From the Discourse on the Resurrection

¹ Read a compendious interpretation of some apostolic words from the same discourse. Let us see, then, what it is that we have endeavoured to say respecting the apostle. For this saying of his, “I was alive without the law once,” refers to the life which was lived in paradise before the law, not without a body, but with a body, by our first parents, as we have shown above; for we lived without concupiscence, being altogether ignorant of its assaults. For not to have a law according to which we ought to live, nor a power of establishing what manner of life we ought to adopt, so that we might justly be approved or blamed, is considered to exempt a person from accusation.

Because one cannot lust after those things from which he is not restrained, and even if he lusted after them, he would not be blamed. For lust is not directed to things which are before us, and subject to our power, but to those which are before us, and not in our power. For how should one care for a thing which is neither forbidden nor necessary to him? And for this reason it is said, “I had not known lust, except the law had said, You shall not covet.” For when (our first parents) heard, “Of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, you shall not eat of it; for in the day you eat thereof you shall surely die,” then they conceived lust, and gathered it.

Therefore was it said, I had not known lust, except the law had said, You shall not covet; nor would they have desired to eat, except it had been said, “You shall not eat of it.” For it was thence that sin took occasion to deceive me. For when the law was given, the devil had it in his power to work lust in me; “for without the law, sin was dead;” which means “when the law was not given, sin could not be committed.” But I was alive and blameless before the law, having no commandment in accordance with which it was necessary to live; “but when the commandment came, sin revived, and I died.

And the commandment, which was ordained to life, I found to be unto death.” For after God had given the law, and had commanded me what I ought to do, and what I ought not to do, the devil wrought lust in me. For the promise of God which was given to me, this was for life and incorruption, so that obeying it I might have ever-blooming life and joy unto incorruption; but to him who disobeyed it, it would issue in death. But the devil, whom he calls sin, because he is the author of sin, taking occasion by the commandment to deceive me to disobedience, deceived and slew me, thus rendering me subject to the condemnation, “In the day that you eat thereof you shall surely die.” “Wherefore the law is holy, and the commandment holy, and just and good;” because it was given, not for injury, but for safety; for let us not suppose that God makes anything useless or hurtful.

What thou? “Was then that which is good made death unto me?” namely, that which was given as a law, that it might be the cause of the greatest good? “God forbid.” For it was not the law of God that became the cause of my being brought into subjection to corruption, but the devil; that he might be made manifested who, through that which is good, wrought evil; that the inventor of evil might become and be proved the greatest of all sinners. “For we know that the law is spiritual;” and therefore it can in no respect be injurious to any one; for spiritual things are far removed from irrational lust and sin.

“But I am carnal, sold under sin;” which means: But I being carnal, and being placed between good and evil as a voluntary agent, am so that I may have it in my power to choose what I will. For “behold I set before you life and death;” meaning that death would result from disobedience of the spiritual law, that is of the commandment; and from obedience to the carnal law, that is the counsel of the serpent; for by such a choice “I am sold” to the devil, fallen under sin. Hence evil, as though besieging me, cleaves to me and dwells in me, justice giving me up to be sold to the Evil One, in consequence of having violated the law.

Therefore also the expressions: “That which I do, I allow not,” and “what I hate, that do I,” are not to be understood of doing evil, but of only thinking it. For it is not in our power to think or not to think of improper things, but to act or not to act upon our thoughts. For we cannot hinder thoughts from coming into our minds, since we receive them when they are inspired into us from without; but we are able to abstain from obeying them and acting upon them. Therefore it is in our power to will not to think these things; but not to bring it about that they shall pass away, so as not to come into the mind again; for this does not lie in our power, as I said; which is the meaning of that statement, “The good that I would, I do not;” for I do not will to think the things which injure me; for this good is altogether innocent.

But “the good that I would, I do not; but the evil which I would not, that I do;”not willing to think, and yet thinking what I do not will. And consider whether it was not for these very things that David entreated God, grieving that he thought of those things which he did not will: “O cleanse me from my secret faults. Keep Your servant also from presumptuous sins. lest they get the dominion over me; so shall I be undefiled, and innocent from the great offense.” And the apostle too, in another place: “Casting down imaginations, and every high thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, and bringing into captivity every thought to the obedience of Christ.”