City of God (Penguin Classics) (6 page)
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Authors: Saint Augustine
On the other hand no mere
hypothesis
of science was accepted by him in preference to an account in the Bible. He believed that one could also follow the Bible as an historical account:
Now in my opinion it is certainly a complete mistake to suppose that no narrative of events in this type of literature (i.e. the Bible) has any significance beyond the purely historical record; but it is equally rash to maintain that every single statement in those books is a complex of allegorical meanings (
Bk XVII, 4
).
The flood of Eastern religions into the West and the mainly spiritualist character of the dominant Neoplatonist philosophy – not to say the theurgic beliefs and practices associated with Porphyry and, especially, Iamblichus and others – had a markedly regressive effect in relation to scientific matters which Christians, including Augustine, shared with their contemporaries. Thus whereas the theory of the spherical nature of the earth put forward by Eudoxus of Cnidus (c. 408–337
B.C
.) was accepted by Plato and Aristotle and their successors down to the second century
A.D
., there was a reversion in the third and fourth centuries
A.D.
to the earlier Homeric and Biblical theory of the earth as a flat disc surrounded by Ocean. And so whereas Plato and Cicero accepted the existence of the antipodes, Augustine demurred (
Bk XVI, 9
). He is careful, however, to indicate the
possibility
that the world might be a suspended sphere, and that the existence of the antipodes was simply not proved
rationally
. His reason for rejecting the theory of the antipodes was that it seemed to threaten the unity of the human race – which was the teaching of the Bible.
Augustine, therefore, found himself from time to time amongst those for whom the marvels related in Pliny the Elder’s
Natural
History
were science. Hence there is a fair share of marvels, metamorphoses and monstrosities to be found in the City
of God:
they should be placed – with the demons – in the context of their times. Nevertheless his position
vis-à-vis
science was clear and acted upon:
Whatever the [scientists] themselves can
demonstrate
by true proofs about the nature of things, we can show not to be contrary to our scriptures. But whatever they
advance
[i.e. as an hypothesis] in any of their books that is contrary to our scriptures… we should either indicate a solution or believe without hesitation that it is false (
De Genesi ad Litteram
1, XXI, 41).
He shared with the Roman world the belief that the end of philosophy was happiness. Happiness was possible in this life, but only by future hope rather than present reality (
Bk XIX, 20
). Our lives can be led in peace if we observe due order in submission:
The peace of the body… is a tempering of the component parts in duly ordered proportion; the peace of the irrational soul is a duly ordered repose of the appetites; the peace of the rational soul is the duly ordered agreement of cognition and action. The peace of the body and soul is the duly ordered life and health of a living creature; peace between mortal man and God is an ordered obedience, in faith, in subjection to an everlasting law; peace between men is an ordered agreement of mind with mind; the peace of a home is the ordered agreement among those who live together about giving and obeying orders; the peace of the Heavenly City is a perfectly ordered and perfectly harmonious fellowship in the enjoyment of God, and a mutual fellowship in God; the peace of the whole universe is the tranquility of order and order is the arrangement of things equal and unequal in a pattern which assigns to each its proper position (
Bk XIX, 13
).
9
Augustine’s idea of philosophy is one that he attributes to Plato: ‘to philosophize is to love God’ (
Bk VIII, 8
). For him philosophy is affective – even mystical. If the end of philosophy is happiness, its agent is the will. Turning to God or turning away from God is the first and final divide. The expression of philosophy is love; its explanation likewise is love: Augustine’s absorption in the idea of love must arise from his temperament which he so passionately delineates in his
Confessions
. He is so insistent on the value of even human love that he refuses to follow the distinction between it, ‘charity’ and ‘friendship’ maintained by other Church Fathers (
Bk XIV, 7
).
Some, therefore, have concluded that Augustine was not a phlosopher in the strict sense of the word. Although he treats philosophically of problems throughout the whole range of traditional philosophy – time, space, matter, form, knowledge, problems in psychology both rational and experimental, happiness, virtue and so on – he would not have claimed to be a philosopher in the strict sense. He was more concerned to know and love God and to bring his fellowmen to do the same.
The theological content of the
City of God
is found in his handling of Scripture. He shows how the Old Testament, which he follows in the main in the Septuagint version, is one long prophecy and symbolization of Christ’s coming. Its prophecies, which he repeatedly calls ‘oracles’, are superior in every way to the oracles of the pagans, especially to the oracles consulted by Porphyry. Its miracles and the Christian miracles since Christ’s coming are likewise superior. One has to accept that Augustine felt it necessary in his apostolate to beat the pagans at their own game.
The great problems of creation, of the creation and fall of the angels, of predestination, of evil, of the last judgement, of eternal punishment, of eternal felicity, of the vision of God and many other questions come up for treatment – on the basis of the evidence of Scripture – in the parts of the
City of God
dealing with the origin (Bks XI-XIV) and the destinies (Bks XIX-XXII) of the two cities. The intervening books give a history of man’s progress and development from the creation to the coming of Christ. It is based on the rather legendary
Chronicle
of Eusebius and the Bible itself, and in fact deals mainly with the Assyrian and Roman Empires.
Neither in Books XV-XVIII of the
City of God
, nor elsewhere in the work, is there any serious attempt at a philosophy of history other than his repudiation of the Platonic theory of the cycle of existences and the substitution for it of the linear progress implicit in the Christian view of the creation, fall, redemption and final destiny. More might be said for Augustine’s having some kind of a theology of history, but this means little more than the view of history as given in the Scriptures, that is the prophesying of redemption and its fulfilment.
10
In addition to the topics we have already seen, Augustine covers a
wide range of other subjects in the course of the City
of Cod
, including beauty, slavery, war and a discussion rather similar to Descartes’s ‘I think, therefore I am’. It must be added that the treatment of such topics in the
Ciy of God
is best considered alongside their treatment in other works by Augustine.
The style of the
City of God
approaches very nearly to the classical ideal as seen in Cicero. While it lacks, except on occasion, the passion and rhetoric of the shorter and more personal
Confessions
, it is on the whole in the grand manner; but for all that it shows great variation in the treatment of its different ideas. It is, perhaps, the last great prose work of classical Rome.
JOHN O’MEARA
City of God
S
EVERAL
times in his writings Augustine tells us how the
City of God
is to be divided, and what is the leading topic of each division. A full consecutive account is to be found in a letter written in the last years of his life, accompanying the gift of a manuscript of the work, to the layman Firmus. This letter was first noted by the Benedictine scholar Dom C. Lambot, of Maredsous Abbey, Belgium, and published by him in
Revue Bénédictine
, vol. LI, nos. 2–3 (1939). In it Augustine writes as follows:
There are XXII notebooks (
quaterniones
), too many to combine in a single volume. If you wish to make two volumes (
codices
) you must so divide them that there are ten in one and twelve in the other. If you want more than two, then you must make five volumes. The first is to contain the five first books (
libros
), in which I write against those who maintain that the worship of the gods – I would rather say, of the evil spirits (
daemones
) – leads to happiness in this life. The second is to contain the next five books, written against those who think that suchlike deities are to be worshipped by rites and sacrifices in order to secure happiness in the life to come. The three following volumes should contain four books each. This section I have arranged so that four should describe the origin of that City, four its progress, or rather its development, and the four last the ends (
sic
) in store for it.
In the
City of God
itself, the reader will find partial descriptions of the work (Bks II, 2; III, 1; IV, 1–2; VI, preface and ch. 1; XI, 1; XII, 1; XVIII, 1) as also in his Retractations Bk II, 43.
Within each book the topics are often so disparate as to defy broad analysis. In the translation that follows this introduction, the chapter headings (very possibly by Augustine himself) are helpful. Here an attempt has been made to pick out some salient features in each book that a reader might wish to be able to find rapidly for reference.
B
OOK I
. The gods did not protect Rome. The Christians suffered with others, but disasters overtake both good and bad, and the loss of worldly goods is not always a disaster. The violation of chastity does not harm the unwilling soul. Suicide is not permissible to avoid this.
B
OOK II
. The pagan gods had no moral teaching to give. Examples of the obscenity of pagan rites drawn from Augustine’s experience. The gods not only tolerated but even demanded obscenity on the stage. Sallust gave a picture of Rome’s decadence. First appearance of Scripio’s definition of a state. Cicero’s judgement. Further account of obscenities in public worship.
B
OOK III
. The gods failed to protect Ilium or to save Rome. Rome was morally firm in Numa’s day. The subsequent religious depravity.
B
OOK IV
. The number and futility of Roman gods. Praise of Varro.
B
OOK V
. The falsity of astrology. God is neither Fate nor Destiny. Roman virtue is responsible for Roman worldly success. A summary of Roman history: ambition for glory; ambition for dominion. God helps the Christian emperors.
B
OOK VI
. Gods are not worshipped for their gift of eternal life. Varro and ‘mythical’ and ‘civil’ deities. ‘M. Varro, you are the shrewdest of men and without doubt the most erudite’ (
Bk VI, 6
,). The absurd small gods. They do not even help temporal life.
B
OOK VII
. The ‘select’ gods. Who are they? How chosen? Is Jupiter supreme? Is a deity the soul of the world?
B
OOK VIII
. ‘Natural’ theology. A short history of Greek philosophy. The Platonists, ‘raised above the rest by the glorious reputation they so thoroughly deserve’. Platonists are near–Christians. The worship of ‘demons’ rejected (Apuleius – Hermes Trismegistus). The pagan cult of the dead and the Christian cult of martyrs. Pagan sacrifice and the one and only true Christian victim.
B
OOK IX
. More about demons. Apuleius and the Neoplatonists.
B
OOK X
. The true worship of God. Porphyry and the false claims of theurgy. The angels. The Christian sacrifice. Platonists refuse to acknowledge Christ, the universal way of salvation.
B
OOK XI
. The Truth of the Scriptures. Creation. Time. Angels, good and apostate. Wickedness is not natural; nothing created is in itself evil. How are we sure of our own existence?
B
OOK XII
. Evil is non-existent. Evil has no cause – it is the turning of a limited creature from God to itself. Creation took place long ago. The Cyclic idea of history is false. The world is not eternal.
B
OOK XIII
. The creation of man and its problems. Death and resurrection.
B
OOK XIV
. The life of the spirit and the life of the flesh. Stoic ‘apathy’ (not human). Only the Creator can undo the results of sin. Two cities.
