The City of God, Volume IIAugustine, of Hippo, Saint
ReligionChristian
The City of God, Volume II
Augustine, of Hippo, Saint
Apologetics -- Early works to 1800; Kingdom of God -- Early works to 1800
If these emotions and affections, arising as they do from the love
of what is good and from a holy charity, are to be called vices,
then let us allow these emotions which are truly vices to pass under
the name of virtues. But since these affections, when they are
exercised in a becoming way, follow the guidance of right reason,
who will dare to say that they are diseases or vicious passions?
Wherefore even the Lord Himself, when He condescended to lead a
human life in the form of a slave, had no sin whatever, and yet
exercised these emotions where He judged they should be exercised.
For as there was in Him a true human body and a true human soul, so
was there also a true human emotion. When, therefore, we read in the
Gospel that the hard-heartedness of the Jews moved Him to sorrowful
indignation,[71] that He said, "I am glad for your sakes, to the
intent ye may believe,"[72] that when about to raise Lazarus He
even shed tears,[73] that He earnestly desired to eat the passover
with His disciples,[74] that as His passion drew near His soul was
sorrowful,[75] these emotions are certainly not falsely ascribed
to Him. But as He became man when it pleased Him, so, in the grace
of His definite purpose, when it pleased Him He experienced those
emotions in His human soul.
But we must further make the admission, that even when these affections
are well regulated, and according to God's will, they are peculiar
to this life, not to that future life we look for, and that often we
yield to them against our will. And thus sometimes we weep in spite
of ourselves, being carried beyond ourselves, not indeed by culpable
desire, but by praiseworthy charity. In us, therefore, these affections
arise from human infirmity; but it was not so with the Lord Jesus, for
even His infirmity was the consequence of His power. But so long as we
wear the infirmity of this life, we are rather worse men than better if
we have none of these emotions at all. For the apostle vituperated and
abominated some who, as he said, were "without natural affection."[76]
The sacred Psalmist also found fault with those of whom he said, "I
looked for some to lament with me, and there was none."[77] For to
be quite free from pain while we are in this place of misery is only
purchased, as one of this world's literati perceived and remarked,[78]
at the price of blunted sensibilities both of mind and body. And
therefore that which the Greeks call ἀπάθεια, and what the Latins would
call, if their language would allow them, "impassibilitas," if it be
taken to mean an impassibility of spirit and not of body, or, in other
words, a freedom from those emotions which are contrary to reason
and disturb the mind, then it is obviously a good and most desirable
quality, but it is not one which is attainable in this life. For the
words of the apostle are the confession, not of the common herd, but
of the eminently pious, just, and holy men: "If we say we have no sin,
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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