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is, in the Substance of Thy Being, that Thou art incorruptible, then all this would be false and abominable; but if corruptible, this is false, and at the very sound of the words detestable." It was then enough to urge this argument against those, who deserved to be completely vomited forth from a surfeited stomach, for they had no escape from the dilemma, without a horrible sacrilege of heart and tongue, by entertaining and giving expression to such things concerning Thee.

B

CHAPTER III.

That Free-will was the Cause of Sin.

UT I also as yet, although I had a firm conviction that Thou our Lord, the true God, Who madest not only our souls but also our bodies, not only our souls and bodies but all creatures, and all things, wert incapable of defilement, alteration, or change in any part; yet I held that the cause of evil was not explained or unravelled: whatever indeed it was, I saw that it must be so sought after, that I should not through it be constrained to believe that the unchangeable God became changeable, lest I should become that very evil for which I was searching. Therefore I sought it out, feeling quite sure that what they said about it was wrong, and shunning their error with my whole soul, because I saw that in searching out the cause of evil, they were themselves filled with evil, in that they preferred to think that Thy substance should suffer evil rather than that theirs should commit it.

And I endeavoured to understand wnat now I heard,

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that an act of our own free-will was the cause of evil, and Thy right judgment the cause of suffering; but I could not clearly see it. Striving then to draw forth my mind's gaze from the abyss, I was plunged into it again, and making frequent attempts, I was plunged back into it again and again. For the fact that I knew that I had a will as well as that I lived, raised me up into Thy Light. When I then willed anything or not, I was perfectly certain that the choice I made had its origin in myself, and I was on the point of perceiving that this was the cause of my sin. But what I unwillingly did, I perceived that I might be said to suffer rather than to do, and that I judged to be not a fault but a punishment, which I at once acknowledged that I justly underwent, thinking Thee just. But again I said, "Who made me?" was it not my God, Who is not only Good but Goodness itself? How, then, does it come to pass that my will chooses the evil and refuses the good, so that there is a just cause why I should be punished? Who has put this in me, and engrafted upon me this root of bitterness, seeing that the whole of me was made by my most secret God? If the devil is the author of it, who made him? But if he through a perverse will was turned from a good angel into a devil, how did he have an evil will, when as an angel his whole being was made by the most good Creator? By these thoughts I was again thrown back and stifled; but yet I sunk not so deep into that grave of error, where no one confesseth unto Thee,' as to believe that Thou dost suffer evil, rather than that man commits it.

I Ps. vi. 5.

FOR

CHAPTER IV.

That God must be Incorruptible.

'OR I was thus striving to find out the rest, as I had discovered that the incorruptible was better than the corruptible; and therefore I acknowledged Thee, whatever Thou wert, to be incorruptible. For never was there, or shall there be, any soul able to conceive of anything better than Thee, Who art the sovereign and best Good. But seeing, that most truly and certainly, the incorruptible is preferred to the corruptible, as I now preferred it, then, if Thou wert not incorruptible, I could in thought have arrived at something which was better than my God. When, then, I saw that the incorruptible was to be preferred to the corruptible, there ought I to seek Thee, and from that stand-point to consider " whence is evil," that is, how does that corruption arise, by which Thy Substance can in no way be injured. For in no way can corruption injure our God; by no will, by no necessity, by no unforeseen accident: since He is God, and what He wills is good, and He is that same Good; but to be corrupted is not good. Nor canst Thou be forced unwillingly to anything, since Thy Will is not greater than Thy Power; for were it greater, Thou wouldst be greater than Thyself, for the Will and Power of God is God Himself. And what can be unforeseen to Thee, Who knowest all things, and what nature is there which Thou knowest not? And what should we say more to show "why that Substance which God is cannot be

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corruptible," for if it could be, it would thereby cease to be God?

CHAPTER V.

He seeks again, whence is Evil, and what is its

A

Root.

ND I went on seeking out the origin of evil, and I sought it in an evil manner; and I did not perceive the evil, which was in my very search. And I made the whole universe pass before the eyes of my soul, whatever was visible in it, such as earth, sea, air, stars, trees, and mortal creatures; and whatever was invisible, as the firmament of heaven, and all the angels, and all the spiritual beings thereof; but these also, as if they had bodies, my imagination arranged here and there in places; and I made Thy creation one vast mass distinguished by the kinds of bodiessome real, some what I had feigned for spirits; and this mass I made vast, not as it really was, for that I could not know, but according to my own thoughts, yet bounded indeed on all sides. But Thee, O Lord, I imagined encircling it and penetrating it everywhere, Thyself being every way infinite: as if a sea were everywhere, and yet on all sides through immense space there were still one infinite sea, and it had within it a sponge of great but limited size; and this sponge should be in every part filled from that immense sea : so I thought Thy finite creation was full of Thee, the Infinite; and I said, Behold God, and behold what God hath created; and God is Good, and exceedingly and incomparably superior to these things: but yet, He, Good Himself, made them good, and behold how He

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surrounds and fills them. Where, then, is evil, and from what source, and how did it creep in hither? What is its root, what its seed? Or is it at all? But why, then, do we fear and avoid that which has no existence? Or if our fear has no foundation, then is that fear itself evil, whereby the heart to no purpose is pricked and tortured, and so much the greater evil, as we have no reason to fear, and do fear. Therefore either there is the evil which we fear, or the evil of the fearing. Whence, then, is it? seeing God has made all these things, the Good made the good. He indeed, the greater and highest Good, made these lesser goods; still both Creator and created are all good. Whence, then, is evil? Or whence did He make these things? was there some evil matter, and did He form and order it, but leave something in it which would not turn to good? And why so? was He not strong enough to turn and change the whole, so that no evil might remain in it, He—the Almighty? Lastly, why does He will to make anything with it, and not rather by the same Almightiness make it cease altogether to exist? Or could it indeed exist against His Will? Or if it were from eternity, why did He suffer it so to exist for infinite spaces of time in the past, and then at length afterwards be pleased to make something out of it? Or if now suddenly He had willed to do some thing, would it not rather be the thing for an Almighty Being to do, to make evil disappear and He Himself exist alone, the whole, true, sovereign, and infinite Good? Or if it were not good for Him Who is Good, not to frame and mould something good, then the evil matter being removed and reduced to nothing, He might make afresh good matter, out of which to create