To Florus 2.27
I asked, then, in strict logical sequence, as all learning will acknowledge with me, through what sin—the work of an evil will, which is also called the devil’s work—could be found in an infant. Through the will? Even our present opponent admits that no such will has existed in the infant. Through marriage? No one doubts that marriage belongs to the parents’ activity, and he had previously stated that they did not sin in this union (Augustine, Marriage and Desire 2.46). If our debater regretted this concession, as the course of his work indicated, he should admit that the parents are guilty, since their union prepares a kingdom for the devil over God’s image. I added, by the necessary steps of argument, that original sin makes the devil the creator of bodies. For if evil comes into human beings through their origin, and the devil’s right over human beings comes through evil, the devil is the maker of human beings, since the origin of those born comes from him. Realizing that these arguments would imprison the advocates of inherited sin in the Manichaeans’ cave, I turned the key to give the captives a way out. I warned him that, if he truly believed human beings were made by God and sincerely confessed married people innocent, he should understand that original sin cannot be derived from them. ‘Certainly,’ I said, ‘the one born does not sin, the one who fathered the child does not sin, and the one who created the child does not sin. Through what cracks, amid so many defenses of innocence, do you imagine sin has entered?’ (Augustine, Marriage and Desire 2.47). What, I ask, could have been framed more reverently, truthfully, clearly, briefly, and firmly than my drawing a fourth proposition—the decisive conclusion—from the three premises my opponent had conceded? Sometimes one or two premises necessarily establish a third. By what rule, then, should I be forbidden to infer the fourth proposition that follows from three admitted premises? And this is only in the second argument. In the first, five or more points are conceded to me, after which a valid and undefeated conclusion follows.
Latin
Quaesivi ergo consequentissime, ut omnis mecum eruditio recognoscat, peccatum quod opus est malae voluntatis, et opus diaboli dicitur, per quid inveniretur in parvulo, si per voluntatem; at nullam in eo fuisse, etiam hic, cum quo agimus, confitetur, si per nuptias; sed has pertinere ad opus parentum, nemo qui dubitet, quos in hac commixtione non peccasse praemiserat [n28] ; aut si concessionis huius paeniteret disputatorem, sicut processus operis indicabat; profiteretur esse reos parentes, quorum conventu regnum in imaginem Dei diabolo pararetur; et addidi necessariis disputationum gradibus, per originale peccatum auctorem corporum diabolum definiri; quia si per originem malum in hominibus, per malum ius diaboli in homines; diabolus est auctor hominum, a quo est origo nascentium. Quae quoniam in antro Manichaeorum Traducianos esse clusura deprehenderat; verti clavem, ut praeberem captis effugium, admonuique ut, si vere a Deo crederet homines fieri, pureque confiteretur esse coniuges innocentes, intellegeret trahi non posse ex his originale peccatum. Certe non peccat, inquam, iste qui nascitur, non peccat ille qui genuit, non peccat iste qui condidit; per quas rimas, inter tot praesidia innocentiae, peccatum fingis ingressum? [n29] Quid potuit, rogo, sanctius, quid verius, quid lucidius, quid brevius firmiusque componi, quam post tria sumpta quae inimico concedente susceperam, inferrem quartum, in quo erat summa conclusio? Nam cum uno nonnumquam, aut duobus sumptis, tertium necessario colligatur, qua lege mihi post tria concessa, quartum quod his adhaeret, non liceret inferre? Et hoc quidem in secunda disputatione; caeterum in priore, quinque mihi aut amplius conceduntur, post quae fit legitima invictaque conclusio.