On the Good of Widowhood.

 Augustin the Bishop, servant of Christ, and of the servants of Christ, unto the religious handmaiden of God, Juliana, in the Lord of lords health.

 2. Whereas, therefore, in every question, which relates to life and conduct, not only teaching, but exhortation also is necessary in order that by te

 3. Therefore (thus) saith the Apostle, the teacher of the Gentiles, the vessel of election, “But I say unto the unmarried and the widows, that it is g

 4. Lo, there is your good compared to that good, which the Apostle calls his own, if faith be present: yea, rather, because faith is present. Short is

 5. Wherefore also when he was advising married persons not to defraud one another of the due of carnal intercourse lest, by this means, the one of th

 6. Wherefore this in the first place you ought to know, that by the good, which you have chosen, second marriages are not condemned, but are set in lo

 7. But whereas the Apostle, when commending the fruit of unmarried men and women, in that they have thought of the things of the Lord, how to please G

 8. Whence, also, what the Apostle Paul said of the unmarried woman, “that she may be holy both in body and spirit ” we are not so to understand, as th

 9. Learn, therefore, that thy good, yea, rather, remember what thou hast learned, that thy good is more praised, because there is another good than wh

 10. Nor, because I called Ruth blessed, Anna more blessed, in that the former married twice, the latter, being soon widowed of her one husband, so liv

 11. But thou who both hast sons, and livest in that end of the world, wherein now is the time not of casting stones, but of gathering not of embracin

 12. But since, as the Lord saith, “Not all receive this word ” therefore let her who can receive it, receive it and let her, who containeth not, marr

 13. Wherefore they who say that the marriages of such are not marriages, but rather adulteries, seem not to me to consider with sufficient acuteness a

 14. Wherefore I cannot indeed say, of females who have fallen away from a better purpose, in case they shall have married, that they are adulteries, n

 15. Men are wont to move a question concerning a third or fourth marriage, and even more numerous marriages than this. On which to make answer strictl

 16. For that also is no foolish question which is wont to be proposed, that whoso can may say, which widow is to be preferred in desert whether one w

 17. Let us therefore set before our eyes three widows, each having one of the things, the whole of which were in her: let us suppose one who had had o

 18. No one indeed of these six widows could come up to your standard. For you, in case that you shall have maintained this vow even unto old age, maye

 19. These discussions, therefore, concerning the different deserts of married women, and of different widows, I would not in this work enter upon, if,

 20. Wherefore, forasmuch as in the beginning of this little work I had proposed certain two necessary matters, and had undertaken to follow them out

 21. These things I am compelled to admonish by reason of certain little discourses of some men, that are to be shunned and avoided, which have begun t

 22. Now it has been my wish on this account to say something on this subject, by reason of certain of our brethren most friendly and dear to us, and w

 23. If, therefore, you had not as yet vowed unto God widowed continence, we would assuredly exhort you to vow it but, in that you have already vowed

 24. Let the inner ear of the virgin also, thy holy child, hear these things. I shall see how far she goes before you in the Kingdom of That King: it i

 25. The past day returns not hereafter, and after yesterday proceeds to-day, and after to-day will proceed to-morrow and, lo, all times and the thing

 26. Therefore let spiritual delights succeed to the place of carnal delights in holy chastity reading, prayer, psalm, good thought, frequency in good

 27. Indeed in all spiritual delights, which unmarried women enjoy, their holy conversation ought also to be with caution lest haply, though their lif

 28. Go on therefore in your course, and run with perseverance, in order that ye may obtain and by pattern of life, and discourse of exhortation, carr

 29. Next I entreat you, by Him, from Whom ye have both received this gift, and hope for the rewards of this gift, that ye be mindful to set me also in

19. These discussions, therefore, concerning the different deserts of married women, and of different widows, I would not in this work enter upon, if, what I am writing unto you, I were writing only for you. But, since there are in this kind of discourse certain very difficult questions, it was my wish to say something more than what properly relates to you, by reason of certain, who seem not to themselves learned, unless they essay, not by passing judgment to discuss, but by rending to cut in pieces the labors of others: in the next place, that you yourself also may not only keep what you have vowed, and make advance in that good; but also know more carefully and more surely, that this same good of yours is not distinguished from the evil of marriage, but is set before the good of marriage. For let not such, as condemn the marriage of widowed females, although they exercise their continence in abstaining from many things, which you make use of, on this account lead you astray, to think what they think, although you cannot do what they do. For no one would be a madman, although he see that the strength of a madman is greater than of men in their sound senses. Chiefly, therefore, let sound doctrine both adorn and guard goodness of purpose. Forsooth it is from this cause that catholic females, even after that they have been married more than once, are by just judgment preferred, not only to the widows who have had one husband, but also to the virgins of heretics. There are indeed on these three matters, of marriage, widowhood, and virginity, many winding recesses of questions, many perplexities; and in order by discussion to enter deeply into and solve these, there is required both greater care, and a fuller discourse; that either we may have a right mind in all those things, or, if in any matter we be otherwise minded, this also God may reveal unto us. However, what there also the Apostle saith next after, “Whereunto we have arrived, in that let us walk.”45    Phil. iii. 15, 16 But we have arrived, in what relates to this matter on which we are speaking, so far as to set continence before marriage, but holy virginity even before widowed continence; and not to condemn any marriages, which yet are not adulteries but marriages, by praise of any purpose whatever of our own or of our friends. Many other things on these matters we have said in a Book concerning the Good of Marriage, and in another Book concerning Holy Virginity, and in a Book which we composed with as great pains as we could against Faustus the Manichee; since, by most biting reproaches in his writings of the chaste marriages of Patriarchs and Prophets, he had turned aside the minds of certain unlearned persons from soundness of faith.

CAPUT XV.

19. Epilogus superiorum. Haec itaque de meritis diversis conjugatarum diversarumque viduarum hoc opere non disputarem, si id quod ad te scribo, tibi tantummodo scriberem. Sed quoniam sunt quaedam in hoc genere sermonis difficillimae quaestiones, aliquid amplius quam quod ad te proprie pertinet, dicere volui, propter quosdam qui sibi docti non videntur, nisi alienos labores non judicando conentur discutere, sed lacerando conscindere: deinde ut etiam tu ipsa non solum serves quod vovisti, et in co bono proficias; verum etiam diligentius firmiusque noveris, idem bonum tuum non a malo nuptiarum distingui, sed bono nuptiarum anteponi. Nam qui viduatarum feminarum nuptias damnant, etiamsi continentiam 0442 suam multarum, quibus tu uteris, rerum abstinentia mirabiliter et ferventer exerceant, non ideo te seducant, ut sentias quod sentiunt, etiamsi facere non possis quod faciunt. Nemo enim vult esse phreneticus, etiamsi videat phrenetici vires viribus sanorum esse fortiores. Praecipue igitur doctrina sana bonitatem propositi et ornet et muniat. Inde est quippe quod catholicae feminae etiam saepius nuptae, non solum univiris viduis, sed et virginibus haereticorum justo judicio praeferuntur. Multi sunt quidem de his tribus rebus, conjugii, viduitatis et virginitatis, quaestionum sinus, multae perplexitates: quibus disputando penetrandis vel dissolvendis, et majore cura opus est, et copiosiore sermone; ut vel in omnibus eis recte sapiamus, vel si quid aliter sapimus, id quoque nobis Deus revelet. Verumtamen, quod etiam illic consequenter dicit Apostolus, In quod pervenimus, in eo ambulemus (Philipp. III, 15, 16). Pervenimus autem, quod ad hanc rem, de qua loquimur, attinet, ut continentiam conjugio praeponamus, sanctam vero virginitatem etiam continentiae viduali; et ne aliquas nuptias, quae tamen non adulteria, sed nuptiae sunt, cujuslibet nostri nostrorumve propositi laude damnemus. Multa alia de istis rebus dicta sunt a nobis in libro de Bono Conjugali, et in alio libro de Sancta Virginitate; et in opere quod adversus Faustum Manichaeum quanto potuimus labore conscripsimus: quoniam Patriarcharum et Prophetarum casta conjugia mordacissime reprehendendo scriptis suis, quorumdam indoctorum animos a fidei sanitate detorsit.