Augustine of Hippo

"I will confess to the Lord according to His justice" [Psalm 7:17]. This is not the sinner's confession: for he says this, who said above most truly, "If there be iniquity in my hands:" but it is a confession of God's justice, in which we speak thus, Verily, O Lord, You are just, in that You both so protect the just, that You enlighten them by Yourself; and so order sinners, that they be punished not by Your malice, but by their own. This confession so praises the Lord, that the blasphemies of the ungodly can avail nothing, who, willing to excuse their evil deeds, are unwilling to attribute to their own fault that they sin, that is, are unwilling to attribute their fault to their fault. Accordingly they find either fortune or fate to accuse, or the devil, to whom He who made us has willed that it should be in our power to refuse consent: or they bring in another nature, which is not of God: wretched waverers, and erring, rather than confessing to God, that He should pardon them. For it is not fit that any be pardoned, except he says, I have sinned. He, then, that sees the deserts of souls so ordered by God, that while each has his own given him, the fair beauty of the universe is in no part violated, in all things praises God: and this is not the confession of sinners, but of the righteous. For it is not the sinner's confession when the Lord says, "I confess to You, O Lord of heaven and earth, because You have hid these things from the wise, and revealed them to babes." [Matthew 11:25] Likewise in Ecclesiasticus it is said, "Confess to the Lord in all His works: and in confession you shall say this, All the works of the Lord are exceeding good." Which can be seen in this Psalm, if any one with a pious mind, by the Lord's help, distinguish between the rewards of the righteous and the penalties of the sinners, how that in these two the whole creation, which God made and rules, is adorned with a beauty wondrous and known to few. Thus then he says, "I will confess to the Lord according to His justice," as one who saw that darkness was not made by God, but ordered nevertheless. For God said, "Let light be made, and light was made." [Genesis 1:3] He did not say, Let darkness be made, and darkness was made: and yet He ordered it. And therefore it is said, "God divided between the light, and the darkness: and God called the light day, and the darkness He called night." [Genesis 1:4-5] This is the distinction, He made the one and ordered it: but the other He made not, but yet He ordered this too. But now that sins are signified by darkness, so is it seen in the Prophet, who says, "And your darkness shall be as the noon day:" [Isaiah 58:10] and in the Apostle, who says, "He that hates his brother is in darkness:" [1 John 2:11] and above all that text, "Let us cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armour of light." [Romans 13:12] Not that there is any nature of darkness. For all nature, in so far as it is nature, is compelled to be. Now being belongs to light: not being to darkness. He then that leaves Him by whom he was made, and inclines to that whence he was made, that is, to nothing, is in this sin endarkened: and yet he does not utterly perish, but he is ordered among the lowest things. Therefore after the Psalmist said, "I will confess unto the Lord:" that we might not understand it of confession of sins, he adds lastly, "And I will sing to the name of the Lord most high." Now singing has relation to joy, but repentance of sins to sadness.

"Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings You have made perfect praise, because of Your enemies" [Psalm 8:2]. I cannot take babes and sucklings to be any other than those to whom the Apostle says, "As unto babes in Christ I have given you milk to drink, not meat." [1 Corinthians 3:1-2] Who were meant by those who went before the Lord praising Him, of whom the Lord Himself used this testimony, when He answered the Jews who bade Him rebuke them, "Have ye not read, out of the mouth of babes and sucklings You have made perfect praise?" [Matthew 21:16] Now with good reason He says not, You have made, but, "You have made perfect praise." For there are in the Churches also those who now no more drink milk, but eat meat: whom the same Apostle points out, saying, "We speak wisdom among them that are perfect;" [1 Corinthians 2:6] but not by those only are the Churches perfected; for if there were only these, little consideration would be had of the human race. But consideration is had, when they too, who are not as yet capable of the knowledge of things spiritual and eternal, are nourished by the faith of the temporal history, which for our salvation after the Patriarchs and Prophets was administered by the most excellent Power and Wisdom of God, even in the Sacrament of the assumed Manhood, in which there is salvation for every one that believes; to the end that moved by Its authority each one may obey Its precepts, whereby being purified and "rooted and grounded in love," he may be able to run with Saints, no more now a child in milk, but a young man in meat, "to comprehend the breadth, the length, the height, and depth, to know also the surpassing knowledge of the love of Christ." [Ephesians 3:17-19]

"For I shall see Your heavens, the works of Your fingers" [Psalm 8:3]. We read that the law was written with the finger of God, and given through Moses, His holy servant: by which finger of God many understand the Holy Ghost. Wherefore if, by the fingers of God, we are right in understanding these same ministers filled with the Holy Ghost, by reason of this same Spirit which works in them, since by them all holy Scripture has been completed for us; we understand consistently with this, that, in this place, the books of both Testaments are called "the heavens." Now it is said too of Moses himself, by the magicians of king Pharaoh, when they were conquered by him, "This is the finger of God." [Exodus 8:19] And what is written, "The heavens shall be rolled up as a book." Although it be said of this æthereal heaven, yet naturally, according to the same image, the heavens of books are named by allegory. "For I shall see," he says, "the heavens, the works of Your fingers:" that is, I shall discern and understand the Scriptures, which You, by the operation of the Holy Ghost, hast written by Your ministers.

"What is man, that You are mindful of him? Or the son of man, that You visit him?" [Psalm 8:4]. It may be asked, what distinction there is between man and son of man. For if there were none, it would not be expressed thus, "man, or son of man," disjunctively. For if it were written thus, "What is man, that You are mindful of him, and son of man, that You visit him?" it might appear to be a repetition of the word "man." But now when the expression is, "man or son of-man," a distinction is more clearly intimated. This is certainly to be remembered, that every son of man is a man; although every man cannot be taken to be a son of man. Adam, for instance, was a man, but not a son of man. Wherefore we may from hence consider and distinguish what is the difference in this place between man and son of man; namely, that they who bear the image of the earthy man, who is not a son of man, should be signified by the name of men; but that they who bear the image of the heavenly Man, [1 Corinthians 15:49] should be rather called sons of men; for the former again is called the old man and the latter the new; but the new is born of the old, since spiritual regeneration is begun by a change of an earthy, and worldly life; and therefore the latter is called son of man. "Man" then in this place is earthy, but "son of man" heavenly; and the former is far removed from God, but the latter present with God; and therefore is He mindful of the former, as in far distance from Him; but the latter He visits, with whom being present He enlightens him with His countenance. For "salvation is far from sinners;" and, "The light of Your countenance has been stamped upon us, O Lord." So in another Psalm he says, that men in conjunction with beasts are made whole together with these beasts, not by any present inward illumination, but by the multiplication of the mercy of God, whereby His goodness reaches even to the lowest things; for the wholeness of carnal men is carnal, as of the beasts; but separating the sons of men from those whom being men he joined with cattle, he proclaims that they are made blessed, after a far more exalted method, by the enlightening of the truth itself, and by a certain inundation of the fountain of life. For he speaks thus: "Men and beasts You will make whole, O Lord, as Your mercy has been multiplied, O God. But the sons of men shall put their trust in the covering of Your wings. They shall be inebriated with the richness of Your house, and of the torrent of Your pleasures You shall make them drink. For with You is the fountain of life, and in Your light shall we see light. Extend Your mercy to them that know You." Through the multiplication of mercy then He is mindful of man, as of beasts; for that multiplied mercy reaches even to them that are afar off; but He visits the son of man, over whom, placed under the covering of His wings, He extends mercy, and in His light gives light, and makes him drink of His pleasures, and inebriates him with the richness of His house, to forget the sorrows and the wanderings of his former conversation. This son of man, that is, the new man, the repentance of the old man begets with pain and tears. He, though new, is nevertheless called yet carnal, while he is fed with milk; "I would not speak unto you as unto spiritual, but as unto carnal," says the Apostle. And to show that they were already regenerate, he says, "As unto babes in Christ, I have given you milk to drink, not meat." And when he relapses, as often happens, to the old life, he hears in reproof that he is a man; "Are ye not men," he says, "and walk as men?"

"You have put," he says, "all things in subjection under His feet." When he says, "all things," he excepts nothing. And that he might not be allowed to understand it otherwise, the Apostle enjoins it to be believed thus, when he says, "He being excepted which put all things under Him." [1 Corinthians 15:27] And to the Hebrews he uses this very testimony from this Psalm, when he would have it to be understood that all things are in such sort put under our Lord Jesus Christ, as that nothing should be excepted. [Hebrews 2:8] And yet he does not seem, as it were, to subjoin any great thing, when he says, "All sheep and oxen, yea, moreover, the beasts of the field, birds of the air, and the fish of the sea, which walk through the paths of the sea" [Psalm 8:7]. For, leaving the heavenly excellencies and powers, and all the hosts of Angels, leaving even man himself, he seems to have put under Him the beasts merely; unless by sheep and oxen we understand holy souls, either yielding the fruit of innocence, or even working that the earth may bear fruit, that is, that earthly men may be regenerated unto spiritual richness. By these holy souls then we ought to understand not those of men only, but of all Angels too, if we would gather from hence that all things are put under our Lord Jesus Christ. For there will be no creature that will not be put under Him, under whom the pre-eminent spirits, that I may so speak, are put. But whence shall we prove that sheep can be interpreted even, not of men, but of the blessed spirits of the angelical creatures on high? May we from the Lord's saying that He had left ninety and nine sheep in the mountains, that is, in the higher regions, and had come down for one? For if we take the one lost sheep to be the human soul in Adam, since Eve even was made out of his side, [Genesis 2:21-22] for the spiritual handling and consideration of all which things this is not the time, it remains that, by the ninety and nine left in the mountains, spirits not human, but angelical, should be meant. For as regards the oxen, this sentence is easily dispatched; since men themselves are for no other reason called oxen, but because by preaching the Gospel of the word of God they imitate Angels, as where it is said, "You shall not muzzle the ox that treads out the grain." How much more easily then do we take the Angels themselves, the messengers of truth, to be oxen, when Evangelists by the participation of their title are called oxen? "You have put under" therefore, he says, "all sheep and oxen," that is, all the holy spiritual creation; in which we include that of holy men, who are in the Church, in those wine-presses to wit, which are intimated under the other similitude of the moon and stars.

"Yea moreover," says he, "the beasts of the field." The addition of "moreover" is by no means idle. First, because by beasts of the plain may be understood both sheep and oxen: so that, if goats are the beasts of rocky and mountainous regions, sheep may be well taken to be the beasts of the field. Accordingly had it been written even thus, "all sheep and oxen and beasts of the field;" it might be reasonably asked what beasts of the plain meant, since even sheep and oxen could be taken as such. But the addition of "moreover" besides, obliges us, beyond question, to recognise some difference or another. But under this word, "moreover," not only "beasts of the field," but also "birds of the air, and fish of the sea, which walk through the paths of the sea" [Psalm 8:8], are to be taken in. What is then this distinction? Call to mind the "wine-presses," holding husks and wine; and the threshing-floor, containing chaff and grain; and the nets, in which were enclosed good fish and bad; and the ark of Noah, in which were both unclean and clean animals: and you will see that the Churches for a while, now in this time, unto the last time of judgment, contain not only sheep and oxen, that is, holy laymen and holy ministers, but "moreover beasts of the field, birds of the air, and birds of the sea, that walk through the paths of the sea." For the beasts of the field were very fitly understood, as men rejoicing in the pleasure of the flesh where they mount up to nothing high, nothing laborious. For the field is also "the broad way, that leads to destruction:" [Matthew 7:13] and in a field is Abel slain. [Genesis 4:8] Wherefore there is cause to fear, lest one coming down from the mountains of God's righteousness ("for your righteousness," he says, "is as the mountains of God" ) making choice of the broad and easy paths of carnal pleasure, be slain by the devil. See now too "the birds of heaven," the proud, of whom it is said, "They have set their mouth against the heaven." See how they are carried on high by the wind, "who say, We will magnify our tongue, our lips are our own, who is our Lord?" Behold too the fish of the sea, that is, the curious; who walk through the paths of the sea, that is, search in the deep after the temporal things of this world: which, like paths in the sea, vanish and perish, as quickly as the water comes together again after it has given room, in their passage, to ships, or to whatsoever walks or swims. For he said not merely, who walk the paths of the sea; but "walk through," he said; showing the very determined earnestness of those who seek after vain and fleeting things. Now these three kinds of vice, namely, the pleasure of the flesh, and pride, and curiosity, include all sins. And they appear to me to be enumerated by the Apostle John, when he says, "Love not the world; for all that is in the world is the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life." [1 John 2:15-16] For through the eyes especially prevails curiosity. To what the rest indeed belong is clear. And that temptation of the Lord Man was threefold: by food, that is, by the lust of the flesh, where it is suggested, "command these stones that they be made bread:" [Matthew 4:3] by vain boasting, where, when stationed on a mountain, all the kingdoms of this earth are shown Him, and promised if He would worship: [Matthew 4:8-9] by curiosity, where, from the pinnacle of the temple, He is advised to cast Himself down, for the sake of trying whether He would be borne up by Angels. [Matthew 4:6] And accordingly after that the enemy could prevail with Him by none of these temptations, this is said of him, "When the devil had ended all his temptation." [Luke 4:13] With a reference then to the meaning of the wine-presses, not only the wine, but the husks too are put under His feet; to wit, not only sheep and oxen, that is, the holy souls of believers, either in the laity, or in the ministry; but moreover both beasts of pleasure, and birds of pride, and fish of curiosity. All which classes of sinners we see mingled now in the Churches with the good and holy. May He work then in His Churches, and separate the wine from the husks: let us give heed, that we be wine, and sheep or oxen; not husks, or beasts of the field, or birds of heaven, or fish of the sea, which walk through the paths of the sea. Not that these names can be understood and explained in this way only, but the explanation of them must be according to the place where they are found. For elsewhere they have other meanings. And this rule must be kept to in every allegory, that what is expressed by the similitude should be considered agreeably to the meaning of the particular place: for this is the manner of the Lord's and the Apostles' teaching. Let us repeat then the last verse, which is also put at the beginning of the Psalm, and let us praise God, saying, "O Lord our Lord, how wonderful is Your name in all the earth!" For fitly, after the matter of the discourse, is the return made to the heading, whither all that discourse must be referred.

"I will confess unto You, O Lord, with my whole heart" [Psalm 9:1]. He does not, with a whole heart, confess unto God, who doubts of His Providence in any particular: but he who sees already the hidden things of the wisdom of God, how great is His invisible reward, who says, "We rejoice in tribulations;" [Romans 5:3] and how all torments, which are inflicted on the body, are either for the exercising of those that are converted to God, or for warning that they be converted, or for just preparation of the obdurate unto their last damnation: and so now all things are referred to the governance of Divine Providence, which fools think done as it were by chance and at random, and without any Divine ordering. "I will tell all Your marvels." He tells all God's marvels, who sees them performed not only openly on the body, but invisibly indeed too in the soul, but far more sublimely and excellently. For men earthly, and led wholly by the eye, marvel more that the dead Lazarus rose again in the body, than that Paul the persecutor rose again in soul. But since the visible miracle calls the soul to the light, but the invisible enlightens the soul that comes when called, he tells all God's marvels, who, by believing the visible, passes on to the understanding of the invisible.

"You sat on the throne Who judgest equity" [Psalm 9:4]. Whether the Son say this to the Father, who said also, "You could have no power against Me, except it were given you from above," [John 19:11] referring this very thing, that the Judge of men was judged for men's advantage, to the Father's equity and His own hidden things: or whether man say to God, "You sat on the throne Who judgest equity," giving the name of God's throne to his soul, so that his body may perhaps be the earth, which is called God's "footstool:" [Isaiah 66:1] for "God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto Himself:" [2 Corinthians 5:19] or whether the soul of the Church, perfect now and without spot and wrinkle, [Ephesians 5:27] worthy, that is, of the hidden things of the Son, in that "the King has brought her into His chamber," [Song of Songs 1:4] say to her spouse, "You sat upon the throne Who judgest equity," in that You have risen from the dead, and ascended up into heaven, and sittest at the right hand of the Father: whichsoever, I say, of those opinions, whereunto this verse may be referred, is preferred, it transgresses not the rule of faith.

"You have rebuked the heathen, and the ungodly has perished" [Psalm 9:5]. We take this to be more suitably said to the Lord Jesus Christ, than said by Him. For who else has rebuked the heathen, and the ungodly perished, save He, who after that He ascended up into heaven, sent the Holy Ghost, that, filled by Him, the Apostles should preach the word of God with boldness, and freely reprove men's sins? At which rebuke the ungodly perished; because the ungodly was justified and was made godly. You have effaced their name for the world, and for the world's world. The name of the ungodly has been effaced. For they are not called ungodly who believe in the true God. Now their name is effaced "for the world," that is, as long as the course of the temporal world endures. "And for the world's world." What is "the world's world," but that whose image and shadow, as it were, this world possesses? For the change of seasons succeeding one another, while the moon is on the wane, and again on the increase, while the sun each year returns to his quarter, while spring, or summer, or autumn, or winter passes away only to return, is in some sort an imitation of eternity. But this world's world is that which abides in immutable eternity. As a verse in the mind, and a verse in the voice, the former is understood, the latter heard; and the former fashions the latter; and hence the former works in art and abides, the latter sounds in the air and passes away. So the fashion of this changeable world is defined by that world unchangeable which is called the world's world. And hence the one abides in the art, that is, in the Wisdom and Power of God: but the other is made to pass in the governance of creation. If after all it be not a repetition, so that after it was said "for the world," lest it should be understood of this world that passes away, it were added "for the world's world." For in the Greek copies it is thus, εἰς τὸν αἰῶνα, καὶ εἰς τὸν αἰῶνα τοῦ αἰῶνος Which the Latins have for the most rendered, not, "for the world, and for the world's world;" but, "for ever, and for the world's world," that in the words "for the world's world." the, words "for ever," should be explained. "The name," then, "of the ungodly You have effaced for ever," for from henceforth the ungodly shall never be. And if their name be not prolonged unto this world, much less unto the world's world.

"The swords of the enemy have failed at the end" [Psalm 9:6]. Not enemies in the plural, but this enemy in the singular. Now what enemy's swords have failed but the devil's? Now these are understood to be various erroneous opinions, whereby as with swords he destroys souls. In overcoming these swords, and in bringing them to failure, that sword is employed, of which it is said in the seventh Psalm, "If you be not converted, He will brandish His sword." And perhaps this is the end, against which the swords of the enemy fail; since up to it they are of some avail. Now it works secretly, but in the last judgment it will be brandished openly. By it the cities are destroyed. For so it follows, "The swords of the enemy have failed at the end: and You have destroyed the cities." Cities indeed wherein the devil rules, where crafty and deceitful counsels hold, as it were, the place of a court, on which supremacy attend as officers and ministers the services of all the members, the eyes for curiosity, the ears for lasciviousness, or for whatsoever else is gladly listened to that bears on evil, the hands for rapine or any other violence or pollution soever, and all the other members after this manner serving the tyrannical supremacy, that is, perverse counsels. Of this city the commonalty, as it were, are all soft affections and disturbing emotions of the mind, stirring up daily seditions in a man. So then where a king, where a court, where ministers, where commonalty are found, there is a city. Now again would such things be in bad cities, unless they were first in individual men, who are, as it were, the elements and seeds of cities. These cities He destroys, when on the prince being shut out thence, of whom it was said, "The prince of this world" has been "cast out," [John 12:31] these kingdoms are wasted by the word of truth, evil counsels are laid to sleep, vile affections tamed, the ministries of the members and senses taken captive, and transferred to the service of righteousness and good works: that as the Apostle says, "Sin should no more reign in" our "mortal body," [Romans 6:12] and so forth. Then is the soul at peace, and the man is disposed to receive rest and blessedness. "Their memorial has perished with uproar:" with the uproar, that is, of the ungodly. But it is said, "with uproar," either because when ungodliness is overturned, there is uproar made: for none passes to the highest place, where there is the deepest silence, but he who with much uproar shall first have warred with his own vices: or "with uproar," is said, that the memory of the ungodly should perish in the perishing even of the very uproar, in which ungodliness riots.

"And the Lord abides for ever" [Psalm 9:7]. "Wherefore" then "have the heathen raged, and the people imagined vain things against the Lord, and against His anointed:" for "the Lord abides for ever. He has prepared His seat in judgment, and He shall judge the world in equity." He prepared His seat when He was judged. For by that patience Man purchased heaven, and God in Man profited believers. And this is the Son's hidden judgment. But seeing He is also to come openly and in the sight of all to judge the quick and the dead, He has prepared His seat in the hidden judgment: and He shall also openly "judge the world in equity:" that is, He shall distribute gifts proportioned to desert, setting the sheep on His right hand, and the goats on His left. [Matthew 25:33] "He shall judge the people with justice" [Psalm 9:8]. This is the same as was said above, "He shall judge the world in equity." Not as men judge who see not the heart, by whom very often worse men are acquitted than are condemned: but "in equity" and "with justice" shall the Lord judge, "conscience bearing witness, and thoughts accusing, or else excusing." [Romans 2:15]

"And let them who know Your Name, hope in You" [Psalm 9:10], when they shall have ceased hoping in wealth, and in the other enticements of this world. For the soul indeed that seeks where to fix her hope, when she is torn away from this world, the knowledge of God's Name seasonably receives. For the mere Name of God has now been published everywhere: but the knowledge of the name is, when He is known whose name it is. For the name is not a name for its own sake, but for that which it signifies. Now it has been said, "The Lord is His Name." [Jeremiah 33:2] Wherefore whoso willingly submits himself to God as His servant, has known this name. "And let them who know Your Name hope in You" [Psalm 9:10]. Again, the Lord says to Moses, "I am That I am; and You shall say to the children of Israel, I Am, has sent me." [Exodus 3:14] "Let them" then "who know Your Name, hope in You;" that they may not hope in those things which flow by in time's quick revolution, having nothing but "will be" and "has been." For what in them is future, when it arrives, straightway becomes the past; it is awaited with eagerness, it is lost with pain. But in the nature of God nothing will be, as if it were not yet; or has been, as if it were no longer: but there is only that which is, and this is eternity. Let them cease then to hope in and love things temporal, and let them apply themselves to hope eternal, who know His name who said, "I am That I am;" and of whom it was said, " I Am has sent me." [Exodus 3:14] "For You have not forsaken them that seek You, O Lord." Whoso seek Him, seek no more things transient and perishable; "For no man can serve two masters." [Matthew 6:24]