Chapter 20.—What Has Been Treated of in This Book. How We Have Reached by Steps to a Certain Trinity, Which is Found in Practical Knowledge and True Faith.

25. Now, therefore, let us see what this prolix discourse has effected, what it has gathered, whereto it has reached. It belongs to all men to will to be blessed; yet all men have not faith, whereby the heart is cleansed, and so blessedness is reached. And thus it comes to pass, that by means of the faith which not all men will, we have to reach on to the blessedness which every one wills. All see in their own heart that they will to be blessed; and so great is the agreement of human nature on this subject, that the man is not deceived who conjectures this concerning another’s mind, out of his own: in short, we know ourselves that all will this. But many despair of being immortal, although no otherwise can any one be that which all will, that is, blessed. Yet they will also to be immortal if they could; but through not believing that they can, they do not so live that they can. Therefore faith is necessary, that we may attain blessedness in all the good things of human nature, that is, of both soul and body. But that same faith requires that this faith be limited in Christ, who rose in the flesh from the dead, not to die any more; and that no one is freed from the dominion of the devil, through the forgiveness of sins, save by Him; and that in the abiding place of the devil, life must needs be at once miserable and never-ending, which ought rather to be called death than life. All which I have also argued, so far as space permitted, in this book, while I have already said much on the subject in the fourth book of this work as well;840    Cc. 19–21. but in that place for one purpose, here for another,—namely, there, that I might show why and how Christ was sent in the fullness of time by the Father,841    Gal. iv. 4 on account of those who say that He who sent and He who was sent cannot be equal in nature; but here, in order to distinguish practical knowlege from contemplative wisdom.

26. For we wished to ascend, as it were, by steps, and to seek in the inner man, both in knowledge and in wisdom, a sort of trinity of its own special kind, such as we sought before in the outer man; in order that we may come, with a mind more practised in these lower things, to the contemplation of that Trinity which is God, according to our little measure, if indeed, we can even do this, at least in a riddle and as through a glass.842    1 Cor. xiii. 12 If, then, any one have committed to memory the words of this faith in their sounds alone, not knowing what they mean, as they commonly who do not know Greek hold in memory Greek words, or similarly Latin ones, or those of any other language of which they are ignorant, has not he a sort of trinity in his mind? because, first, those sounds of words are in his memory, even when he does not think thereupon; and next, the mental vision (acies) of his act of recollection is formed thence when he conceives of them; and next, the will of him who remembers and thinks unites both. Yet we should by no means say that the man in so doing busies himself with a trinity of the interior man, but rather of the exterior; because he remembers, and when he wills, contemplates as much as he wills, that alone which belongs to the sense of the body, which is called hearing. Nor in such an act of thought does he do anything else than deal with images of corporeal things, that is, of sounds. But if he holds and recollects what those words signify, now indeed something of the inner man is brought into action; not yet, however, ought he to be said or thought to live according to a trinity of the inner man, if he does not love those things which are there declared, enjoined, promised. For it is possible for him also to hold and conceive these things, supposing them to be false, in order that he may endeavor to disprove them. Therefore that will, which in this case unites those things which are held in the memory with those things which are thence impressed on the mind’s eye in conception, completes, indeed, some kind of trinity, since itself is a third added to two others; but the man does not live according to this, when those things which are conceived are taken to be false, and are not accepted. But when those things are believed to be true, and those things which therein ought to be loved, are loved, then at last the man does live according to a trinity of the inner man; for every one lives according to that which he loves. But how can things be loved which are not known, but only believed? This question has been already treated of in former books;843    Bk. viii. cc. 8 seqq., and Bk. x. c. 1, etc. and we found, that no one loves what he is wholly ignorant of, but that when things not known are said to be loved, they are loved from those things which are known. And now we so conclude this book, that we admonish the just to live by faith,844    Rom. i. 17 which faith worketh by love,845    Gal. v. 6 so that the virtues also themselves, by which one lives prudently, boldly, temperately, and justly, be all referred to the same faith; for not otherwise can they be true virtues. And yet these in this life are not of so great worth, as that the remission of sins, of some kind or other, is not sometimes necessary here; and this remission comes not to pass, except through Him, who by His own blood conquered the prince of sinners. Whatsoever ideas are in the mind of the faithful man from this faith, and from such a life, when they are contained in the memory, and are looked at by recollection, and please the will, set forth a kind of trinity of its own sort.846    [The ternary is this: 1. The idea of a truth or fact held in the memory. 2. The contemplation of it as thus recollected. 3. The love of it. This last is the “will” that “unites” the first two.—W.G.T.S.] But the image of God, of which by His help we shall afterwards speak, is not yet in that trinity; a thing which will then be more apparent, when it shall have been shown where it is, which the reader may expect in a succeeding book.

CAPUT XX.

25. Quid actum in hoc libro. Quomodo gradatim perventum est ad trinitatem quamdam quae in scientia activa et vera fide reperitur. Jam itaque videamus quid sermo iste prolixus effecerit, quid collegerit, quo pervenerit. Beatos esse se velle, omnium hominum est: nec tamen omnium est fides, qua cor mundante ad beatitudinem pervenitur. Ita fit ut per istam quam non omnes volunt, ad illam tendendum sit quam nemo potest esse qui nolit. Beatos esse se velle, omnes in corde suo vident, tantaque est in hac re naturae humanae conspiratio, ut non fallatur homo qui hoc ex animo suo de animo conjicit alieno; denique omnes id velle nos novimus. Multi vero immortales se esse posse desperant, cum id quod omnes volunt, id est beatus, nullus esse aliter possit : volunt tamen etiam immortales esse, si possent: sed non credendo quod possint, non ita vivunt ut possint. Necessaria ergo est fides ut beatitudinem consequamur, omnibus humanae naturae bonis, id est, et animi et corporis. Hanc autem fidem in Christo esse definitam, qui in carne resurrexit a mortuis, non moriturus 1035 ulterius: nec nisi per illum quemquam liberari a diaboli dominatu, per remissionem peccatorum: in cujus diaboli partibus necesse est miseram esse vitam, eamdemque perpetuam, quae mors est potius dicenda quam vita, eadem fides habet. De qua et in hoc libro, sicut potui, pro spatio temporis disputavi, cum jam et in quarto libro hujus operis multa de hac re dixerim (Cap. 19-21); sed ibi propter aliud, hic propter aliud: ibi scilicet ut ostenderem cur et quomodo Christus in plenitudine temporis a Patre sit missus (Galat. IV, 4), propter eos qui dicunt, eum qui misit, et eum qui missus est, aequales natura esse non posse; hic autem, ad distinguendam activam scientiam a contemplativa sapientia.

26. Placuit quippe velut gradatim ascendentibus in utraque requirere apud interiorem hominem quamdam sui cujusque generis trinitatem, sicut prius apud exteriorem quaesivimus; ut ad illam Trinitatem quae Deus est, pro nostro modulo, si tamen vel hoc possumus, saltem in aenigmate et per speculum contuendam (I Cor. XIII, 12) exercitatiore in his inferioribus rebus mente veniamus. Hujus igitur verba fidei quisquis in solis vocibus memoriae commendaverit, nesciens quid significent; sicut solent qui graece nesciunt, graeca verba tenere memoriter, vel latina similiter, vel cujusque alterius linguae, qui ejus ignari sunt: nonne habet quamdam in suo animo trinitatem, quia et in memoria sunt illi verborum soni, etiam quando inde non cogitat; et inde formatur acies recordationis ejus, quando de his cogitat; et voluntas recordantis atque cogitantis utrumque conjungit? Nullo modo tamen dixerimus istum, cum hoc agit, secundum trinitatem interioris hominis agere, sed potius exterioris: quia id solum meminit, et quando vult, quantum vult intuetur, quod ad sensum corporis pertinet, qui vocatur auditus, nec aliud quam corporalium rerum, id est sonorum, tali cogitatione imagines versat. Si autem quod verba illa significant, teneat et recolat; 1036 jam quidem aliquid interioris hominis agit: sed nondum dicendus vel putandus est vivere secundum interioris hominis trinitatem, si ea non diligat quae ibi praedicantur, praecipiuntur, promittuntur. Potest enim etiam ad hoc tenere atque cogitare, ut falsa esse existimans, conetur etiam redarguere. Voluntas ergo illa, quae ibi conjungit ea quae memoria tenebantur, et ea quae inde in acie cogitationis impressa sunt, implet quidem aliquam trinitatem, cum ipsa sit tertia: sed non secundum eam vivitur, quando illa quae cogitantur velut falsa non placent. Cum autem vera esse creduntur, et quae ibi diligenda sunt diliguntur, jam secundum trinitatem interioris hominis vivitur: secundum hoc enim vivit quisque quod diligit. Quomodo autem diligantur quae nesciuntur, sed tantum creduntur? Jam quaestio ista tractata est in superioribus libris (Lib. 8, capp. 8 et seqq., et lib. 18, cap. 1, etc.), et inventum neminem diligere quod penitus ignorat; ex iis autem quae nota sunt diligi, quando diligi dicuntur ignota. Nunc librum istum ita claudimus, ut admoneamus quod justus ex fide vivit (Rom. I, 17): quae fides per dilectionem operatur (Galat. V, 6), ita ut virtutes quoque ipsae quibus prudenter, fortiter, temperanter, justeque vivitur, omnes ad eamdem referantur fidem: non enim aliter poterunt verae esse virtutes. Quae tamen in hac vita non valent tantum, ut aliquando non sit hic necessaria qualiumcumque remissio peccatorum; quae non fit nisi per eum qui sanguine suo vicit principem peccatorum. Ex hac fide et tali vita quaecumque notiones sunt in animo fidelis hominis, cum memoria continentur, et recordatione inspiciuntur, et voluntati placent, reddunt quamdam sui generis trinitatem. Sed imago Dei, de qua in ejus adjutorio post loquemur, nondum in ipsa est: quod tunc melius apparebit, cum demonstratum fuerit ubi sit: quod in futuro volumine lector exspectet.