Chapter 21 [XVI.]—Unbaptized Infants Damned, But Most Lightly;67    See Augustin’s Enchirid. c. 93, and Contra Julianum, v. 11. The Penalty of Adam’s Sin, the Grace of His Body Lost.

It may therefore be correctly affirmed, that such infants as quit the body without being baptized will be involved in the mildest condemnation of all. That person, therefore, greatly deceives both himself and others, who teaches that they will not be involved in condemnation; whereas the apostle says: “Judgment from one offence to condemnation,”68    Rom. v. 16. and again a little after: “By the offence of one upon all persons to condemnation.”69    Ver. 18. When, indeed, Adam sinned by not obeying God, then his body—although it was a natural and mortal body—lost the grace whereby it used in every part of it to be obedient to the soul. Then there arose in men affections common to the brutes which are productive of shame, and which made man ashamed of his own nakedness.70    Gen. iii. 10. Then also, by a certain disease which was conceived in men from a suddenly injected and pestilential corruption, it was brought about that they lost that stability of life in which they were created, and, by reason of the mutations which they experienced in the stages of life, issued at last in death. However many were the years they lived in their subsequent life, yet they began to die on the day when they received the law of death, because they kept verging towards old age. For that possesses not even a moment’s stability, but glides away without intermission, which by constant change perceptibly advances to an end which does not produce perfection, but utter exhaustion. Thus, then, was fulfilled what God had spoken: “In the day that ye eat thereof, ye shall surely die.”71    Gen. ii. 17. As a consequence, then, of this disobedience of the flesh and this law of sin and death, whoever is born of the flesh has need of spiritual regeneration—not only that he may reach the kingdom of God, but also that he may be freed from the damnation of sin. Hence men are on the one hand born in the flesh liable to sin and death from the first Adam, and on the other hand are born again in baptism associated with the righteousness and eternal life of the second Adam; even as it is written in the book of Ecclesiasticus: “Of the woman came the beginning of sin, and through her we all die.”72    Ecclus. xxv. 24. Now whether it be said of the woman or of Adam, both statements pertain to the first man; since (as we know) the woman is of the man, and the two are one flesh. Whence also it is written: “And they twain shall be one flesh; wherefore,” the Lord says, “they are no more twain, but one flesh.”73    Matt. xix. 5, 6.

CAPUT XVI.

21. Infantes non baptizati lenissime quidem, sed tamen damnantur. Poena peccati Adae gratia corporis amissa. Potest proinde recte dici, parvulos sine Baptismo de corpore exeuntes in damnatione omnium mitissima futuros. Multum autem fallit et fallitur, qui eos in damnatione praedicat non futuros, dicente Apostolo, Judicium ex uno delicto in condemnationem; et paulo post, Per unius delictum in omnes homines ad condemnationem. Quando ergo peccavit Adam non obediens Deo, tunc ejus corpus, quamvis esset animale ac mortale, gratiam perdidit, qua ejus animae omni ex parte obediebat; tunc ille exstitit bestialis motus pudendus hominibus, quem in sua erubuit nuditate. Tunc etiam morbo quodam ex repentina et pestifera corruptione concepto factum in illis est, ut illa in qua creati sunt stabilitate aetatis amissa, per mutabilitates aetatum irent in mortem. Quamvis ergo annos multos postea vixerint, illo tamen die mori coeperunt, quo mortis legem, qua in senium veterascerent, acceperunt. Non enim stat vel temporis puncto, sed sine intermissione labitur, quiquid continua 0121 mutatione sensim currit in finem, non perficientem, sed consumentem. Sic itaque impletum est quod dixerat Deus, Qua die ederitis, morte moriemini (Gen. II, 17). Ex hac igitur inobedientia carnis, ex hac lege peccati et mortis, quisquis carnaliter generatur, regenerari spiritualiter opus habet, ut non solum ad regnum Dei perducatur, verum etiam a peccati damnatione liberetur. Simul itaque peccato et morti primi hominis obnoxii nascuntur in carne, et simul justitiae vitaeque aeternae secundi hominis sociati renascuntur in Baptismo: sicut et in Ecclesiastico scriptum est, A muliere initium factum est peccati, et per illam omnes morimur (Eccli. XXV, 33). Sive autem a muliere, sive ab Adam dicatur, utrumque ad primum hominem pertinet: quoniam, sicut novimus, mulier ex viro est, et utriusque una caro est. Unde et illud quod scriptum est, Et erunt duo in carne una. Igitur jam non duo, inquit Dominus, sed una caro (Matth. XIX, 5, 6).