Wednesday, August 4, 2010

A very excellant passage from Augustine.

An early doctrine of a civil righteousness: "Wherefore, though I have, according to my ability, shown for what reason God, who alone is true and just, helped forward the Romans, who were good according to a certain standard of an earthly state..."

On the righteousness of true worshippers of God: "But such men, however great virtues they possess in this life, attribute it solely to the grace of God that He has bestowed it on them- willing, believing, seeking."

The righteousness of faith juxtaposed with human righteousness: "But however much that virtue may be praised and cried up, which without true piety is the slave of human glory, it is not at all to be compared even to the feeble beginnings of the virtue of the saints, whose hope is placed in the grace and mercy of the true God." (De Civitate Dei, 5.19)

Augustine cannot help but spill forth good doctrine eloquently and salubriously, and he is rightly esteemed as a true interpreter of God's Word and a theologian and a doctor of the church.

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