Augustine: DE CIVITATE DEI

[I] De felicitate paradisi uel de ipso paradiso et de uita ibi primorum hominum eorumque peccato atque supplicio multi multa senserunt, multa dixerunt, multa litteris mandauerunt. Nos quoque secundum scripturas sanctas uel quod in eis legimus uel quod ex eis intellegere potuimus earum congruentes auctoritati de his rebus in superioribus libris diximus. Enucleatius autem si ista quaerantur, multiplices atque multimodas pariunt disputationes, quae pluribus intexendae sint uoluminibus, quam hoc opus tempusque deposcit, quod non ita largum habemus, ut in omnibus, quae possunt requirere otiosi et scrupulosi, paratiores ad interrogandum quam capaciores ad intellegendum, nos oporteat inmorari.

[1] Concerning the felicity of paradise, or concerning paradise itself and the life there of the first humans and their sin and punishment, many have held many opinions, have said many things, have committed many things to writing. We too, according to the sacred scriptures, either what we read in them or what we were able to understand from them, congruent with their authority, have spoken about these matters in the preceding books. But if these things be inquired more minutely, they beget multiple and multiform disputations, which would need to be woven into more volumes than this work and the time demand, which we do not have so ample, that we should linger over everything which the idle and the over-scrupulous can require, readier to interrogate than capable to understand.

Arbitror tamen satis nos iam fecisse magnis et difficillimis quaestionibus de initio uel mundi uel animae uel ipsius generis humani, quod in duo genera distribuimus, unum eorum, qui secundum hominem, alterum eorum, qui secundum Deum uiuunt; quas etiam mystice appellamus ciuitates duas, hoc est duas societates hominum, quarum est una quae praedestinata est in aeternum regnare cum Deo, altera aeternum supplicium subire cum diabolo. Sed iste finis est earum, de quo post loquendum est. Nunc autem quoniam de exortu earum siue in angelis, quorum numerus ignoratur a nobis, siue in duobus primis hominibus satis dictum est, iam mihi uidetur earum adgrediendus excursus, ex quo illi duo generare coeperunt, donec homines generare cessabunt.

I judge, however, that we have by now done enough for the great and most difficult questions about the beginning either of the world or of the soul or of the human race itself, which we have distributed into two genera: one of those who live according to man, the other of those who live according to God; which we also mystically call the two cities, that is, two societies of human beings, of which the one is that which is predestined to reign for eternity with God, the other to undergo eternal punishment with the devil. But this is their end, about which there is to be speech afterward. Now, however, since about their origin either in the angels—whose number is unknown to us—or in the two first human beings enough has been said, it now seems to me that their course is to be undertaken, from the point at which those two began to beget, until human beings will cease to beget.

Hoc enim uniuersum tempus siue saeculum, in quo cedunt morientes succeduntque nascentes, istarum duarum ciuitatum, de quibus disputamus, excursus est.

For this whole time, or age, in which the dying yield and the being-born succeed, is the excursus of those two cities about which we are disputing.

Natus est igitur prior Cain ex illis duobus generis humani parentibus, pertinens ad hominum ciuitatem, posterior Abel, ad ciuitatem Dei. Sicut enim in uno homine, quod dixit apostolus, experimur, quia non primum quod spiritale est, sed quod animale, postea spiritale (unde unusquisque, quoniam ex damnata propagine exoritur, primo sit necesse est ex Adam malus atque carnalis; quod si in Christum renascendo profecerit, post erit bonus et spiritalis): sic in uniuerso genere humano, cum primum duae istae coeperunt nascendo atque moriendo procunere ciuitates, prior est natus ciuis huius saeculi, posterius autem isto peregrinus in saeculo et pertinens ad ciuitatem Dei, gratia praedestinatus gratia electus, gratia peregrinus deorsum gratia ciuis sursum. Nam quantum ad ipsum adtinet, ex eadem massa oritur, quae originaliter est tota damnata; sed tamquam figulus Deus (hanc enim similitudinem non inpudenter, sed prudenter introducit apostolus) ex eadem massa fecit aliud uas in honorem, aliud in contumeliam.

Therefore, first was born Cain from those two parents of the human race, belonging to the city of men, later Abel, to the City of God. For as in one man, as the apostle said, we experience that not first is that which is spiritual, but that which is animal, afterwards spiritual (whence each person, since he arises from a condemned propagation, must first be from Adam evil and carnal; which, if he shall have made progress by being reborn into Christ, afterwards he will be good and spiritual): so in the whole human race, when these two cities began to advance by being born and dying, earlier was born a citizen of this age, but later than this a pilgrim in the age and belonging to the City of God, by grace predestined, by grace elect, by grace a pilgrim downward, by grace a citizen upward. For as far as he himself is concerned, he arises from the same mass, which originally is wholly condemned; but, as a potter, God (for the apostle introduces this likeness not shamelessly but prudently) from the same mass made one vessel unto honor, another unto contumely.

Prius autem factum est uas in contumeliam, post uero alterum in honorem, quia et in ipso uno, sicut iam dixi, homine prius est reprobum, unde necesse est incipiamus et ubi non est necesse ut remaneamus, posterius uero probum, quo proficientes ueniamus et quo peruenientes maneamus. Proinde non quidem omnis homo malus erit bonus, nemo tamen erit bonus qui non erat malus; sed quanto quisque citius mutatur in melius, hoc in se facit nominari, quod adprehendit, celerius et posteriore cooperit uocabulum prius. Scriptum est itaque de Cain, quod condiderit ciuitatem; Abel autem tamquam peregrinus non condidit.

But first the vessel was made unto contumely, afterwards indeed the other unto honor, because even in that one man, as I have already said, there is first what is reprobate, whence it is necessary that we begin, and where it is not necessary that we remain; but afterwards what is approved, to which, advancing, we may come, and in which, having arrived, we may remain. Accordingly, not indeed will every bad man be good, yet no one will be good who was not bad; but the more quickly each one is changed for the better, so much the more quickly he causes that to be named in himself which he has apprehended, and the latter appellation covers the former. It is written therefore concerning Cain that he founded a city; but Abel, as a pilgrim, did not found one.

Superna est enim sanctorum ciuitas, quamuis hic pariat ciues, in quibus peregrinatur, donec regni eius tempus adueniat, cum congregatura est omnes in suis corporibus resurgentes, quando eis promissum dabitur regnum, ubi cum suo principe rege saeculorum sine ullo temporis fine regnabunt.

For the city of the saints is supernal, although here it bears citizens, among whom it sojourns as a pilgrim, until the time of its kingdom arrives, when it will congregate all who are rising again in their own bodies; when the kingdom promised to them will be given, where, with their prince, the King of the ages, they will reign without any end of time.

[II] Vmbra sane quaedam ciuitatis huius et imago prophetica ei significandae potius quam praesentandae seruiuit in terris, quo eam tempore demonstrari oportebat, et dicta est etiam ipsa ciuitas sancta merito significantis imaginis, non expressae, sicut futura est, ueritatis. De hac imagine seruiente et de illa, quam significat, libera ciuitate sic apostolus ad Galatas loquitur: Dicite mihi, inquit, sub lege uolentes esse legem non audistis? Scriptum est enim, quod Abraham duos filios habuit, unum de ancilla et unum de libera.

[2] A certain shadow indeed of this city and a prophetic image served on earth rather for signifying it than for presenting it, at the time when it ought to be shown; and even that city itself was called holy by merit of a signifying image, not of the expressed truth, such as the truth will be. About this serving image and about that free city which it signifies, thus the apostle speaks to the Galatians: "Tell me," he says, "you who wish to be under the law, have you not heard the law? For it is written that Abraham had two sons, one from the handmaid and one from the freewoman."

Sed ille quidem, qui de ancilla, secundum carnem natus est, qui autem de libera, per repromissionem; quae sunt in allegoria. Haec enim sunt duo testamenta, unum quidem a monte Sina in seruitutem generans, quod est Agar; Sina enim mons est in Arabia, quae coniuncta est huic quae nunc est Hierusalem, seruit enim cum filiis suis. Quae autem sursum est Hierusalem, libera est, quae est mater nostra.

But he indeed who was of the handmaid was born according to the flesh, but he who was of the free woman, through the promise; which things are in allegory. For these are two testaments: one indeed from Mount Sinai, generating into servitude, which is Hagar; for Sinai is a mountain in Arabia, which is conjoined to the Jerusalem that now is, for she serves with her children. But the Jerusalem which is above is free, which is our mother.

Scriptum est enim: Laetare sterilis, quae non paris, erumpe et exclama, quae non parturis; quoniam multi filii desertae, magis quam eius quae habet uirum. Nos autem, fratres, secundum Isaac promissionis filii sumus. Sed sicut tunc, qui secundum carnem natus fuerat, persequebatur eum, qui secundum spiritum: ita et nunc.

For it is written: “Rejoice, barren one, who does not bear; break forth and exclaim, you who do not travail; for the children of the deserted are many, more than of her who has a husband.” But we, brothers, are, according to Isaac, sons of the promise. Yet just as then the one who had been born according to the flesh was persecuting him who was born according to the spirit, so also now.

Sed quid dicit scriptura? Eice ancillam et filium eius; non enim heres erit filius ancillae cum filio liberae. Nos autem, fratres, non sumus ancillae filii, sed liberae, qua libertate Christus nos liberauit.

But what does the Scripture say? Cast out the handmaid and her son; for the son of the handmaid shall not be heir with the son of the freewoman. But we, brothers, are not children of the handmaid, but of the freewoman, by which liberty Christ has liberated us.

Haec forma intellegendi de apostolica auctoritate descendens locum nobis aperit, quem ad modum scripturas duorum testamentorum, ueteris et noui, accipere debeamus. Pars enim quaedam terrenae ciuitatis imago caelestis ciuitatis effecta est, non se significando, sed alteram, et ideo seruiens. Non enim propter se ipsam, sed propter aliam significandam est instituta, et praecedente alia significatione et ipsa praefigurans praefigurata est.

This form of understanding, descending from apostolic authority, opens for us the place for how we ought to receive the scriptures of the two testaments, the Old and the New. For a certain part of the earthly city has been made an image of the heavenly city, not by signifying itself, but the other, and therefore as serving. For it was instituted not on account of itself, but for the sake of signifying another; and with another signification preceding, it also, prefiguring, has been prefigured.

Namque Agar ancilla Sarrae eiusque filius imago quaedam huius imaginis fuit; et quoniam transiturae erant umbrae luce ueniente, ideo dixit libera Sarra, quae significabat liberam ciuitatem, cui rursus alio modo significandae etiam illa umbra seruiebat: Eice ancillam et filium eius; non enim heres erit filius ancillae cum filio meo Isaac, quod ait apostolus: Cum filio liberae. Inuenimus ergo in terrena ciuitate duas formas, unam suam praesentiam demonstrantem, alteram caelesti ciuitati significandae sua praesentia seruientem. Parit autem ciues terrenae ciuitatis peccato uitiata natura, caelestis uero ciuitatis ciues parit a peccato naturam liberans gratia; unde illa uocantur uasa irae, ista uasa misericordiae.

For Hagar, the handmaid of Sarah, and her son were a certain image of this image; and since the shadows were to pass away with the light coming, therefore said the free Sarah, who signified the free city—to the signifying of which again, in another way, that shadow also was serving: “Cast out the handmaid and her son; for the son of the handmaid shall not be heir with my son Isaac,” which the apostle renders: “with the son of the freewoman.” We find therefore in the earthly city two forms: one displaying its own presence, the other by its presence serving to signify the heavenly city. Now the citizens of the earthly city are brought forth by a nature vitiated by sin, but the citizens of the heavenly city are brought forth by grace freeing nature from sin; whence the former are called vessels of wrath, the latter vessels of mercy.

Significatum est hoc etiam in duobus filiis Abrahae, quod unus de ancilla, quae dicebatur Agar, secundum carnem natus est Ismael, alter est autem de Sarra libera secundum repromissionem natus Isaac. Vterque quidem de semine Abrahae; sed illum genuit demonstrans consuetudo naturam, illum uero dedit promissio significans gratiam; ibi humanus usus ostenditur, hic diuinum beneficium commendatur.

This, too, was signified in the two sons of Abraham: that one, Ishmael, was born according to the flesh from the handmaid who was called Hagar, but the other, Isaac, was born from Sarah the free woman according to the promise. Both indeed are from the seed of Abraham; but that one customary usage, demonstrating nature, begot, whereas this one the promise, signifying grace, gave; there human use is displayed, here divine beneficence is commended.

[III] Sarra quippe sterilis erat et desperatione prolis saltem de ancilla sua concupiscens habere, quod de se ipsa non se posse cernebat, dedit eam fetandam uiro, de quo parere uoluerat nec potuerat. Exegit itaque etiam sic debitum de marito utens iure suo in utero alieno. Natus est ergo Ismael, sicut nascuntur homines, permixtione sexus utriusque, usitata lege naturae.

[3] For Sarah was sterile and, in the desperation of offspring, at least desiring to have from her handmaid what she saw she could not have from herself, she gave her to her husband to be made fruitful, by whom she had wished to bear and had not been able. Thus even so she exacted the marital due from her husband, using her own right in another’s womb. Therefore Ishmael was born, just as human beings are born, by the permixture of both sexes, by the customary law of nature.

Ideo dictum est: Secundum carnem; non quod ista beneficia Dei non sint aut non illa operetur Deus, cuius opifex sapientia adtingit, sicut scriptum est, a fine usque ad finem fortiter et disponit omnia suauiter; sed ubi significandum fuerat Dei donum, quod indebitum hominibus gratis gratia largiretur, sic oportuit dari filium, quem ad modum naturae non debebatur excursibus. Negat enim natura iam filios tali commixtioni maris et feminae, qualis esse poterat Abrahae et Sarrae in illa iam aetate, etiam mulieris accedente sterilitate, quae nec tunc parere potuit, quando non aetas fecunditati, sed aetati fecunditas defuit. Quod ergo naturae sic affectae fructus posteritatis non debebatur, significat quod natura generis humani peccato uitiata ac per hoc iure damnata nihil uerae felicitatis in posterum merebatur.

Therefore it was said: According to the flesh; not that these are not benefits of God or that God does not effect those things, whose artisan, Wisdom, as it is written, reaches from end to end powerfully and disposes all things sweetly; but where the gift of God had to be signified, namely that grace would lavish, gratis, what was not owed to human beings, thus it was fitting that a son be given in a way that was not owed to the courses of nature. For nature now denies children to such a commixture of male and female as could have been that of Abraham and Sarah at that age, with the woman’s sterility also supervening, who not even then could bear, when it was not age that failed fertility, but fertility that failed age. Therefore, the fact that to nature thus affected the fruit of posterity was not owed signifies that the nature of the human race, vitiated by sin and by this very right condemned, was meriting nothing of true felicity for the future.

Recte igitur significat Isaac, per repromissionem natus, filios gratiae, ciues ciuitatis liberae, socios pacis aeternae, ubi sit non amor propriae ac priuatae quodam modo uoluntatis, sed communi eodemque inmutabili bono gaudens atque ex multis unum cor faciens, id est perfecte concors oboedientia caritatis.

Therefore Isaac, born through the promise, rightly signifies the sons of grace, citizens of the free city, companions of eternal peace, where there is not the love of one’s own and, in a certain manner, private will, but rejoicing in the common and likewise immutable good and out of many making one heart, that is, perfectly concordant by the obedience of charity.

[IV] Terrena porro ciuitas, quae sempiterna non erit (neque enim, cum extremo supplicio damnata fuerit, iam ciuitas erit), hic habet bonum suum, cuius societate laetatur, qualis esse de talibus laetitia rebus potest. Et quoniam non est tale bonum, ut nullas angustias faciat amatoribus suis, ideo ciuitas ista aduersus se ipsam plerumque diuiditur litigando, bellando atque pugnando et aut mortiferas aut certe mortales uictorias requirendo. Nam ex quacumque sui parte aduersus alteram sui partem bellando surrexerit, quaerit esse uictrix gentium, cum sit captiua uitiorum; et si quidem, cum uicerit, superbius extollitur, etiam mortifera; si uero condicionem cogitans casusque communes magis quae accidere possunt aduersis angitur, quam eis quae prouenerunt secundis rebus inflatur, tantummodo mortalis est ista uictoria.

[4] The earthly city, moreover, which will not be sempiternal (for neither, when it shall have been condemned to the extreme punishment, will it be a city any longer), here has its own good, in the society of which it rejoices, such as joy from such things can be. And since it is not such a good as to cause no anguishes to its lovers, therefore this city is for the most part divided against itself by litigating, warring, and fighting, and by seeking victories either mortiferous or at least mortal. For from whatever part of itself it has risen up by warring against another part of itself, it seeks to be the victress of the nations, while it is a captive of vices; and if indeed, when it has conquered, it is lifted up more proudly, the victory is even mortiferous; but if, considering the condition and common chances, it is more distressed by the things that can befall in adverse circumstances than it is inflated by those that have come forth in prosperous affairs, that victory is only mortal.

Neque enim semper dominari poterit permanendo eis, quos potuerit subiugare uincendo. Non autem recte dicitur ea bona non esse, quae concupiscit haec ciuitas, quando est et ipsa in suo humano genere melior. Concupiscit enim terrenam quandam pro rebus infimis pacem; ad eam namque desiderat peruenire bellando; quoniam si uicerit et qui resistat non fuerit, pax erit, quam non habebant partes in uicem aduersantes et pro his rebus, quas simul habere non poterant, infelici egestate certantes.

For neither will it be able always to dominate by continuing in control of those whom it has been able to subjugate by conquering. Nor is it rightly said that the goods which this city covets are not goods, since it too is better in its own human kind. For it desires a certain earthly peace for the lowest things; indeed, it longs to arrive at that by waging war; since, if it shall have conquered and there is no one to resist, there will be peace—peace which the parties, opposing one another in turn and contending in wretched scarcity for those things which they could not possess at the same time, did not have.

Hanc pacem requirunt laboriosa bella, hanc adipiscitur quae putatur gloriosa uictoria. Quando autem uincunt qui causa iustiore pugnabant, quis dubitet gratulandam esse uictoriam et prouenisse optabilem pacem? Haec bona sunt et sine dubio Dei dona sunt.

This peace laborious wars seek, this is attained by the victory which is thought glorious. But when those win who were fighting with a more just cause, who would doubt that the victory is to be congratulated and that the desirable peace has come about? These are good things, and without doubt gifts of God.

Sed si neglectis melioribus, quae ad supernam pertinent ciuitatem, ubi erit uictoria in aeterna et summa pace secura, bona ista sic concupiscuntur, ut uel sola esse credantur uel his, quae meliora creduntur, amplius diligantur: necesse est miseria consequatur et quae inerat augeatur.

But if, with the better things neglected, which pertain to the supernal city, where victory will be secure in eternal and highest peace, these goods are so desired that either they alone are believed to exist, or they are loved more than those things which are believed to be better: it is necessary that misery follow, and that what was already inherent be augmented.

[V] Primus itaque fuit terrenae ciuitatis conditor fratricida; nam suum fratrem ciuem ciuitatis aeternae in hac terra peregrinantem inuidentia uictus occidit. Vnde mirandum non est, quod tanto post in ea ciuitate condenda, quae fuerat huius terrenae ciuitatis, de qua loquimur, caput futura et tam multis gentibus regnatura, huic primo exemplo et, ut Graeci appellant, *a)rxetu/pwj quaedam sui generis imago respondit. Nam et illic, sicut ipsum facinus quidam poeta commemorauit illorum,

[5] Thus the first founder of the earthly city was a fratricide; for he slew his own brother, a citizen of the eternal city, sojourning on this earth, overcome by envy. Whence it is not a wonder that, much later, in the founding of that city which was to be the head of this earthly city of which we speak and to reign over so many nations, there answered to this first example, and, as the Greeks call it, *a)rxetu/pwj, a certain image of its own kind. For even there, as a certain poet of theirs commemorated that very deed,

Fraterno primi maduerunt sanguine muri. Sic enim condita est Roma, quando occisum Remum a fratre Romulo Romana testatur historia; nisi quod isti terrenae ciuitatis ambo ciues erant. Ambo gloriam de Romanae rei publicae institutione quaerebant; sed ambo eam tantam, quantam si unus esset, habere non poterant.

The walls first were drenched with fraternal blood. Thus Rome was founded, when Roman history attests that Remus was slain by his brother Romulus; except that these two were both citizens of the earthly city. Both were seeking glory from the institution of the Roman republic; but both could not have it so great as if there were but one.

Qui enim uolebat dominando gloriari, minus utique dominaretur, si eius potestas uiuo consorte minueretur. Vt ergo totam dominationem haberet unus, ablatus est socius, et scelere creuit in peius, quod innocentia minus esset et melius. Hi autem fratres Cain et Abel non habebant ambo inter se similem rerum terrenarum cupiditatem, nec in hoc alter alteri inuidit, quod eius dominatus fieret angustior, qui alterum occidit, si ambo dominarentur (Abel quippe non quaerebat dominationem in ea ciuitate, quae condebatur a fratre), sed inuidentia illa diabolica, qua inuident bonis mali, nulla alia causa, nisi quia illi boni sunt, illi mali.

For he who was willing to glory by dominating would of course dominate less, if his power were diminished by a living consort. Therefore, that one might have the whole domination, the partner was taken away; and by crime it grew into the worse, which by innocence would be less and better. These brothers Cain and Abel, however, did not both have between themselves a similar cupidity for earthly things, nor in this did the one envy the other—that his dominion would become narrower—he who killed the other, if both were to dominate (for Abel, to be sure, was not seeking domination in that city which was being founded by his brother), but rather by that diabolical envy by which the evil envy the good, for no other cause than that those are good, these evil.

Nullo enim modo fit minor accedente seu permanente consorte possessio bonitatis, immo possessio bonitas, quam tanto latius, quanto concordius indiuidua sociorum possidet caritas. Non habebit denique istam possessionem, qui eam noluerit habere communem, et tanto eam reperiet ampliorem, quanto amplius ibi potuerit amare consortem. Illud igitur, quod inter Remum et Romulum exortum est, quem ad modum aduersus se ipsam terrena ciuitas diuidatur, ostendit; quod autem inter Cain et Abel, inter duas ipsas ciuitates, Dei et hominum, inimicitias demonstrauit.

For in no way is the possession of goodness made less by a consort acceding or remaining; nay rather, possession is goodness, which the undivided charity of associates possesses so much the more broadly, the more concordantly it is held. Finally, he will not have this possession who has been unwilling to have it in common, and he will find it the more ample, the more he shall have been able to love a consort there more. That, therefore, which arose between Remus and Romulus showed how the earthly city is divided against itself; but that which was between Cain and Abel demonstrated enmities between the two cities themselves, of God and of men.

Pugnant ergo inter se mali et mali; item pugnant inter se mali et boni: boni uero et boni, si perfecti sunt, inter se pugnare non possunt. Proficientes autem nondumque perfecti ita possunt, ut bonus quisque ex ea parte pugnet contra alterum, qua etiam contra semet ipsum; et in uno quippe homine caro concupiscit aduersus spiritum et spiritus aduersus carnem. Concupiscentia ergo spiritalis contra alterius potest pugnare carnalem uel concupiscentia carnalis contra alterius spiritalem, sicut inter se pugnant boni et mali; uel certe ipsae concupiscentiae carnales inter se duorum bonorum, nondum utique perfectorum, sicut inter se pugnant mali et mali, donec eorum, qui curantur, ad ultimam uictoriam sanitas perducatur.

Therefore the evil and the evil fight among themselves; likewise the evil and the good fight among themselves: but the good and the good, if they are perfect, cannot fight among themselves. Those, however, who are progressing and not yet perfect can do so, in such a way that each good man fights against the other in that part in which he also fights against himself; for in one and the same man the flesh concupisces against the spirit and the spirit against the flesh. Therefore spiritual concupiscence can fight against the other’s carnal concupiscence, or carnal concupiscence against the other’s spiritual, just as the good and the evil fight among themselves; or certainly the very carnal concupiscences, between two good men, not yet to be sure perfected, fight among themselves, just as the evil and the evil fight among themselves, until the health of those who are being cured is brought to the ultimate victory.

[VI] Languor est quippe iste, id est illa inoboedientia, de qua in libro quarto decimo disseruimus, primae inoboedientiae supplicium, et ideo non natura, sed uitium; propter quod dicitur proficientibus bonis et ex fide in hac peregrinatione uiuentibus: In uicem onera uestra portate, et sic adimplebitis legem Christi; item alibi dicitur: Corripite inquietos, consolamini pusillanimes, suscipite infirmos, patientes estote ad omnes; uidete ne quis malum pro malo alicui reddat; item alio loco: Si praeoccupatus fuerit homo in aliquo delicto, uos, qui spiritales estis, instruite huius modi in spiritu mansuetudinis, intendens te ipsum, ne et tu tempteris; et alibi: Sol non occidat super iracundiam uestram; et in euangelio: Si peccauerit in te frater tuus, corripe eum inter te et ipsum. item de peccatis, in quibus multorum cauetur offensio, apostolus dicit: Peccantes coram omnibus argue, ut ceteri timorem habeant. Propter hoc et de uenia in uicem danda multa praecipiuntur et magna cura propter tenendam pacem, sine qua nemo poterit uidere Deum; ubi ille terror, quando iubetur seruus decem milium talentorum reddere debita, quae illi fuerant relaxata, quoniam debitum denariorum centum conseruo suo non relaxauit; qua similitudine proposita Dominus Iesus adiecit atque ait: Sic et uobis faciet Pater uester caelestis, si non dimiseritis unusquisque fratri suo de cordibus uestris.

[6] For this languor is, that is, that inobedience of which we discoursed in book fourteen, the punishment of the first inobedience, and therefore not nature but vice; on account of which it is said to those progressing in good and living by faith in this peregrination: Carry one another’s burdens, and thus you will fulfill the law of Christ; likewise elsewhere it is said: Correct the unruly, console the pusillanimous, take up the infirm, be patient toward all; see that no one render evil for evil to anyone; likewise in another place: If a man should be pre-occupied in some transgression, you who are spiritual restore such a one in a spirit of meekness, considering yourself, lest you also be tempted; and elsewhere: Let not the sun set upon your anger; and in the gospel: If your brother sins against you, rebuke him between you and him alone. Likewise concerning sins in which the offense of many is guarded against, the apostle says: Those sinning, rebuke before all, so that the rest may have fear. For this reason also many things are enjoined about pardon to be given in turn, and great care, for the holding of peace, without which no one will be able to see God; there is that dread, when the servant is ordered to pay back the debts of 10,000 talents which had been remitted to him, because he did not remit the debt of 100 denarii to his fellow-servant; with which likeness set forth the Lord Jesus added and said: So also will your heavenly Father do to you, if you do not forgive each one his brother from your hearts.

Hoc modo curantur ciues ciuitatis Dei in hac terra peregrinantes et paci supernae patriae suspirantes. Spiritus autem sanctus operatur intrinsecus, ut ualeat aliquid medicina, quae adhibetur extrinsecus. Alioquin etiamsi Deus ipse utens creatura sibi subdita in aliqua specie humana sensus adloquatur humanos, siue istos corporis siue illos, quos istis simillimos habemus in somnis, nec interiore gratia mentem regat atque agat, nihil prodest homini omnis praedicatio ueritatis.

In this way the citizens of the City of God are treated while pilgriming on this earth and sighing for the peace of their supernal fatherland. But the Holy Spirit works intrinsically, so that the medicine which is applied extrinsically may have some efficacy. Otherwise, even if God himself, using a creature subject to himself, should address human senses in some human appearance—whether those of the body, or those which in dreams we have very similar to these—and should not by inward grace rule and actuate the mind, all preaching of truth profits a human being nothing.

Facit autem hoc Deus a uasis misericordiae irae uasa discernens, dispensatione qua ipse nouit multum occulta, sed tamen iusta. Ipso quippe adiuuante mirabilibus et latentibus modis, cum peccatum quod habitat in membris nostris, quae potius iam poena peccati est, sicut apostolus praecipit, non regnat in nostro mortali corpore ad oboediendum desideriis eius nec ei membra nostra uelut iniquitatis arma exhibemus, conuertitur ad mentem non sibi ad mala, Deo regente, consentientem et eam regentem tranquillius nunc habebit, postea sanitate perfecta atque inmortalitate percepta homo sine ullo peccato in aeterna pace regnabit.

But God does this, distinguishing the vessels of wrath from the vessels of mercy, by a dispensation which he himself knows, very hidden yet nevertheless just. For with himself aiding in marvelous and latent ways, when the sin that dwells in our members—which is rather now the penalty of sin—as the Apostle bids, does not reign in our mortal body so as to obey its desires, nor do we present to it our members as arms of iniquity, it is turned toward the mind—which, God governing, does not consent to it for evils—and, with the mind ruling, he will have it more tranquil now; afterwards, with perfect health and immortality received, man will reign without any sin in eternal peace.

[VII] Sed hoc ipsum, quod sicut potuimus exposuimus, cum Deus locutus esset ad Cain eo more, quo cum primis hominibus per creaturam subiectam uelut eorum socius forma congrua loquebatur, quid ei profuit? Nonne conceptum scelus in necando fratre etiam post uerbum diuinae admonitionis impleuit? Nam cum sacrificia discreuisset amborum, in illius respiciens, huius despiciens, quod non dubitandum est potuisse cognosci signo aliquo adtestante uisibili, et hoc ideo fecisset Deus, quia mala erant opera huius, fratris uero eius bona: contristatus est Cain ualde et concidit facies eius.

[7] But this very thing, which we have expounded as we were able—when God had spoken to Cain in that manner in which he used to speak with the first human beings through a creature subject to him, as though their companion, in a congruent form—what did it profit him? Did he not fulfill the conceived crime in slaying his brother even after the word of divine admonition? For when he had distinguished the sacrifices of both, looking upon that one’s and despising this one’s—which it is not to be doubted could have been recognized by some visible attesting sign—and God had done this for this reason, because the works of this one were evil, but of his brother good: Cain was greatly grieved, and his face fell.

Sic enim scriptum est: Et dixit Dominus ad Cain: Quare tristis factus es et quare concidit facies tua? Nonne si recte offeras, recte autem non diuidas, peccasti? Quiesce; ad te enim conuersio eius, et tu dominaberis illius.

For thus it is written: And the Lord said to Cain: Why have you become sad, and why has your face fallen? Is it not that, if you offer rightly, yet do not divide rightly, you have sinned? Be still; for to you is its turning, and you will dominate it.

In hac admonitione uel monitu, quem Deus protulit ad Cain, illud quidem quod dictum est: Nonne si recte offeras, recte autem non diuidas, peccasti? quia non elucet cur uel unde sit dictum, multos sensus peperit eius obscuritas, cum diuinarum scripturarum quisque tractator secundum fidei regulam id conatur exponere. Recte quippe offertur sacrificium, cum offertur Deo uero, cui uni tantummodo sacrificandum est.

In this admonition or monition which God brought forth to Cain, that, indeed, which was said: “Is it not that if you offer rightly, but do not divide rightly, you have sinned?”—because it does not shine forth why or whence it was said—its obscurity has begotten many senses, as each tractator of the divine scriptures, according to the rule of faith, endeavors to expound it. For a sacrifice is rightly offered when it is offered to the true God, to whom alone it is to be sacrificed.

Non autem recte diuiditur, dum non discernuntur recte uel loca uel tempora uel res ipsae quae offeruntur uel qui offert et cui offertur uel hi, quibus ad uescendum distribuitur quod oblatum est, ut diuisionem hic discretionem intellegamus; siue cum offertur, ubi non oportet aut quod non ibi, sed alibi oportet, siue cum offertur, quando non oportet aut quod non tunc, sed alias oportet, siue cum offertur, quod nusquam et num quam penitus debuit, siue cum electiora sibi eiusdem generis rerum tenet homo, quam sunt ea, quae offert Deo, siue eius rei, quae oblata est, fit particeps profanus aut quilibet quem fas non est fieri. In quo autem horum Deo displicuerit Cain, facile non potest inueniri. Sed quoniam Iohannes apostolus, cum de his fratribus loqueretur: Non sicut Cain, inquit, ex maligno erat et occidit fratrem suum; et cuius rei gratia occidit?

But it is not rightly divided, when either the places or the times or the very things that are offered, or he who offers and to whom it is offered, or those to whom what has been offered is distributed for eating, are not rightly discerned, so that here by division we may understand discretion; whether when it is offered where it ought not, or that which ought not there but elsewhere; or when it is offered when it ought not, or that which ought not then but at other times; or when that is offered which ought nowhere and never at all to have been; or when a man keeps to himself choicer things of the same kind than those which he offers to God; or when the profane, or anyone whom it is not lawful to become such, is made a participant of the thing that has been offered. But in which of these Cain displeased God cannot easily be discovered. Yet since the apostle John, when he was speaking of these brothers, said, Not as Cain, he says, he was of the malign one and killed his brother; and for what thing’s sake did he kill him?

Quia opera illius maligna fuerunt, fratris autem eius iusta: datur intellegi propterea Deum non respexisse in munus eius, quia hoc ipso male diuidebat, dans Deo aliquid suum, sibi autem se ipsum. Quod omnes faciunt, qui non Dei, sed suam sectantes uoluntatem, id est non recto, sed peruerso corde uiuentes, offerunt tamen Deo munus, quo putant eum redimi, ut eorum non opituletur sanandis prauis cupiditatibus, sed explendis. Et hoc est terrenae proprium ciuitatis, Deum uel deos colere, quibus adiuuantibus regnet in uictoriis et pace terrena, non caritate consulendi, sed dominandi cupiditate.

Because his works were malignant, but his brother’s just: it is given to be understood that for this reason God did not look upon his gift, because by this very thing he was dividing badly, giving to God something of his own, but to himself himself. Which all do who, following not God’s will but their own—that is, living not with a right but with a perverse heart—yet offer to God a gift by which they think he is to be bought off, so that he may not succor them for the healing of their crooked cupidities, but for their fulfilling. And this is proper to the earthly city: to worship God or gods, with whose helping it may reign in earthly victories and peace, not by the charity of caring, but by the cupidity of dominating.

Boni quippe ad hoc utuntur mundo, ut fruantur Deo; mali autem contra, ut fruantur mundo, uti uolunt Deo; qui tamen eum uel esse uel res humanas curare iam credidit. Sunt enim multo deteriores, qui ne hoc quidem credunt. Cognito itaque Cain quod super eius germani sacrificium, nec super suum respexerat Deus, utique fratrem bonum mutatus imitari, non elatus debuit aemulari.

For the good indeed use the world for this end, that they may enjoy God; but the wicked, contrariwise, in order that they may enjoy the world, use God as they will—provided, however, that they have already believed that he either exists or cares for human affairs. For there are much worse who do not believe even this. Therefore, when Cain learned that God had regarded his brother’s sacrifice but not his own, he ought surely, being changed, to imitate the good brother, not, being puffed up, to rival him.

Sed contristatus est et concidit facies eius. Hoc peccatum maxime arguit Deus, tristitiam de alterius bonitate, et hoc fratris. Hoc quippe arguendo interrogauit dicens: Quare contristatus es, et quare concidit facies tua?

But he was saddened, and his face fell. This sin God most of all reproves: sorrow at another’s goodness—and that of a brother at that. Indeed, by arraigning this he questioned, saying: Why have you been saddened, and why has your face fallen?

Quia enim fratri inuidebat, Deus uidebat et hoc arguebat. Nam hominibus, quibus absconditum est cor alterius, esse posset ambiguum et prorsus incertum, utrum illa tristitia malignitatem suam, in qua se Deo displicuisse didicerat, an fratris doluerit bonitatem, quae Deo placuit, cum in sacrificium eius aspexit. Sed rationem reddens Deus, cur eius oblationem accipere noluerit, ut sibi ipse potius merito quam ei frater inmerito displiceret, cum esset iniustus non recte diuidendo, hoc est non recte uiuendo, et indignus cuius adprobaretur oblatio, quam esset iniustior, quod fratrem iustum gratis odisset, ostendit.

Because he was envying his brother, God saw it and reproved this as well. For to human beings, to whom another’s heart is hidden, it could be ambiguous and utterly uncertain whether that sadness grieved over his own malignity—in which he had learned that he was displeasing to God—or over his brother’s goodness, which pleased God when He looked upon his sacrifice. But God, rendering the reason why He was unwilling to accept his oblation, in order that he himself might rather be displeasing to himself deservedly than that his brother be displeasing to him undeservedly, showed that, since he was unjust by not dividing rightly—that is, by not living rightly—and unworthy that his oblation be approved, he was so much the more unjust in that he hated his just brother without cause.

Non tamen eum dimittens sine mandato sancto, iusto et bono: Quiesce, inquit; ad te enim conuersio eius, et tu dominaberis illius. Numquid fratris? Absit.

Yet he did not dismiss him without a holy, just, and good mandate: "Be still," he says; "for to you is its conversion, and you will dominate it." Of your brother? Far be it.

Cuius igitur, nisi peccati? Dixerat enim: Peccasti, tum deinde addidit: Quiesce; ad te enim conuersio eius, et tu dominaberis illius. Potest quidem ita intellegi ad ipsum hominem conuersionem esse debere peccati, ut nulli alii quam sibi sciat tribuere debere quod peccat.

Of what, then, if not of sin? For he had said: You have sinned, then thereafter he added: Be at rest; for to you is its conversion, and you will dominate it. It can indeed be understood thus, that the conversion of sin ought to be to the man himself, so that he know he ought to attribute to no one other than himself the fact that he sins.

Haec est enim salubris paenitentiae medicina et ueniae petitio non incongrua, ut, ubi ait: Ad te enim conuersio eius, non subaudiatur "erit", sed "sit"; praecipientis uidelicet, non praedicentis modo. Tunc enim dominabitur quisque peccato, si id sibi non defendendo praeposuerit, sed paenitendo subiecerit; alioquin et illi seruiet dominanti, si patrocinium adhibuerit accidenti. Sed ut peccatum intellegatur concupiscentia ipsa carnalis, de qua dicit apostolus: Caro concupiscit aduersus spiritum, in cuius carnis fructibus et inuidiam commemorat, qua utique Cain stimulabatur et accendebatur in fratris exitium: bene subauditur "erit", id est: Ad te enim conuersio eius erit, et tu dominaberis illius.

For this is the salubrious medicine of penitence and a not incongruous petition for pardon, that, where he says: For to you is its conversion, one should not understand by ellipsis “will be,” but “let it be”; of one, namely, giving a precept, not merely proclaiming. For then will each person be lord over sin, if by not defending it he has not set it before himself, but by repenting has subjected it; otherwise he will also serve that which dominates, if he bring advocacy to the accident. But in order that sin be understood as the very carnal concupiscence, of which the Apostle says: The flesh lusts against the spirit, among whose flesh’s fruits he also commemorates envy, by which assuredly Cain was goaded and inflamed unto his brother’s destruction: it is well supplied “will be,” that is: For to you its conversion will be, and you will be lord over it.

Cum enim commota fuerit pars ipsa carnalis, quam peccatum appellat apostolus, ubi dicit: Non ego operor illud, sed quod habitat in me peccatum (quam partem animi etiam philosophi dicunt esse uitiosam, non quae mentem debeat trahere, sed cui mens debeat imperare eamque ab inlicitis operibus ratione cohibere); —- cum ergo commota fuerit ad aliquid perperam committendum, si quiescatur et obtemperetur dicenti apostolo: Nec exhibueritis membra uestra arma iniquitatis peccato, ad mentem domita et uicta conuertitur, ut subditae ratio dominetur. Hoc praecepit Deus huic, qui facibus inuidiae inflammabatur in fratrem et, quem debuerat imitari, cupiebat auferri. Quiesce, inquit; manus ab scelere contine, non regnet peccatum in tuo mortali corpore ad oboediendum desideriis eius, nec exhibeas membra tua iniquitatis arma peccato.

Since indeed when that very carnal part has been stirred, which the apostle calls sin, where he says: I do not do that, but the sin that dwells in me (which part of the soul even the philosophers say is vicious, not one that ought to drag the mind, but one over which the mind ought to command and by reason restrain it from illicit works); —- when therefore it has been stirred to commit something amiss, if there is quiet and obedience is paid to the apostle saying: Do not present your members as arms of iniquity to sin, it is turned back to the mind, tamed and conquered, so that reason, with it subjected, may have dominion. This God commanded to this man, who was being inflamed with the torches of envy against his brother and desired that the one whom he ought to have imitated be taken away. Be quiet, he says; hold back your hands from crime, let not sin reign in your mortal body for obeying its desires, nor present your members as the arms of iniquity to sin.

Ad te enim conuersio eius, dum non adiuuatur relaxando, sed quiescendo frenatur; et tu dominaberis illius, ut, cum forinsecus non permittitur operari, sub potestate mentis regentis et beneuolentis adsuescat etiam intrinsecus non moueri. Dictum est tale aliquid in eodem diuino libro et de muliere, quando post peccatum Deo interrogante atque iudicante damnationis sententias acceperunt, in serpente diabolus et in se ipsis illa et maritus. Cum enim dixisset et: Multiplicans multiplicabo tristitias tuas et gemitum tuum, et in tristitiis paries filios, deinde addidit: Et ad uirum tuum conuersio tua, et ipse tui dominabitur.

For to you is its conversion, while it is not aided by relaxing, but is reined in by becoming quiescent; and you shall have dominion over it, so that, when it is not permitted to operate outwardly, under the power of the ruling and benevolent mind it may be habituated also not to be moved inwardly. Something of this sort is said in the same divine book also about the woman, when after the sin, with God interrogating and judging, they received the sentences of condemnation—the devil in the serpent, and she herself and her husband in themselves. For when he had said also: Multiplying I will multiply your sorrows and your groaning, and in sorrows you shall bear sons, then he added: And to your husband shall be your conversion, and he shall have dominion of you.

Quod dictum est ad Cain de peccato uel de uitiosa carnis concupiscentia, hoc isto loco de peccatrice femina; ubi intellegendum est uirum ad regendam uxorem animo carnem regenti similem esse oportere. Propter quod dicit apostolus: Qui diligit uxorem suam, se ipsum diligit; nemo enim umquam carnem suam odio habuit. Sananda sunt enim haec sicut nostra, non sicut aliena damnanda.

What was said to Cain about sin or about the vicious concupiscence of the flesh is, in this place, about the woman who sinned; where it must be understood that the husband, for governing the wife, ought to be like a mind governing the flesh. For which reason the apostle says: He who loves his wife loves himself; for no one ever hated his own flesh. For these things are to be healed as our own, not to be condemned as though alien.

Sed illud Dei praeceptum Cain sicut praeuaricator accepit. Inualescente quippe inuidentiae uitio fratrem insidiatus occidit. Talis erat terrenae conditor ciuitatis.

But Cain received that precept of God as a transgressor. For, with the vice of envy growing strong, he lay in wait for his brother and killed him. Such was the founder of the earthly city.

Quo modo autem significauerit etiam Iudaeos, a quibus Christus occisus est pastor ouium hominum, quem pastor ouium pecorum praefigurabat Abel, quia in allegoria prophetica res est, parco nunc dicere, et quaedam hinc aduersus Faustum Manichaeum dixisse me recolo.

But in what manner Cain also signified the Jews, by whom Christ was slain—the shepherd of the sheep of men, whom Abel, the shepherd of the sheep of the flocks, prefigured—since the matter is one of prophetic allegory, I spare to say now; and I recall that I have said certain things on this point against Faustus the Manichaean.

[VIII] Nunc autem defendenda mihi uidetur historia, ne sit scriptura incredibilis, quae dicit aedificatam ab uno homine ciuitatem eo tempore, quo non plus quam uiri quattuor uel potius tres, postea quam fratrem frater occidit, fuisse uidentur: in terra, id est primus homo pater omnium et ipse Cain et eius filius Enoch, ex cuius nomine ipsa ciuitas nuncupata est. Sed hoc quos mouet, parum considerant non omnes homines, qui tunc esse potuerunt, scriptorem sacrae huius historiae necesse habuisse nominare, sed eos solos, quos operis suscepti ratio postulabat. Propositum quippe scriptoris illius fuit, per quem sanctus Spiritus id agebat, per successiones certarum generationum ex uno homine propagatarum peruenire ad Abraham ac deinde ex eius semine ad populum Dei, in quo distincto a ceteris gentibus praefigurarentur et praenuntiarentur omnia, quae de ciuitate, cuius aeternum erit regnum, et de rege eius eodemque conditore Christo in Spiritu praeuidebantur esse uentura; ita ut nec de altera societate hominum taceretur, quam terrenam dicimus ciuitatem, quantum ei commemorandae satis esset, ut ciuitas Dei etiam suae aduersariae conparatione clarescat.

[8] Now, however, the history seems to me to need defending, lest the Scripture be incredible, which says that a city was built by one man at the time when no more than four men, or rather three, after a brother slew his brother, seem to have been on earth: on earth, that is, the first man, the father of all, and Cain himself, and his son Enoch, from whose name the city itself was appellated. But those whom this moves consider too little that it was not necessary for the writer of this sacred history to name all the men who could then have existed, but only those whom the plan of the undertaken work required. For the purpose of that writer—through whom the Holy Spirit was accomplishing this—was to arrive, through the successions of certain generations propagated from one man, at Abraham, and then from his seed to the people of God, in which, distinguished from the other nations, all things should be prefigured and preannounced which, concerning the City whose kingdom will be eternal, and concerning its King and likewise Founder, Christ, were foreseen in the Spirit to be about to come; so that neither should the other society of men be passed over in silence, which we call the earthly city, to the extent sufficient for its commemoration, in order that the City of God might also shine forth by comparison with its adversary.

Cum igitur scriptura diuina, ubi et numerum annorum, quos illi homines uixerunt, commemorat, ita concludat, ut dicat de illo, de quo loquebatur: Et genuit filios et filias, et fuerunt omnes dies illius uel illius quos uixit anni tot, et mortuus est: numquid quia eosdem filios et filias non nominat, ideo intellegere non debemus per tam multos annos, quibus tunc in saeculi huius prima aetate uiuebant, nasci potuisse plurimos homines, quorum coetibus condi possent etiam plurimae ciuitates? Sed pertinuit ad Deum, quo ista inspirante conscripta sunt, has duas societates suis diuersis generationibus primitus digerere atque distinguere, ut seorsum hominum, hoc est secundum hominem uiuentium, seorsum autem filiorum Dei, id est hominum secundum Deum uiuentium, generationes contexerentur usque diluuium, ubi ambarum societatum discretio concretioque narratur; discretio quidem, quod ambarum separatim generationes commemorantur, unius fratricidae Cain, alterius autem qui uocabatur Seth; natus quippe fuerat et ipse de Adam pro illo, quem frater occidit; concretio autem, quia bonis in deterius declinantibus tales uniuersi facti fuerant, ut diluuio delerentur; excepto uno iusto, cui nomen erat Noe, et eius coniuge et tribus filiis totidemque nuribus, qui homines octo ex illa omnium uastatione mortalium per arcam euadere meruerunt.

Since therefore the divine Scripture, where it also recounts the number of years which those men lived, so concludes as to say of him of whom it was speaking: And he begot sons and daughters, and all the days of this one or that one which he lived were so many years, and he died: is it the case that because it does not name those same sons and daughters, we ought not therefore to understand that, through so many years as they then lived in the first age of this world, very many human beings could have been born, by whose assemblages very many cities also could have been founded? But it pertained to God, by whose inspiration these things were written, first to sort out and to distinguish these two societies by their diverse generations, so that separately the generations of men—that is, of those living according to man—and separately the generations of the sons of God—that is, of men living according to God—might be woven together down to the Flood, where the discretion and the concretion of both societies is narrated; discretion indeed, in that the generations of both are recounted separately, of the one, the fratricide Cain, and of the other, him who was called Seth (for he too had been born from Adam instead of him whom his brother slew); but concretion, because, as the good declined into the worse, all had become such that they were blotted out by the Flood—except one just man, whose name was Noah, and his spouse and three sons and as many daughters-in-law, who, eight human beings, from that devastation of all mortals, merited to escape through the ark.

Quod igitur scriptum est: Et cognouit Cain uxorem suam, et concipiens peperit Enoch; et erat aedificans ciuitatem in nomine filii sui Enoch: non est quidem consequens, ut istum primum filium genuisse credatur. Neque enim hoc ex eo putandum est, quia dictus est cognouisse uxorem suam, quasi tunc se illi primitus concumbendo miscuisset. Nam et de ipso patre omnium Adam non tunc solum hoc dictum est, quando conceptus est Cain, quem primogenitum uidetur habuisse; uerum etiam posterius eadem scriptura: Cognouit, inquit, Adam Euam uxorem suam, et concepit et peperit filium, et nominauit nomen illius Seth.

Quod therefore is written: And Cain knew his wife, and conceiving she bore Enoch; and he was building a city in the name of his son Enoch: it does not, indeed, follow as a consequence that he is to be believed to have begotten this one as his first son. Nor is this to be thought on the ground that he is said to have known his wife, as if then for the first time he had joined himself to her in intercourse. For even of Adam himself, the father of all, this is not said only at that time when Cain was conceived, whom he seems to have had as firstborn; but also later the same Scripture says: “Adam knew Eve his wife, and she conceived and bore a son, and she named his name Seth.”

Vnde intellegitur ita solere illam scripturam loqui, quamuis non semper cum in ea legitur factos hominum fuisse conceptus, non tamen solum cum primum sibi sexus uterque miscetur. Nec illud necessario est argumento, ut primogenitum patri existimemus Enoch, quod eius nomine illa ciuitas nuncupata est. Non enim ab re est, ut propter aliquam causam, cum et alios haberet, diligeret eum pater ceteris amplius.

Whence it is understood that that Scripture is wont to speak thus: although, when one reads in it that conceptions of human beings took place, this is not always only when the two sexes are first joined with each other. Nor is that necessarily an argument for us to suppose Enoch the firstborn to his father, because that city was denominated by his name. For it is not out of place that, for some cause, though he had others as well, the father loved him more than the rest.

Neque enim et Iudas primogenitus fuit, a quo Iudaea cognominata est et Iudaei. Sed etiamsi conditori ciuitatis illius iste filius primus est natus, non ideo putandum est tunc a patre conditae ciuitati nomen eius inpositum, quando natus est, quia nec constitui tunc ab uno poterat ciuitas, quae nihil est aliud quam hominum multitudo aliquo societatis uinculo conligata; sed cum illius hominis familia tanta numerositate cresceret, ut haberet iam populi quantitatem, tunc potuit utique fieri, ut et constitueret et nomen primogeniti sui constitutae inponeret ciuitati. Tam longa quippe uita illorum hominum fuit, ut illic memoratorum, quorum et anni taciti non sunt, qui uixit minimum ante diluuium, ad septingentos quinquaginta tres perueniret.

For neither was Judah the first-born, from whom Judea and the Jews are cognominated. But even if to the founder of that city this son was born first, it is not on that account to be thought that his name was imposed by the father upon the founded city at the time when he was born, since a city could not then be constituted by one man, which is nothing other than a multitude of human beings bound by some bond of society; but when that man’s household should grow to such a numerosity that it already had the quantity of a people, then indeed it could come to pass that he both established it and imposed the name of his first-born upon the established city. For so long, in fact, was the life of those men, that among those mentioned there—whose years, too, are not passed over in silence—the one who lived the least before the Flood reached 753.

Nam plures nongentos annos etiam transierunt, quamuis nemo ad mille peruenerit. Quis itaque dubitauerit per unius hominis aetatem tantum multiplicari potuisse genus humanum, ut esset unde constituerentur non una, sed plurimae ciuitates? Quod ex hoc conici facillime potest, quia ex uno Abraham non multo amplius quadringentis annis numerositas Hebraeae gentis tanta procreata est, ut in exitu eiusdem populi ex Aegypto sescenta hominum milia fuisse referantur bellicae iuuentutis; ut omittamus gentem Idumaeorum non pertinentem ad populum Israel, quam genuit frater eius Esau, nepos Abrahae, et alias natas ex semine ipsius Abrahae non per Sarram coniugem procreato.

For many even went beyond 900 years, although no one reached 1000. Who, then, would doubt that within the lifetime of a single man the human race could have been multiplied so much that there would be enough whence not one, but very many cities might be constituted? Which can be inferred most easily from this: that from one Abraham, in not much more than 400 years, so great a multitude of the Hebraean nation was procreated that, at the exodus of that same people from Egypt, 600,000 men of fighting youth are reported to have existed; to say nothing of the nation of the Idumaeans, not pertaining to the people of Israel, whom his brother Esau, the grandson of Abraham, begot, and others born from the seed of Abraham himself, begotten not through Sarah his spouse.

[IX] Quam ob rem nullus prudens rerum existimator dubitauerit Cain non solum aliquam, uerum etiam magnam potuisse condere ciuitatem, quando in tam longum tempus protendebatur uita mortalium; nisi forte infidelium quispiam ex ipsa numerositate annorum nobis ingerat quaestionem, qua uixisse tunc homines scriptum est in auctoritatibus nostris, et hoc neget esse credendum. Ita quippe non credunt etiam magnitudines corporum longe ampliores tunc fuisse quam nunc sunt. Vnde et nobilissimus eorum poeta Vergilius de ingenti lapide, quem in agrorum limite infixum uir fortis illorum temporum pugnans et rapuit et cucurrit et intorsit et misit:

[9] Wherefore no prudent estimator of things will have doubted that Cain could have founded not only some city, but even a great one, since the life of mortals was stretched out into so long a time; unless perhaps some unbeliever thrusts upon us a question from the very number of the years, according to which it is written in our authorities that men then lived, and denies that this is to be believed. For in like manner they do not believe that even the magnitudes of bodies were then far greater than they are now. Whence also their most noble poet Vergil, concerning a huge stone which, fixed on the boundary of the fields, a strong man of those times, fighting, both seized and ran and whirled and cast:

Vix illum (inquit) lecti bis sex ceruice subirent,

Hardly would twice six select men (he says) lift it upon the neck,

Qualia nunc hominum producit corpora tellus, significans maiora tunc corpora producere solere tellurem. Quanto magis igitur temporibus recentioribus mundi ante illud nobile diffamatumque diluuium! Sed de corporum magnitudine plerumque incredulos nudata per uetustatem siue per uim fluminum uariosque casus sepulcra conuincunt, ubi apparuerunt uel unde ceciderunt incredibilis magnitudinis ossa mortuorum.

Such as are the bodies of men that the earth now produces, signifying that the earth then was wont to produce larger bodies. How much more, then, in the more recent times of the world before that renowned and much-bruited Deluge! But concerning the magnitude of bodies, sepulchers, laid bare by antiquity or by the force of rivers and by various accidents, for the most part convince the incredulous, where there have appeared, or whence there have fallen out, bones of the dead of incredible magnitude.

Vidi ipse non solus, sed aliquot mecum in Vticensi litore molarem hominis dentem tam ingentem, ut, si in nostrorum dentium modulos minutatim concideretur, centum nobis uideretur facere potuisse. Sed illum gigantis alicuius fuisse crediderim. Nam praeter quod erant omnium multo quam nostra maiora tunc corpora, gigantes longe ceteris anteibant; sicut aliis deinde nostrisque temporibus rara quidem, sed numquam ferme defuerunt, quae modum aliorum plurimum excederent.

I myself saw—not alone, but with several along with me—on the Utican shore a human molar tooth so enormous that, if it were cut minutely into the measures of our teeth, it would seem to us to have been able to make a hundred. But I would believe that it belonged to some giant. For besides the fact that at that time the bodies of all were much greater than ours, the giants far outstripped the rest; just as in other times and then in our own there have indeed been rare instances, yet they have hardly ever altogether been lacking, of those who very greatly exceeded the measure of others.

Plinius Secundus, doctissimus homo, quanto magis magisque praeterit saeculi excursus, minora corpora naturam ferre testatur; quod etiam Homerum commemorat saepe carmine fuisse conquestum, non haec uelut poetica figmenta deridens, sed in historicam fidem tamquam miraculorum naturalium scriptor adsumens. Verum, ut dixi, antiquorum magnitudines corporum inuenta plerumque ossa, quoniam diuturna sunt, etiam multo posterioribus saeculis produnt. Annorum autem numerositas cuiusque hominis, quae temporibus illis fuit, nullis nunc talibus documentis uenire in experimentum potest.

Pliny Secundus, a most learned man, testifies that the more and more the course of the age passes by, nature bears smaller bodies; and he notes that Homer too often lamented this in song, not deriding these things as if they were poetic figments, but adopting them into historical credence as a writer of natural miracles. Indeed, as I said, the magnitudes of the bodies of the ancients are revealed to even much later ages by bones often found, since they are long-lasting. But the numerosity of the years of each man, which existed in those times, now cannot come into empirical verification by any such documents.

Nec tamen ideo fides sacrae huic historiae deroganda est, cuius tanto inpudentius narrata non credimus, quanto impleri certius praenuntiata conspicimus. Dicit tamen etiam idem Plinius esse adhuc gentem, ubi ducentos annos uiuitur. Si ergo humanarum uitarum diuturnitates, quas experti non sumus, hodie habere creduntur incognita nobis loca, cur non habuisse credantur et tempora?

Nor, nevertheless, on that account should the credit of this sacred history be diminished, whose narrative we the more impudently refuse to believe, the more surely we behold its foretold things being fulfilled. Yet the same Pliny also says that there still is a nation where people live two hundred years. If, therefore, the long durations of human lives, which we have not experienced, are today believed to belong to places unknown to us, why should times also not be believed to have had them?

An uero credibile est alicubi esse quod hic non est, et incredibile est aliquando fuisse quod nunc non est?

Or truly, is it credible that somewhere there exists what is not here, and is it incredible that at some time there was what now is not?

[X] Quocirca etsi inter Hebraeos et nostros codices de ipso numero annorum nonnulla uidetur esse distantia, quod ignoro qua ratione sit factum: non tamen tanta est, ut illos homines tam longaeuos fuisse dissentiant. Nam ipse homo primus Adam, antequam gigneret filium, qui est appellatus Seth, ducentos triginta uixisse annos reperitur in codicibus nostris, in Hebraeis autem centum triginta perhibetur; sed postea quam eum genuit, septingentos uixisse legitur in nostris, octingentos uero in illis; atque ita in utrisque uniuersitatis summa concordat. Ac deinde per consequentes generationes antequam gignatur, qui gigni commemoratur, minus uixisse apud Hebraeos pater eius inuenitur centum annos; sed postea quam est genitus idem ipse, centum minus quam in Hebraeis inueniuntur in nostris; atque ita et hinc et inde numeri uniuersitas consonat.

[10] Wherefore even if between the Hebrew and our codices there seems to be some difference about the very number of years—which I do not know by what rationale it has arisen—yet it is not so great that they disagree that those men were so long-lived. For the man himself, the first, Adam, before he begot the son who was called Seth, is found in our codices to have lived two hundred thirty years, but in the Hebrew [codices] he is said to have lived one hundred thirty; but after he begot him, he is read to have lived seven hundred in ours, but eight hundred in theirs; and thus in both the sum of the whole agrees. And then through the subsequent generations, before the one who is said to be begotten is begotten, his father is found among the Hebrews to have lived one hundred years less; but after the same is begotten, in our [codices] there are found one hundred fewer than in the Hebrews; and thus on both sides the totality of the numbers is consonant.

In sexta autem generatione nusquam utrique codices discrepant. In septima uero, ubi ille qui natus est Enoch non mortuus, sed quod Deo placuerit translatus esse narratur, eadem dissonantia est, quae in superioribus quinque de centum annis antequam gigneret eum, qui ibi commemoratus est, filium, atque in summa similis consonantia. Vixit enim annos, antequam transferretur, secundum utrosque codices trecentos sexaginta quinque.

In the sixth generation, however, the two codices nowhere disagree. But in the seventh, where it is narrated that the one who was born, Enoch, was not dead but, because it pleased God, was translated, there is the same dissonance as in the preceding five about the one hundred years before he begot the son who is there commemorated, and a like consonance in the total. For before he was transferred, he lived, according to both codices, 365 years.

Octaua generatio habet quidem nonnullam diuersitatem, sed minorem ac dissimilem ceteris. Mathusalam quippe, quem genuit Enoch, antequam gigneret eum, qui in ipso ordine sequitur, secundum Hebraeos non centum minus, sed uiginti amplius uixit annos; qui rursus in nostris, postea quam eum genuit, reperiuntur additi, et in utrisque sibi summa uniuersi numeri occurrit. In sola nona generatione, id est in annis Lamech, filii Mathusalae, patris autem Noe, summa uniuersitatis discrepat, sed non plurimum.

The eighth generation does indeed have some diversity, but less and unlike the others. For Methuselah, whom Enoch begot, before he begot him who follows in that very order, according to the Hebrews lived not one hundred fewer, but twenty more years; which, in our codices, are in turn found to be added after he begot him, and in both the total of the whole number agrees with itself. In the ninth generation alone, that is, in the years of Lamech, son of Methuselah yet father of Noah, the sum of the whole disagrees, but not by very much.

Viginti enim et quattuor annos plus uixisse in Hebraeis quam in nostris codicibus inuenitur. Namque antequam gigneret filium, qui uocatus est Noe, sex minus habet in Hebraeis quam in nostris; postea uero quam eum genuit, triginta amplius in eisdem quam in nostris. Vnde sex illis detractis restant uiginti quattuor, ut dictum est.

For it is found that he lived twenty-four years more in the Hebrew than in our codices. For before he begat the son who was called Noah, he has six fewer in the Hebrew codices than in ours; but after he begat him, thirty more in the same than in ours. Whence, those six subtracted, there remain twenty-four, as has been said.

[XI] Per hanc autem discrepantiam Hebraeorum codicum atque nostrorum exoritur illa famosissima quaestio, ubi Mathusalam quattuordecim annos uixisse post diluuium conputatur, cum scriptura ex omnibus, qui in terra tunc fuerant, solos octo homines in arca exitium commemoret euasisse diluuii, in quibus Mathusalam non fuit. Secundum codices enim nostros Mathusalam priusquam gigneret illum, quem uocauit Lamech, uixit annos centum sexaginta septem; deinde ipse Lamech, antequam ex illo natus esset Noe, uixit annos centum octoginta octo, qui fiunt simul trecenti quinquaginta quinque; his adduntur sescenti Noe, quoto eius anno diluuium factum est: qui fiunt nongenti quinquaginta quinque, ex quo Mathusalam natus est, usque ad annum diluuii. Omnes autem anni uitae Mathusalam nongenti sexaginta nouem conputantur, quia, cum uixisset annos centum sexaginta septem et genuisset filium, qui est appellatus Lamech, post eum genitum uixit annos octingentos duo; qui omnes, ut diximus, nongenti sexaginta nouem fiunt.

[11] Through this discrepancy of the codices of the Hebrews and of ours there arises that most famous question, where Methuselah is computed to have lived 14 years after the deluge, whereas Scripture records that, out of all who were then on earth, only 8 human beings in the ark escaped the destruction of the deluge, among whom Methuselah was not. For according to our codices Methuselah, before he begot him whom he called Lamech, lived 167 years; then Lamech himself, before Noah had been born from him, lived 188 years, which make together 355; to these are added the 600 of Noah, in which year of his the deluge took place: which make 955 from the time Methuselah was born up to the year of the deluge. But all the years of Methuselah’s life are computed as 969, because, when he had lived 167 years and had begotten the son who was called Lamech, after he was begotten he lived 802 years; which all, as we said, make 969.

Vnde detractis nongentis quinquaginta quinque ab ortu Mathusalae usque ad diluuium remanent quattuordecim, quibus uixisse creditur post diluuium. Propter quod eum nonnulli, etsi non in terra, ubi omnem carnem, quam uiuere in aquis natura non sinit, constat fuisse deletam, cum patre suo qui translatus fuerat aliquantum fuisse atque ibi, donec diluuium praeteriret, uixisse arbitrantur, nolentes derogare fidem codicibus, quos in auctoritatem celebriorem suscepit ecclesia, et credentes Iudaeorum potius quam istos non habere quod uerum est. Non enim admittunt, quod magis hic esse potuerit error interpretum, quam in ea lingua esse falsum, unde in nostram per Graecam scriptura ipsa translata est, sed inquiunt non esse credibile septuaginta interpretes, qui uno simul tempore unoque sensu interpretati sunt, errare potuisse aut ubi nihil eorum intererat uoluisse mentiri; Iudaeos uero, dum nobis inuident, quod lex et prophetae ad nos interpretando transierint, mutasse quaedam in codicibus suis, ut nostris minueretur auctoritas.

Whence, with 955 subtracted from the origin of Methuselah up to the deluge, there remain 14, during which he is believed to have lived after the deluge. For which reason some judge that he—though not upon the earth, where it is agreed that all flesh which nature does not allow to live in the waters was destroyed—was for a while with his father who had been translated, and there lived until the flood should pass by; unwilling to derogate from the credit of the codices which the church has received into more celebrated authority, and believing that the Jews rather than these do not have what is true. For they do not admit that there could more likely have been here an error of the interpreters than that there is a falsehood in that language from which the scripture itself was translated into ours through Greek; but they say it is not credible that the seventy interpreters, who at one and the same time and with one and the same sense made the interpretation, could have erred or would have wished to lie where none of their interests were concerned; whereas the Jews, while envying us the fact that the Law and the Prophets have passed over to us by being interpreted, altered certain things in their codices, so that the authority of ours might be diminished.

Hanc opinionem uel suspicionem accipiat quisque ut putauerit; certum est tamen non uixisse Mathusalam post diluuium, sed eodem anno fuisse defunctum, si uerum est quod de numero annorum in Hebraeis codicibus inuenitur. De illis autem septuaginta interpretibus quid mihi uideatur, suo loco diligentius inserendum est, cum ad ipsa tempora, quantum necessitas huius operis postulat, commemoranda adiuuante Domino uenerimus. Praesenti enim sufficit quaestioni secundum utrosque codices tam longas habuisse uitas illius aeui homines, ut posset aetate unius, qui de duobus, quos solos terra tunc habuit, parentibus primus est natus, ad constituendam etiam ciuitatem multiplicari genus humanum.

Let each one accept this opinion or suspicion as he has supposed; yet it is certain that Methuselah did not live after the deluge, but was deceased in the same year, if what is found concerning the number of years in the Hebrew codices is true. But about those seventy interpreters, what seems to me is to be more diligently inserted in its own place, when, with the Lord helping, we shall have come to the very times to be commemorated, so far as the necessity of this work demands. For to the present question it suffices, according to both codices, that the men of that age had lives so long that within the lifetime of a single man—who, from the two parents whom alone the earth then had, was first born—the human race could be multiplied to constitute even a city.

[XII] Neque enim ullo modo audiendi sunt, qui putant aliter annos illis temporibus conputatos, id est tantae breuitatis, ut unus annus noster decem illos habuisse credatur. Quapropter, inquiunt, cum audierit quisque uel legerit nongentos annos quemque uixisse, debet intellegere nonaginta; decem quippe illi anni unus est noster et decem nostri centum illi fuerunt. Ac per hoc, ut putant, uiginti trium annorum fuit Adam, quando genuit Seth, et ipse Seth uiginti agebat et sex menses, quando ex illo natus est Enos, quos appellat scriptura ducentos et quinque annos; quoniam sicut isti suspicantur, quorum exponimus opinionem, unum annum, qualem nunc habemus, in decem partes illi diuidebant et easdem partes annos uocabant; quarum partium habet una quadratum senarium, eo quod sex diebus Deus perfecerit opera sua, ut in septimo requiesceret (de qua re in libro undecimo, sicut potui, disputaui); sexiens autem seni, qui numerus quadratum senarium facit, triginta sex dies sunt; qui multiplicati deciens ad trecentos sexaginta perueniunt, id est duodecim menses lunares.

[12] For we must in no way listen to those who think that in those times the years were computed otherwise, that is, of such brevity that one of our years is believed to have contained ten of theirs. “Wherefore,” they say, “when anyone has heard or read that each lived nine hundred years, he ought to understand ninety; for those ten years are one of ours, and ten of ours were one hundred of theirs.” And accordingly, as they think, Adam was twenty-three years old when he begot Seth, and Seth himself was twenty years and six months old when Enos was born from him— which the Scripture calls two hundred and five years— because, as these men suspect, whose opinion we are setting forth, they used to divide one year such as we now have into ten parts and call those same parts years; of which parts one has a senary square, in that God perfected His works in six days so that on the seventh He might rest (about which matter in the eleventh book, as I could, I have argued); but six times six, which number makes a senary square, are thirty-six days; which, multiplied ten times, come to three hundred sixty, that is, twelve lunar months.

Propter quinque dies enim reliquos, quibus solaris annus impletur, et diei quadrantem, propter quem quater ductum eo anno, quo bissextum uocant, unus dies adicitur, addebantur a ueteribus postea dies, ut occurreret numerus annorum, quod dies Romani intercalares uocabant. Proinde etiam Enos, quem genuit Seth, decem et nouem agebat annos, quando ex illo natus est filius eius Cainan, quos annos dicit scriptura centum nonaginta. Et deinceps per omnes generationes, in quibus hominum anni commemorantur ante diluuium, nullus fere in nostris codicibus inuenitur, qui, cum esset centum annorum uel infra uel etiam centum uiginti aut non multo amplius, genuerit filium; sed qui minima aetate genuerunt, centum sexaginta, et quod excurrit, fuisse referuntur; quia nemo, inquiunt, decem annorum homo potest gignere filios, qui numerus centum appellabantur anni ab illis hominibus; sed in annis sedecim est matura pubertas et proli iam idonea procreandae, quos centum et sexaginta annos illa tempora nuncupabant.

For on account of the five remaining days by which the solar year is completed, and the quarter of a day, on account of which, when it has been carried four times, in that year which they call bissextile (leap-year) one day is added, days used afterwards to be added by the ancients, so that the reckoning of the years might catch up, which the Romans called intercalary days. Accordingly even Enos, whom Seth begot, was nineteen years old when from him his son Cainan was born, which years Scripture calls one hundred and ninety. And thereafter through all the generations in which the years of men are commemorated before the deluge, scarcely anyone is found in our codices who, when he was one hundred years or below or even one hundred and twenty or not much more, begot a son; but those who begot at the least age are reported to have been one hundred and sixty and something beyond; because, they say, a ten-year-old human cannot beget sons—this number they called one hundred years; but at sixteen years there is mature puberty and already fitness for procreating offspring, which those times used to name one hundred and sixty years.

Vt autem aliter annum tunc fuisse conputatum non sit incredibile, adiciunt quod apud plerosque scriptores historiae reperitur, Aegyptios habuisse annum quattuor mensum, Acarnanas sex mensum, Lauinios tredecim mensum. Plinius Secundus cum commemorasset relatum fuisse in litteras quendam uixisse centum quinquaginta duos, alium decem amplius, alios ducentorum annorum habuisse uitam, alios trecentorum, quosdam ad quingentos, alios ad sescentos, nonnullos ad octingentos etiam peruenisse, haec omnia inscitia temporum accidisse arbitratus est. "Alii quippe, inquit, aestate determinabant annum et alterum hieme, alii quadripertitis temporibus, sicut Arcades, inquit, quorum anni trimenstres fuerunt." Adiecit etiam aliquando Aegyptios, quorum paruos annos quaternorum mensum fuisse supra diximus, lunae fine limitasse annum.

But, that it not be unbelievable that the year was then computed otherwise, they add what is found among very many writers of history: that the Egyptians had a year of four months, the Acarnanians of six months, the Lavinians of thirteen months. Pliny Secundus, when he had commemorated that it had been reported in writing that a certain man lived 152, another ten more, others had a life of 200 years, others of 300, some had reached to 500, others to 600, some even to 800, judged that all these things befell through an ignorance of times. “For some,” he says, “were determining the year by summer and another by winter; others by times divided into four parts, just as the Arcadians,” he says, “whose years were three-month.” He added also that sometimes the Egyptians—whose small years of four months, as we said above, there were—limited the year by the end of the moon.

"Itaque apud eos, inquit, et singula milia annorum uixisse produntur."

"And so among them, he says, even single thousands of years are reported to have been lived."

His uelut probabilibus argumentis quidam non destruentes fidem sacrae huius historiae, sed astruere nitentes, ne sit incredibile quod tam multos annos uixisse referuntur antiqui, persuaserunt sibi, nec se suadere inpudenter existimant, tam exiguum spatium temporis tunc annum uocatum, ut illi decem sint unus noster et decem nostri centum illorum. Hoc autem esse falsissimum documento euidentissimo ostenditur. Quod antequam faciam, non mihi tacendum uidetur, quae credibilior possit esse suspicio.

By these, as it were with probable arguments, certain men, not destroying the faith of this sacred history but striving to adstruate it, lest it be incredible that the ancients are reported to have lived so many years, have persuaded themselves—and do not think themselves to be persuading impudently—that so exiguous a span of time was then called a year, that their ten would be one of ours, and our ten a hundred of theirs. But that this is most false is shown by a most evident document (proof). Before I do this, it seems to me not to be kept silent what suspicion might be more credible.

Poteramus certe hanc adseuerationem ex Hebraeis codicibus redarguere atque conuincere, ubi Adam non ducentorum triginta, sed centum triginta annorum fuisse reperitur, quando tertium genuit filium; qui anni si tredecim nostri sunt, procul dubio, primum quando genuit, undecim uel non multo amplius annorum fuit. Quis potest hac aetate generare usitata ista nobisque notissima lege naturae? Sed hunc omittamus, qui fortasse etiam quando creatus est potuit; non enim eum tam paruum, quam infantes nostri sunt, factum fuisse credibile est.

We could certainly refute and convict this asseveration from the Hebrew codices, where Adam is found to have been not 230, but 130 years old when he begot his third son; which years, if they are 13 of ours, then without doubt, at first when he begot, he was 11 or not much more years old. Who can beget at that age by that usual and to us most well-known law of nature? But let us omit him, who perhaps even when he was created could do so; for it is not credible that he was made as small as our infants are.

Seth filius eius non ducentorum quinque, sicut nos legimus, sed centum quinque fuit, quando genuit Enos; ac per hoc secundum istos nondum habebat undecim annos aetatis. Quid dicam de Cainan eius filio, qui cum apud nos centum septuaginta reperiatur, apud Hebraeos septuaginta legitur fuisse, quando genuit Maleleel? Quis generat homo septennis, si tunc anni septuaginta nuncupabantur, qui septem fuerunt?

Seth, his son, was not two hundred and five, as we read, but one hundred and five, when he begot Enos; and through this, according to those men, he did not yet have eleven years of age. What shall I say of Cainan, his son, who, while with us he is found at one hundred seventy, among the Hebrews is read to have been seventy when he begot Maleleel? Who begets at seven years old, if then “seventy years” were denominated which were seven?

[XIII] Sed cum hoc dixero, continuo referetur illud Iudaeorum esse mendacium, de quo superius satis actum est; nam septuaginta interpretes laudabiliter celebratos uiros non potuisse mentiri. Vbi si quaeram, quid sit credibilius, Iudaeorum gentem tam longe lateque diffusam in hoc conscribendum mendacium uno consilio conspirare potuisse et, dum aliis inuident auctoritatem, sibi abstulisse ueritatem, an septuaginta homines, qui etiam ipsi Iudaei erant, uno in loco positos, quoniam rex Aegyptius Ptolomaeus eos ad hoc opus asciuerat, ipsam ueritatem gentibus alienigenis inuidisse et communicato istuc fecisse consilio: quis non uideat quid procliuias faciliusque credatur? Sed absit ut prudens quispiam uel Iudaeos cuiuslibet peruersitatis atque malitiae tantum potuisse credat in codicibus tam multis et tam longe lateque dispersis, uel septuaginta illos memorabiles uiros hoc de inuidenda gentibus ueritate unum communicasse consilium.

[13] But when I shall have said this, it will straightway be retorted that that is a mendacity of the Jews, about which above enough has been dealt with; for that the seventy interpreters, men laudably celebrated, could not have lied. Where, if I should inquire what is more credible—whether that the nation of the Jews, spread so far and wide, could have conspired with one counsel to inscribe this lie, and, while they begrudged others authority, took truth away from themselves; or that seventy men, who were themselves also Jews, placed in one place, since the Egyptian king Ptolemy had enlisted them for this work, begrudged the very truth to foreign nations and, by a counsel communicated among themselves, did this—who does not see what is more likely and easier to be believed? But far be it that any prudent person either believe that the Jews, of whatever perversity and malice, could have achieved so much in so many codices and so far and wide dispersed, or that those seventy memorable men brought into one common counsel this design of begrudging the nations the truth.

Credibilius ergo quis dixerit, cum primum de bibliotheca Ptolomaei describi ista coeperunt, tunc aliquid tale fieri potuisse in codice uno, sed primitus inde descripto, unde iam latius emanaret; ubi potuit quidem accidere etiam scriptoris error. Sed hoc in illa quaestione de uita Mathusalae non absurdum est suspicari, et in illo alio, ubi superantibus uiginti quattuor annis summa non conuenit. In his autem, in quibus continuatur ipsius mendositatis similitudo, ita ut ante genitum filium, qui ordini inseritur, alibi supersint centum anni, alibi desint; post genitum autem ubi deerant supersint, ubi supererant desint, ut summa conueniat; et hoc in prima, secunda, tertia, quarta, quinta, septima generatione inuenitur: uidetur habere quandam, si dici potest, error ipse constantiam nec casum redolet, sed industriam.

More credibly, then, one would say that, when these items first began to be copied from the library of Ptolemy, something of this sort could have happened in a single codex, but from there, having been first transcribed, it would spread more widely; where indeed a scribe’s error also could have occurred. But this is not absurd to suspect in that question concerning the life of Methuselah, and in that other case where, with twenty-four years exceeding, the sum does not agree. However, in those instances in which the likeness of the very mendosity is continued—such that, before the son is begotten who is inserted into the order, in one place a hundred years are in excess, elsewhere they are lacking; but after the begetting, where they were lacking they are in excess, where they were in excess they are lacking, so that the sum may agree; and this is found in the first, second, third, fourth, fifth, seventh generation—the error itself seems to have a certain, if it can be said, constancy, and it savors not of accident but of contrivance.

Itaque illa diuersitas numerorum aliter se habentium in codicibus Graecis et Latinis, aliter in Hebraeis, ubi non est ista de centum annis prius additis et postea detractis per tot generationes continuata parilitas, nec malitiae Iudaeorum nec diligentiae uel prudentiae septuaginta interpretum, sed scriptoris tribuatur errori, qui de bibliotheca supradicti regis codicem describendum primus accepit. Nam etiam nunc, ubi numeri non faciunt intentum ad aliquid, quod facile possit intellegi uel quod appareat utiliter disci, et neglegenter describuntur et neglegentius emendantur. Quis enim sibi existimet esse discendum, quot milia hominum tribus Israel singillatim habere potuerunt?

Therefore that diversity of numbers—being one way in the Greek and Latin codices, another in the Hebrew, where there is not that continued parity about one hundred years first added and afterwards subtracted through so many generations—is to be attributed not to the malice of the Jews nor to the diligence or prudence of the seventy interpreters, but to the error of the scribe who first received a codex to be copied from the library of the aforesaid king. For even now, where numbers do not make one intent upon something that can easily be understood or that appears usefully to be learned, they are carelessly copied and more carelessly corrected. For who would think for himself that it is something to be learned—how many thousands of men each of the tribes of Israel could have had?

quoniam prodesse aliquid non putatur; et quotus quisque hominum est, cui profunditas utilitatis huius appareat? Hic uero, ubi per tot contextas generationes centum anni alibi adsunt, alibi desunt, et post natum, qui commemorandus fuerat, filium desunt ubi adfuerunt, adsunt ubi defuerunt, ut summa concordet, nimirum cum uellet persuadere, qui hoc fecit, ideo numerosissimos annos uixisse antiquos, quod eos breuissimos nuncupabant, et hoc de maturitate pubertatis, qua idonea filii gignerentur, conaretur ostendere, atque ideo in illis centum annis decem nostros insinuandos putaret incredulis, ne homines tamdiu uixisse recipere in fidem nollent, addidit centum, ubi gignendis filiis habilem non inuenit aetatem, eosdemque post genitos filios, ut congrueret summa, detraxit. Sic quippe uoluit credibiles facere idonearum generandae proli conuenientias aetatum, ut tamen numero non fraudaret uniuersas aetates uiuentium singulorum.

since it is not thought to profit anything; and how few among men are there to whom the profundity of this utility would appear? But here, where through so many interwoven generations one hundred years are present in some places, elsewhere absent, and after the son—who was to be mentioned—was born, they are absent where they had been present, present where they had been absent, so that the total may be concordant, clearly the one who did this, wishing to persuade that the ancients lived for very numerous years because they designated them as very brief, and trying to demonstrate this from the maturity of puberty, by which sons fit to be begotten would be engendered, therefore thought that into those one hundred years ten of ours should be insinuated for the incredulous, lest they be unwilling to receive in faith that men lived so long; he added a hundred where he did not find an age suitable for begetting sons, and the same hundred, after sons had been begotten, he subtracted, so that the sum might agree. For thus he wished to make credible the congruences of ages suitable for generating progeny, yet not by the number to defraud the total lifetimes of the individual living persons.

Quod autem id in sexta generatione non fecit, hoc ipsum est quod magis monet ideo illum fecisse, cum res, quam dicimus, postulauit, quia non fecit, ubi non postulauit. Inuenit namque in eadem generatione apud Hebraeos uixisse Iared, antequam genuisset Enoch, centum sexaginta duos, qui secundum illam rationem breuium annorum fiunt anni sedecim et aliquid minus quam menses duo; quae iam aetas apta est ad gignendum, et ideo addere centum annos breues, ut nostri uiginti sex fierent, necesse non fuit, nec post natum Enoch eos detrahere, quos non addiderat ante natum. Sic factum est ut hic nulla esset inter codices utrosque uarietas.

But that he did not do this in the sixth generation is itself what the more indicates that he therefore did it when the matter we speak of required, because he did not do it where it did not require. For he found in the same generation among the Hebrews that Jared, before he begot Enoch, had lived 162, which, according to that reckoning of short years, become 16 years and something less than two months; which age is already apt for begetting, and therefore it was not necessary to add 100 short years, so that our 26 might be made, nor to subtract them after Enoch was born, which he had not added before the birth. Thus it came about that here there was no variation between the two codices.

Sed rursus mouet, cur in octaua generatione, antequam de Mathusalam nasceretur Lamech, cum apud Hebraeos legantur centum octoginta duo anni, uiginti minus inueniuntur in codicibus nostris, ubi potius addi centum solent, et post genitum Lamech conplendam restituuntur ad summam, quae in codicibus utrisque non discrepat. Si enim centum septuaginta annos propter pubertatis maturitatem decem et septem uolebat intellegi, sicut nihil addere, ita nihil detrahere iam debebat, quia inuenerat aetatem idoneam generationi filiorum, propter quam in aliis centum illos annos, ubi eam non inueniebat, addebat. Hoc autem de uiginti annis merito putaremus casu mendositatis accidere potuisse, nisi eos, sicut prius detraxerat, restituere postea curaret, ut summae conueniret integritas.

Sed again it troubles us why in the eighth generation, before Lamech was born from Methuselah, when among the Hebrews there are read 182 years, twenty less are found in our codices, where rather 100 are wont to be added, and after Lamech has been begotten they are restored for completing to the sum which in both codices does not disagree. For if he wished the 170 years, on account of the maturity of puberty, to be understood as 17, just as he ought to add nothing, so he ought now to subtract nothing, because he had found an age suitable to the generation of sons, on account of which in other cases he used to add those 100 years where he did not find it. But we would rightly suppose that this matter of 20 years could have occurred by a chance of textual mendosity, unless he then took care to restore them, just as he had previously subtracted them, so that integrity might agree with the sum.

An forte astutius factum existimandum est, ut illa, qua centum anni prius solent adici et postea detrahi, occultaretur industria, cum et illic, ubi necesse non fuerat, non quidem de centum annis, uerum tamen de quantulocumque numero prius detracto, post reddito, tale aliquid fieret? Sed quomodolibet istuc accipiatur, siue credatur ita esse factum siue non credatur, siue postremo ita siue non ita sit: recte fieri nullo modo dubitauerim, ut, cum diuersum aliquid in utrisque codicibus inuenitur, quando quidem ad fidem rerum gestarum utrumque esse non potest uerum, ei linguae potius credatur, unde est in aliam per interpretes facta translatio. Nam in quibusdam etiam codicibus Graecis tribus et uno Latino et uno etiam Syro inter se consentientibus inuentus est Mathusalam sex annis ante diluuium fuisse defunctus.

Or perhaps it is to be judged more shrewdly done, that by an industry that matter, in which a hundred years are accustomed first to be added and afterward subtracted, might be concealed, since there too, where it had not been necessary, not indeed of a hundred years, yet nevertheless of whatever small number, something of the sort was done—first taken away, afterward given back? But however that may be taken, whether it be believed to have been done thus or not believed, whether finally it be so or not so: I would in no way doubt that it is done rightly, that, when something different is found in both codices, since indeed, for the credibility of the deeds done, both cannot be true, greater credence be given to that tongue from which, into another, the translation has been made through interpreters. For in certain codices also—three Greek, and one Latin, and even one Syrian—agreeing among themselves, Methuselah was found to have been defunct six years before the deluge.

[XIV] Nunc iam uideamus quonam modo euidenter possit ostendi, non tam breues, ut illi decem unus esset noster, sed tantae prolixitatis annos, quantae nunc habemus (quos utique circuitus conficit solis), in illorum hominum uita prolixissima conputatos. Sescentensimo nempe anno uitae Noe scriptum est factum esse diluuium. Cur ergo ibi legitur: Et aqua diluuii facta est super terram sescentensimo anno in uita Noe, secundi mensis, septima et uicensima mensis, si annus ille minimus, quales decem faciunt unum nostrum, triginta sex habebat dies?

[14] Now let us see in what way it can be shown plainly that the years counted in the very long life of those men were not so short that ten of theirs would make one of ours, but of such length as we now have (which, to be sure, the circuit of the sun completes). For it is written that the deluge happened in the 600th year of the life of Noah. Why, therefore, is it read there: And the water of the deluge came upon the earth in the 600th year in the life of Noah, of the 2nd month, on the 27th of the month, if that least kind of year—such that ten make one of ours—had 36 days?

Tantillus quippe annus, si antiquo more hoc nomen accepit, aut non habet menses, aut mensis eius est triduum, ut habeat duodecim menses. Quo modo igitur hic dictum est: Sescentensimo anno, secundi mensis, septima et uicensima mensis, nisi quia tales, quales nunc sunt, etiam tunc erant menses? Nam quo pacto aliter uicensimo et septimo die secundi mensis diceretur coeptum esse diluuium?

Indeed, such a tiny year, if it received this name according to ancient custom, either does not have months, or its month is a triduum (a three-day span), so that it may have twelve months. How, then, has it here been said: In the six-hundredth year, of the second month, on the seventh and twentieth of the month, unless because the months, such as they are now, were also then? For how otherwise would it be said that the deluge began on the twenty-seventh day of the second month?

Deinde postea in fine diluuii ita legitur: Et sedit arca in mense septimo septima et uicensima mensis super montes Ararat. Aqua autem minuebatur usque ad undecimum mensem; in undecimo autem mense prima die mensis paruerunt capita montium. Si igitur tales menses erant, tales profecto et anni erant, quales nunc habemus.

Then afterwards at the end of the flood it is read thus: And the ark sat, in the seventh month, on the twenty-seventh of the month, upon the mountains of Ararat. But the water was diminishing until the eleventh month; and in the eleventh month, on the first day of the month, the heads of the mountains appeared. If therefore such were the months, such indeed also were the years, such as we now have.

Menses quippe illi triduani uiginti et septem dies habere non poterant. Aut si pars tricensima tridui tunc appellabatur dies, ut omnia proportione minuantur: ergo nec toto quadriduo nostro factum est illud tam grande diluuium, quod memoratur factum quadraginta diebus et noctibus. Quis hanc absurditatem et uanitatem ferat?

For those three-day months indeed could not have twenty-seven days. Or if the thirtieth part of a three-day period was then called a “day,” so that all things might be diminished in proportion: therefore not even in our whole four-day period was that so great deluge accomplished, which is recorded to have been done in forty days and nights. Who would bear this absurdity and vanity?

Proinde remoueatur hic error, qui coniectura falsa ita uult astruere scripturarum nostrarum fidem, ut alibi destruat. Prorsus tantus etiam tunc dies fuit, quantus et nunc est, quem uiginti quattuor horae diurno curriculo nocturnoque determinant; tantus mensis, quantus et nunc est, quem luna coepta et finita concludit; tantus annus, quantus et nunc est, quem duodecim menses lunares additis propter cursum solarem quinque diebus et quadrante consummant, quanti anni sescentensimi uitae Noe secundus erat mensis eiusque mensis uicensimus et septimus dies, quando coepit esse diluuium, in quo dies quadraginta continuatae ingentes pluuiae memorantur, qui dies non binas ac paulo amplius horas habebant, sed uicenas et quaternas die noctuque transactas. Ac per hoc tam magnos annos uixerunt illi antiqui usque amplius quam nongentos, quantos postea uixit Abraham centum septuaginta et post eum filius eius Isaac centum octoginta et filius eius Iacob centum quinquaginta, et quantos interposita aliquanta aetate Moyses centum uiginti, et quantos etiam nunc uiuunt homines septuaginta uel octoginta uel non multo amplius, de quibus dictum est: Et amplius eis labor et dolor.

Accordingly, let this error be removed, which by a false conjecture wishes so to establish the credence of our Scriptures as to destroy it elsewhere. Entirely, the day then was just as it is now, which 24 hours, by the diurnal and nocturnal course, determine; the month as it is now, which the moon, once begun and finished, concludes; the year as it is now, which 12 lunar months, with 5 days and a quadrant added on account of the solar course, consummate—such as was the second month of the 600th year of Noah’s life, and the 27th day of that month, when the deluge began, in which 40 days of continuous, huge rains are recorded—days which did not have two and a little more hours each, but 24, passed by day and night. And thus those ancients lived such great years, up to more than 900; as later Abraham lived 170, and after him his son Isaac 180, and his son Jacob 150, and, with some interval of time interposed, Moses 120; and as even now humans live 70 or 80 or not much more—about whom it was said: And beyond that for them, labor and dolor.

Illa uero numerorum uarietas, quae inter codices Hebraeos inuenitur et nostros, neque de hac antiquorum longaeuitate dissentit, et si quid habet ita diuersum, ut uerum esse utrumque non possit, rerum gestarum fides ab ea lingua repetenda est, ex qua interpretatum est quod habemus. Quae facultas cum uolentibus ubique gentium praesto sit, non tamen uacat, quod septuaginta interpretes in plurimis, quae diuersa dicere uidentur, ex Hebraeis codicibus emendare ausus est nemo. Non enim est illa diuersitas putata mendositas; nec ego ullo modo putandam existimo: sed ubi non est scriptoris error, aliquid eos diuino spiritu, ubi sensus esset consentaneus ueritati et praedicans ueritatem, non interpretantium munere, sed prophetantium libertate aliter dicere uoluisse credendum est.

Illa indeed the variety of numbers which is found between the Hebrew codices and our own neither dissents concerning this longevity of the ancients; and if it has anything so different that both cannot be true, the reliability of the events is to be sought back from that language from which what we have has been interpreted. And although this facility is available to those who wish, everywhere among the nations, nevertheless it is not without weight that no one has dared to emend the seventy interpreters, in the many places which seem to say diverse things, on the basis of the Hebrew codices. For that diversity has not been thought a corruption; nor do I judge it in any way to be thought so: but where there is no copyist’s error, it is to be believed that by the divine Spirit they wished to say something otherwise—where the sense would be consentaneous to truth and proclaiming truth—not by the office of interpreters, but by the liberty of prophets.

Vnde merito non solum Hebraeis, uerum etiam ipsis, cum adhibet testimonia de scripturis, uti apostolica inuenitur auctoritas. Sed hinc me oportuniore loco, si Deus adiuuerit, promisi diligentius locuturum; nunc quod instat expediam. Non enim ambigendum est ab homine, qui ex primo homine primus est natus, quando tamdiu uiuebant, potuisse constitui ciuitatem, sane terrenam, non illam, quae dicitur ciuitas Dei, de qua ut scriberemus, laborem tanti huius operis in manus sumpsimus.

Whence deservedly, not only by the Hebrews, but even by the apostles themselves, when they adduce testimonies from the Scriptures, the apostolic authority is found to employ it. But about this I have promised to speak more diligently in a more opportune place, if God shall aid; now I will dispatch what is urgent. For it is not to be doubted that by the man who, from the first man, was first born, since they lived so long, a city could have been constituted—assuredly an earthly one, not that which is called the City of God, on account of which, that we might write, we have taken into our hands the labor of so great a work.

[XV] Dicet ergo aliquis: "Itane credendum est hominem filios generaturum nec habentem propositum continentiae centum et amplius, uel secundum Hebraeos non multo minus, id est octoginta, septuaginta, sexaginta annos a concumbendi opere uacuisse, aut si non uacaret, nihil prolis gignere potuisse?" Haec quaestio duobus modis soluitur. Aut enim tanto serior fuit proportione pubertas, quanto uitae totius maior annositas; aut, quod magis uideo esse credibile, non hic primogeniti filii commemorati sunt, sed quos successionis ordo poscebat, ut perueniretur ad Noe, a quo rursus ad Abraham uidemus esse peruentum, ac deinde usque ad certum articulum temporis, quantum oportebat signari etiam generationibus commemoratis cursum gloriosissimae ciuitatis in hoc mundo peregrinantis et supernam patriam requirentis. Quod enim negari non potest, prior omnibus Cato ex coniunctione maris et feminae natus est.

[15] Therefore someone will say: "Is it so to be believed that a man destined to beget sons and not having a purpose of continence was free from the work of intercourse for a hundred years and more, or, according to the Hebrews, not much less, that is, eighty, seventy, sixty years; or, if he were not free, that he could have generated no offspring?" This question is solved in two ways. For either puberty was by so much later in proportion as the longevity of the whole life was greater; or, what I see to be more credible, the firstborn sons are not here recorded, but those whom the order of succession required, so that one might arrive at Noah, from whom again we see that it was arrived at Abraham, and then up to a certain juncture of time, inasmuch as it was fitting that, with the generations also recounted, there should be marked the course of the most glorious City peregrinating in this world and seeking the heavenly fatherland. For what cannot be denied is that, before all, Cato was born from the conjunction of male and female.

Neque enim illo nato dixisset Adam, quod dixisse legitur: Adquisiui hominem per Deum, nisi illis duobus ipse fuisset homo. nascendo additus primus. Hunc secutus Abel, quem maior frater occidit, praefigurationem quandam peregrinantis ciuitatis Dei, quod ab impiis et quodam modo terrigenis, id est terrenam originem diligentibus et terrenae ciuitatis terrena felicitate gaudentibus, persecutiones iniquas passura fuerat, primus ostendit.

For neither, when that one was born, would Adam have said, as he is read to have said, “I have acquired a man through God,” unless to those two he himself had been the first man added by being born. Him there followed Abel—whom his elder brother slew—who first showed a certain prefiguration of the pilgrim City of God, namely that it would undergo iniquitous persecutions from the impious and, as it were, earth-born: that is, from those who love an earthly origin and rejoice in the earthly felicity of the earthly city.

Sed quot annorum erat Adam, cum eos genuit, non apparet. Exinde digeruntur generationes aliae de Cain, aliae de illo, quem genuit Adam in eius successionem, quem frater occidit, et appellauit nomen illius Seth dicens, ut scriptum est: Suscitauit enim mihi Deus semen aliud pro Abel, quem occidit Cain. Cum itaque istae duae series generationum, una de Seth, altera de Cain, has duas, de quibus agimus, distinctis ordinibus insinuent ciuitates, unam caelestem in terris peregrinantem, alteram terrenam terrenis tamquam sola sint gaudiis inhiantem uel inhaerentem: nullus de progenie Cain, cum dinumerata sit connumerato Adam usque ad octauam generationem, quot annorum fuisset expressus est, quando genuit eum, qui commemoratur post eum.

But how many years Adam was when he begot them does not appear. From that point the generations are set forth—some from Cain, others from that one whom Adam begot in his succession—and he called his name Seth, saying, as it is written: For God has raised up for me another seed in place of Abel, whom Cain slew. When therefore these two series of generations, one from Seth, the other from Cain, by distinct orders insinuate the two cities of which we are treating—one celestial, peregrinating on earth; the other earthly, gaping after or clinging to terrestrial joys as though they were the only ones—of the progeny of Cain, when it is reckoned, with Adam included, up to the eighth generation, in no case is it expressed how many years each was when he begot him who is mentioned after him.

Noluit enim Spiritus Dei in terrenae ciuitatis generationibus tempora notare ante diluuium, sed in caelestis maluit, tamquam essent memoria digniores. Porro autem Seth quando natus est, non quidem taciti sunt anni patris eius, sed iam genuerat alios; et utrum solos Cain et Abel, adfirmare quis audeat? Non enim quia soli nominati sunt propter ordines generationum quas commemorare oportebat, ideo consequens uideri debet solos fuisse tunc generatos ex Adam.

For the Spirit of God did not wish to note the times in the generations of the earthly city before the Deluge, but preferred to do so in those of the heavenly, as if they were more worthy of memory. Moreover, when Seth was born, the years of his father were not indeed kept silent, but he had already begotten others; and would anyone dare to affirm that these were only Cain and Abel? For not because they alone are named, on account of the orders of generations which it was fitting to commemorate, therefore ought it to seem consequent that they alone had then been begotten from Adam.

.Cum enim silentio coopertis omnium nominibus ceterorum legatur eum genuisse filios et filias: quota fuerit ista proles eius, quis praesumat adserere, si culpam temeritatis euitat? Potuit quippe Adam diuinitus admonitus dicere, postea quam Seth natus est: Suscitauit enim mihi Deus semen aliud pro Abel, quoniam talis erat futurus, qui impleret illius sanctitatem, non quod ipse prior post eum temporis ordine nasceretur. Deinde quod scriptum est: Vixit autem Seth quinque et ducentos annos (uel secundum Hebraeos quinque et centum annos), et genuit Enos; quis possit nisi inconsideratus adseuerare hunc eius primogenitum fuisse?

.For since, with the names of all the others covered in silence, it is read that he had begotten sons and daughters: what number that progeny amounted to, who would presume to assert, if he avoids the blame of temerity? For indeed Adam, divinely admonished, could say, after Seth was born: For God has raised up for me another seed in place of Abel, because such a one was going to be who would fulfill his sanctity, not that he himself would be born sooner, next after him in the order of time. Then as to what is written: But Seth lived five and two hundred years (or, according to the Hebrews, five and one hundred years), and begot Enos; who could, unless inconsiderate, aver that this was his firstborn?

ut admirantes merito requiramus, quo modo per tot annos inmunis fuerit a conubio sine ullo proposito continentiae uel non genuerit coniugatus; quando quidem etiam de ipso legitur: Et genuit filios et filias, et fuerunt omnes dies Seth duodecim et nongenti anni, et mortuus est. Atque ita deinceps, quorum anni commemorantur, nec filios filiasque genuisse reticentur. Ac per hoc non apparet omnino, utrum, qui nominatur genitus, ipse fuerit primogenitus: Immo uero, quoniam credibile non est patres illos aetate tam longa aut inpuberes fuisse aut coniugibus caruisse uel fetibus, nec illos eorum filios primos eis natos fuisse credibile est.

so that, wondering with reason, we may inquire how for so many years he was immune from conubium without any proposed purpose of continence, or, being married, did not beget; since indeed even of him it is read: “And he begot sons and daughters, and all the days of Seth were 912 years, and he died.” And thus thereafter, of those whose years are recorded, it is not kept silent that they begot sons and daughters. And therefore it does not at all appear whether the one who is named as begotten was himself the first-born. Nay rather, since it is not credible that those fathers, with so long an age, were either impuberal or lacked spouses or offspring, neither is it credible that those sons of theirs were the first born to them.

Sed cum sacrae scriptor historiae ad ortum uitamque Noe, cuius tempore diluuium factum est, per successiones generationum notatis temporibus intenderet peruenire, eas utique commemorauit, non quae primae suis parentibus fuerint, sed quae in propagationis ordinem uenerint.

But since the writer of the sacred history was aiming to arrive, through the successions of generations with the times noted, at the origin and life of Noah, in whose time the deluge occurred, he accordingly commemorated those—not those which were first to their parents, but those which had come into the order of propagation.

Exempli gratia, quo id fiat apertius, aliquid interponam, unde nullus ambigat fieri potuisse quod dico. Euangelista Matthaeus generationem dominicae carnis per seriem parentum uolens commendare memoriae, ordiens a patre Abraham atque ad Dauid primitus ut perueniret intendens: Abraham, inquit, genuit Isaac; cur non dixit Ismael, quem primitus genuit? Isaac autem, inquit, genuit Iacob; cur non dixit Esau, qui eius primogenitus fuit?

For example’s sake, that this may become more open, I will insert something, whence none may doubt that what I say could have been done. The Evangelist Matthew, wishing to commend to memory the generation of the Lord’s flesh through the series of parents, beginning from the father Abraham and intending in the first place to arrive at David: “Abraham,” he says, “begot Isaac;” why did he not say Ishmael, whom he first begot? “But Isaac,” he says, “begot Jacob;” why did he not say Esau, who was his firstborn?

Quia scilicet per illos ad Dauid peruenire non posset. Deinde sequitur: Iacob autem genuit Iudam et fratres eius; numquid Iudas primogenitus fuit? Iudas, inquit, genuit Phares et Zarat; nec istorum geminorum aliquis fuit primogenitus Iudae, sed ante illos iam tres genuerat.

Because, plainly, through them he could not come to David. Then follows: But Jacob begot Judah and his brothers; was Judah the first-born? Judah, he says, begot Phares and Zarat; and of those twins neither was the first-born of Judah, but before them he had already begotten three.

Eos itaque tenuit in ordine generationum, per quos ad Dauid atque inde quo intenderat perueniret. Ex quo intellegi potest, ueteres quoque homines ante diluuium non primogenitos, sed eos fuisse commemoratos, per quos ordo succedentium generationum ad Noe patriarcham duceretur, ne serae pubertatis illorum obscura et non necessaria quaestio nos fatiget.

Those, therefore, he kept in the order of generations, through whom he might arrive at David and thence to where he had intended. From which it can be understood that the ancient men before the Deluge, not the firstborn, were the ones commemorated, but those through whom the order of succeeding generations would be led to the patriarch Noah, lest the obscure and unnecessary question of their late puberty wear us out.

[XVI] Cum igitur genus humanum post primam copulam uiri facti ex puluere et coniugis eius ex uiri latere marium feminarumque coniunctione opus haberet, ut gignendo multipficaretur, nec essent ulli homines, nisi qui ex illis duobus nati fuissent: uiri sorores suas coniuges acceperunt; quod profecto quanto est antiquius conpellente necessitate, tanto postea factum est damnabilius religione prohibente. Habita est enim ratio rectissima caritatis, ut homines, quibus esset utilis atque honesta concordia, diuersarum necessitudinum uinculis necterentur, nec unus in uno multas haberet, sed singulae spargerentur in singulos ac sic ad socialem uitam diligentius conligandam plurimae plurimos obtinerent. Pater quippe et socer duarum sunt necessitudinum nomina.

[16] Accordingly, since the human race, after the first coupling of the man made from dust and of his spouse from the man’s side, had need of the conjunction of males and females in order to be multiplied by begetting, and there would be no humans except those who had been born from those two, men took their sisters as spouses; which assuredly, by as much as it was more ancient under the compulsion of necessity, by so much later it became more damnable with religion prohibiting. For the most upright rationale of charity was observed: that humans, for whom concord would be useful and honorable, should be bound by the bonds of diverse kinships, and that one should not have many in one, but that individual ties should be scattered among individuals, and thus, for the more diligent binding-together of social life, very many should hold very many. For “father” and “father-in-law” are names of two kinships.

Vt ergo alium quisque habeat patrem, alium socerum, numerosius se caritas porrigit. Vtrumque autem unus Adam esse cogebatur et filiis et filiabus suis, quando fratres sororesque conubio iungebantur. Sic et Eua uxor eius utrique sexui filiorum fuit et socrus et mater; quae si duae feminae fuissent, mater altera et socrus altera, copiosius se socialis dilectio conligaret.

Therefore, so that each may have one person as father and another as father-in-law, charity stretches itself more numerously. But one Adam was compelled to be both for his sons and for his daughters, when brothers and sisters were joined in wedlock. Thus too Eve his wife was, for the children of both sexes, both mother-in-law and mother; who, if there had been two women—one a mother and the other a mother-in-law—social affection would bind itself more copiously.

Ipsa denique iam soror, quod etiam uxor fiebat, duas tenebat una necessitudines; quibus per singulas distributis, ut altera esset soror, altera uxor, hominum numero socialis propinquitas augeretur. Sed hoc unde fieret tunc non erat, quando nisi fratres et sorores ex illis duobus primis nulli homines erant. Fieri ergo debuit quando potuit, ut existente copia inde ducerentur uxores, quae non erant iam sorores, et non solum illud ut fieret nulla necessitas esset, uerum etiam si fieret nefas esset.

The very sister herself, since she also became a wife, held two kinships in one; with these distributed singly, so that the one would be sister, the other wife, social propinquity would be increased by the number of human beings. But there was not then any means whence this could be done, since, apart from brothers and sisters from those first two, there were no human beings. Therefore it ought to have been done when it could, so that, with an abundance existing, wives might be taken in marriage from there who were no longer sisters; and not only would there be no necessity for that to be done, but even, if it were done, it would be nefarious.

Nam si et nepotes primorum hominum, qui iam consobrinas poterant accipere coniuges, sororibus matrimonio iungerentur: non iam duae, sed tres in homine uno necessitudines fierent, quae propter caritatem numerosiore propinquitate nectendam disseminari per singulos singulae debuerunt. Esset enim unus homo filiis suis, fratri scilicet sororique coniugibus, et pater et socer et auunculus; ita et uxor eius eisdem communibus filiis et mater et amita et socrus; idemque inter se filii eorum non solum essent fratres atque coniuges, uerum etiam consobrini, quia et fratrum filii. Omnes autem istae necessitudines, quae uni homini tres homines conectebant, nouem conecterent, si essent in singulis singulae, ut unus homo haberet alteram sororem, alteram uxorem, alteram consobrinam, alterum patrem, alterum auunculum, alterum socerum, alteram matrem, alteram amitam, alteram socrum; atque ita se non in paucitate coartatum, sed latius atque numerosius propinquitatibus crebris uinculum sociale diffunderet.

For if even the grandchildren of the first humans—who already could take cousins (consobrines) as spouses—were joined in marriage to sisters: then not two but three relationships would arise in one person, which, in order that charity might be bound by a more numerous propinquity, ought to have been disseminated, one by one, through individuals. For one man would be, for his own children—namely to a brother and a sister who are spouses—both father and father-in-law and maternal uncle (avunculus); and likewise his wife, to those same children held in common, would be both mother and paternal aunt (amita) and mother-in-law; and their children among themselves would be not only brothers and spouses, but also cousins (consobrini), because they are sons of brothers. But all these relationships, which were connecting three persons to one man, would connect nine, if they were in individuals singly, so that one man would have one woman as a sister, another as a wife, another as a cousin; another as a father, another as a maternal uncle (avunculus), another as a father-in-law; another as a mother, another as a paternal aunt (amita), another as a mother-in-law; and thus the social bond would spread itself, not cramped in scarcity, but more broadly and more numerously by frequent kinships.

Quod humano genere crescente et multiplicato etiam inter impios deorum multorum falsorumque cultores sic obseruari cernimus, ut, etiamsi peruersis legibus permittantur fraterna coniugia, melior tamen consuetudo ipsam malit exhorrere licentiam, et cum sorores accipere in matrimonium primis humani generis temporibus omnino licuerit, sic auersetur, quasi numquam licere potuerit. Ad humanum enim sensum uel adliciendum uel offendendum mos ualet plurimum; qui cum in hac causa inmoderationem concupiscentiae coherceat, eum dissignari atque corrumpi merito esse nefarium iudicatur. Si enim est iniquum auiditate possidendi transgredi limitem agrorum, quanto est iniquius libidine concumbendi subuertere limitem morum!

Quod we observe to be kept even among the impious worshipers of many and false gods as the human race grows and multiplies, such that, even if by perverse laws sibling unions are permitted, yet the better custom prefers to shudder at that very license; and although to take sisters in marriage was altogether permitted in the earliest times of the human race, it is now so abhorred as if it could never have been permitted. For custom has the greatest power to allure or to offend the human sense; and when in this matter it restrains the immoderation of concupiscence, it is rightly judged nefarious for it to have its demarcation effaced and to be corrupted. For if it is iniquitous, through avidity of possessing, to transgress the limit of fields, how much more iniquitous, through libido of coupling, to subvert the limit of morals!

Experti autem sumus in conubiis consobrinarum etiam nostris temporibus propter gradum propinquitatis fraterno gradui proximum quam raro per mores fiebat, quod fieri per leges licebat, quia id nec diuina prohibuit et nondum prohibuerat lex humana. Verum tamen factum etiam licitum propter uicinitatem horrebatur inliciti et, quod fiebat cum consobrina, paene cum sorore fieri uidebatur; quia et ipsi inter se propter tam propinquam consanguinitatem fratres uocantur et paene germani sunt. Fuit autem antiquis patribus religiosae curae.

Moreover, we have experienced that marriages with cousins, even in our own times, on account of the degree of propinquity next to the fraternal degree, were done how rarely by custom, although it was permitted to be done by the laws, since neither the divine [law] forbade it and the human law had not yet forbidden it. Yet nevertheless, the deed, though licit, was shuddered at as illicit because of the proximity; and what was done with a cousin seemed almost to be done with a sister; because they themselves among one another, on account of such close consanguinity, are called brothers and are almost full siblings. Moreover, for the ancient fathers it was a matter of religious care.

ne ipsa propinquitas se paulatim propaginum ordinibus dirimens longius abiret et propinquitas esse desisteret, eam nondum longe positam rursus matrimonii uinculo conligare et quodam modo reuocare fugientem. Vnde iam pleno hominibus orbe terrarum, non quidem sorores ex patre uel matre uel ex ambobus suis parentibus natas, sed tamen amabant de suo genere ducere uxores. Verum quis dubitet honestius hoc tempore etiam consobrinorum prohibita esse coniugia?

lest propinquity itself, little by little, as the ranks of propagations divide it, should go farther off and cease to be propinquity, they would, while it was not yet set far away, bind it anew by the bond of matrimony and, in a certain way, recall it as it fled. Whence, now that the orb of lands is full of human beings, not indeed sisters born from their father or mother or from both their parents, but nevertheless they loved to take wives from their own stock. But who would doubt that it is more honorable in this time that even the marriages of first cousins are prohibited?

non solum secundum ea, quae disputauimus, propter multiplicandas adfinitates, ne habeat duas necessitudines una persona, cum duae possint eas habere et numerus propinquitatis augeri; sed etiam quia nescio quo modo inest humanae uerecundiae quiddam naturale atque laudabile, ut, cui debet causa propinquitatis reuerendum honorem, ab ea contineat, quamuis generatricem, tamen libidinem, de qua erubescere uidemus et ipsam pudicitiam coniugalem.

not only according to the things which we have discussed, for the multiplying of affinities, lest one person have two bonds of obligation, when two can have them and the number of kinship be increased; but also because, I know not how, there is in human modesty something natural and laudable, such that, toward her to whom, by reason of kinship, reverend honor is owed, one restrains—though generative—yet lust, about which we see even conjugal pudicity blush.

Copulatio igitur maris et feminae, quantum adtinet ad genus mortalium, quoddam seminarium est ciuitatis; sed terrena ciuitas generatione tantummodo, caelestis autem etiam regeneratione opus habet, ut noxam generationis euadat. Vtrum autem aliquod fuerit, uel si fuit, quale fuerit corporale atque uisibile regenerationis signum ante diluuium, sicut Abrahae circumcisio postea est imperata, sacra historia tacet. Sacrificasse tamen Deo etiam illos antiquissimos homines non tacet; quod et in duobus primis fratribus claruit, et Noe post diluuium, cum de arca fuisset egressus, hostias Deo legitur immolasse.

Copulation, therefore, of male and female, so far as it pertains to the race of mortals, is a certain seedbed of the City; but the earthly city has need only of generation, whereas the heavenly has need also of regeneration, that it may escape the harm of generation. Whether, however, there was any, or if there was, of what sort it was—a corporeal and visible sign of regeneration before the Deluge, as the circumcision of Abraham was afterwards commanded—the sacred history is silent. It is not silent, nevertheless, that even those most ancient men sacrificed to God; which both was made clear in the two first brothers, and that Noah after the Deluge, when he had gone forth from the ark, is read to have immolated victims to God.

De qua re in praecedentibus libris iam diximus, non ob aliud daemones arrogantes sibi diuinitatem deosque se credi cupientes sibi expetere sacrificium et gaudere huius modi honoribus, nisi quia uerum sacrificium uero Deo deberi sciunt.

Concerning which matter in the preceding books we have already said that the demons, arrogating divinity to themselves and desiring to be believed gods, seek sacrifice for themselves and rejoice in honors of this kind for no other reason except that they know that true sacrifice is owed to the true God.

[XVII] Cum ergo esset Adam utriusque generis pater, id est et cuius series ad terrenam, et cuius series ad caelestem pertinet ciuitatem, occiso Abel atque in eius interfectione commendato mirabili sacramento facti sunt duo patres singulorum generum, Cain et Seth, in quorum filiis, quos commemorari oportebat, duarum istarum ciuitatum in genere mortalium euidentius indicia clarere coeperunt. Cain quippe genuit Enoch, in cuius nomine condidit ciuitatem, terrenam scilicet, non peregrinantem in hoc mundo, sed in eius temporali pace ac felicitate quiescentem. Cain autem interpretatur possessio; unde dictum est, quando natus est, siue a patre siue a matre eius: Adquisiui hominem per Deum.

[17] Since therefore Adam was the father of both kinds, that is, of one whose series pertains to the terrestrial city and of one whose series pertains to the celestial, with Abel slain, and in his killing a wondrous sacrament commended, there were made two fathers of the respective kinds, Cain and Seth, in whose sons, whom it was proper to commemorate, the indications of those two cities began more evidently to shine forth in the race of mortals. For Cain begot Enoch, in whose name he founded a city—earthly, to wit—not sojourning in this world, but reposing in its temporal peace and felicity. Moreover, Cain is interpreted “possession”; whence it was said, when he was born, whether by his father or by his mother: I have acquired a man through God.

Enoch uero dedicatio; hic enim dedicatur terrena ciuitas, ubi conditur, quoniam hic habet eum, quem intendit et appetit, finem. Porro ille Seth interpretatur resurrectio et Enos filius eius interpretatur homo; non sicut Adam. Et ipsum enim nomen homo interpretatur; sed commune perhibetur esse in illa lingua, id est Hebraea, masculo et feminae.

Enoch, indeed, “dedication”; for here the earthly city is dedicated, where it is founded, since here it has the end which it intends and appetites. Moreover, that Seth is interpreted “resurrection,” and Enos his son is interpreted “man”; not as Adam. For the very name “man” itself is interpreted thus; but it is reported to be common in that language, that is, Hebrew, to the male and to the female.

Nam sic de illo scriptum est: Masculum et feminam fecit illos et benedixit illos et cognominauit nomen eorum Adam. Vnde non ambigitur sic appellatam fuisse feminam Euam proprio nomine, ut tamen Adam, quod interpretatur homo, nomen esset amborum. Enos autem sic interpretatur homo, ut hoc non posse feminam nuncupari periti linguae illius adseuerent, tamquam filius resurrectionis, ubi non nubent neque uxores ducent.

For thus it is written of him: “Male and female he made them, and he blessed them, and he surnamed their name Adam.” Whence it is not doubted that the female was called Eve by her proper name, yet that Adam, which is interpreted “man,” was the name of both. But Enos is so interpreted “man” that those skilled in that tongue assert this cannot be styled of a female, as being a son of the resurrection, where they neither marry nor take wives.

Non enim erit ibi generatio, cum illuc perduxerit regeneratio. Quare et hoc non incassum notandum arbitror, quod in eis generationibus, quae propagantur ex illo qui est appellatus Seth, cum genuisse filios filiasque dicantur, nulla ibi genita nominatim femina expressa est; in his autem, quae propagantur ex Cain, in ipso fine, quo usque pertendunt, nouissima femina genita nominatur. Sic enim legitur: Mathusael genuit Lamech.

For there will not be generation there, when regeneration has brought thither. Wherefore I also judge this not to be noted in vain, that in those generations which are propagated from him who is called Seth, though they are said to have begotten sons and daughters, no female begotten there is set forth by name; but in those which are propagated from Cain, at the very end, to which they reach, the last female begotten is named. For so it is read: Mathusael begot Lamech.

et sumpsit sibi Lamech duas uxores, nomen uni Ada et nomen secundae Sella, et peperit Ada Iobel; hic erat pater habitantium in tabernaculis pecuariorum. Et nomen fratris eius Iobal; hic fuit qui ostendit psalterium et citharam. Sella autem peperit et ipsa Tobel; et erat malleator et aerarius aeramenti et ferri.

and Lamech took to himself two wives, the name of the one was Ada and the name of the second Sella; and Ada bore Iobel; he was the father of those dwelling in the tents of herdsmen. And the name of his brother was Iobal; he was the one who introduced the psaltery and the cithara. But Sella also bore, even she, Tobel; and he was a hammerer and a smith of bronze and of iron.

Soror autem Tobel Noemma. Hoc usque porrectae sunt generationes ex Cain, quae sunt omnes ab Adam octo adnumerato ipso Adam, septem scilicet usque ad Lamech, qui duarum maritus uxorum fuit, et octaua est generatio in filiis eius, in quibus commemoratur et femina. Vbi eleganter significatum est terrenam ciuitatem usque in sui finem carnales habituram generationes, quae marium feminarumque coniunctione proueniunt.

But the sister of Tobel was Noemma. Up to this point the generations from Cain are extended, which are all eight from Adam, with Adam himself counted—namely seven up to Lamech, who was the husband of two wives—and the eighth is the generation in his sons, in which a female too is commemorated. Where it is elegantly signified that the earthly city, down to its own end, will have carnal generations, which proceed from the conjunction of males and females.

Vnde et ipsae, quod praeter Euam nusquam reperitur ante diluuium, nominibus propriis exprimuntur uxores illius hominis, qui nominatur hic nouissimus pater. Sicut autem Cain, quod interpretatur possessio, terrenae conditor ciuitatis, et filius eius, in cuius nomine condita est, Enoch, quod interpretatur dedicatio, indicat istam ciuitatem et initium et finem habere terrenum, ubi nihil speratur amplius, quam in hoc saeculo cerni potest: ita Seth, quod interpretatur resurrectio, cum sit generationum seorsus commemoratarum pater, quid de filio eius sacra haec historia dicat, intuendum est.

Whence also the wives of that man, who is here named the last father, are expressed by proper names—something which, apart from Eve, is found nowhere before the Deluge. But just as Cain, which is interpreted “possession,” the founder of the terrene city, and his son, in whose name it was founded, Enoch, which is interpreted “dedication,” indicate that this city has both its beginning and its end terrene, where nothing more is hoped for than can be seen in this age: so Seth, which is interpreted “resurrection,” since he is the father of the generations separately commemorated, it must be considered what this sacred history says about his son.

[XVIII] Et Seth, inquit, natus est filius, et nominauit nomen eius Enos; hic sperauit inuocare nomen Domini Dei. Nempe clamat adtestatio ueritatis. In spe igitur uiuit homo filius resurrectionis; in spe uiuit, quamdiu peregrinatur hic, ciuitas Dei, quae gignitur ex fide resurrectionis Christi.

[18] And Seth, he says, a son was born, and he named his name Enos; this one hoped to invoke the name of the Lord God. Assuredly the attestation of truth cries out. In hope, therefore, lives man, the son of resurrection; in hope lives, so long as it sojourns here, the City of God, which is begotten from faith in the resurrection of Christ.

Ex duobus namque illis hominibus, Abel, quod interpretatur luctus, et eius fratre Seth, quod interpretatur resurrectio, mors Christi et uita eius ex mortuis figuratur. Ex qua fide gignitur hic ciuitas Dei, id est homo, qui sperauit inuocare nomen Domini Dei. Spe enim salui facti sumus, ait apostolus.

For from those two men, Abel, which is interpreted mourning, and his brother Seth, which is interpreted resurrection, the death of Christ and his life from the dead are prefigured. From which faith this City of God is begotten, that is, the man who hoped to call upon the name of the Lord God. For in hope we have been saved, says the Apostle.

Spes autem quae uidetur, non est spes. Quod enim uidet quis, quid et sperat? Si autem quod non uidemus speramus, per patientiam expectamus.

But hope which is seen is not hope. For what someone sees, why also does he hope for? But if we hope for what we do not see, through patience we await it.

Nam quis uacare hoc existimet ab altitudine sacramenti? Numquid enim Abel non sperauit inuocare nomen Domini Dei, cuius sacrificium scriptura tam acceptum Deo fuisse commemorat? Numquid ipse Seth non sperauit inuocare nomen Domini Dei, de quo dictum est: Suscitauit enim mihi Deus semen aliud pro Abel?

For who would think this to be devoid of the altitude of the sacrament? For did not Abel hope to invoke the name of the Lord God, whose sacrifice Scripture commemorates to have been so acceptable to God? And did not Seth himself hope to invoke the name of the Lord God, of whom it was said: For God has raised up for me another seed in place of Abel?

Cur ergo huic proprie tribuitur, quod piorum omnium intellegitur esse commune, nisi quia oportebat in eo, qui de patre generationum in meliorem.partem, hoc est supernae ciuitatis, separatarum, primus commemoratur exortus, praefigurari hominem, id est hominum societatem, quae non secundum hominem in re felicitatis terrenae, sed secundum Deum uiuit in spe felicitatis aeternae? Nec dictum est: "Hic sperauit in Dominum Deum", aut: "Hic inuocauit nomen Domini Dei", sed: Sperauit, inquit, inuocare nomen Domini Dei. Quid sibi hoc uult Sperauit inuocare, nisi quia prophetia est exorturum populum, qui secundum electionem gratiae inuocaret nomen Domini Dei?

Why, then, is this attributed to him in particular, which is understood to be common to all the pious, unless because it was fitting that in him—who, from the father of generations, in the better part, that is, of the heavenly city, of those set apart, is first commemorated as arisen—there should be prefigured the man, that is, the society of men, which does not live according to man in the matter of earthly felicity, but according to God lives in the hope of eternal felicity? Nor was it said: "Here he hoped in the Lord God," or: "Here he invoked the name of the Lord God," but: "He hoped," he says, "to invoke the name of the Lord God." What does this He hoped to invoke mean, except that it is a prophecy that a people would arise who, according to the election of grace, would invoke the name of the Lord God?

Hoc est, quod per alium prophetam dictum apostolus de hoc populo intellegit ad Dei gratiam pertinente: Et erit, omnis qui inuocauerit nomen Domini saluus erit. Hoc ipsum enim quod dicitur: Et nominauit nomen eius Enos, quod interpretatur homo, ac deinde additur: Hic sperauit inuocare nomen Domini Dei, satis ostenditur, quod non in se ipso spem ponere debeat homo; maledictus enim omnis (sicut alibi legitur), qui spem suam ponit in homine, ac per hoc nec in se, ut sit ciuis alterius ciuitatis, quae non secundum filium Cain dedicatur hoc tempore, id est mortalis huius saeculi labente transcursu, sed in illa inmortalitate beatitudinis sempiternae. [XIX] Nam et ista propago, cuius est pater Seth, in ea generatione habet dedicationis nomen, quae septima est ex Adam adnumerato Adam.

This is what the Apostle understands, concerning this people, as said through another prophet, pertaining to the grace of God: “And it shall be, everyone who invokes the name of the Lord will be saved.” For this very thing that is said, “And he named his name Enos,” which is interpreted “man,” and thereafter is added, “This one hoped to invoke the name of the Lord God,” shows sufficiently that man ought not to place hope in himself; for “cursed is everyone” (as is read elsewhere) “who puts his hope in man,” and therefore neither in himself, so that he may be a citizen of another city, which is not dedicated according to the son of Cain at this time, that is, in the gliding passage of this mortal age, but in that immortality of everlasting beatitude. [19] For even that lineage, whose father is Seth, has in that generation the name of dedication, which is the seventh from Adam, with Adam counted.

Septimus enim ab illo natus est Enoch, quod interpretatur dedicatio. Sed ipse est ille translatus, quoniam placuit Deo, et insigni numero in ordine generationum, quo sabbatum consecratum est, septimo scilicet ab Adam. Ab ipso autem patre istarum generationum, quae discernuntur a progenie Cain, id est a Seth, sextus est; quoto die factus est homo et consummauit Deus omnia opera sua.

For Enoch was born seventh from him, which is interpreted dedication. But he himself is that one translated, because he pleased God, and with the notable number in the order of generations, in which the sabbath has been consecrated, namely the seventh from Adam. But from the very father of these generations, which are separated from the progeny of Cain, that is, from Seth, he is the sixth—on which day man was made and God consummated all his works.

Sed huius Enoch translatio nostrae dedicationis est praefigurata dilatio. Quae quidem iam facta est in Christo capite nostro, qui sic resurrexit, ut non moriatur ulterius, sed etiam ipse translatus est; restat autem altera dedicatio uniuersae domus, cuius ipse Christus est fundamentum, quae differtur in finem, quando erit omnium resurrectio non moriturorum amplius. Siue autem domus Dei dicatur siue templum Dei siue ciuitas Dei, id ipsum est nec abhorret a Latini eloquii consuetudine.

But the translation of this Enoch is the prefigured postponement of our dedication. Which indeed has already been accomplished in Christ our head, who so resurrected that he does not die any further, but he too has been translated; but another dedication of the whole house remains, of which Christ himself is the foundation, which is deferred to the end, when there will be the resurrection of all who will no longer die. And whether it be called the house of God or the temple of God or the city of God, it is the same thing and does not offend the usage of Latin eloquence.

Nam et Vergilius imperiosissimam ciuitatem domum appellat Assaraci, Romanos uolens intellegi, qui de Assaraco per Troianos originem ducunt; et domum Aeneae eosdem ipsos, quia eo duce Troiani cum Italiam uenissent ab eis condita est Roma. Imitatus namque est poeta ille litteras sacras, in quibus dicitur domus Iacob iam ingens populus Hebraeorum.

For even Vergil calls the most imperious city the house of Assaracus, wishing the Romans to be understood, who draw their origin from Assaracus through the Trojans; and the house of Aeneas, those very same people, because with him as leader, when the Trojans had come to Italy, Rome was founded by them. For that poet imitated the sacred letters, in which the house of Jacob is said—namely the now vast people of the Hebrews.

[XX] Dicet aliquis: "Si hoc intendebat scriptor huius historiae in commemorandis generationibus, ex Adam per filium eius Seth, ut per illas perueniret ad Noe, sub quo factum est diluuium, a quo rursus contexeretur ordo nascentium, quo perueniret ad Abraham, a quo Matthaeus, euangelista incipit generationes, quibus ad Christum peruenit aeternum regem ciuitatis Dei: quid intendebat in generationibus ex Cain et quo eas perducere uolebat?" Respondetur: Vsque ad diluuium, quo totum illud genus terrenae ciuitatis absumptum est, sed reparatum est ex filiis Noe. Neque enim deesse poterit haec terrena ciuitas societasque hominum secundum hominem uiuentium usque ad huius saeculi finem, de quo Dominus ait: Filii saeculi huius generant et generantur. Ciuitatem uero Dei peregrinantem in hoc saeculo regeneratio perducit ad alterum saeculum, cuius filii nec generant nec generantur.

[20] Someone will say: "If this was what the writer of this history intended in commemorating the generations, from Adam through his son Seth, so that through them he would arrive at Noah, under whom the Deluge was effected, from whom again the order of those being born would be woven together, so that he would arrive at Abraham, from whom Matthew the evangelist begins the generations, by which he arrived at Christ, the eternal king of the City of God: what did he intend in the generations from Cain, and to what end did he wish to lead them?" It is answered: Up to the Deluge, by which that whole stock of the earthly city was consumed; but it was repaired from the sons of Noah. For this earthly city and the society of men living according to man will not be able to be lacking until the end of this age, of which the Lord said: "The sons of this age beget and are begotten." But the City of God, sojourning in this age, regeneration leads to the other age, whose sons neither beget nor are begotten.

Hic ergo generari et generare ciuitati utrique commune est; quamuis Dei ciuitas habeat etiam hic multa ciuium milia, quae ab opere generandi se abstineant; sed habet etiam illa ex imitatione quadam, licet errantium. Ad eam namque pertinent etiam, qui deuiantes ab huius fide diuersas haereses condiderunt; secundum hominem quippe uiuunt, non secundum Deum. Et Indorum gymnosophistae, qui nudi perhibentur philosophari in solitudinibus Indiae, ciues eius sunt, et a generando se cohibent.

Here, therefore, to be begotten and to beget is common to each city; although the City of God has even here many thousands of citizens who abstain from the work of generating; but that other city has them too, from a certain imitation, though of those erring. For to it belong also those who, deviating from the faith of this one, have founded diverse heresies; for they live according to man, not according to God. And the gymnosophists of the Indians, who are reported to philosophize naked in the solitudes of India, are its citizens, and they restrain themselves from begetting.

Non est enim hoc bonum, nisi cum fit secundum fidem summi boni, qui Deus est. Hoc tamen nemo fecisse ante diluuium reperitur; quando quidem etiam ipse Enoch septimus ab Adam, qui translatus refertur esse, non mortuus, genuit filios et filias antequam transferretur; in quibus fuit Mathusalam, per quem generationum memorandarum ordo transcurrit.

For this is not good, except when it is done according to the faith of the supreme good, who is God. Yet no one is found to have done this before the Deluge; since indeed even Enoch himself, the seventh from Adam, who is reported to have been translated, not dead, begot sons and daughters before he was translated; among whom was Methuselah, through whom the order of generations to be commemorated runs through.

Cur ergo tanta paucitas successionum commemoratur in generationibus ex Cain, si eas usque ad diluuium perduci oportebat, nec erat diuturna aetas praeueniens pubertatem, quae centum uel amplius annos uacaret a fetibus? Nam si non intendebat auctor libri huius aliquem, ad quem necessario perduceret seriem generationum, sicut in illis, quae ueniunt de semine Seth, intendebat peruenire ad Noe, a quo rursus ordo necessarius sequeretur: quid opus erat praetermittere primogenitos filios, ut perueniretur ad Lamech, in cuius filiis finitur illa contextio, octaua generatione scilicet ex Adam, septima ex Cain, quasi esset inde aliquid deinceps conectendum, unde perueniretur uel ad Israeliticum populum, in quo caelesti ciuitati etiam terrena Hierusalem figuram propheticam praebuit, uel ad Christum secundum carnem, qui est super omnia Deus benedictus in saecula, supernae Hierusalem fabricator atque regnator, cum tota progenies Cain diluuio sit deleta? Vnde uideri potest in eodem ordine generationum primogenitos fuisse commemoratos.

Why then is so great a paucity of successions recounted in the generations from Cain, if they ought to be carried down to the flood, nor was there a long span forestalling puberty, which would go idle of offspring for a hundred years or more? For if the author of this book was not intending someone to whom he would necessarily lead the series of generations, as in those that come from the seed of Seth he intended to arrive at Noah, from whom again the necessary order would follow: what need was there to pass over the firstborn sons, in order to arrive at Lamech, in whose sons that contexture is finished, namely in the eighth generation from Adam, the seventh from Cain, as though there were from thence something to be connected thereafter, whence one would arrive either at the Israelitic people, in which for the heavenly city even the earthly Jerusalem afforded a prophetic figure, or at Christ according to the flesh, who is over all, God blessed forever, the builder and ruler of the supernal Jerusalem, since the whole progeny of Cain was destroyed by the flood? Whence it can be seen that in that same order of generations the firstborn were the ones commemorated.

Cur ergo tam pauci sunt? Non enim usque ad diluuium tot esse potuerunt, non uacantibus usque ad centenariam pubertatem patribus ab officio generandi, si non erat tunc proportione longaeuitatis illius etiam sera pubertas. Vt enim peraeque triginta annorum fuerint, cum filios generare coeperunt, octiens triceni (quoniam octo sunt generationes cum Adam et cum eis quos genuit Lamech) ducenti et quadraginta sunt anni: num itaque toto deinde tempore usque ad diluuium non generauerunt?

Why then are they so few? For up to the Flood they could not have been so few, with fathers not standing idle from the duty of generating until a centenarian puberty, unless at that time, in proportion to that longevity, puberty also was late. For suppose they were roughly thirty years old when they began to beget sons: eight times thirty (since there are eight generations counting Adam and those whom Lamech begot) are two hundred and forty years; did they then not beget during all the rest of the time up to the Flood?

Qua tandem causa, qui haec scripsit, generationes commemorare noluit quae sequuntur? Nam ex Adam usque ad diluuium conputantur anni secundum codices nostros duo milia ducenti sexaginta duo; secundum Hebraeos autem mille sescenti quinquaginta sex. Vt ergo istum numerum minorem credamus esse ueriorem, de mille sescentis quinquaginta sex annis ducenti quadraginta detrahantur: numquid credibile est per mille quadringentos, et quod excurrit, annos, qui restant usque diluuium, progeniem Cain a generationibus uacare potuisse?

By what cause, then, did he who wrote these things not wish to commemorate the generations that follow? For from Adam up to the deluge the years are computed, according to our codices, as 2,262; but according to the Hebrews, 1,656. Therefore, in order that we may believe that smaller number to be truer, let 240 be subtracted from the 1,656 years: is it credible that for 1,400 years, and what runs over, the years which remain up to the deluge, the progeny of Cain could have been able to be vacant of generations?

Sed qui ex hoc mouetur, meminerit, cum quaererem, quo modo credendum sit antiquos illos homines per tam multos annos a gignendis filiis cessare potuisse, duobus modis istam solutam esse quaestionem: aut de sera pubertate, proportione tam longae uitae, aut de filiis qui commemorantur in generationibus, quod non fuerint primogeniti, sed hi, per quos ad eum, quem intendebat auctor libri, poterat perueniri, sicut ad Noe in generationibus Seth. Proinde in generationibus Cain, si non occurrit qui deberet intendi, ad quem praetermissis primogenitis per eos, qui commemorati sunt, perueniri oportebat, sera pubertas intellegenda restabit, ut aliquanto post centum annos puberes habilesque ad gignendum facti fuerint, ut ordo generationum per primogenitos curreret et usque diluuium ad numerum annorum tantae quantitatis occurreret. Quamuis fieri possit, ut propter aliquam secretiorem causam, quae me latet, usque ad Lamech et eius filios generationum perueniente contextu commendaretur haec ciuitas, quam dicimus esse terrenam, ac deinde cessaret scriptor libri commemorare ceteras, quae usque ad diluuium esse potuerunt.

Sed whoever is moved by this, let him remember that, when I was inquiring how it is to be believed that those ancient men could have ceased from begetting sons for so many years, that question was solved in two ways: either by a late puberty, in proportion to so long a life, or by the fact that the sons who are commemorated in the generations were not firstborn, but those through whom one could arrive at him whom the author of the book intended—just as to Noah in the generations of Seth. Accordingly, in the generations of Cain, if the one who ought to be intended does not occur, to whom, the firstborn being passed over, it was proper to arrive through those who are mentioned, a late puberty must be understood to remain, such that somewhat after one hundred years they became pubescent and fit for begetting, so that the order of the generations would run through the firstborn and, up to the Deluge, would tally with a number of years of such magnitude. Although it can be that, on account of some more secret cause which escapes me, with the context of generations reaching as far as Lamech and his sons, this city, which we say is earthly, would be commended, and then the writer of the book ceased to commemorate the others which could have existed up to the Deluge.

Potest et illa esse causa, cur non ordo generationum per primogenitos duceretur, ut necesse non sit in illis hominibus tam seram credere pubertatem, quod scilicet eadem ciuitas, quam Cain in nomine Enoch filii sui condidit, longe lateque regnare potuerit et reges habere non simul plures, sed suis aetatibus singulos, quos genuissent sibi successuros quicumque regnassent. Horum regum primus esse potuit ipse Cain, secundus filius eius Enoch, in cuius nomine, ubi regnaretur, condita est ciuitas; tertius Gaidad, quem genuit Enoch; quartus Meuia, quem genuit Gaidad; quintus Mathusael, quem genuit Meuia; sextus Lamech, quem genuit Mathusael, qui est septimus ab Adam per Cain. Non autem erat consequens, ut primogeniti regum regnantibus succederent patribus, sed quos regnandi meritum propter uirtutem terrenae utilem ciuitati uel sors aliqua reperiret, uel ille potissimum succederet patri hereditario quodam iure regnandi, quem prae ceteris filiis dilexisset.

That too can be a cause why the order of generations was not traced through the firstborn, so that it be not necessary to believe such late puberty in those men: namely, that the same city which Cain founded in the name of his son Enoch could have reigned far and wide and have kings, not several at the same time, but single ones in their own ages—whomever had reigned, having begotten them, would have as successors to themselves. Of these kings the first could have been Cain himself, the second his son Enoch, in whose name the city, where rule was exercised, was founded; the third Gaidad, whom Enoch begot; the fourth Meuia, whom Gaidad begot; the fifth Mathusael, whom Meuia begot; the sixth Lamech, whom Mathusael begot, who is the seventh from Adam through Cain. Nor did it follow that the firstborn of kings should succeed their fathers while they reigned, but rather those whom the merit of ruling—by reason of a virtue useful to the earthly city—or some lot might discover; or else that one would most of all succeed his father by a certain hereditary right of ruling, whom he had loved before the rest of his sons.

Potuit autem uiuente adhuc Lamech atque regnante fieri diluuium, ut ipsum cum aliis omnibus hominibus, exceptis qui in arca fuerunt, quem perderet inueniret. Neque enim mirandum est, si uaria quantitate numerositatis annorum interposita per tam longam aetatem ab Adam usque diluuium non aequalis numeri generationes habuit utraque progenies, sed per Cain septem, per Seth autem decem; septimus est enim, ut iam dixi, ab Adam Lamech, decimus Noe; et ideo non unus filius Lamech, sicut in ceteris superius, sed plures commemorati sunt, quia incertum erat quis ei fuisset mortuo successurus, si regnandi tempus inter ipsum et diluuium remansisset.

It could, moreover, have come to pass that, while Lamech was still living and reigning, the deluge occurred, so that it found him—whom it would destroy—together with all other men, except those who were in the ark. Nor, indeed, is it a matter for wonder if, with a varied quantity and numerosity of years interposed through so long an age from Adam up to the deluge, each progeny did not have generations of equal number, but through Cain seven, through Seth, however, ten; for Lamech is, as I have already said, the seventh from Adam, Noah the tenth; and therefore not one son of Lamech, as in the foregoing cases, but several were recorded, because it was uncertain who would have succeeded him after his death, if a time of reigning had remained between him and the deluge.

Sed quoquo modo se habeat siue per primogenitos siue per reges ex Cain generationum ordo decurrens, illud mihi nullo pacto praetereundum silentio uidetur, quod, cum Lamech septimus ab Adam fuisset inuentus, tot eius adnumerati sunt filii, donec undenarius numerus impleretur, quo significatur peccatum. Adduntur enim tres filii et una filia. Vxores autem aliud possunt significare, non hoc quod nunc commendandum uidetur.

But however the matter stands, whether through the firstborns or through kings, the order of generations running down from Cain, this seems to me by no means to be passed over in silence: that, since Lamech was found to be the seventh from Adam, so many of his children are counted up until the elevenfold number was fulfilled, whereby sin is signified. For three sons and one daughter are added. But the wives can signify something else, not that which now seems to be commended.

Nunc enim de generationibus loquimur; illae uero unde sint genitae, tacitum est. Quoniam ergo lex denario numero praedicatur, unde est memorabilis ille decalogus, profecto numerus undenarius, quoniam transgreditur denarium, transgressionem legis ac per hoc peccatum significat. Hinc est quod in tabernaculo testimonii, quod erat in itinere populi Dei uelut templum ambulatorium, undecim uela cilicina fieri praecepta sunt.

For now we are speaking about generations; but as for those, whence they were begotten, it is left unspoken. Since therefore the Law is proclaimed by the number 10, whence is that memorable Decalogue, assuredly the number 11, because it transgresses the 10, signifies a transgression of the Law and thereby sin. Hence it is that in the tabernacle of testimony, which was on the way of the people of God like a ambulatory temple, 11 goat-hair curtains were commanded to be made.

In cilicio quippe recordatio est peccatorum propter haedos ad sinistram futuros; quod confitentes in cilicio prosternimur tamquam dicentes quod in psalmo scriptum est: Et peccatum meum ante me est semper. Progenies ergo ex Adam per Cain sceleratum undenario numero finitur, quo peccatum significatur; et ipse numerus femina clauditur, a quo sexu initium factum est peccati, per quod omnes morimur. Commissum est autem, ut et uoluptas carnis, quae spiritui resisteret, sequeretur.

In the cilice, to be sure, there is a remembrance of sins on account of the kids destined to be on the left; wherefore, confessing, we prostrate ourselves in cilice as though saying what is written in the Psalm: And my sin is before me always. The progeny therefore from Adam through wicked Cain is brought to an end at the eleven-number, by which sin is signified; and that number itself is closed by a female, from which sex the beginning of sin was made, through which we all die. Moreover, it was permitted that the pleasure of the flesh, which would resist the spirit, should follow.

Nam et ipsa filia Lamech Noemma uoluptas interpretatur. Per Seth autem ab Adam usque ad Noe denarius insinuatur legitimus numerus. Cui Noe tres adiciuntur filii, unde uno lapso duo benedicuntur a patre, ut remoto reprobo et probatis filiis ad numerum additis etiam duodenarius numerus intimetur, qui et in patriarcharum et in apostolorum numero insignis est, propter septenarii partes alteram per alteram multiplicatas.

For even Lamech’s daughter herself, Noemma, is interpreted as “Pleasure.” But through Seth, from Adam down to Noah, the legitimate denary number is insinuated. To Noah there are added three sons, whence, one having fallen, two are blessed by the father, so that, with the reprobate removed and the approved sons added to the number, even the duodenary number may be intimated, which is notable both in the number of the patriarchs and of the apostles, on account of the parts of the seven multiplied one by the other.

Nam ter quaterni uel quater terni ipsum faciunt. His ita se habentibus uideo considerandum et commemorandum, ista utraque progenies, quae distinctis generationibus duas insinuat ciuitates, unam terrigenarum, alteram regeneratorum, quo modo postea sic commixta fuerit atque confusa, ut uniuersum genus humanum exceptis octo hominibus diluuio perire mereretur.

For thrice four or four times three make the same. With these things being so, I see that it should be considered and commemorated how those two progenies, which by distinct generations insinuate two cities—one of the earth-born, the other of the regenerated—were afterwards so commixed and confused that the whole human race, with eight men excepted, deserved to perish by the deluge.

[XXI] Primo autem intuendum est, quem ad modum, cum ex Cain generationes enumerarentur, commemorato ante ceteros posteros eius illo, in cuius nomine condita est ciuitas, id est Enoch, contexti sunt ceteri usque ad illum finem, de quo locutus sum, donec illud genus atque uniuersa propago diluuio deleretur; cum uero filius Seth unus commemoratus fuisset Enos, nondum usque ad diluuium additis ceteris articulus quidam interponitur et dicitur: Hic liber natiuitatis hominum, qua die fecit Deus Adam, ad imaginem Dei fecit illum. Masculum et feminam fecit illos, et benedixit illos, et cognominauit nomen eorum Adam, qua die fecit illos. Quod mihi uidetur ad hoc interpositum, ut hinc rursus inciperet ab ipso Adam dinumeratio temporum, quam noluit facere, qui haec scripsit, in ciuitate terrena; tamquam eam Deus sic commemoraret, ut non conputaret.

[21] First, however, it must be considered how, when from Cain the generations were enumerated, after that descendant of his had been commemorated before the others, in whose name the city was founded, that is Enoch, the rest were linked together down to that end of which I have spoken, until that race and the entire progeny were destroyed by the deluge; but when one son of Seth had been mentioned, Enos, the others not yet added down to the flood, a certain section is interposed and it is said: This is the book of the generation of men: on the day God made Adam, in the image of God he made him. Male and female he made them, and he blessed them, and he surnamed their name Adam on the day he made them. This seems to me to have been interposed for this purpose: that from here again there might begin from Adam himself the enumeration of times, which the one who wrote these things did not wish to make in the earthly city; as though God thus were commemorating it, so as not to compute it.

Sed quare hinc reditur ad istam recapitulationem, postea quam commemoratus est filius Seth, homo qui sperauit inuocare nomen Domini Dei, nisi quia sic oportebat istas duas proponere ciuitates, unam per homicidam usque ad homicidam (nam et Lamech duabus uxoribus suis se perpetrasse homicidium confitetur), alteram per eum, qui sperauit inuocare nomen Domini Dei? Hoc est quippe in hoc mundo peregrinantis ciuitatis Dei totum atque summum in hac mortalitate negotium, quod per unum hominem, quem sane occisi resurrectio genuit, commendandum fuit. Homo quippe ille unus totius supernae ciuitatis est unitas, nondum quidem conpleta, sed praemissa ista prophetica praefiguratione conplenda.

But why is there a return here to that recapitulation, after the son of Seth has been commemorated—the man who hoped to invoke the name of the Lord God—unless because it was thus fitting to set forth these two cities: the one through a homicide down to a homicide (for Lamech too confesses to his two wives that he has perpetrated a homicide), the other through him who hoped to invoke the name of the Lord God? For this indeed is the whole and highest business in this mortality of the City of God peregrinating in this world, which was to be commended through one man, whom indeed the resurrection of the slain brought forth. For that one man is the unity of the whole supernal city, not yet indeed completed, but to be completed, with this prophetic prefiguration having been set forth beforehand.

Filius ergo Cain, hoc est filius possessionis, (cuius nisi terrenae?) habeat nomen in ciuitate terrena, quia in eius nomine condita est. De his est enim, de quibus cantatur in psalmo: Inuocabunt nomina eorum in terris ipsorum; propter quod sequitur eos quod in alio psalmo scriptum est: Domine, in ciuitate tua imaginem eorum ad nihilum rediges. Filius autem Seth, hoc est filius resurrectionis, speret inuocare nomen Domini Dei; eam quippe societatem hominum praefigurat quae dicit: Ego autem sicut oliua fructifera in domo Dei speraui in misericordia Dei; uanas autem glorias famosi in terra nominis non requirat; beatus est enim uir, cuius est nomen Domini spes eius, et non respexit in uanitates et insanias mendaces.

Therefore the son of Cain, that is, the son of possession (whose, if not of the earthly one?), let him have a name in the earthly city, because in his name it was founded. For he is of those about whom it is sung in the psalm: They will call upon their names in their own lands; wherefore that follows them which is written in another psalm: O Lord, in your city you will reduce their image to nothing. But the son of Seth, that is, the son of resurrection, let him hope to invoke the name of the Lord God; for he prefigures that society of men which says: But I, like a fruitful olive tree in the house of God, have hoped in the mercy of God; and let him not seek the vain glories of a name famous on earth; for blessed is the man whose hope is the name of the Lord, and he has not looked toward vanities and lying insanities.

Propositis itaque duabus ciuitatibus, una in re huius saeculi, altera in spe Dei, tamquam ex communi, quae aperta est in Adam, ianua mortalitatis egressis, ut procurrant et excurrant ad discretos proprios ac debitos fines, incipit dinumeratio temporum: In qua et aliae generationes adiciuntur, facta recapitulatione ex Adam, ex cuius origine damnata, ueluti massa una meritae damnationi tradita, facit Deus alia in contumeliam uasa irae, alia in honorem uasa misericordiae, illis reddens quod debetur in poena, istis donans quod non debetur in gratia; ut ex ipsa etiam conparatione uasorum irae superna ciuitas discat, quae peregrinatur in terris, non fidere libertate arbitrii sui, sed speret inuocare nomen Domini Dei. Quoniam uoluntas in natura, quae facta est bona a Deo bono, sed mutabilis ab inmutabili, quia ex nihilo, et a bono potest declinare, ut faciat malum, quod fit libero arbitrio, et a malo, ut faciat bonum, quod non fit sine diuino adiutorio.

Accordingly, with the two cities set forth—one in the reality of this age, the other in the hope of God—having gone out, as it were, through the common door of mortality which was opened in Adam, so that they may run forward and run out to their distinct, proper, and due ends, the enumeration of the times begins: in which also other generations are added, a recapitulation having been made from Adam, from whose condemned origin, as though one mass handed over to deserved condemnation, God makes some vessels of wrath for contumely, others vessels of mercy for honor, to those rendering what is owed in punishment, to these granting what is not owed in grace; so that from that very comparison of the vessels of wrath the supernal city, which sojourns upon the earth, may learn not to trust in the liberty of its own arbitrium, but to hope to invoke the name of the Lord God. For the will in nature—which was made good by the good God, yet is mutable by the Immutable, because it is from nothing—can decline from good, so as to do evil, which is done by free will, and from evil, so as to do good, which is not done without divine aid.

[XXII] Hoc itaque libero uoluntatis arbitrio genere humano progrediente atque crescente facta est permixtio et iniquitate participata quaedam utriusque confusio ciuitatis. Quod malum a sexu femineo causam rursus inuenit; non quidem illo modo quo ab initio (non enim cuiusquam etiam tunc fallacia seductae illae feminae persuaserunt peccatum uiris;) sed ab initio quae prauis moribus fuerant in terrena ciuitate, id est in terrigenarum societate, amatae sunt a filiis Dei, ciuibus scilicet peregrinantis in hoc saeculo alterius ciuitatis, propter pulchritudinem corporis. Quod bonum Dei quidem donum est; sed propterea id largitur etiam malis, ne magnum bonum uideatur bonis.

[22] Thus, with the free choice of the will, as the human race advanced and increased, there arose a commixture and, with iniquity shared, a certain confusion of both cities. This evil again found its occasion from the female sex; not indeed in the same way as at the beginning (for then, by the deceit of someone, those women, having been seduced, persuaded the men to sin); but from the beginning those who by depraved morals had been in the earthly city, that is, in the society of the earth-born, were loved by the sons of God—namely, citizens of the other city, which is a sojourner in this age—on account of the beauty of the body. Which good is indeed a gift of God; but for this reason He bestows it also upon the wicked, lest it seem a great good to the good.

Deserto itaque bono magno et bonorum proprio lapsus est factus ad bonum minimum, non bonis proprium, sed bonis malisque commune; ac sic filii Dei filiarum hominum amore sunt capti, atque ut eis coniugibus fruerentur, in mores societatis terrigenae defluxerunt, deserta pietate, quam in sancta societate seruabant. Sic enim corporis pulchritudo, a Deo quidem factum, sed temporale carnale infimum bonum, male amatur postposito Deo, aeterno interno sempiterno bono, quem ad modum iustitia deserta et aurum amatur ab auaris, nullo peccato auri, sed hominis. Ita se habet omnis creatura.

Therefore, when the great good, proper to the good, was deserted, a fall was made to the least good, not proper to the good, but common to good and bad; and thus the sons of God were captured by love of the daughters of men, and, in order to enjoy them as spouses, they flowed down into the mores of the earthborn society, piety having been abandoned, which they kept in the holy society. For thus the beauty of the body, indeed a thing made by God, but a temporal, carnal, lowest good, is ill-loved with God set aside, the eternal, internal, sempiternal good, just as, justice having been deserted, even gold is loved by the avaricious—with no sin of the gold, but of the man. Thus stands every creature.

Cum enim bona sit, et bene amari potest et male: bene scilicet ordine custodito, male ordine perturbato. Quod in laude quadam cerei breuiter uersibus dixi:

For since it is good, it can be loved well and ill: well, namely, with order kept, ill with order perturbed. Which I briefly said in verses in a certain praise of the wax-candle:

Haec tua sunt, bona sunt, quia tu bonus ista creasti.
Nil nostrum est in eis, nisi quod peccamus amantes
Ordine neglecto pro te, quod conditur abs te.

These are yours; they are good, because you, good, created these things.
Nothing of ours is in them, except that we sin as lovers,
with order neglected, instead of you, what is founded by you.

Creator autem si ueraciter ametur, hoc est si ipse, non aliud pro illo quod non est ipse, ametur, male amari non potest. Nam et amor ipse ordinate amandus est, quo bene amatur quod amandum est, ut sit in nobis uirtus qua uiuitur bene. Vnde mihi uidetur, quod definitio breuis et uera uirtutis ordo est amoris; propter quod in sancto cantico canticorum cantat sponsa Christi, ciuitas Dei: Ordinate in me caritatem.

But if the Creator is loved veraciously—that is, if he himself, not something else in his place which he himself is not, is loved—he cannot be loved badly. For even love itself must be loved in an ordered way, whereby what is to be loved is loved well, so that there may be in us the virtue by which one lives well. Whence it seems to me that a brief and true definition of virtue is the order of love; on account of which in the holy Song of Songs the bride of Christ, the City of God, sings: Order love in me.

Huius igitur caritatis, hoc est dilectionis et amoris, ordine perturbato Deum filii Dei neglexerunt et filias hominum dilexerunt. Quibus duobus nominibus satis ciuitas utraque discernitur. Neque enim et illi non erant filii hominum per naturam; sed aliud nomen coeperant habere per gratiam.

Therefore, with the order of this charity—that is, of dilection and of love—disturbed, the sons of God neglected God and loved the daughters of men. By these two names each city is sufficiently distinguished. For neither were they not also sons of men by nature; but they had begun to have another name by grace.

Nam in eadem scriptura, ubi dicti sunt dilexisse filias hominum filii Dei, idem dicti sunt etiam angeli Dei. Vnde illos multi putant non homines fuisse, sed angelos.

For in the same scripture, where the sons of God are said to have loved the daughters of men, the same are also said to be angels of God. Whence many think them not to have been men, but angels.

[XXIII] Quam quaestionem nos transeunter commemoratam in tertio huius operis libro reliquimus insolutam, utrum possint angeli, cum spiritus sint, corporaliter coire cum feminis. Scriptum est enim: Qui facit angelos suos spiritus, id est eos, qui natura spiritus sunt, facit esse angelos suos, iniungendo eis officium nuntiandi. Qui enim Graece dicitur *a)/ggelos, quod nomen Latina declinatione angelus perhibetur, Latina lingua nuntius interpretatur.

[23] We, having mentioned this question in passing in the third book of this work, left it unresolved—whether angels, since they are spirits, can corporeally consort with females. For it is written: He makes his angels spirits; that is, those who by nature are spirits, he makes to be his angels by enjoining upon them the office of announcing. For what in Greek is called *a)/ggelos*, which name is rendered with Latin declension as angelus, in the Latin tongue is interpreted as messenger.

Sed utrum eorum corpora consequenter adiunxerit dicendo: Et ministros suos ignem ardentem, an quod caritate tamquam igne spiritali feruere debeant ministri eius, ambiguum est. Apparuisse tamen hominibus angelos in talibus corporibus, ut non solum uideri, uerum etiam tangi possent, eadem ueracissima scriptura testatur. Et quoniam creberrima fama est multique se expertos uel ab eis, qui experti essent, de quorum fide dubitandum non esset, audisse confirmant, Siluanos et Panes, quos uulgo incubos uocant, inprobos saepe extitisse mulieribus et earum appetisse ac peregisse concubitum; et quosdam daemones, quos Dusios Galli nuncupant, adsidue hanc inmunditiam et temptare et efficere, plures talesque adseuerant, ut hoc negare inpudentiae uideatur: non hinc aliquid audeo definire, utrum aliqui spiritus elemento aerio corporati (nam hoc elementum etiam cum agitatur flabello sensu corporis tactuque sentitur) possint hanc etiam pati libidinem, ut, quo modo possunt, sentientibus feminis misceantur.

But whether he has consequently adjoined their bodies by saying, “And his ministers a burning fire,” or whether his ministers ought to be fervent with charity as though with spiritual fire, is ambiguous. Yet that angels have appeared to human beings in such bodies that they could not only be seen but even touched, the same most truthful Scripture attests. And since there is a most frequent report, and many affirm that they have experienced it, or have heard it from those who had experienced it—whose trustworthiness should not be doubted—that Silvans and Pans, whom in the common speech they call incubi, have often proved themselves wanton toward women and have desired and consummated concubitus with them; and that certain demons, whom the Gauls call Dusii, assiduously both attempt and effect this uncleanness—so many and suchlike assert this that to deny it would seem impudence: from this I do not dare to define anything, whether certain spirits, embodied in the airy element (for this element, even when it is agitated by a fan, is perceived by the sense of the body and by touch), can also suffer this libido, so that, in whatever way they can, they are mixed with women who feel it.

Dei tamen angelos sanctos nullo modo illo tempore sic labi potuisse crediderim; nec de his dixisse apostolum Petrum: Si enim Deus angelis peccantibus non pepercit, sed carceribus caliginis inferi retrudens tradidit in iudicio puniendos reseruari; sed potius de illis, qui primum apostatantes a Deo cum zabulo suo principe ceciderunt, qui primum hominem per inuidiam serpentina fraude deiecit. Angelos autem fuisse etiam Dei homines nuncupatos eadem scriptura sancta locupletissima testis est. Nam et de Iohanne scriptum est: Ecce mitto angelum meum ante faciem tuam, qui praeparabit uiam tuam, et Malachiel propheta propria quadam, id est proprie sibi inpertita gratia dictus est angelus.

Nevertheless, I would by no means believe that the holy angels of God could at that time have fallen thus; nor that the apostle Peter said this of them: “For if God spared not angels when they sinned, but, thrusting them down to the prisons of the gloom of the underworld, delivered them to be reserved for punishment in the judgment”; but rather of those who first, apostasizing from God, fell with the Devil, their prince, who by envy cast down the first man with serpentine fraud. Moreover, that even men of God were styled angels, the same most ample Holy Scripture is a most abundant witness. For it is written also concerning John: “Behold, I send my angel before your face, who will prepare your way”; and the prophet Malachi, by a certain propriety, that is, by a grace imparted properly to himself, was called “Angel.”

Verum hoc mouet quosdam, quod ex illis, qui dicti sunt angeli Dei, et ex mulieribus, quas amauerunt, non quasi homines generis nostri, sed gigantes legimus esse natos. Quasi uero corpora hominum modum nostrum longe excedentia, quod etiam supra commemoraui, non etiam nostris temporibus nata sunt. Nonne ante paucos annos, cum Romanae urbis quod a Gothis factum est adpropinquaret excidium, Romae fuit femina cum suo patre et sua matre, quae corpore quodam modo giganteo longe ceteris praemineret?

But this moves some, that from those who are called angels of God, and from the women whom they loved, we read that not as men of our race, but giants were born. As though indeed human bodies far exceeding our measure—which I also recalled above—were not also born in our own times. Was there not, a few years ago, when the destruction of the city of Rome that was wrought by the Goths was drawing near, in Rome a woman with her father and her mother, who by a certain gigantic body far towered above the rest?

Ad quam uisendam mirabilis fiebat usquequaque concursus. Et hoc erat maxime admirationi, quod ambo parentes eius nec saltem tam longi homines erant, quam longissimos uidere consueuimus. Potuerunt igitur gigantes nasci, et prius quam filii Dei, qui et angeli Dei dicti sunt, filiabus hominum, hoc est secundum hominem uiuentium, miscerentur; filii scilicet Seth filiis Cain.

To see her, a marvelous concourse was made everywhere. And this was especially for admiration: that both her parents were not even so tall as the tallest men we are accustomed to see. Giants, therefore, could be born—even before the sons of God, who are also called angels of God, were mingled with the daughters of men, that is, of those living according to man; namely, the sons of Seth with the daughters of Cain.

Nam et canonica scriptura sic loquitur, in quo libro haec legimus, cuius uerba ista sunt: Et factum est, postquam coeperunt homines multi fieri super terram, et filiae natae sunt illis; uidentes autem angeli Dei filias hominum, quia bonae sunt, sumpserunt sibi uxores ex omnibus quas elegerunt. Et dixit Dominus Deus: Non permanebit spiritus meus in hominibus his in aeternum, propter quod caro sunt. Erunt autem dies eorum centum uiginti anni.

For even the canonical Scripture speaks thus, in that book wherein we read these things, whose words are these: And it came to pass, after men began to become many upon the earth, and daughters were born to them; but the angels of God, seeing the daughters of men that they were good/beautiful, took for themselves wives from all whom they chose. And the Lord God said: My spirit shall not remain in these men forever, because they are flesh. But their days shall be one hundred and twenty years.

Gigantes autem erant super terram in diebus illis et post illud, cum intrarent filii Dei ad filias hominum, et generabant sibi; illi erant gigantes a saeculo homines nominati. Haec libri uerba diuini satis indicant iam illis diebus fuisse gigantes super terram, quando filii Dei acceperunt uxores filias hominum, cum eas amarent bonas, id est pulchras. Consuetudo quippe scripturae huius est, etiam speciosos corpore bonos uocare.

But there were giants upon the earth in those days and after that, when the sons of God went in to the daughters of men, and they begot for themselves; those were giants from of old, men of name. These words of the divine book sufficiently indicate that already in those days there were giants upon the earth, when the sons of God took as wives the daughters of men, since they loved them as good, that is, beautiful. For the custom of this Scripture is to call even those handsome in body good.

Sed et postquam hoc factum est, nati sunt gigantes. Sic enim ait: Gigantes autem erant super terram in diebus illis et post illud, cum intrarent filii Dei ad filias hominum. Ergo et ante in illis diebus et post illud.

But also after this had been done, giants were born. For thus it says: But giants were upon the earth in those days and after that, when the sons of God went in to the daughters of men. Therefore both before, in those days, and after that.

Quod autem ait: Et generabant sibi, satis ostendit, quod prius, antequam sic caderent filii Dei, Deo generabant, non sibi, id est non dominante libidine coeundi, sed seruiente officio propagandi; non familiam fastus sui, sed ciues ciuitatis Dei, quibus adnuntiarent tamquam angeli Dei, ut ponerent in Deo spem suam, similes illius, qui natus est de Seth, filius resurrectionis, et sperauit inuocare nomen Domini Dei; in qua spe essent cum suis posteris coheredes aeternorum bonorum et sub Deo patre fratres filiorum.

But that he says, “And they were begetting for themselves,” sufficiently shows that previously, before the sons of God thus fell, they were begetting for God, not for themselves; that is, not with the libido of coition dominating, but with the office of propagating serving; not a household of their own haughtiness, but citizens of the City of God, to whom they would announce, like angels of God, that they should set their hope in God, similar to him who was born of Seth, the son of resurrection, and hoped to invoke the name of the Lord God; in which hope they might be, together with their descendants, co-heirs of eternal goods, and, under God the Father, brothers as sons.

Non autem illos ita fuisse angelos Dei, ut homines non essent, sicut quidam putant, sed homines procul dubio fuisse, scriptura ipsa sine ulla ambiguitate declarat. Cum enim praemissum esset, quod uidentes angeli Dei filias hominum, quia bonae sunt, sumpserunt sibi uxores ex omnibus quas elegerunt, mox adiunctum est: Et dixit Dominus Deus: Non permanebit spiritus meus in hominibus his in aeternum, propter quod caro sunt. Spiritu Dei quippe fuerant facti angeli Dei et filii Dei, sed declinando ad inferiora dicuntur homines nomine naturae, non gratiae; dicuntur et caro desertores spiritus et deserendo deserti.

Not, however, that they were angels of God in such a way as not to be humans, as some think, but that they were humans, beyond doubt, the Scripture itself declares without any ambiguity. For when it had been premised that, the angels of God seeing the daughters of men, because they were good, took for themselves wives from all whom they chose, straightway it was added: And the Lord God said: My Spirit shall not abide in these men forever, because they are flesh. For by the Spirit of God they had been made angels of God and sons of God; but by declining to lower things they are called “men” by the name of nature, not of grace; they are also called “flesh,” deserters of the Spirit and, by deserting, deserted.

Et septuaginta quidem interpretes et angelos Dei dixerunt istos et filios Dei; quod quidem non omnes codices habent, nam quidam nisi filios Dei non habent. Aquila autem, quem interpretem Iudaei ceteris anteponunt, non angelos Dei, nec filios Dei, sed filios deorum interpretatus est. Vtrumque autem uerum est.

And indeed the seventy interpreters said these were both angels of God and sons of God; which reading not all codices have, for some have nothing but sons of God. But Aquila, whom the Jews put before the others as an interpreter, translated not angels of God nor sons of God, but sons of the gods. And both are true.

Nam et filii Dei erant, sub quo patre suorum patrum etiam fratres erant; et filii deorum, quoniam diis geniti erant, cum quibus et ipsi dii erant iuxta illud psalmi: Ego dixi: Dii estis et filii Excelsi omnes. Merito enim creduntur septuaginta interpretes accepisse propheticum spiritum, ut, si quid eius auctoritate mutarent atque aliter quam erat quod interpretabantur dicerent, neque hoc diuinitus dictum esse dubitaretur. Quamuis hoc in Hebraeo esse perhibeatur ambiguum, ut et filii Dei et filii deorum posset interpretari.

For they were both sons of God, under whose fatherhood of their forefathers they were also brothers; and sons of gods, since they were begotten of gods, with whom they themselves were gods as well, according to that of the psalm: I said, You are gods, and all of you sons of the Most High. For with good reason the seventy interpreters are believed to have received the prophetic spirit, so that, if by its authority they should alter anything and say what they translated otherwise than it was, not even this would be doubted to have been spoken divinely. Although this is maintained to be ambiguous in Hebrew, so that it could be interpreted both as sons of God and as sons of gods.

Omittamus igitur earum scripturarum fabulas, quae apocryphae nuncupantur, eo quod earum occulta origo non claruit patribus, a quibus usque ad nos auctoritas ueracium scripturarum certissima et notissima successione peruenit. In his autem apocryphis etsi inuenitur aliqua ueritas, tamen propter multa falsa nulla est canonica auctoritas. Scripsisse quidem nonnulla diuine illum Enoch, septimum ab Adam, negare non possumus, cum hoc in epistula canonica Iudas apostolus dicat.

Let us therefore omit the fables of those scriptures which are called apocryphal, because their hidden origin has not been clear to the Fathers, by whom the authority of the truthful Scriptures has come down to us by a most certain and most well-known succession. But in these apocrypha, although some truth is found, nevertheless on account of many falsehoods there is no canonical authority. That Enoch, the seventh from Adam, wrote certain things divinely, we cannot deny, since the Apostle Jude says this in his canonical epistle.

Sed non frustra non sunt in eo canone scripturarum, qui seruabatur in templo Hebraei populi succedentium diligentia sacerdotum, nisi quia ob antiquitatem suspectae fidei iudicata sunt, nec utrum haec essent, quae ille scripsisset, poterat inueniri, non talibus proferentibus, qui ea per seriem successionis reperirentur rite seruasse. Vnde illa, quae sub eius nomine proferuntur et continent istas de gigantibus fabulas, quod non habuerint homines patres, recte a prudentibus iudicantur non ipsius esse credenda; sicut multa sub nominibus et aliorum prophetarum et recentiora sub nominibus apostolorum ab haereticis proferuntur, quae omnia nomine apocryphorum ab auctoritate canonica diligenti examinatione remota sunt. Igitur secundum scripturas canonicas Hebraeas atque Christianas multos gigantes ante diluuium fuisse non dubium est, et hos fuisse ciues terrigenae societatis hominum; Dei autem filios, qui secundum carnem de Seth propagati sunt, in hanc societatem deserta iustitia declinasse.

But not without reason are they not in that canon of the Scriptures which was kept in the temple of the Hebrew people by the diligence of succeeding priests, except that on account of their antiquity they were judged of suspect credibility, nor could it be found whether these were the things which he had written, there being no such producers as could be discovered to have duly preserved them through a series of succession. Whence those items which are put forward under his name and contain those fables about the giants—that they did not have men for fathers—are rightly judged by the prudent not to be believed as his; just as many things under the names of other prophets, and more recent ones under the names of the apostles, are produced by heretics, all of which, under the name of apocrypha, have been removed from canonical authority by diligent examination. Therefore, according to the canonical Scriptures, Hebrew and Christian, it is not doubtful that many giants existed before the deluge, and that these were citizens of the earth-born society of men; but that the sons of God, who according to the flesh were propagated from Seth, declined into this society, with justice deserted.

Nec mirandum est, quod etiam de ipsis gigantes nasci potuerunt. Neque enim omnes gigantes, sed magis multi utique tunc fuerunt, quam post diluuium temporibus ceteris. Quos propterea creare placuit Creatori, ut etiam hinc ostenderetur non solum,pulchritudines, uerum etiam magnitudines et fortitudines corporum non magni pendendas esse sapienti, qui spiritalibus atque inmortalibus longe melioribus atque firmioribus et bonorum propriis, non bonorum malorumque communibus beatificatur bonis.

Nor is it a marvel, that even from those themselves giants could be born. For not all were giants, but certainly many more were then than after the deluge in the other times. Whom therefore it pleased the Creator to create, in order that even from this it might be shown that not only,beauties, but also magnitudes and strengths of bodies are not to be held of great account by the wise man, who is beatified by goods spiritual and immortal, far better and firmer, and proper to the good, not goods common to both good and bad.

Quam rem alius propheta commendans ait: Ibi fuerunt gigantes illi nominati, qui ab initio fuerunt staturosi, scientes proelium. Nos hos elegit Dominus, nec uiam scientiae dedit illis; sed interierunt, quia non habuerunt sapientiam, perierunt propter inconsiderantiam.

Commending this matter, another prophet says: There were there those giants named, who from the beginning were of great stature, knowing battle. Not these did the Lord choose, nor did he give to them the way of knowledge; but they perished, because they did not have wisdom, they perished on account of inconsideration.

[XXIV] Quod autem dixit Deus: Erunt dies eorum centum uiginti anni, non sic accipiendum est, quasi praenuntiatum sit post haec homines centum uiginti annos uiuendo non transgredi, cum et post diluuium etiam quingentos excessisse inueniamus; sed intellegendum est hoc Deum dixisse, cum circa finem quingentorum annorum esset Noe, id est quadringentos octoginta uitae annos ageret, quos more suo scriptura quingentos uocat, nomine totius maximam partem plerumque significans; sescentensimo quippe anno uitae Noe, secundo mense factum est diluuium; ac sic centum uiginti anni praedicti sunt futuri uitae hominum periturorum, quibus transactis diluuio delerentur. Nec frustra creditur sic factum esse diluuium, iam non inuentis in terra qui non erant digni tali morte defungi, qua in impios uindicatum est; non quo quicquam bonis quandoque morituris tale genus mortis faciat aliquid, quod eis possit obesse post mortem; uerum tamen nullus eorum diluuio mortuus est, quos de semine Seth propagatos sancta scriptura commemorat. Sic autem diuinitus diluuii causa narratur: Videns, inquit, Dominus Deus, quia multiplicatae sunt malitiae hominum super terram, et omnis quosque cogitat in corde suo diligenter super maligna omnes dies, et cogitauit Deus, quia fecit hominem super terram, et recogitauit, et dixit Deus: Deleam hominem, quem feci, a facie terrae, ab homine usque ad pecus et a repentibus usque ad uolatilia caeli, quia iratus sum, quoniam feci eos.

[24] But as for what God said: Their days shall be 120 years, this is not to be taken as though it were foretold that thereafter humans, by living, would not pass 120 years—since even after the deluge we find some to have exceeded 500—but it is to be understood that God said this when Noah was near the end of 500 years, that is, he was living 480 years, which, in its manner, Scripture calls 500, very often signifying the greater part by the name of the whole; for in the 600th year of Noah’s life, in the second month, the deluge took place; and thus 120 years were foretold as the future life of the humans who would perish, at the end of which they would be blotted out by the deluge. Nor is it vainly believed that the deluge was thus brought to pass, when by then there were not found on the earth any who were not worthy to die by such a death, whereby vengeance was taken upon the impious; not that such a kind of death does anything to the good, who will someday die, which could harm them after death; nevertheless, none of those died in the deluge whom Holy Scripture records as having been propagated from the seed of Seth. But the cause of the deluge is divinely narrated thus: Seeing, says the Lord God, that the malices of men were multiplied upon the earth, and that everyone diligently sets his heart upon evil all his days, and God considered that he had made man upon the earth, and reconsidered; and God said: I will delete man whom I have made from the face of the earth, from man even to cattle, and from creeping things even to the birds of heaven, because I am angered, for I made them.

[XXV] Ira Dei non perturbatio animi eius est, sed iudicium quo inrogatur poena peccato. Cogitatio uero eius et recogitatio mutandarum rerum est inmutabilis ratio. Neque enim sicut hominem, ita Deum cuiusquam facti sui paenitet, cuius est de omnibus omnino rebus tam fixa sententia quam certa praescientia.

[XXV] The wrath of God is not a perturbation of His mind, but a judgment by which a penalty is inflicted upon sin. His cogitation and re-cogitation concerning things to be changed is an immutable reason. For it is not with God as with a man, that He repents of any deed of His own, whose sentence concerning absolutely all things is as fixed as His foreknowledge is certain.

Sed si non utatur scriptura talibus uerbis, non se quodam modo familiarius insinuabit omni generi hominum, quibus uult esse consultum, ut et perterreat superbientes et excitet neglegentes, et exerceat quaerentes et alat intellegentes; quod non faceret, si non se prius inclinaret et quodam modo descenderet ad iacentes. Quod autem etiam interitum omnium animalium terrenorum uolatiliumque denuntiat: magnitudinem futurae cladis effatur, non animantibus rationis expertibus, tamquam et ipsa peccauerint, minatur exitium.

Sed if Scripture were not to use such verbs, it would not, in a certain manner, insinuate itself more familiarly to every kind of men, whose welfare it wills to be consulted, so as both to terrify the proud and to rouse the negligent, and to exercise the seekers and to nourish the understanding; which it would not do, if it did not first incline itself and in a certain way descend to those lying low. But that it also announces the destruction of all terrestrial and winged animals: it declares the magnitude of the future disaster, it does not threaten ruin to animate beings bereft of reason, as though they too had sinned.

[XXVI] Iam uero quod Noe homini iusto et, sicut de illo scriptura ueridica loquitur, in sua generatione perfecto (non utique sicut perficiendi sunt ciues ciuitatis Dei in illa inmortalitate, qua aequabuntur angelis Dei, sed sicut esse possunt in hac peregrinatione perfecti) imperat Deus, ut arcam faciat, in qua cum suis, id est uxore, filiis et nuribus, et cum animalibus, quae ad illum ex Dei praecepto in arcam ingressa sunt, liberaretur a diluuii uastitate: procul dubio figura est peregrinantis in hoc saeculo ciuitatis Dei, hoc est ecclesiae, quae fit salua per lignum, in quo pependit mediator Dei et hominum, homo Christus Iesus. Nam et mensurae ipsae longitudinis et altitudinis et latitudinis eius significant corpus humanum, in cuius ueritate ad homines praenuntiatus est uenturus et uenit. Humani quippe corporis longitudo a uertice usque ad uestigia sexiens tantum habet quam latitudo, quae est ab uno latere ad alterum latus, et deciens tantum quam altitudo, cuius altitudinis mensura est in latere a dorso ad uentrem; uelut si iacentem hominem metiaris supinum seu pronum, sexiens tantum longus est a capite ad pedes, quam latus a dextra in sinistram uel a sinistra in dextram, et deciens, quam altus a terra.

[26] Now indeed, that God commands Noah, a just man and, as the truthful Scripture speaks about him, perfect in his own generation (assuredly not as the citizens of the City of God are to be perfected in that immortality, in which they will be equated to the angels of God, but as they can be perfect in this pilgrimage), to make an ark, in which with his own, that is, his wife, his sons and daughters‑in‑law, and with the animals which entered the ark to him by God’s precept, he might be delivered from the vastness of the deluge: without doubt this is a figura of the City of God peregrinating in this age, that is, the Church, which is made safe through the wood on which hung the Mediator of God and humans, the man Christ Jesus. For even the very measures of its length and height and breadth signify the human body, in whose truth he was foretold as about to come to humans and did come. For the length of the human body from the crown to the soles has six times as much as the breadth, which is from one side to the other side, and ten times as much as the height, whose measure of height is in the side from the back to the belly; just as if you should measure a man lying supine or prone, he is six times as long from head to feet as he is broad from right to left or from left to right, and ten times as he is high from the ground.

Vnde facta et arca trecentorum in longitudine cubitorum et quinquaginta in latitudine et triginta in altitudine. Et quod ostium in latere accepit, profecto illud est uulnus, quando latus crucifixi lancea perforatum est; hac quippe ad illum uenientes ingrediuntur, quia inde sacramenta manarunt, quibus credentes initiantur. Et quod de lignis quadratis fieri iubetur, undique stabilem uitam sanctorum significat; quacumque enim uerteris quadratum, stabit; et cetera, quae in eiusdem arcae constructione dicuntur, ecclesiasticarum signa sunt rerum.

Whence also the ark was made 300 cubits in length and 50 in breadth and 30 in height. And that it received a door in its side is assuredly that wound, when the side of the Crucified was pierced by a lance; for by this those coming to him enter, because from there the sacraments flowed forth, by which believers are initiated. And that it is commanded to be made of squared timbers signifies the stable life of the saints on every side; for whichever way you turn a square, it will stand; and the other things which are said in the construction of that same ark are signs of ecclesiastical realities.

Sed ea nunc persequi longum est; et hoc iam fecimus in opere, quod aduersus Faustum Manichaeum scripsimus, negantem in Hebraeorum libris aliquid de Christo esse prophetatum. Et fieri quidem potest, ut et nobis quispiam et alius alio exponat haec aptius, dum tamen ea, quae dicuntur, ad hanc de qua loquimur Dei ciuitatem in hoc saeculo maligno tamquam in diluuio peregrinantem omnia referantur, si ab eius sensu, qui ista conscripsit, non uult longe aberrare, qui exponit. Exempli gratia, uelut si quispiam, quod hic scriptum est: Inferiora bicamerata et tricamerata facies eam, non quod ego in illo opere dixi uelit intellegi, quia ex omnibus gentibus ecclesia congregatur, bicameratam dictam propter duo genera hominum, circumcisionem scilicet et praeputium, quos apostolus et alio modo dicit Iudaeos et Graecos; tricameratam uero eo, quod omnes gentes de tribus filiis Noe post diluuium reparatae sunt; sed aliud dicat aliquid, quod a fidei regula non sit alienum.

But to pursue these things now would be long; and this we have already done in the work which we wrote against Faustus the Manichaean, who was denying that in the books of the Hebrews anything was prophesied about Christ. And indeed it can happen that someone for us, and another for someone else, expounds these things more aptly, provided, however, that the things which are said are all referred to this City of God of which we speak, peregrinating in this evil age as in a deluge, if the one who expounds does not wish to stray far from the sense of him who composed these things. For example, as if someone, with respect to what is written here: “Lower parts, two‑chambered and three‑chambered, you shall make it,” should not wish it to be understood as I said in that work—namely, that, because the Church is gathered out of all nations, it is called two‑chambered on account of the two kinds of men, circumcision to wit and foreskin, whom the Apostle also in another way calls Jews and Greeks; but three‑chambered for this reason, that all nations were replenished from the three sons of Noah after the deluge—but should say something else which is not alien from the rule of faith.

Nam quoniam non solas in inferioribus mansiones habere arcam uoluit, uerum etiam in superioribus (et haec dixit bicamerata) et in superioribus superiorum (et haec appellauit tricamerata), ut ab imo sursum uersus tertia consurgeret habitatio: possunt hic intellegi et tria illa, quae commendat apostolus, fides spes, caritas; possunt etiam multo conuenientius tres illae ubertates euangelicae, tricena, sexagena, centena, ut in infimo habitet pudicitia coniugalis, supra uidualis atque hac superior uirginalis, et si quid melius secundum fidem ciuitatis huius intellegi et dici potest. Hoc etiam de ceteris, quae hic exponenda sunt, dixerim, quia, etsi non uno disseruntur modo, ad unam tamen catholicae fidei concordiam reuocanda sunt.

For since he willed that the ark have mansions not only in the lower parts, but also in the upper (and he called these bicamerate) and in the upper of the upper (and he named these tricamerate), so that from the bottom upward a third habitation might rise: here those three things also can be understood which the apostle commends, faith, hope, charity; and much more fittingly those three evangelical yields, thirtyfold, sixtyfold, a hundredfold, so that on the lowest level dwell conjugal chastity, above it the widowed, and above this the virginal, and whatever better can be understood and said according to the faith of this City. This also I would say about the rest that are to be expounded here, that, even if they are not discussed in one way, nevertheless they are to be recalled to the one concord of the catholic faith.

[XXVII] Non tamen quisquam putare debet aut frustra haec esse conscripta, aut tantummodo rerum gestarum ueritatem sine ullis allegoricis significationibus hic esse quaerendam, aut e contrario haec omnino gesta non esse, sed solas esse uerborum figuras, aut quidquid illud est nequaquam ad prophetiam ecclesiae pertinere. Quis enim nisi mente peruersus inaniter scriptos esse contendat libros per annorum milia tanta religione et tam ordinatae successionis obseruantia custoditos aut solas res gestas illic intuendas, ubi certe, ut alia omittam, si numerositas animalium cogebat arcae tantam fieri magnitudinem, inmunda bina et munda septena intromitti animalia quid cogebat, cum aequalis numeri possent utraque seruari? Aut uero Deus, qui propter genus reparandum seruanda praecepit, eo modo illa, quo instituerat, restituere non ualebat?

[27] Nevertheless no one ought to think either that these things were written in vain, or that here only the verity of deeds done is to be sought without any allegorical significations, or, on the contrary, that these things were not done at all, but are mere figures of words, or that, whatever it is, it by no means pertains to the prophecy of the Church. For who, unless perverted in mind, would maintain that books were written vainly which have been guarded through thousands of years with such religion and with the observance of so ordered a succession, or that only the deeds done are to be beheld there—where surely, to omit other things, if the numerousness of the animals compelled the ark to be made of such magnitude, what compelled that the unclean animals be brought in by twos and the clean by sevens, since both could have been preserved in equal number? Or indeed was God, who commanded them to be preserved for the repairing of the stock, not able to restore them in the manner in which he had instituted them?

Qui uero non esse gesta, sed solas rerum significandarum figuras esse contendunt, primum opinantur tam magnum fieri non potuisse diluuium, ut altissimos montes quindecim cubitis aqua crescendo transcenderet, propter Olympi uerticem montis supra quem perhibent nubes non posse concrescere, quod tam sublime iam caelum sit, ut non ibi sit aer iste crassior, ubi uenti nebulae imbresque gignuntur; nec adtendunt omnium elementorum crassissimam terram ibi esse potuisse. An forte negant esse terram uerticem montis? Cur igitur usque ad illa caeli spatia terris exaltari licuisse, et aquis exaltari non licuisse contendunt, cum isti mensores et pensores elementorum aquas terris perhibeant superiores atque leuiores?

Those, however, who contend that these things were not done, but are solely figures for signifying realities, first opine that so great a deluge could not have happened as that the water, by growing, would overtop the highest mountains by fifteen cubits, on account of the summit of Mount Olympus, above which they assert clouds cannot condense, because the heaven is there already so high that that thicker air is not there, where winds, mists, and rains are generated; nor do they attend that the earth—the densest of all the elements—could have been there. Or perchance do they deny that the summit of a mountain is earth? Why then do they contend that it was permitted for the lands to be exalted up to those spaces of heaven, and not permitted for the waters to be exalted, since those measurers and weighers of the elements declare the waters to be higher and lighter than the earth?

Quid itaque rationis adferunt, quare terra grauior et inferior locum caeli tranquillioris inuaserit per uolumina tot annorum, et aqua leuior ac superior permissa non sit huc facere saltem ad tempus exiguum?

What reason, then, do they bring forward, why the earth, heavier and inferior, has intruded into the place of the more tranquil heaven through the volumes of so many years, and why the water, lighter and superior, has not been permitted to make its way hither, at least for a brief time?

Dicunt etiam non potuisse capere arcae illius quantitatem animalium genera tam multa in utroque sexu, bina de inmundis, septena de mundis. Qui mihi uidentur non conputare nisi trecenta cubita longitudinis et latitudinis quinquaginta, nec cogitare aliud tantum esse in superioribus itemque aliud tantum in superioribus superiorum, ac per hoc ter ducta illa cubita fieri nongenta per centum quinquaginta. Si autem cogitemus quod Origenes non ineleganter astruxit, Moysen scilicet hominem Dei eruditum, sicut scriptum est, omni sapientia Aegyptiorum, qui geometricam dilexerunt, geometrica cubita significare potuisse, ubi unum quantum sex nostra ualere adseuerant, quis non uideat quantum rerum capere illa potuit magnitudo?

They also say that that ark could not have contained the quantity of animals—so many kinds in both sexes, by twos of the unclean, by sevens of the clean. These seem to me to compute only three hundred cubits of length and fifty of breadth, and not to consider that there is an equal amount in the upper stories and likewise an equal amount in the upper stories of the upper stories; and thereby, those cubits, taken thrice, become 900 by 150. But if we consider what Origen not inelegantly has established—namely, that Moses, a man of God educated, as it is written, in all the wisdom of the Egyptians, who loved geometry, could have signified geometric cubits, where they asseverate that one equals as much as six of ours—who would not see what a quantity of things that magnitude could take in?

Nam illud quod disputant tantae magnitudinis arcam non potuisse conpingi, ineptissime calumniantur, cum sciant inmensas urbes fuisse constructas, nec adtendunt centum annos, quibus arca illa est fabricata; nisi forte lapis lapidi adhaerere potest sola calce coniunctus, ut murus per tot milia circumagatur, et lignum ligno per suscudines, epiros, clauos, gluten bituminis non potest adhaerere, ut fabricetur arca non curuis, sed rectis lineis longe lateque porrecta, quam nullus in mare mittat conatus hominum, sed leuet unda, cum uenerit, naturali ordine ponderum, magisque diuina prouidentia quam humana prudentia natantem gubernet, ne incurrat ubicumque naufragium.

For that point which they argue, that an ark of so great magnitude could not have been put together, they most ineptly calumniate, since they know that immense cities have been constructed, and they do not attend to the one hundred years during which that ark was fabricated; unless, perchance, stone can adhere to stone joined by lime alone, so that a wall is led around for so many thousands, and wood to wood cannot adhere by treenails, epiroi, nails, the glue of bitumen, so that an ark may be fabricated not with curved but with straight lines, stretched out far and wide, which no effort of men launches into the sea, but the wave, when it shall come, lifts, by the natural order of weights, and rather divine providence than human prudence pilots as it floats, lest it run into shipwreck anywhere.

Quod autem scrupulosissime quaeri solet de minutissimis bestiolis, non solum quales sunt mures et stelliones, uerum etiam quales lucustae, scarabei, muscae denique et pulices, utrum non amplioris numeri in arca illa fuerint, quam qui est definitus, cum hoc imperaret Deus, prius admonendi sunt, quos haec mouent, sic accipiendum esse quod dictum est. Quae repunt super terram, ut necesse non fuerit conseruari in arca, quae possunt in aquis uiuere, non solum mersa, sicut pisces, uerum etiam supernatantia, sicut multae alites. Deinde cum dicitur: Masculus et femina erunt, profecto intellegitur ad reparandum genus dici; ac per hoc nec illa necesse fuerat ibi esse, quae possunt sine concubitu de quibusque rebus uel rerum corruptionibus nasci; uel si fuerunt, sicut in domibus esse consuerunt, sine ullo numero definito esse potuisse; aut si mysterium sacratissimum, quod agebatur, et tantae rei figura etiam ueritate facti aliter non posset impleri, nisi ut omnia ibi certo illo numero essent, quae uiuere in aquis natura prohibente non possent, non fuit ista cura illius hominis uel illorum hominum, sed diuina.

But as for what is most scrupulously wont to be asked about the most minute little animals, not only such as mice and stellions, but also such as locusts, scarabs, flies, and finally fleas—whether they were not in that ark in a number larger than the number defined when God commanded this—those whom these questions move must first be admonished that what was said is to be taken thus: “which creep upon the earth,” so that it would not have been necessary to preserve in the ark those which can live in the waters, not only submerged, like fishes, but also afloat, like many winged creatures. Then, when it is said: “Male and female they shall be,” it is plainly understood to be said for the repairing of the kind; and therefore it had not been necessary for those to be there which can be born without concubitus from various things or from the corruptions of things; or if they were there, as they are wont to be in houses, they could have been there without any number defined; or, if the most sacrosanct mystery that was being enacted, and the figura of so great a matter, could not otherwise be fulfilled even in the truth of the deed, except that all things there should be in that fixed number—those which could not live in the waters, nature forbidding—this was not the care of that man or of those men, but divine.

Non enim ea Noe capta intromittebat, sed uenientia et intrantia permittebat. Ad hoc enim ualet quod dictum est: Intrabunt ad te; non scilicet hominis actu, sed Dei nutu; ita sane, ut non illic fuisse credenda sint, quae sexu carent. Praescriptum enim atque definitum est: Masculus et femina erunt.

For Noah was not capturing them and letting them in, but was permitting those that were coming and entering. For to this avails what was said: “They shall enter to you”; not, to wit, by the act of man, but by the nod of God; so indeed that those which are devoid of sex are not to be believed to have been there. For it was prescribed and defined: “They shall be male and female.”

Alia sunt quippe quae de quibusque rebus sine concubitu ita nascuntur, ut postea concumbant et generent, sicut muscae; alia uero in quibus nihil sit maris et feminae, sicut apes. Ea porro quae sic habent sexum, ut non habeant fetum, sicut muli et mulae, mirum si fuerunt ibi, ac non potius parentes eorum ibi fuisse suffecerit, equinum uidelicet atque asininum genus; et si qua alia sunt, quae commixtione diuersi generis genus aliquod gignunt. Sed si et hoc ad mysterium pertinebat, ibi erant.

There are, indeed, some that are born from sundry things without intercourse, such that afterward they have intercourse and beget, like flies; others, however, in which there is nothing of male and female, like bees. Those moreover which have sex in such a way that they have no offspring, like male and female mules, it would be a wonder if they were there, and that it did not rather suffice that their parents were there, namely the equine and the asinine kind; and if there are any others which by the commixture of a different kind beget some kind. But if this too pertained to the mystery, they were there.

Habet enim et hoc genus masculum et feminam. Solet etiam mouere nonnullos, genera escarum, quae illic habere poterant animalia, quae non nisi carne uesci putantur, utrum praeter numerum ibi fuerint sine transgressione mandati, quae aliorum alendorum necessitas illic coegisset includi; an uero, quod potius est credendum, praeter carnes aliqua alimenta esse potuerunt, quae omnibus conuenirent. Nouimus enim quam multa animalia, quibus caro cibus est, frugibus pomisque uescantur et maxime fico atque castaneis.

For indeed this genus too has male and female. It is also wont to trouble some, as to the kinds of foods which the animals there could have had, those which are thought to feed on nothing but flesh—whether, beyond the number, there were some there, without transgressing the command, which the necessity of nourishing others had compelled to be enclosed there; or else, what rather is to be believed, that besides meats there could have been certain aliments which would be suitable for all. For we know how many animals, for which flesh is food, feed on grains and fruits, and especially on the fig and chestnuts.

Quid ergo mirum, si uir ille sapiens et iustus, etiam diuinitus admonitus, quid cuique congrueret, sine carnibus aptam cuique generi alimoniam praeparauit et condidit? Quid est autem, quo uesci non cogeret fames? aut quid non suaue ac salubre facere posset Deus, qui etiam, ut sine cibo uiuerent, diuina facilitate donaret, nisi ut pascerentur etiam hoc inplendae figurae tanti mysterii conueniret?

What wonder, then, if that wise and just man, even divinely admonished as to what was congruent for each, prepared and laid up for each kind an aliment apt to each without meats? And what is there, moreover, that hunger would not compel to be eaten? or what could God not make suave and salubrious, who could also by divine facility grant that they live without food—unless it were fitting, for the figure of so great a mystery to be fulfilled, that they too should be fed?

Non autem ad praefigurandam ecclesiam pertinere tam multiplicia rerum signa gestarum, nisi fuerit contentiosus, nemo permittitur opinari. Iam enim gentes ita ecclesiam repleuerunt, mundique et inmundi, donec certum ueniatur ad finem, ita eius unitatis quadam compagine continentur, ut ex hoc uno manifestissimo etiam de ceteris, quae obscurius aliquanto dicta sunt et difficilius agnosci queunt, dubitare fas non sit. Quae cum ita sint, [si] nec inaniter ista esse conscripta putare quisquam uel durus audebit, nec nihil significare cum gesta sint, nec sola dicta esse significatiua non facta, nec aliena esse ab ecclesia significanda probabiliter dici potest; sed magis credendum est et sapienter esse memoriae litterisque mandata, et gesta esse, et significare aliquid, et ipsum aliquid ad praefigurandam ecclesiam pertinere.

But that such manifold signs of deeds do not pertain to the prefiguring of the church, no one is permitted to opine, unless he be contentious. For already the Gentiles have so filled the church, and the clean and the unclean, until a certain end be come, are so held together by a certain framework of its unity, that from this one most manifest [example] even concerning the others, which are spoken somewhat more obscurely and are harder to recognize, it is not lawful to doubt. Since these things are so, [if] neither will anyone, even a hard man, dare to think that these things were written in vain, nor that, since they were done, they signify nothing, nor that they were merely said as significative, not enacted, nor can it be said with probability that they are alien from the church to be signified; but rather it must be believed both that they were wisely committed to memory and to letters, and that they were done, and that they signify something, and that this very something pertains to the prefiguring of the church.

Iam usque ad hunc articulum perductus liber iste claudendus est, ut ambarum ciuitatum cursus, terrenae scilicet secundum hominem uiuentis et caelestis secundum Deum, post diluuium et deinceps in rebus consequentibus requiratur.

Now, brought up to this point, this book must be closed, so that the course of both cities—the earthly, namely, living according to man, and the heavenly, according to God—after the Deluge and thereafter in the consequent matters may be inquired into.