Quote 1705
This we now say, that, according to this condition of being born and dying, which we know, and in which we have been created, the marriage of male and female is some good; the compact whereof divine Scripture so commends, as that neither is it allowed one put away by her husband to marry, so long as her husband lives: nor is it allowed one put away by his wife to marry another, unless she who have separated from him be dead. Therefore, concerning the good of marriage, which the Lord also confirmed in the Gospel, not only in that He forbade to put away a wife, save because of fornication, but also in that He came by invitation to a marriage
Augustine
https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/1309.htm#:~:text=This%20we%20now%20say%2C%20that,long%20as%20her%20husband%20lives%3AOther Quotes from the Author & Topic
If you believe what you like in the gospels, and reject what you don't like, it is not the gospel you believe, but yourself.
God does not have mercy on someone because that person has willed and run, but he willed and ran because God has had mercy on him.Contra Julianum opus imperfectrum, bk1, c141.
Every good work in us is performed only by grace.Epist. 105 ad Bonifac.
God had one son on earth without sin, but never one without suffering.
In answering this question I have tried hard to maintain the free choice of the human will. But the grace of God prevailed. Augustine: earlier writings, Volume 1953, Part 2 (Page 370)
But, during all those years, where was my free will? What was the hidden, secret place from which it was summoned in a moment, so that I might bend my neck to your easy yoke and take your light burden on my shoulders, Christ Jesus, my Helper and my Redeemer? How sweet all at once it was for me to be rid of those fruitless joys which I had once feared to lose and was now glad to reject! You drove them from me, you who are the true, the sovereign joy. You drove them from me and took their place, you who are sweeter than all pleasure, though not to flesh and blood, you who outshine all light yet are hidden deeper than any secret in our hearts, you who surpass all honour though not in the eyes of men who see all honour in themselves. At last my mind was free from the gnawing anxieties of ambition and gain, from wallowing in filth and scratching the itching sore of lust. I began to talk to you freely, O Lord my God, my Light, my Wealth, and my Salvation. Confessions Book IX Chapter I
If the Holy Spirit is the Spirit of the Son, why should we not believe that he proceeds from the Son? Indeed, if he did not proceed from the Son, Christ would not have breathed on his disciples after the resurrection and said, "Receive the Holy Spirit." What else did such breathing mean than that the Holy Spirit also proceeds from the Son?Tractatus in Iohannis Evangelium 99.6
yet they preach that our visible sun spreads its rays over all manner of offal, but keeps them clean and pure. Therefore, if pure things which are visible can be touched by visible things which are unclean and not share their pollution how much more did the unchangeable and invisible Truth, receiving a soul through the spirit and a body through the soul, take on the whole man without contamination to itself and free him from all infirmities?De agone christiano, c18 n20
sin is every word or deed or desire which happens against the law of GodContra Faustum bk22 c27
the sin of the first man harmed not only him, but the whole human race, because from it we received condemnation and fault together.Hypognosticon, bk2 c4 n4
some heretics, who are called Pelagians, said that the sin of the first transgression passed into other men not by propagation, but by imitationDe Peccatorum b1 c9 m9-10
Since God is an incorporeal and unchangeable living nature, remaining in eternal stability in his own self, he is entirely present in all things, and entirely in each of them. But those in whom he dwells receive him according to the diversity of their capacity, some more, some less, whom he builds into a temple most beloved to himself by the grace of his goodness.Epistola 187, c6 n19
How foolish are they who know not God! So many good things before their eyes, yet Him Who Is they fail to see.Confessions (Ch. Conversion)
He loves Thee too little who loves anything together with Thee, which he loves not for Thy sake.
[the Ten Commandments] are reduced to two, namely, that we should love God with our whole heart, and with our whole soul, and with our whole mind; and that we should love our neighbours as ourselves.Catechizndis Rvdibvs, 99
The person who lives a just and holy life is one who is a sound judge of these things. He is also a person who has ordered his love, so that he does not love what it is wrong to love, or fail to love what should be loved, or love too much what should be loved less (or love too little what should be loved more), or love two things equally if one of them should be loved either less or more than the other, or love things either more or less if they should be loved equally
God is man's happiness.
might be able to fulfil the law not only without its being a burden but even with delight. Now this law was given to the Jews in ten commandments which they call the Decalogue.Cateschizandis Rvdibvs, trans. Joseph Patrick Christopher
[Sin: ] Some deed, word, or desire against the eternal law.Against Faustus
That Scripture counsels marriage, however, and never allows any release from the union, is expressly contained in the law: 'You shall not divorce a wife, except for reason of immorality.' And it regards as adultery the marriage of a spouse, while the one from whom a separation was made is still alive. 'Whoever takes a divorced woman as wife commits adultery,' it says; for 'if anyone divorce his wife, he debauches her'; that is, he compels her to commit adultery. And not only does he that divorces her become the cause of this, but also he that takes the woman and gives her the opportunity of sinning; for if he did not take her, she would return to her husbandMiscellanies 2:23:145:3 [A.D. 208]
It is, in other words, a text of concession, not a text of intention. You do not learn to fly an airplane by following the instructions for making a crash landing; you will not be successful in war if you train by the rules for beating a retreat. The same is true of marriage and divorce. The exceptional measures necessary when a marriage fails are of no help in discovering the meaning and intention for marriage. Jesus endeavors to recover God's will for marriage, not to argue about possible exceptions to it. His opponents ask what is permissible, he points to what is commanded.Pillar Commentary
I have been concerned that such accounts should be published because I saw that signs of divine power like those of older days were frequently occuring in modern times too
That men sin, is attributable to themselves: that in sinning they produce this or that result, is owing to the mighty power of God, who divides the darkness as he pleasesDe praedest. sanct.
That the will is indeed free, but not freed--free of righteousness, but enslaved to sin.Contra Julianum
true religion looks upon those wars that are waged, not for motives of aggrandizement or cruelty, but with the object of securing peace, of punishing evil-doers, and of uplifting the good.
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