Chapter XIV.—(32.) The Fourth Passage. In What Sense God Only is Good. With God to Be Good and to Be Himself are the Same Thing.

“They likewise,” says he, “quote what the Saviour says: ‘Why callest thou me good? There is none good save one, that is, God?’”138    Luke xviii. 19. This statement, however, he makes no attempt whatever to explain; all he does is to oppose to it sundry other passages which seem to contradict it, which he adduces to show that man, too, is good. Here are his remarks: “We must answer this text with another, in which the same Lord says, ‘A good man out of the good treasure of his heart bringeth forth good things.’139    Matt. xii. 35. And again: ‘He maketh His sun to rise on the good and on the evil.’140    Matt. v. 45. Then in another passage it is written, ‘For the good things are created from the beginning;’141    Ecclus. xxxix. 25. and yet again, ‘They that are good shall dwell in the land.’”142    Prov. ii. 21. Now to all this we must say in answer, that the passages in question must be understood in the same sense as the former one, “There is none good, save one, that is, God.” Either because all created things, although God made them very good, are yet, when compared with their Creator, not good, being in fact incapable of any comparison with Him. For in a transcendent, and yet very proper sense, He said of Himself, “I Am that I Am.”143    Ex. iii. 14. The statement therefore before us, “None is good save one, that is, God,” is used in some such way as that which is said of John, “He was not that light;”144    John i. 8. although the Lord calls him “a lamp,”145    John v. 35: [“lucernam,” not “lux:” as also in the Dies Iræ it is said of John, “non lux iste, sed lucernam,” in allusion to these passages.—W.] just as He says to His disciples: “Ye are the light of the world: . . .neither do men light a lamp and put it under a bushel.”146    Matt. v. 14, 15. Still, in comparison with that light which is “the true light which lighteth every man that cometh into the world,”147    John i. 9. he was not light. Or else, because the very sons of God even, when compared with themselves as they shall hereafter become in their eternal perfection, are good in such a way that they still remain also evil. Although I should not have dared to say this of them (for who would be so bold as to call them evil who have God for their Father?) unless the Lord had Himself said: “If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more shall your Father which is in heaven give good things to them that ask Him?”148    Matt. vii. 11. Of course, by applying to them the words, “your Father,” He proved that they were already sons of God; and yet at the same time He did not hesitate to say that they were “evil.” Your author, however, does not explain to us how they are good, whilst yet “there is none good save one, that is, God.” Accordingly the man who asked “what good thing he was to do,”149    Matt. xix. 16. was admonished to seek Him150    Luke x. 27, 28. by whose grace he might be good; to whom also to be good is nothing else than to be Himself, because He is unchangeably good, and cannot be evil at all.

CAPUT XIV.

32. «Item dicunt,» inquit, «illud quod Salvator ait, Quid me dicis bonum? Nemo bonus, nisi solus Deus» (Luc. XVIII, 19; et Marc. X, 18). Hanc item propositionem omnino non solvit: sed opposuit velut ex adverso alia testimonia, quibus probaret esse et hominem bonum. Dixit enim esse respondendum quod idem Dominus alibi ait, «Bonus homo de bono thesauro cordis sui profert bona» (Matth. XII, 35): et iterum, «Qui solem suum oriri facit super bonos et malos» (Id. V, 45). Et alibi scriptum est, inquit, «Bona bonis creata sunt ab initio» (Eccli. XXXIX, 30): et iterum, «Qui sunt boni, erunt habitatores terrae» (Prov. II, 21). Cui sic respondendum est, ut et illud intelligatur quomodo dictum sit, Nemo bonus, nisi unus Deus. Sive quia omnia quae creata sunt, quamvis ea Deus fecerit bona valde, Creatori tamen comparata, nec bona sunt, cui comparata nec sunt: altissime quippe et proprio modo quodam de se ipso dixit, Ego sum qui sum (Exod. III, 14). Sic dictum est, Nemo bonus, nisi unus Deus;0309 quemadmodum de Joanne dictum est, Non erat ille lumen (Joan. I, 8); cum Dominus eum esse dicat lucernam (Id. V, 35), sicut discipulos, quibus dixit, Vos estis lumen mundi; nemo accendit lucernam et ponit eam sub modio (Matth. V, 14, 15): sed in comparatione luminis illius, quod est verum lumen, illuminans omnem hominem venientem in hunc mundum (Joan. I, 9), non erat ille lumen. Sive quia ipsi etiam filii Dei comparati sibi ipsis quales in illa perfectione aeterna futuri sunt, ita boni sunt, ut adhuc et mali sint. Quod de illis dicere non auderem (quis enim audeat dicere malos esse, quorum pater est Deus), nisi ipse Dominus diceret, Si ergo vos cum sitis mali, nostis bona data dare filiis vestris; quanto magis Pater vester, qui in coelis est, dabit bona petentibus se (Matth. VII, 11)? Cum ait utique, Pater vester; filios Dei jam esse monstravit, quos tamen adhuc malos esse non tacuit. Ille tamen non solvit, quomodo et isti boni sint, et nemo sit bonus, nisi unus Deus: unde est ille admonitus, qui interrogaverat quid boni faceret, ut illum quaereret cujus gratia bonus esset, cui bonum esse, hoc est ipsum esse; quia incommutabiliter bonus, et non potest omnino malus esse .