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On Marriage and Concupiscence

St. Augustine of Hippo

3h 59m read
Post-Nicene

Two books to Count Valerius on marriage and concupiscence (419–420), distinguishing the good of the marriage bond from the disordered concupiscence that entered the world through original sin.

Table of Contents

1Retractations2Advertisement to the Reader on the Following Treatise3A Letter Addressed to the Count Valerius4Concerning the Argument of This Treatise5Why This Treatise Was Addressed to Valerius6Conjugal Chastity the Gift of God7A Difficulty as Regards the Chastity of Unbelievers. None But a Believer is Truly a Chaste Man8The Natural Good of Marriage. All Society Naturally Repudiates a Fraudulent Companion. What is True Conjugal Purity? No True Virginity and Chastity Except in Devotion to True Faith9The Censuring of Lust is Not a Condemnation of Marriage; Whence Comes Shame in the Human Body. Adam and Eve Were Not Created Blind; Meaning of Their 'Eyes Being Opened.'10Man’s Disobedience Justly Requited in the Rebellion of His Own Flesh; The Blush of Shame for the Disobedient Members of the Body11The Evil of Lust Does Not Take Away the Good of Marriage12This Disease of Concupiscence in Marriage is Not to Be a Matter of Will, But of Necessity; What Ought to Be the Will of Believers in the Use of Matrimony; Who is to Be Regarded as Using, and Not Succumbing To, the Evil of Concupiscence; How the Holy Fathers of the Old Testament Formerly Used Wives13Why It Was Sometimes Permitted that a Man Should Have Several Wives, Yet No Woman Was Ever Allowed to Have More Than One Husband. Nature Prefers Singleness in Her Dominations14The Sacrament of Marriage; Marriage Indissoluble; The World’s Law About Divorce Different from the Gospel’s15Marriage Does Not Cancel a Mutual Vow of Continence; There Was True Wedlock Between Mary and Joseph; In What Way Joseph Was the Father of Christ16In the Marriage of Mary and Joseph There Were All the Blessings of the Wedded State; All that is Born of Concubinage is Sinful Flesh17Before Christ It Was a Time for Marrying; Since Christ It Has Been a Time for Continence18The Teaching of the Apostle on This Subject19A Certain Degree of Intemperance is to Be Tolerated in the Case of Married Persons; The Use of Matrimony for the Mere Pleasure of Lust is Not Without Sin, But Because of the Nuptial Relation the Sin is Venial20What is Sinless in the Use of Matrimony? What is Attended With Venial Sin, and What with Mortal?21Continence Better Than Marriage; But Marriage Better Than Fornication22Blessing of Matrimony23Why Children of Wrath are Born of Holy Matrimony24Thus Sinners are Born of Righteous Parents, Even as Wild Olives Spring from the Olive25Even Infants, When Unbaptized, are in the Power of the Devil; Exorcism in the Case of Infants, and Renunciation of the Devil26Sin Has Not Arisen Out of the Goodness of Marriage; The Sacrament of Matrimony a Great One in the Case of Christ and the Church—A Very Small One in the Case of a Man and His Wife27Lust and Shame Come from Sin; The Law of Sin; The Shamelessness of the Cynics28Concupiscence in the Regenerate Without Consent is Not Sin; In What Sense Concupiscence is Called Sin29Whatever is Born Through Concupiscence is Not Undeservedly in Subjection to the Devil by Reason of Sin; The Devil Deserves Heavier Punishment Than Men30Through Lust Original Sin is Transmitted; Venial Sins in Married Persons; Concupiscence of the Flesh, the Daughter and Mother of Sin31Concupiscence Remains After Baptism, Just as Languor Does After Recovery from Disease; Concupiscence is Diminished in Persons of Advancing Years, and Increased in the Incontinent32How Concupiscence Remains in the Baptized in Act, When It Has Passed Away as to Its Guilt33The Evil Desires of Concupiscence; We Ought to Wish that They May Not Be34Who is the Man that Can Say, ‘It is No More I that Do It’?35When Good Will Be Perfectly Done36True Freedom Comes with Willing Delight in God’s Law37How Concupiscence Made a Captive of the Apostle; What the Law of Sin Was to the Apostle38The Flesh, Carnal Affection39Even Now While We Still Have Concupiscence We May Be Safe in Christ40The Law of Sin with Its Guilt in Unbaptized Infants. By Adam’s Sin the Human Race Has Become a 'Wild Olive Tree.'41To Baptism Must Be Referred All Remission of Sins, and the Complete Healing of the Resurrection. Daily Cleansing42By the Holiness of Baptism, Not Sins Only, But All Evils Whatsoever, Have to Be Removed. The Church is Not Yet Free from All Stain43Refutation of the Pelagians by the Authority of St. Ambrose, Whom They Quote to Show that the Desire of the Flesh is a Natural Good1Book II1Preliminary Notes on the Second Book2Introductory Statement3In This and the Four Next Chapters He Adduces the Garbled Extracts He Has to Consider4The Same Continued5The Same Continued6The Same Continued7The Same Continued8Augustin Adduces a Passage Selected from the Preface of Julianus. (See ‘The Unfinished Work,’ i. 73.)9Augustin Refutes the Passage Adduced Above10The Catholics Maintain the Doctrine of Original Sin, and Thus are Far from Being Manicheans11In What Manner the Adversary’s Cavils Must Be Refuted12The Devil the Author, Not of Nature, But Only of Sin13Eve’s Name Means Life, and is a Great Sacrament of the Church14The Pelagian Argument to Show that the Devil Has No Rights in the Fruits of Marriage15Concupiscence Alone, in Marriage, is Not of God16Man, by Birth, is Placed Under the Dominion of the Devil Through Sin; We Were All One in Adam When He Sinned17It is Not of Us, But Our Sins, that the Devil is the Author18The Pelagians are Not Ashamed to Eulogize Concupiscence, Although They are Ashamed to Mention Its Name19The Same Continued20The Pelagians Misunderstand ‘Seed’ In Scripture21Original Sin is Derived from the Faulty Condition of Human Seed22It is the Good God That Gives Fruitfulness, and the Devil That Corrupts the Fruit23Shall We Be Ashamed of What We Do, or of What God Does?24The Pelagians Affirm that God in the Case of Abraham and Sarah Aroused Concupiscence as a Gift from Heaven25What Covenant of God the New-Born Babe Breaks. What Was the Value of Circumcision26Chapter 25 [XII.]—Augustin Not the Deviser of Original Sin.27The Child in No Sense Formed by Concupiscence28The Pelagians Argue that God Sometimes Closes the Womb in Anger, and Opens It When Appeased29Augustin’s Answer to This Argument. Its Dealing with Scripture30The Same Continued. Augustin Also Asserts that God Forms Man at Birth31The Case of Abimelech and His House Examined32Why God Proceeds to Create Human Beings, Who He Knows Will Be Born in Sin33God Not the Author of the Evil in Those Whom He Creates34Though God Makes Us, We Perish Unless He Re-makes Us in Christ35The Pelagians Argue that Cohabitation Rightly Used is a Good, and What is Born from It is Good36He Answers the Arguments of Julianus. What is the Natural Use of the Woman? What is the Unnatural Use?37God Made Nature Good: the Saviour Restores It When Corrupted38If There is No Marriage Without Cohabitation, So There is No Cohabitation Without Shame39Jovinian Used Formerly to Call Catholics Manicheans; The Arians Also Used to Call Catholics Sabellians40Man Born of Whatever Parentage is Sinful and Capable of Redemption41Augustin Declines the Dilemma Offered Him42The Pelagians Argue that Original Sin Cannot Come Through Marriage If Marriage is Good43The Pelagians Try to Get Rid of Original Sin by Their Praise of God’s Works; Marriage, in Its Nature and by Its Institution, is Not the Cause of Sin44The Good Tree in the Gospel that Cannot Bring Forth Evil Fruit, Does Not Mean Marriage45The Pelagians Argue that If Sin Comes by Birth, All Married People Deserve Condemnation46Answer to This Argument: The Apostle Says We All Sinned in One47The Reign of Death, What It Is; The Figure of the Future Adam; How All Men are Justified Through Christ48The Scriptures Repeatedly Teach Us that All Sin in One49Original Sin Arose from Adam’s Depraved Will. Whence the Corrupt Will Sprang50In Infants Nature is of God, and the Corruption of Nature of the Devil51The Rise and Origin of Evil. The Exorcism and Exsufflation of Infants, a Primitive Christian Rite52To Call Those that Teach Original Sin Manicheans is to Accuse Ambrose, Cyprian, and the Whole Church53Sin Was the Origin of All Shameful Concupiscence54Concupiscence Need Not Have Been Necessary for Fruitfulness55How Marriage is Now Different Since the Existence of Sin56Lust is a Disease; The Word ‘Passion’ In the Ecclesiastical Sense57The Pelagians Allow that Christ Died Even for Infants; Julianus Slays Himself with His Own Sword58The Great Sin of the First Man59Adam’s Sin is Derived from Him to Every One Who is Born Even of Regenerate Parents; The Example of the Olive Tree and the Wild Olive60The Pelagians Can Hardly Venture to Place Concupiscence in Paradise Before the Commission of Sin61Let Not the Pelagians Indulge Themselves in a Cruel Defence of Infants