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On the Soul and Its Origin

Blessed Augustine, NPNF I.5

Extract from Augustin’s Retractations
d2
Book 1, Argument
Book 1, Renatus Had Done Him a Kindness by Sending Him the Books Which Had Been Addressed…
Book 1, He Receives with a Kindly and Patient Feeling the Books of a Young and…
Book 1, The Eloquence of Vincentius, Its Dangers and Its Tolerableness
Book 1, The Errors Contained in the Books of Vincentius Victor. He Says that the Soul…
Book 1, 5. Another of Victor’s Errors, that the Soul is Corporeal
Book 1, Another Error Out of His Second Book, to the Effect, that the Soul Deserved to Be…
Book 1, Victor Entangles Himself in an Exceedingly Difficult Question. God’s…
Book 1, Victor’s Erroneous Opinion, that the Soul Deserved to Become Sinful
Book 1, Victor Utterly Unable to Explain How the Sinless Soul Deserved to Be Made Sinful
Book 1, L-Another Error of Victor’s, that Infants Dying Unbaptized May Attain to the…
Book 1, Martyrdom for Christ Supplies the Place of Baptism. The Faith of the Thief Who…
Book 1, Dinocrates, Brother of the Martyr St. Perpetua, is Said to Have Been Delivered…
Book 1, The Sacrifice of the Body and Blood of Christ Will Not Avail for Unbaptized…
Book 1, Victor’s Dilemma: He Must Either Say All Infants are Saved, or Else God Slays the…
Book 1, God Does Not Judge Any One for What He Might Have Done If His Life Had Been…
Book 1, Difficulty in the Opinion Which Maintains that Souls are Not by Propagation
Book 1, He Shows that the Passages of Scripture Adduced by Victor Do Not Prove that Souls…
Book 1, 18. By “Breath” Is Signified Sometimes the Holy Spirit
Book 1, 19. The Meaning of “Breath” In Scripture
Book 1, 20. Other Ways of Taking the Passage
Book 1, 21. The Second Passage Quoted by Victor
Book 1, 22. Victor’s Third Quotation
Book 1, 23. His Fourth Quotation
Book 1, Whether or No the Soul is Derived by Natural Descent (Ex Traduce), His Cited…
Book 1, Just as the Mother Knows Not Whence Comes Her Child Within Her, So We Know Not…
Book 1, 26. The Fifth Passage of Scripture Quoted by Victor
Book 1, Augustin Did Not Venture to Define Anything About the Propagation of the Soul
Book 1, 28. A Natural Figure of Speech Must Not Be Literally Pressed
Book 1, 29. The Sixth Passage of Scripture Quoted by Victor
Book 1, 30. The Danger of Arguing from Silence
Book 1, The Argument of the Apollinarians to Prove that Christ Was Without the Human Soul…
Book 1, The Self-Contradiction of Victor as to the Origin of the Soul
Book 1, Augustin Has No Objection to the Opinion About the Propagation of Souls Being…
Book 1, The Mistakes Which Must Be Avoided by Those Who Say that Men’s Souls are Not…
Book 1, 35. Conclusion
Book 2, Argument
Book 2, 1. Depraved Eloquence an Injurious Accomplishment
Book 2, 2. He Asks What the Great Knowledge is that Victor Imparts
Book 2, 3. The Difference Between the Senses of the Body and Soul
Book 2, 4. To Believe the Soul is a Part of God is Blasphemy
Book 2, 5. In What Sense Created Beings are Out of God
Book 2, Shall God’s Nature Be Mutable, Sinful, Impious, Even Eternally Damned
Book 2, 7. To Think the Soul Corporeal an Error
Book 2, The Thirst of the Rich Man in Hell Does Not Prove the Soul to Be Corporeal
Book 2, How Could the Incorporeal God Breathe Out of Himself a Corporeal Substance?
Book 2, Children May Be Found of Like or of Unlike Dispositions with Their Parents
Book 2, Victor Implies that the Soul Had a “State” And “Merit” Before Incarnation
Book 2, 12. How Did the Soul Deserve to Be Incarnated?
Book 2, 13. Victor Teaches that God Thwarts His Own Predestination
Book 2, Victor Sends Those Infants Who Die Unbaptized to Paradise and the Heavenly…
Book 2, Victor “Decides” That Oblations Should Be Offered Up for Those Who Die Unbaptized
Book 2, Victor Promises to the Unbaptized Paradise After Their Death, and the Kingdom of…
Book 2, Disobedient Compassion and Compassionate Disobedience Reprobated. Martyrdom in…
Book 2, 18. Victor’s Dilemma and Fall
Book 2, 19. Victor Relies on Ambiguous Scriptures
Book 2, Victor Quotes Scriptures for Their Silence, and Neglects the Biblical Usage
Book 2, 21. Victor’s Perplexity and Failure
Book 2, 22. Peter’s Responsibility in the Case of Victor
Book 2, Who They are that are Not Injured by Reading Injurious Books
Book 3, Argument
Book 3, 1. Augustin’s Purpose in Writing
Book 3, Why Victor Assumed the Name of Vincentius. The Names of Evil Men Ought Never to…
Book 3, He Enumerates the Errors Which He Desires to Have Amended in the Books of…
Book 3, Victor’s Simile to Show that God Can Create by Breathing Without Impartation of…
Book 3, Examination of Victor’s Simile: Does Man Give Out Nothing by Breathing?
Book 3, 6. The Simile Reformed in Accordance with Truth
Book 3, 7. Victor Apparently Gives the Creative Breath to Man Also
Book 3, 9. His Third Error. (See Above in Book II. II [VII.].)
Book 3, His Fourth Error. (See Above in Book I. 6 [VI.] and Book II. II [VII.].)
Book 3, His Fifth Error. (See Above in Book I. 8 [VIII.] and Book II. 12 [VIII.].)
Book 3, His Sixth Error. (See Above in Book I. 10-12 [IX., X.], and in Book II. 13, 14…
Book 3, 13. His Seventh Error. (See Above in Book II. 13 [IX.].)
Book 3, 14. His Eighth Error. (See Above in Book II. 13 [IX.].)
Book 3, 15. His Ninth Error. (See Above in Book II. 14 [X.].)
Book 3, God Rules Everywhere: And Yet the “Kingdom of Heaven” May Not Be Everywhere
Book 3, 17. Where the Kingdom of God May Be Understood to Be
Book 3, His Tenth Error. (See Above in Book I. 13 [XI.] and Book II. 15 [XI.]
Book 3, His Eleventh Error. (See above in Book I. 15 [XII.] and Book II. 16.)
Book 3, Augustin Calls on Victor to Correct His Errors. (See Above in Book II. 22 [XVI.].)
Book 3, 21. Augustin Compliments Victor’s Talents and Diligence
Book 3, 22. A Summary Recapitulation of the Errors of Victor
Book 3, 23. Obstinacy Makes the Heretic
Book 4, Argument
Book 4, 1. The Personal Character of This Book
Book 4, 2. The Points Which Victor Thought Blameworthy in Augustin
Book 4, 3. How Much Do We Know of the Nature of the Body?
Book 4, Is the Question of Breath One that Concerns the Soul, or Body, or What?
Book 4, 5. God Alone Can Teach Whence Souls Come
Book 4, Questions About the Nature of the Body are Sufficiently Mysterious, and Yet Not…
Book 4, We Often Need More Teaching as to What is Most Intimately Ours Than as to What is…
Book 4, 8. We Have No Memory of Our Creation
Book 4, Our Ignorance of Ourselves Illustrated by the Remarkable Memory of One Simplicius
Book 4, The Fidelity of Memory; The Unsearchable Treasure of Memory; The Powers of a…
Book 4, The Apostle Peter Told No Lie, When He Said He Was Ready to Lay Down His Life for…
Book 4, The Apostle Paul Could Know the Third Heaven and Paradise, But Not Whether He Was…
Book 4, In What Sense the Holy Ghost is Said to Make Intercession for Us
Book 4, It is More Excellent to Know that the Flesh Will Rise Again and Live for…
Book 4, 15. We Must Not Be Wise Above What is Written
Book 4, Ignorance is Better Than Error. Predestination to Eternal Life, and…
Book 4, A Twofold Question to Be Treated Concerning the Soul; Is It “Body”? And is It…
Book 4, The First Question, Whether the Soul is Corporeal; Breath and Wind, Nothing Else…
Book 4, 19. Whether the Soul is a Spirit
Book 4, 20. The Body Does Not Receive God’s Image
Book 4, 21. Recognition and Form Belong to Souls as Well as Bodies
Book 4, 22. Names Do Not Imply Corporeity
Book 4, 23. Figurative Speech Must Not Be Taken Literally
Book 4, 24. Abraham’s Bosom-What It Means
Book 4, The Disembodied Soul May Think of Itself Under a Bodily Form
Book 4, St. Perpetua Seemed to Herself, in Some Dreams, to Have Been Turned into a Man,…
Book 4, 27. Is the Soul Wounded When the Body is Wounded?
Book 4, 18 The Soul Deformed by the Body’s Imperfections?
Book 4, 29. Does the Soul Take the Body’s Clothes Also Away with It?
Book 4, 30. Is Corporeity Necessary for Recognition?
Book 4, 31. Modes of Knowledge in the Soul Distinguished
Book 4, Inconsistency of Giving the Soul All the Parts of Sex and Yet No Sex
Book 4, 33. The Phenix After Death Coming to Life Again
Book 4, 34. Prophetic Visions
Book 4, 35. Do Angels Appear to Men in Real Bodies?
Book 4, He Passes on to the Second Question About the Soul, Whether It is Called Spirit
Book 4, 37. Wide and Narrow Sense of the Word “Spirit.”
Book 4, 38. Victor’s Chief Errors Again Pointed Out
Book 4, 39. Concluding Admonition