrated, and after 50 days the
Law is given, which inspires fear, written by the finger of God.
Christ is slain, being led as a lamb to the slaughter as Isaiah
testifies;1831
the true
Passover is celebrated; and after 50 days is given the Holy Spirit,
who is the finger of God, and whose fruit is love, and who is
therefore opposed to men who seek their own, and consequently bear
a grievous yoke and heavy burden, and find no rest for their souls;
for love “seeketh not her own.”1832
Therefore there is no rest in the
unloving spirit of heretics, whom the apostle declares guilty of
conduct like that of the magicians of Pharaoh, saying, “Now as
Jannes and Jambres withstood Moses, so do these also resist the
truth: men of corrupt minds, reprobate concerning the faith. But
they shall proceed no further: for their folly shall be manifest to
all men, as theirs also was.”1833
For because through this
corruptness of mind they were utterly disquieted, they failed at
the third miracle, confessing that the Spirit of God which was in
Moses was opposed to them: for in owning their failure, they said,
“This is the finger of God.”1834
The Holy Spirit, who shows Himself
reconciled and gracious to the meek and lowly in heart, and gives
them rest, shows Himself an inexorable adversary to the proud and
haughty, and vexes them with disquiet. Of this disquiet those
despicable insects were a figure, under which Pharaoh’s magicians
owned themselves foiled, saying, “This is the finger of
God.”
30. Read the book of Exodus, and observe the
number of days between the first passover and the giving of the
Law. God speaks to Moses in the desert of Sinai on the first day of
the third month. Mark, then, this as one day of the month, and then
observe what (among other things) the Lord said on that day: “Go
unto the people, and sanctify them today and tomorrow, and let them
wash their clothes, and be ready against the third day; for the
third day the Lord will come down in the sight of all the people
upon Mount Sinai.”1835
The Law was accordingly given on
the third day of the month. Now reckon the days between the 14th
day of the first month, the day of the passover, and the 3d day of
the third month, and you have 17 days of the first month, 30 of the
second, and 3 of the third—50 in all. The Law in the Ark of the
Testimony represents holiness in the Lord’s body, by whose
resurrection is promised to us the future rest; for our receiving
of which, love is breathed into us by the Holy Spirit. But the
Spirit had not then been given, for Jesus had not yet been
glorified.1836
Hence that
prophetic song, “Arise, O Lord, into Thy rest, Thou and the ark
of Thy strength” [holiness, LXX.].1837
Where there is rest, there is
holiness. Wherefore we have now received a pledge of it, that we
may love and desire it. For to the rest belonging to the other
life, whereunto we are brought by that transition from this life of
which the passover is a symbol, all are now invited in the name of
the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
Chap. XVII.
31. Hence also, in the number of the large fishes
which our Lord after His resurrection, showing this new life,
commanded to be taken on the right side of the ship, there is found
the number 50 three times multiplied, with the addition of three
more [the symbol of the Trinity] to make the holy mystery more
apparent; and the disciples’ nets were not
broken,1838
because in that new life there
shall be no schism caused by the disquiet of heretics. Then [in
this new life] man, made perfect and at rest, purified in body and
in soul by the pure words of God, which are like silver purged from
its dross, seven times refined,1839
shall receive his reward, the
denarius;1840
so that
with that reward the numbers 10 and 7 meet in him. For in this
number [17] there is found, as in other numbers representing a
combination of symbols, a wonderful mystery. Nor is it without good
reason that the seventeenth Psalm1841
| 1841 The eighteenth in the English Bible. | is the only one which is given
complete in the book of Kings,1842
because it signifies that kingdom
in which we shall have no enemy. For its title is, “A Psalm of
David, in the day that the Lord delivered him from the hand of all
his enemies, and from the hand of Saul.” For of whom is David the
type, but of Him who, according to the flesh, was born of the seed
of David?1843
He in His
Church, that is, in His body, still endures the malice of enemies.
Therefore the words which from heaven fell upon the ear of that
persecutor whom Jesus slew by His voice, and whom He transformed
into a part of His body (as the food which we use becomes a part of
ourselves), were these, “Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou
Me?”1844
And when
shall this His body be finally delivered from enemies? Is it not
when the last enemy, Death, shall be destroyed? It is to that time
that the number of the 153 fishes pertains. For if the number 17
itself be the side of an arithmetical triangle,1845
| 1845 Such a triangle as this:
.
. .
. . .
. . . .
. . . . .
. . . . . .
. . . . . . .
. . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
| formed by placing above each other
rows of units, increasing in number from 1 to 17, the whole sum of
these units is 153: since 1 and 2 make 3; 3 and 3, 6; 6 and 4, 10;
10 and 5, 15; 15 and 6, 21; and so on: continue this up to 17, the
total is 153.
32. The celebration of Easter and Pentecost is
therefore most firmly based on Scripture. As to the observance of
the forty days before Easter, this has been confirmed by the
practice of the Church; as also the separation of the eight days of
the neophytes, in such order that the eighth of these coincides
with the first. The custom of singing the Alleluia on those 50 days
only in the Church is not universal; for in other places it is sung
also at various other times, but on these days it is sung
everywhere. Whether the custom of standing at prayer on these days
and on all the Lord’s days, is everywhere observed or not, I do
not know; nevertheless, I have told you what guides the Church in
this usage, and it is in my opinion sufficiently obvious.1846
| 1846 He refers to the significance of the standing
upright as an emblem of resurrection. |
Chap. XVIII.
33. As to the feet-washing, since the Lord
recommended this because of its being an example of that humility
which He came to teach, as He Himself afterwards explained, the
question has arisen at what time it is best, by literal performance
of this work, to give public instruction in the important duty
which it illustrates, and this time [of Lent] was suggested in
order that the lesson taught by it might make a deeper and more
serious impression. Many, however, have not accepted this as a
custom, lest it should be thought to belong to the ordinance of
baptism; and some have not hesitated to deny it any place among our
ceremonies. Some, however, in order to connect its observance with
the more sacred associations of this solemn season, and at the same
time to prevent its being confounded with baptism in any way, have
selected for this ceremony either the eighth day itself, or that on
which the third eighth day occurs, because of the great
significance of the number three in many holy mysteries.
34. I am surprised at your expressing a desire that
I should write anything in regard to those ceremonies which are
found different in different countries, because there is no
necessity for my doing this; and, moreover, one most excellent rule
must be observed in regard to these customs, when they do not in
any way oppose either true doctrine or sound morality, but contain
some incentives to the better life, viz., that wherever we see them
observed, or know them to be established, we should not only
refrain from finding fault with them, but even recommend them by
our approval and imitation, unless restrained by fear of doing
greater harm than good by this course, through the infirmity of
others. We are not, however, to be restrained by this, if more good
is to be expected from our consenting with those who are zealous
for the ceremony, than loss to be feared from our displeasing those
who protest against it. In such a case we ought by all means to
adopt it, especially if it be something in defence of which
Scripture can be alleged: as in the singing of hymns and psalms,
for which we have on record both the example and the precepts of
the Lord and of His apostles. In this religious exercise, so useful for inducing
a devotional frame of mind and inflaming the strength of love to
God, there is diversity of usage, and in Africa the members of the
Church are rather too indifferent in regard to it; on which account
the Donstists reproach us with our grave chanting of the divine
songs of the prophets in our churches, while they inflame their
passions in their revels by the singing of psalms of human
composition, which rouse them like the stirring notes of the
trumpet on the battle-field. But when brethren are assembled in the
church, why should not the time be devoted to singing of sacred
songs, excepting of course while reading or preaching1847
| 1847 Preaching. The word in the original is
“disputatur,”—something much more lively and
entertaining. | is going
on, or while the presiding minister prays aloud, or the united
prayer of the congregation is led by the deacon’s voice? At the
other intervals not thus occupied, I do not see what could be a
more excellent, useful, and holy exercise for a Christian
congregation.
Chap. XIX.1848
| 1848 I have taken the liberty here of putting the
beginning of the
Chapter and paragraph a sentence further
on than in the Benedictine edition, so as to finish in sec. 34 the
remarks on psalm-singing. |
35. I cannot, however, sanction with my approbation
those ceremonies which are departures from the custom of the
Church, and are instituted on the pretext of being symbolical of
some holy mystery; although, for the sake of avoiding offence to
the piety of some and the pugnacity of others, I do not venture to
condemn severely many things of this kind. But this I deplore, and
have too much occasion to do so, that comparatively little
attention is paid to many of the most wholesome rites which
Scripture has enjoined; and that so many false notions everywhere
prevail, that more severe rebuke would be administered to a man who
should touch the ground with his feet bare during the octaves
(before his baptism), than to one who drowned his intellect in
drunkenness. My opinion therefore is, that wherever it is possible,
all those things should be abolished without hesitation, which
neither have warrant in Holy Scripture, nor are found to have been
appointed by councils of bishops, nor are confirmed by the practice
of the universal Church, but are so infinitely various, according
to the different customs of different places, that it is with
difficulty, if at all, that the reasons which guided men in
appointing them can be discovered. For even although nothing be
found, perhaps, in which they are against the true faith; yet the
Christian religion, which God in His mercy made free, appointing to
her sacraments very few in number, and very easily observed, is by
these burdensome ceremonies so oppressed, that the condition of the
Jewish Church itself is preferable: for although they have not
known the time of their freedom, they are subjected to burdens
imposed by the law of God, not by the vain conceits of men. The
Church of God, however, being meanwhile so constituted as to
enclose much chaff and many tares, bears with many things; yet if
anything be contrary to faith or to holy life, she does not approve
of it either by silence or by practice.
Chap. XX.
36. Accordingly, that which you wrote as to
certain brethren abstaining from the use of animal food, on the
ground of its being ceremonially unclean, is most clearly contrary
to the faith and to sound doctrine. If I were to enter on anything
like a full discussion of this matter, it might be thought by some
that there was some obscurity in the precepts of the apostle in
this matter whereas he, among many other things which he said on
this subject, expressed his abhorrence of this opinion of the
heretics in these words: “Now the Spirit speaketh expressly, that
in the latter times some shall depart from the faith, giving heed
to seducing spirits and doctrines of devils; speaking lies in
hypocrisy; having their conscience seared with a hot iron;
forbidding to marry, and commanding to abstain from meats, which
God hath created to be received with thanksgiving of them which
believe and know the truth. For every creature of God is good, and
nothing to be refused, if it be received with thanksgiving: for it
is sanctified by the word of God and prayer.”1849
Again, in another place, he says,
concerning these things: “Unto the pure all things are pure: but
unto them that are defiled and unbelieving is nothing pure; but
even their mind and conscience is defiled.”1850
Read the rest for yourself, and
read these passages to others—to as many as you can—in order
that, seeing that they have been called to liberty, they may not
make void the grace of God toward them; only let them not use their
liberty for an occasion to serve the flesh: let them not refuse to
practise the purpose of curbing carnal appetite, abstinence from
some kinds of food, on the pretext that it is unlawful to do so
under the promptings of superstition or unbelief.
37. As to those who read futurity by taking at
random a text from the pages of the Gospels, although it is better
that they should do this than go to consult spirits of divination,
nevertheless it is, in my opinion, a censurable practice to try to
turn to secular affairs and the vanity of this life those divine
oracles which were intended to teach us concerning the higher
life.
Chap. XXI.
38. If you do not consider that I have now written
enough in answer to your questions, you must have little knowledge
of my capacities or of my engagements. For so far am I from being,
as you have thought, acquainted with everything, that I read
nothing in your letter with more sadness than this statement, both
because it is most manifestly untrue, and because I am surprised
that you should not be aware, that not only are many things unknown
to me in countless other departments, but that even in the
Scriptures themselves the things which I do not know are many more
than the things which I know. But I cherish a hope in the name of
Christ, which is not without its reward, because I have not only
believed the testimony of my God that “on these two commandments
hang all the Law and the Prophets;”1851
but I have myself proved it, and
daily prove it, by experience. For there is no holy mystery, and no
difficult passage of the word of God, in which, when it is opened
up to me, I do not find these same commandments: for “the end of
the commandment is charity, out of a pure heart, and of a good
conscience, and of faith unfeigned;”1852
and “love is the fulfilling of
the law.”1853
39. I beseech you therefore also, my dearly
beloved, whether studying these or other writings, so to read and
so to learn as to bear in mind what hath been most truly said,
“Knowledge puffeth up, but charity edifieth;”1854
but
charity vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up. Let knowledge
therefore be used as a kind of scaffolding by which may be erected
the building of charity, which shall endure for ever when knowledge
faileth.1855
Knowledge,
if applied as a means to charity, is most useful; but apart from
this high end, it has been proved not only superfluous, but even
pernicious. I know, however, how holy meditation keeps you safe
under the shadow of the wings of our God. These things I have
stated, though briefly, because I know that this same charity of
yours, which “vaunteth not itself,” will prompt you to lend and
read this letter to many.
E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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