Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, First Series • VOLUME 3
Augustine — Trinity, Doctrinal & Moral Treatises
SECTION 81
Chapter 2.--No One at All Loves Things Unknown.
[723] Wine. Chapter 2.--No One at All Loves Things Unknown. 4. No studious person, then, no inquisitive person, loves things he does not know, even while he is urgent with the most vehement desire to know what he does not know. For he either knows already generically what he loves, and longs to know it also in some individual …
1,214 wordsSECTION 82Chapter 4.--How the Mind Knows Itself, Not in Part, But as a Whole.
Chapter 4.--How the Mind Knows Itself, Not in Part, But as a Whole. 6. What then shall we say? Does that which knows itself in part, not know itself in part? But it is absurd to say, that it does not as a whole know what it knows. I do not say, it knows wholly; but what it knows, it as a whole knows. When therefore it knows any…
1,231 wordsSECTION 83Chapter 6.--The Opinion Which the Mind Has of Itself is Deceitful.
Chapter 6.--The Opinion Which the Mind Has of Itself is Deceitful. 8. But the mind errs, when it so lovingly and intimately connects itself with these images, as even to consider itself to be something of the same kind. For so it is conformed to them to some extent, not by being this, but by thinking it is so: not that it think…
1,110 wordsSECTION 84Chapter 8.--How the Soul Inquires into Itself. Whence Comes the Error of the Soul Concerning Itself.
Chapter 8.--How the Soul Inquires into Itself. Whence Comes the Error of the Soul Concerning Itself. 11. It is then a wonderful question, in what manner the soul seeks and finds itself; at what it aims in order to seek, or whither it comes, that it may come into or find out. For what is so much in the mind as the mind itself? B…
763 wordsSECTION 85Chapter 10.--Every Mind Knows Certainly Three Things Concerning Itself--That It Understands, that It Is, and that It Lives.
Chapter 10.--Every Mind Knows Certainly Three Things Concerning Itself--That It Understands, that It Is, and that It Lives. 13. Let it not then add anything to that which it knows itself to be, when it is bidden to know itself. For it knows, at any rate, that this is said to itself; namely, to the self that is, and that lives, …
2,486 wordsSECTION 86Chapter 12.--The Mind is an Image of the Trinity in Its Own Memory, and Understanding, and Will.
Chapter 12.--The Mind is an Image of the Trinity in Its Own Memory, and Understanding, and Will. 19. Are we, then, now to go upward, with whatever strength of purpose we may, to that chiefest and highest essence, of which the human mind is an inadequate image, yet an image? Or are these same three things to be yet more distinct…
2,337 wordsSECTION 874. But if any perhaps attend to what I am about to mention, they will find no such trouble in this inquiry. Commonly, when we have looked fo
4. But if any perhaps attend to what I am about to mention, they will find no such trouble in this inquiry. Commonly, when we have looked for some little time at a light, and then shut our eyes, there seem to play before our eyes certain bright colors variously changing themselves, and shining less and less until they wholly cea…
896 wordsSECTION 88Chapter 3.--The Unity of the Three Takes Place in Thought, Viz Of Memory, of Ternal Vision, and of Will Combining Both.
Chapter 3.--The Unity of the Three Takes Place in Thought, Viz Of Memory, of Ternal Vision, and of Will Combining Both. 6. The rational soul, however, lives in a degenerate fashion, when it lives according to a trinity of the outer man; that is, when it applies to those things which form the bodily sense from without, not a pra…
746 wordsSECTION 89Chapter 4.--How This Unity Comes to Pass.
Chapter 4.--How This Unity Comes to Pass. 7. But if that will which moves to and fro, hither and thither, the eye that is to be informed, and unites it when formed, shall have wholly converged to the inward phantasy, and shall have absolutely turned the mind's eye from the presence of the bodies which lie around the senses, and…
1,803 wordsSECTION 90Chapter 6.--Of What Kind We are to Reckon the Rest (Requies), and End (Finis), of the Will in Vision.
Chapter 6.--Of What Kind We are to Reckon the Rest (Requies), and End (Finis), of the Will in Vision. 10. Perhaps we can rightly call vision the end and rest of the will, only with respect to this one object [namely, the bodily thing that is visible]. For it will not will nothing else merely because it sees something which it i…
1,635 wordsSECTION 91Chapter 8.--Different Modes of Conceiving.
Chapter 8.--Different Modes of Conceiving. But since the eye of the mind cannot look at all things together, in one glance, which the memory retains, these trinities of thought alternate in a series of withdrawals and successions, and so that trinity becomes most innumerably numerous; and yet not infinite, if it pass not beyond…
1,582 wordsSECTION 92Chapter 9.--Species is Produced by Species in Succession.
Chapter 9.--Species is Produced by Species in Succession. 16. In this arrangement, then, while we begin from the bodily species and arrive finally at the species which comes to be in the intuition (contuitu) of the concipient, we find four species born, as it were, step by step one from the other, the second from the first, the…
1,088 wordsSECTION 93Chapter 11.--Number, Weight, Measure.
Chapter 11.--Number, Weight, Measure. 18. But because those things which are impressed on the memory singly, can be conceived according to number, measure seems to belong to the memory, but number to the vision; because, although the multiplicity of such visions is innumerable, yet a limit not to be transgressed is prescribed f…
707 wordsSECTION 94Chapter 2.--Man Alone of Animate Creatures Perceives the Eternal Reasons of Things Pertaining to the Body.
Chapter 2.--Man Alone of Animate Creatures Perceives the Eternal Reasons of Things Pertaining to the Body. 2. And the beasts, too, are able both to perceive things corporeal from without, through the senses of the body, and to fix them in the memory, and remember them, and in them to seek after things suitable, and shun things …
928 wordsSECTION 95Chapter 5.--The Opinion Which Devises an Image of the Trinity in the Marriage of Male and Female, and in Their Offspring.
Chapter 5.--The Opinion Which Devises an Image of the Trinity in the Marriage of Male and Female, and in Their Offspring. 5. Accordingly they do not seem to me to advance a probable opinion, who lay it down that a trinity of the image of God in three persons, so far as regards human nature, can so be discovered as to be complet…
2,697 wordsSECTION 9611. For that the Apostle Paul, when speaking outwardly of the sex of male and female, figured the mystery of some more hidden truth, may be
11. For that the Apostle Paul, when speaking outwardly of the sex of male and female, figured the mystery of some more hidden truth, may be understood from this, that when he says in another place that she is a widow indeed who is desolate, without children and nephews, and yet that she ought to trust in God, and to continue in …
831 wordsSECTION 97Chapter 8.--Turning Aside from the Image of God.
Chapter 8.--Turning Aside from the Image of God. 13. A common nature, therefore, is recognized in their minds, but in their bodies a division of that one mind itself is figured. As we ascend, then, by certain steps of thought within, along the succession of the parts of the mind, there where something first meets us which is no…
848 wordsSECTION 98Chapter 11.--The Image of the Beast in Man.
Chapter 11.--The Image of the Beast in Man. 16. For as a snake does not creep on with open steps, but advances by the very minutest efforts of its several scales; so the slippery motion of falling away [from what is good] takes possession of the negligent only gradually, and beginning from a perverse desire for the likeness of …
1,491 wordsSECTION 99Chapter 13.--The Opinion of Those Who Have Thought that the Mind Was Signified by the Man, the Bodily Sense by the Woman.
Chapter 13.--The Opinion of Those Who Have Thought that the Mind Was Signified by the Man, the Bodily Sense by the Woman. 20. Nor does it escape me, that some who before us were eminent defenders of the Catholic faith and expounders of the word of God, while they looked for these two things in one human being, whose entire soul…
2,263 wordsSECTION 100Book XIII.
25. If therefore this is the right distinction between wisdom and knowledge, that the intellectual cognizance of eternal things belongs to wisdom, but the rational cognizance of temporal things to knowledge, it is not difficult to judge which is to be preferred or postponed to which. But if we must employ some other distinction …
2,584 wordsSECTION 101[792] John i. 1-14
[792] John i. 1-14 [793] Ps. xiv. 1 [794] Heb. xi. 1 Chapter 2.--Faith a Thing of the Heart, Not of the Body; How It is Common and One and the Same in All Believers. The Faith of Believers is One, No Otherwise than the Will of Those Who Will is One. 5. But faith, of which we are compelled, by reason of the arrangement of our…
768 wordsSECTION 102Chapter 3.--Some Desires Being the Same in All, are Known to Each. The Poet Ennius.
Chapter 3.--Some Desires Being the Same in All, are Known to Each. The Poet Ennius. 6. There is, indeed, so closely conspiring a harmony in the same nature living and using reason, that although one knows not what the other wills, yet there are some wills of all which are also known to each; and although each man does not know …
759 wordsSECTION 103Chapter 4.--The Will to Possess Blessedness is One in All, But the Variety of Wills is Very Great Concerning that Blessedness Itself.
Chapter 4.--The Will to Possess Blessedness is One in All, But the Variety of Wills is Very Great Concerning that Blessedness Itself. 7. It is wonderful, however, since the will to obtain and retain blessedness is one in all, whence comes, on the other hand, such a variety and diversity of wills concerning that blessedness itse…
1,170 wordsSECTION 104Chapter 6.--Why, When All Will to Be Blessed, that is Rather Chosen by Which One Withdraws from Being So.
Chapter 6.--Why, When All Will to Be Blessed, that is Rather Chosen by Which One Withdraws from Being So. 9. Since, then, a blessed life consists of these two things, and is known to all, and dear to all; what can we think to be the cause why, when they cannot have both, men choose, out of these two, to have all things that the…
1,430 wordsSECTION 105Chapter 8.--Blessedness Cannot Exist Without Immortality.
Chapter 8.--Blessedness Cannot Exist Without Immortality. 11. As, therefore, all men will to be blessed, certainly, if they will truly, they will also to be immortal; for otherwise they could not be blessed. And further, if questioned also concerning immortality, as before concerning blessedness, all reply that they will it. Bu…
2,063 wordsSECTION 106Chapter 11.--A Difficulty, How We are Justified in the Blood of the Son of God.
Chapter 11.--A Difficulty, How We are Justified in the Blood of the Son of God. 15. But what is meant by "justified in His blood?" What power is there in this blood, I beseech you, that they who believe should be justified in it? And what is meant by "being reconciled by the death of His Son?" Was it indeed so, that when God th…
1,028 wordsSECTION 107Chapter 13.--Man Was to Be Rescued from the Power of the Devil, Not by Power, But by Righteousness.
Chapter 13.--Man Was to Be Rescued from the Power of the Devil, Not by Power, But by Righteousness. 17. But the devil was to be overcome, not by the power of God, but by His righteousness. For what is more powerful than the Omnipotent? Or what creature is there of which the power can be compared to the power of the Creator? But…
778 wordsSECTION 108Chapter 14.--The Unobligated Death of Christ Has Freed Those Who Were Liable to Death.
Chapter 14.--The Unobligated Death of Christ Has Freed Those Who Were Liable to Death. 18. What, then, is the righteousness by which the devil was conquered? What, except the righteousness of Jesus Christ? And how was he conquered? Because, when he found in Him nothing worthy of death, yet he slew Him. And certainly it is just,…
2,530 wordsSECTION 109Chapter 17.--Other Advantages of the Incarnation.
[834] 1 Cor. x. 13 [835] C. 2. [836] Rom. viii. 28-32 [837] Wisd. xii. 18 [838] Rom. v. 8, 12 Chapter 17.--Other Advantages of the Incarnation. 22. There are many other things also in the incarnation of Christ, displeasing as it is to the proud, that are to be observed and thought of advantageously. And one of them is, tha…
1,133 wordsSECTION 110Chapter 19.--What in the Incarnate Word Belongs to Knowledge, What to Wisdom.
Chapter 19.--What in the Incarnate Word Belongs to Knowledge, What to Wisdom. 24. And all these things which the Word made flesh did and bare for us in time and place, belong, according to the distinction which we have undertaken to demonstrate, to knowledge, not to wisdom. And as the Word is without time and without place, it …
870 wordsSECTION 111Chapter 20.--What Has Been Treated of in This Book. How We Have Reached by Steps to a Certain Trinity, Which is Found in Practical Knowledge and True Faith.
Chapter 20.--What Has Been Treated of in This Book. How We Have Reached by Steps to a Certain Trinity, Which is Found in Practical Knowledge and True Faith. 25. Now, therefore, let us see what this prolix discourse has effected, what it has gathered, whereto it has reached. It belongs to all men to will to be blessed; yet all m…
1,177 wordsSECTION 112Book XIV.
Book XIV. ------------------------ The true wisdom of man is treated of; and it is shown that the image of God, which man is in respect to his mind, is not placed properly in transitory things, as in memory, understanding, and love, whether of faith itself as existing in time, or even of the mind as busied with itself, but in …
1,210 wordsSECTION 113Chapter 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 of God.
Chapter 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 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;" [869] undoubtedly, so long as …
1,267 wordsSECTION 114Chapter 4.--The Image of God is to Be Sought in the Immortality of the Rational Soul. How a Trinity is Demonstrated in the Mind.
Chapter 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, i.e., the rational or intellectu…
1,074 wordsSECTION 115Chapter 6.--How a Kind of Trinity Exists in the Mind Thinking of Itself. What is the Part of Thought in This Trinity.
Chapter 6.--How a Kind of Trinity Exists in the Mind Thinking of Itself. What is the Part of Thought in This Trinity. The function of thought, however, is so great, that not even the mind itself can, so to say, place itself in its own sight, except when it thinks of itself; and hence it is so far the case, that nothing is in th…
946 wordsSECTION 116Chapter 7.--The Thing is Made Plain by an Example. In What Way the Matter is Handled in Order to Help the Reader.
Chapter 7.--The Thing is Made Plain by an Example. In What Way the Matter is Handled in Order to Help the Reader. Wherefore let us consider more carefully that example which we have adduced, wherein it was shown that not knowing a thing is different from not thinking [conceiving] of it; and that it may so happen that a man know…
1,025 wordsSECTION 117Chapter 8.--The Trinity Which is the Image of God is Now to Be Sought in the Noblest Part of the Mind.
Chapter 8.--The Trinity Which is the Image of God is Now to Be Sought in the Noblest Part of the Mind. 11. But we have come now to that argument in which we have undertaken to consider the noblest part of the human mind, by which it knows or can know God, in order that we may find in it the image of God. For although the human …
1,001 wordsSECTION 118Chapter 9.--Whether Justice and the Other Virtues Cease to Exist in the Future Life.
Chapter 9.--Whether Justice and the Other Virtues Cease to Exist in the Future Life. 12. There is, however, some question raised, whether the virtues likewise by which one lives well in this present mortality, seeing that they themselves begin also to be in the mind, which was a mind none the less when it existed before without…
1,059 wordsSECTION 119Chapter 11.--Whether Memory is Also of Things Present.
Chapter 11.--Whether Memory is Also of Things Present. 14. But some one will say, That is not memory by which the mind, which is ever present to itself, is affirmed to remember itself; for memory is of things past, not of things present. For there are some, and among them Cicero, who, in treating of the virtues, have divided pr…
1,028 wordsSECTION 120Chapter 13.--How Any One Can Forget and Remember God.
Chapter 13.--How Any One Can Forget and Remember God. 17. Let us take an instance for the purpose from visible things. Somebody whom you do not recognize, says to you, You know me; and in order to remind you, tells you where, when, and how he became known to you; and if, after the mention of every sign by which you might be rec…
2,597 wordsSource & rights
Historical text source: Christian Classics Ethereal Library. The downloaded text itself records Public Domain.