Chapter 16.—How Sin Died, and How It Revived.

And what he says in that passage of the Epistle to the Romans, “Sin, that it might appear sin, wrought death to me by that which is good,”41    Rom. vii. 13. agrees with the former passages where he said, “But I had not known sin but by the law, for I had not known lust unless the law had said, Thou shalt not covet.”42    Rom. vii. 7. And previously, “By the law is the knowledge of sin,” for he said this also here, “that it might appear sin;” that we might not understand what he had said, “For without law sin was dead,” except in the sense as if it were not, “it lies hidden, it does not appear, it is completely ignored, as if it were buried in I know not what darkness of ignorance.” And in that he says, “And I was alive once without the law,” what does he say except, I seemed to myself to live? And with respect to what he added, “But when the commandment came, sin revived,” what else is it but sin shone forth, became apparent? Nor yet does he say lived, but revived. For it had lived formerly in Paradise, where it sufficiently appeared, admitted in opposition to the command given; but when it is inherited by children coming into the world, it lies concealed, as if it were dead, until its evil, resisting righteousness, is felt by its prohibition, when one thing is commanded and approved, another thing delights and rules: then, in some measure sin revives in the knowledge of the man that is born, although it had lived already for some time in the knowledge of the man as at first made.

0559 16. Quod autem ait in hoc Epistolae loco ad Romanos, Peccatum ut appareat peccatum, per bonum mihi operatum est mortem; congruit superioribus ubi dixit. Sed peccatum non cognovi, nisi per legem; nam concupiscentiam nesciebam, nisi lex diceret, Non concupisces. Et superius, Per legem cognitio peccati: hoc enim et hic dixit, ut appareat peccatum: ut illud quod dixerat, Sine lege enim peccatum mortuum est; non intelligamus nisi tanquam non sit, Latet, non apparet, penitus ignoratur, tanquam in nescio quibus ignorantiae tenebris sit sepultum. Et quod ait, Ego autem vivebam aliquando sine lege; quid ait, nisi, Vivere mihi videbar? Et quod adjunxit, Adveniente autem mandato peccatum revixit; quid est aliud, quam, Eminuit et apparuit? Nec tamen ait, Vixit; sed, revixit. Vixerat enim aliquando in paradiso, quando contra datum praeceptum satis apparebat admissum: cum autem a nascentibus trahitur, tanquam mortuum sit latet, donec repugnans justitiae malum ejus prohibitione sentiatur, cum aliud jubetur atque approbatur, aliud delectat atque dominatur: tunc peccatum quodam modo in notitia nati hominis reviviscit, quod in notitia primum facti hominis aliquando jam vixerat.