On Repentance 3

For which sins, then, repentance may seem just and due, that is, which things must be reckoned as offenses, the context does call for me to point out; but it may seem superfluous. For once the Lord is known, the spirit, regarded by its author, rises of its own accord to the knowledge of the truth, and, admitted to the Lord's commandments, is at once taught by them that what God forbids must be reckoned sin. For since it is agreed that God is some great good, nothing but evil could displease the good, because there is no friendship between contraries. Still, it will not be irksome to touch briefly on this: that some offenses are carnal, that is, bodily, and some spiritual. For since man is made up of this combination of a twofold substance, he sins from no other source than that of which he consists. But they do not differ from each other in that body and spirit are two (otherwise they are all the more equal, because the two make one), so that no one should distinguish their sins by the difference of their materials, as to think one lighter or heavier than the other. For both flesh and spirit are things of God, the one formed by his hand, the other completed by his breath. Since, then, they belong equally to the Lord, whichever of them sins offends the Lord equally. Or would you distinguish the acts of flesh and spirit, which in life, in death, and in resurrection have such communion and partnership that they are then raised together either to life or to judgment, because, of course, they have either sinned or acted innocently together? We have said this first so that we may understand that the need of repentance weighs no less on one part than on both, if it has sinned. The guilt of both is common; common, too, is the judge, God; common, therefore, is also the remedy of repentance. They are called spiritual and bodily because every offense is either done or thought, so that what lies in deed is bodily, since a deed, like a body, can be seen and touched, while what lies in the mind is spiritual, since spirit is neither seen nor held. By this it is shown that offenses not only of deed but also of will must be avoided and cleansed by repentance. For if human limitation judges only the deed, because it is not equal to the hiding places of the will, we must not therefore neglect the crimes of the will in the sight of God. God is sufficient for all things. Nothing from which any sin at all proceeds is removed from his sight, for he does not fail to know it, nor omit to bring it to judgment. He is no dissembler or betrayer of his own clear sight. What of the fact that the will is the origin of the deed? Let those cases look to themselves that are put down to chance or necessity or ignorance; apart from these, there is no sin except by the will. Since, then, the will is the origin of the deed, is it not as much the more liable to punishment as it is the first cause of guilt, since it is not freed even when some difficulty prevents its carrying out? For it is itself charged to its own account, and cannot be excused by that bad luck in completing the act, since it has done what was its own part. In short, how does the Lord show that he is building an addition onto the law, if not by forbidding offenses of the will too, when he defines as an adulterer not only the man who has actually fallen upon another's marriage, but also the one who has defiled himself by the lust of his gaze? So it is quite dangerous for the mind to picture to itself what it is forbidden to carry out, and rashly by the will to complete the effect. And since the force of this will is so great that, even without sating itself with gratification, it stands for the deed, it will therefore be punished as the deed. It is utterly idle to say, “I willed, but I did not do it.” On the contrary, you ought to carry it out, since you will it, or not will it either, since you do not carry it out. But you pronounce sentence yourself by the confession of your conscience. For if you desired a good thing, you would have longed to carry it out; and just as you do not carry out the evil, so you ought not to have desired it either. Wherever you place yourself, you are bound by guilt, because either you have willed evil or you have not fulfilled good.