The City of God, Volume IAugustine, of Hippo, Saint
ReligionChristian
The City of God, Volume I
Augustine, of Hippo, Saint
Apologetics -- Early works to 1800; Kingdom of God -- Early works to 1800
however, who was his pupil, perceived that a divine mind was the
productive cause of all things which we see, and said that all the
various kinds of things, according to their several modes and species,
were produced out of an infinite matter consisting of homogeneous
particles, but by the efficiency of a divine mind. Diogenes, also,
another pupil of Anaximenes, said that a certain air was the original
substance of things out of which all things were produced, but that
it was possessed of a divine reason, without which nothing could be
produced from it. Anaxagoras was succeeded by his disciple Archelaus,
who also thought that all things consisted of homogeneous particles,
of which each particular thing was made, but that those particles were
pervaded by a divine mind, which perpetually energized all the eternal
bodies, namely, those particles, so that they are alternately united
and separated. Socrates, the master of Plato, is said to have been the
disciple of Archelaus; and on Plato's account it is that I have given
this brief historical sketch of the whole history of these schools.
3. _Of the Socratic philosophy._
Socrates is said to have been the first who directed the entire
effort of philosophy to the correction and regulation of manners, all
who went before him having expended their greatest efforts in the
investigation of physical, that is, natural phenomena. However, it
seems to me that it cannot be certainly discovered whether Socrates
did this because he was wearied of obscure and uncertain things,
and so wished to direct his mind to the discovery of something
manifest and certain, which was necessary in order to the obtaining
of a blessed life,--that one great object toward which the labour,
vigilance, and industry of all philosophers seem to have been
directed,--or whether (as some yet more favourable to him suppose)
he did it because he was unwilling that minds defiled with earthly
desires should essay to raise themselves upward to divine things. For
he saw that the causes of things were sought for by them,--which
causes he believed to be ultimately reducible to nothing else than
the will of the one true and supreme God,--and on this account he
thought they could only be comprehended by a purified mind; and
therefore that all diligence ought to be given to the purification of
the life by good morals, in order that the mind, delivered from the
depressing weight of lusts, might raise itself upward by its native
vigour to eternal things, and might, with purified understanding,
contemplate that nature which is incorporeal and unchangeable light,
where live the causes of all created natures. It is evident, however,
that he hunted out and pursued, with a wonderful pleasantness of
style and argument, and with a most pointed and insinuating urbanity,
the foolishness of ignorant men, who thought that they knew this
or that,--sometimes confessing his own ignorance, and sometimes
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