The life of S. Augustine. The first part: Written by himself in the first ten books of his Confessions faithfully translated.

CHAP. VII.

Their questions that stumbled him; and the solutions of them: in the three Chapters following.

FOr meanwhile, that which was true in thy word was not truly understood by me; and their seeming a∣cutenesse moved me to assent to those silly deceivers, when they put such questions unto me; Whence came E∣vill?† [ 1] And, * whether God were concluded within a [ 2] corporeal shape? And had hair and nails? And * whe∣ther they were to be accounted righteous men, that, at [ 3] one time, had many Wives? and those who slew men? and sacrificed living creatures? With which things my ignorance was much troubled; and travelling away from Truth, thought still, I marched toward it. For, ignorant I was, that Evil was a privation of Good, even to the furthest extent thereof: any thing lesse than which good, hath at all no real being. Which how could I di∣scern, [ 1] whose sight, * of my eyes, extended only to a body; * of my mind, to a phantasme.

Again; I knew not God to be a Spirit, and not such a thing, whose parts were extended in length and breadth, [ 2] and whose being was bigness: for a bigness is less in a part, than in its whole, and (though supposed infinite) is lesse in some portion of it included within a certain space, than in its infinitude; and is not all of it every where, as a spirit, as God, is. And what there could be in us like unto God, and whether we were rightly said in the Scriptures to be made after his image, I was utterly ignorant.

And again; I knew not, that true and interior iustice, not judging out of customs, but out of the perfect Law of [ 3] the Almighty God; by which were variously fashioned the manners of all Countries and times, according to the exigence of those times, and Countreys; when as it,

meanwhile, in all times, and all places, remaineth but one; not, at any time diverse, or any where otherwise: According to which, Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, and Moses, and David, were righteous, and commended by God, though deemed ungodly by silly men, judging ac∣cording to their own short day, and measuring, by a little span of their own fashions, the universal customes of all mankind; As if one in an Armory, not knowing what suted to every member, would cover his head with Greaves, and his feet with an Helmet, and then murmur at his ill accoutrement: Or, when traffick is forbidden for an afternoon, a shop-keeper should rage, that he was not permitted to sell his wares, because he might only do this in the morning: Or, a Servant in a house, seeing another take something in hand, which perchance the cup-bearer was forbid to meddle with, or something done behind the stables, not sufferable in the Dining-room, should chafe, that in one dwelling, and one fami∣ly, the same thing, to every one, in every place was not allowed. Even such are they, who strange at it, when they hear; that righteous men in one age might do something, which in another, righteous men might not; and that God had commanded one thing to these, to those another, for reasons temporal, whilst still the same eternal justice is obeyed by both: when as yet in one man, and on one day, and in one family, they see several things sute to the several members; something formerly lawful, after an hour not so: some thing in one corner permitted, or also commanded, that is in another forbidden & punished. Doth the rule of justice then swerve sometimes and vary from it self? No. But the times, over which it presides, run not constant, and even, for they are (fleeting) times. But men, whose dayes are few upon the earth, being, by their short sense, unable to con∣nex & reconcile the causes unexperienced of past ages, and forreign Nations, with those of their own tryed by them, and yet well discerning in one body, or day, or house, what members, what minutes, what roomes and persons every thing becometh, are offended in those, in these well satisfied.

These things then I knew not, observed not; on every side they beat upon my sight, I regarded them not. And I knew when I composed Sonnets I might not place every foot every where, but in several kinds of verse, in a di∣verse manner; and, in any one verse, not in all places

the same foot; yet the art, by which I composed, in its capacity comprehended all these varieties at once. And I did not behold, that that justice which good and holy men obeyed, did farr more excellently and more sub∣limely together at once in fold all those things, which it had severally commanded, and was in no part varied, and yet through so varying times did distribute and en∣joyn, not all at once, but to each their proprieties. And thus (Blind-man) I censured those holy Patriarchs, not only managing the present affairs, as God commanded and inspired them; but also thereby, foreshewing the future, as he revealed these unto them.

†

Notes

• †

  Suppo∣sed Ten en•• of Chri∣stianity. See Gen. 1.26, 27. Gen. 16.2 Gen. 22.10.
• 1 Cor. 4.3.
• †

  Allud∣ing to the Israelites sacrificing of Beasts, and Abraham his Son, and other ceremonies, that were typicall.