Book One: Good and Bad Men Suffer Alike
“The patience of God still invite(s) the wicked to repentance, even as the scourge of God educates the good to patience. And so, too, does the mercy of God embrace the good that it may cherish them, as the severity of God arrests the wicked to punish them. To the divine providence it has seemed good to prepare in the world to come for the righteous good things, which the unrighteous shall not enjoy; and for the wicked evil things, which the good shall not be tormented. But as for the good things of this life, and its ills, God has willed that these should be common to both; that we may not too eagerly covet the things which wicked men are seen equally to enjoy, nor shrink with an unseemly fear from the ills which even good men often suffer.”
“ There is, too, a very real difference in the purpose served by both those events which we call adverse and those prosperous. For the good man is neither uplifted with the good things of time, nor broken by its ills; but the wicked man, because he is corrupted by this world’s happiness, feels himself punished by its unhappiness.”
“Wherefore, though good and bad men suffer alike, we must not suppose that there is no difference between the men themselves, because there is no difference in what they both suffer. For even in the likeness of the sufferings, there remains an unlikeness in the sufferers; and though exposed to the same anguish, virtue and vice are not the same thing. For as the same fire causes gold to glow brightly, and chaff to smoke; and under the same flail the straw is beaten small, while the grain is cleansed; and as the lees are not mixed with the oil, though squeezed out of the vat by the same pressure, so the same violence of affliction proves, purges, clarifies the good, but damns, ruins, exterminates the wicked. And thus it is that in the same affliction the wicked detest God and blaspheme, while the good pray and praise. So material a difference does it make, not what ills are suffered, but what kind of man suffers them. For, stirred up with the same movement, mud exhales a horrible stench, and ointment emits a fragrant odor.”
“And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.” ~ Romans 8:28
“These are the considerations which one must keep in view, that he may answer the question whether any evil happens to the faithful and godly which cannot be turned to profit.” ~ Saint Augustine
*The City of God by Saint Augustine Translated by Marcus Dods, D.D. with an introduction by Thomas Merton, pages Book one pages 10-13
1993 Modern Library Edition
Introduction copyright 1950,1978 by Random House, Inc.
ISBN 0-679-60087-6
