Chapter 7: The Corruption of Natural Theology Under Sin
Natural theology in the state of sin corrupted — The means of total corruption — The fatal superstition substituted in its place — What the knowledge of God among nations destitute of the word is — The corruption of theology through philosophy — The origin of philosophy — The two parts of natural theology — The first wholly corrupted through metaphysics and ethics — The origin, abuse, use, and restoration of ethics, and likewise of metaphysics — Then of astronomy and natural philosophy — Natural theology corrupted through these.
Since the condition of natural theology corrupted by sin, considered in itself, was such that no spiritual good could ever be expected from it, let us proceed to see in what manner it was further corrupted through the cunning of the devil and the vanity of the human mind — intending to treat next of the new theology, and of those whom God has by that means enrolled as His peculiar people. And here we have resolved to deal only with the chief heads of these matters, referring the investigation of the origin and progress of idolatry to another place. All know that natural theology was corrupted, and among the greater part of mortals almost entirely lost, and that in its place a pernicious superstition was substituted from the earliest monuments of history and human memory. By what way and by what means that fatal and universal transformation was introduced into the world, we shall now briefly explain.
We have shown and demonstrated that some knowledge of God flourished among nations destitute of the light of the divine word, flowing from that twofold source of which we spoke — namely, the internal natural light, and that revelation of Him which was made through the works of God. That the outcome corresponded to these principles has long been made manifest through testimonies gathered on all sides from the writings of learned men among them: Josephus, Justin Martyr, Athenagoras, Theophilus of Antioch, Origen, Clement of Alexandria, Athanasius, Theophilus of Alexandria, Chrysostom, Eusebius, Theodoret, Tertullian, Lactantius, Arnobius, Augustine, and others among the ancients. Thomas, Eugubinus, Raimundus Sebundus, Ludovicus Vives, Mornaeus, Baronius, Fotherby, Vossius, Stuckius, Giraldus Ferrariensis, Grotius, and writers of every kind in later ages have rendered the same service. The extant works of Orpheus, Homer, Plato, Xenophon, Aristotle, Hesiod, Plutarch, Epictetus, Arrian, Cicero, Seneca, Photinus, Iamblichus, Proclus, Philostratus, and others prove the same thing clearly. The monuments and histories of all ages, nations, and peoples agree. For even if we grant that the multitude were always so wrapped in the veil of ignorance and darkness that they never so much as thought of the supreme deity or of the obedience rightly owed to Him according to right reason; and even if the unlearned were so empty of divine things that they held wisdom in contempt; yet another account must be given of the wise and those devoted to contemplation, in whom some useful concern for investigating the natures of things and advancing common notions resided. It is well known that these men, while the first effort of struggling nature still endured, expounded many things excellently and ornately concerning God and His worship, the obedience owed to Him, and the final end and happiness of mankind. Let us therefore see in what manner and by what means this theology was wholly corrupted, until in a horrible and total apostasy from God it ended in the dreadful swamp of monstrous idolatry and the most impure vanities. Now this evil of human defection and misery appears to have flowed from a twofold source. For men left to themselves and their own ways either endeavored to promote the remnants of natural theology and in that attempt, out of their native blindness, corrupted them further, or else set about deliberately corrupting them still more. That both attempts succeeded perniciously enough is evident from the outcome. The former, however, was the more noble, and more worthy of rational creatures. We shall therefore treat of it first. We have demonstrated that sinful men, destitute of all supernatural revelation, retain a natural power of knowing God that spontaneously exerts itself in adults. We have also previously attributed to them a general knowledge discriminating the honorable from the base in relation to God, His governance, and His final judgment — a knowledge of which the practical intellect could not be wholly deprived without ruin. But from the perpetual restlessness and fluctuation of conscience by which they were oppressed, and which those common notions produced, they easily perceived that this knowledge or theology was insufficient for attaining their ultimate end. Aided, therefore, by the benefit of that revelation of the eternal power and divinity of God through the works of creation and providence, which we have shown was likewise left to them, they strove with great effort to advance those innate principles. That they themselves were largely ignorant of why they did so is evident from the outcome. Equipped with the means of the operations of the intellect, they set about proving by a kind of groping what might be produced from them. And this is the origin of philosophy. Philosophy is indeed the result — the offshoot, so to speak — of the remnant of that theology which the first man possessed as innate in the state of integral nature, enlarged by the aforesaid revelation through the works of God. To seek God by groping, who is not far from every one of us; to scrutinize the testimonies of which He did not suffer Himself to be without witness in His works; and to weigh in the mind the natures of all things by which the invisible things of God are perceived — of all of which the first man was full with knowledge, as things necessary for the worship of God the Creator — this at length is to philosophize. It was in this manner that those called the sages of earlier ages endeavored to elucidate and advance those principles mentioned above, so that the minds of men might rise through them to the origin of those principles and their primeval state.
It is certain that philosophy had no other origin and no other end than this. The Greeks, as though they were the first to cultivate it, always boasted most magnificently of themselves — without doubt, foolishly. Diogenes Laërtius, in the preface to his work, reproaches those who dared to say that philosophy took its beginning from the barbarians; he says: they are ignorant of the achievements of the Greeks, to whom not only philosophy but the very human race itself owed its beginning, attributing these to the barbarians — that is, "These men truly, through want of understanding, apply the right deeds of the Greeks to the barbarians; for from them not only philosophy, but the very human race itself, took its origin." And this is beyond doubt.
Tatian, Clement, Theophilus, Eusebius, and others prove the contrary more clearly than light. Manifest traces of theft are also extant. For they borrowed everything from the Chaldeans, the Egyptians, the Indians, the Magi, the Syrians, and the Jews. Yet it cannot be denied that the ancient Greeks greatly advanced through earnest study the philosophy devised by others. What they had received by report, what they had stolen from the monuments of the Orientals, what they had learned from living teachers in the course of long journeys undertaken for that purpose, and what they had themselves observed under the guidance and companionship of nature concerning God and His works, concerning the base and the honorable as common notions — all this the greater part of them labored to peddle, first by word of mouth under the title of wisdom, and then in writings bearing the stamp of philosophy. But I know not what an Iliad of evils accompanied the endeavors of these men from their very cradle. For the philosophers themselves, as they wished to be called, were for the most part idle fellows of notorious licentiousness; and especially so greedy of vainglory in so servile and open a manner, and such ostentatious boasters, that they were themselves objects of ridicule and mockery to the common people.
"They ceased to be upright when they became learned," says Seneca. And by Timon all philosophers without exception are called —
"Bladders full of empty opinion" (that is, of arrogant self-conceit). And Euripides: "I hate the sophist who does not have wisdom for himself." — Frag. inc. And indeed scarcely one in many ever gave any specimen of true wisdom in human life. To these agrees that passage of the comic poet Anaxippus in Athenaeus: "Do you philosophize? But I observe that philosophers are wise only in words; in deeds, however, I perceive them to be fools."
Epictetus therefore boasts foolishly, proudly, and contemptuously toward God concerning these men — slaves of vanity — saying: "The condition and character of the philosopher is to expect all advantage and harm from himself." That is, every philosopher would have himself be a god. Even the Brahmins among the Indians openly boasted that they were gods. For when Apollonius inquired what opinion they held of themselves, their chief Jarchas replied that "they believed themselves to be gods." But in vain. For the place and esteem in which they ought to be and be held was more correctly assessed by Amithocrates, king of the Indians, who — as Athenaeus testifies, Deipnosophistae, bk. xiv. — requested by letter from King Antiochus that sweet wine, figs, and a sophist be sent to him, all purchased at his own expense.
It is shameful to recount what Athenaeus, bk. xi., records concerning Plato himself. Let them expect everything they please from themselves, so long as others expect nothing from them. But whatever sort of men they were, it is evident from the outcome that they either lost or corrupted the true use and end of common notions concerning God, the true, and the honorable. That these notions should serve as the rule and guide of human life with respect to the obedience owed to God and the natural worship of Him; that they should serve as the means for obtaining the blessed condition in the enjoyment of God Himself — these things appear never to have entered their minds. Hence from that obscure and faint knowledge or report concerning the immortal state which they retained, there flowed little or no efficacy for ordering life according to right reason. These, therefore, were the men through whom all the remnants of natural wisdom were turned into empty sophistry. The attempt of certain Platonists, after the preaching of the Christian religion, to restore philosophy to its former place is, as we shall see later, a different matter.
Philosophy had from the beginning no other end than the restoration of that primordial theology which had collapsed and been lost through the entrance of sin. And it was by this path that the human race set about repairing theology.
Now it was shown above that that primeval theology had two parts. Natural knowledge of God and of His will concerning the obedience and worship due to Him in that state of affairs, together with knowledge of the works of God directing and stimulating theologians toward the proper worship of God, the supreme Creator of all things — these constituted it.
Since, therefore, after the ruins of theology had been cast down, philosophy raised itself toward the same ends that this theology had set before itself, it strives to render a vicarious service to sinful men, or it accomplishes nothing at all. For men of a cultivating disposition, who first labored in building up and polishing philosophy, thought it their appointed task to cherish, draw out, and stimulate the common notions concerning God and His will — along with their innate moral sense discerning between good and evil — so that, guided by these, men might enjoy God, if it were possible.
That such was the first endeavor of those who philosophized among
the nations destitute of divine revelations, and that it was directed toward that end of which we have spoken, appears not only from the nature of the matter itself but also from all the traces of their design and purpose that occur everywhere. That whole ancient wisdom which Pythagoras and others investigated through Egypt and the Eastern parts of the world consisted in the rationale of establishing religions and in the ceremonies of divine worship. From it those men were held to be the dispensers of priesthood. Thus, when Telesinus asked what his wisdom or philosophy was, Apollonius — a follower of ancient wisdom — replied, as recorded in Philostratus, lib. iv. cap. xiii: proceeding from divine inspiration, and teaching how one ought to pray to the gods and sacrifice to them. Greece first produced philosophers who were not priests, after the new corruption of philosophy, of which we shall speak presently. I confess that this whole philosophy savored of idolatrous superstition; yet it nonetheless retained certain dim images and vestiges of truth.
The outcome, therefore, did not correspond to this splendid endeavor. By its power and auspices natural theology was not restored — indeed it was rather more corrupted. Whatever of philosophy exists anywhere, drawn from the monuments of the most ancient writers and still surviving, bears witness to this. For the innate vanity of the human mind led the natural light — or what remains of it — in various directions in its search for truth, until, plunged into the Syrtes and swamps of empty curiosities, endless quarrels, and useless speculations, it was nearly extinguished.
XIV. For after it pleased certain sharp men of subtle genius — setting aside all consideration of the primary end of this philosophy — to bind the universal knowledge of things and the account of obedience due to God artificially to certain methods of teaching, and to compress it rather into the snares, fetters, and manacles of certain disciplines or arts, and to burden it with the chains of empty notions, subtle terms, and arbitrary meanings, so that art quickly twisted nature away from its original design, this knowledge gradually declined into a certain ethics — that is, a methodical doctrine of virtues and vices — and into metaphysics; of which matters something must be said briefly.
XV. Now since both of these disciplines — both ethics, which Cicero calls that part of philosophy pertaining to morals, and metaphysics, which is called by some natural theology (although it presents a far lighter shadow of it than ethics does) — formed according to the standard of Aristotle's teaching, have everywhere obtained such dominion over the judgments of learned men that they have not only occupied a conspicuous place in Christian schools for several centuries now, but have also thoroughly mixed themselves into that theology which is publicly taught in them, they must be handled by me only gently and with a soft step, as it were. For I would not wish to stir up learned hornets, or to rouse against me fiery and inveterate disputants. It has been long since I grew utterly weary of all controversies; and I especially fear lest I might fall upon those men who have their wit so ready at hand that they can at any hour produce fifty or a hundred arguments (most of them futile) on any subject whatever, and who are almost entirely transformed into syllogisms. And it is an irritable breed of men.
Nothing, however, that I know of prevents me from thinking myself free to set forth briefly what I myself think of those arts and of the place they hold in the schools. I will therefore first subject ethics, and then metaphysics, to examination.
XVI. Ethics, moreover, is the science of morals. It was once a part of natural theology — that part, namely, which prescribed the rational rule for living to God according to the norm of the law of creation, and the manner and rule for performing duties toward oneself and toward others. It has been shown that remnants of this knowledge clung to the human mind after the entrance of sin. To arouse those remnants, to bring them forth, to elucidate them by reasoning, and to distribute them into various classes — this was the labor and work of the philosophers in ethics. Aristotle, that supreme and admirable artificer of compressing general notions into a systematic body, reduced them, once set forth and collected and (by the dexterity of his genius) enlarged by himself, into a disciplinary science. But since both he and the others who preceded him in that work were utterly ignorant of the true God and of the observance owed to Him, they displaced the whole rational principle that distinguishes the honorable from the base — which subsisted in the remnants of natural theology — and twisted it toward an entirely different end from that for which it was originally established by God. For which of the philosophers ever undertook to treat or teach the doctrine of virtue and vice, of the base and the honorable, with the end in view that it should be the rule for living to God, or the means by which men might at last enjoy Him in a blessed condition forever? Indeed, that the knowledge of virtue and moral duties should stand in the same place, esteem, and degree in theology as it held in the state of integral nature, so as to have the same end — this was both impossible, and God Himself denied it by the terms of the new covenant. Since, therefore, that teaching concerning morals, that is, ethics, which Aristotle cultivated, appears at length to have been received back into the church, as it were by right of postliminy, let us briefly consider in what place it should be held, or what use or end we can assign to it.
XVII. 1. We have previously demonstrated that the end for which that teaching, which in the state of integral nature was innate, was appointed, was none other than to be the directing principle of human minds in the worship and obedience owed to God, so that, walking before Him according to the law of creation, they might at last live blessedly with Him. If anyone is willing to acknowledge that man was made for the glory of God and capable of moral dependence upon Him, he will not, I think, deny that this was the end of the knowledge of right and wrong. But which of the philosophers can we suppose ever had this in mind? Indeed, what Christian either ought to teach ethics toward this end, or has dared to do so? For would this not be to bring miserable sinners back again under the dominion of the covenant of nature, where they must perish forever? Therefore: XVIII. 2. Let us grant that those who learn or teach Aristotelian ethics do not intend that end — tell me, then, what is that other end toward which they direct their eyes? The end of moral science can only be practice. But the end of the practice of moral duties is nothing other than the glory of God and our own enjoyment of Him. Let this, then, be the end of ethics; but what follows? Nothing except that we miserable little men are brought back again, by its help and benefit, under the law of creation, as was said before. But we are far mistaken; another end will be offered — namely, that, instructed by this teaching, we may lead a political life rightly and usefully here in the midst of the human race. Is that really so? But who is endowed with the authority to pervert at will the teaching which God established for one end to another end? Moreover, this is not even a different end; for no one ought to lead a godly, sober, and useful life among men except in order to obey God and live to Him. As ethics has therefore departed from theology and is preparing its return to the church, it belongs to the covenant of works.
XIX. 3. But in the end, what need is there here of either theology or philosophy? No Christian will deny that a true, solid, and sincere knowledge of virtue, of vices, of the base and the honorable, and of all moral duties is revealed and delivered more plainly and fully in the Holy Scriptures than is contained in all the writings of all the philosophers, or in their archetype, namely the remnants of innate theology. I mean the things themselves; for the precision of notions and the grasp of the harmony of terms by which knowledge of things is technically transmitted count for nothing with me — except insofar as I reckon them to be the greatest impediments to true wisdom. One may almost daily observe innumerable persons who, though they know all the definitions, divisions, distinctions, terms, and notions by which some science is taught, and indeed the entire system of a given doctrine, as familiarly as their own fingernails — so that they never triumph more earnestly than when they come to disputations — are nevertheless in reality unacquainted with the things themselves, and are most learnedly stupid. Learned, to be sure, in the manner in which Philostratus reports that Euxinus, the teacher of Apollonius, was versed in Pythagorean philosophy: "He knew," he says, "the doctrines of Pythagoras as birds are sometimes taught by men to speak human words: for they utter 'hail,' and 'may you fare well,' and 'Jupiter be propitious,' and certain words of that kind, neither knowing what they say, nor speaking in a manner suited to men, but merely moving their tongue in measured rhythm." And surely in no different way do most people seem to be wise from the discipline of the sciences. This vanity of the human mind nowhere appears more plainly than when it is occupied with this moral science. The unjust, the rapacious, the drunkards, the irascible, the cowardly — all are versed, or can be versed, in this science;
for it is not virtue itself, but the shadow of virtue; not moral duties themselves, but the mask of moral duties, that fill both pages of it. I would dare to say that not one true virtue is truly and certainly taught in all of Aristotle's books addressed to Nicomachus; nor will anyone ever emerge from their teaching just, good, or truly virtuous — only a masked hypocrite.
XX. 4. I will therefore state the matter as it is. God has placed the whole teaching concerning duties, virtue, and the observance of right reason in a different place and a different order under the covenant of grace than it was arranged under the law of nature. But those natural notions from which ethics was born and emerged look only to that first order which is now abolished (as was set forth above). There is now no virtue except what is graciously granted to the faithful by the power of the new covenant. No moral act is good and beneficial to the agent unless it proceeds from a new principle, that is, from a spiritual habit graciously infused into the heart. And the reason is that God has constituted all moral duties, of whatever kind they are, and all abstinence from vices, as part of the obedience He requires under the new covenant. Nor are virtues to be seriously taught in any other way — the school is mere play — if we wish to be Christians. I reckon it to be utterly impious for anyone to be instructed in the knowledge of the general nature of virtue without being at the same time instructed in the knowledge of supernatural grace and of the relation that virtue bears to Christ the Mediator; or for anyone to be urged to the performance of acts of virtue without being at the same time taught from where the strength for performing them is to be expected. Moral duties must be performed; acts of virtue must be practiced; it is necessary that we be just, sober, temperate, and courageous — but only under the principle of that obedience which God requires of us in the covenant of grace. The nature of virtue must be taught, all moral duties must be explained, the practice of them must be earnestly pressed, the knowledge of sin and hatred of vices must be seriously inculcated — but that all these things have regard to Christ the Mediator, to the Holy Spirit, to the covenant of grace, and constitute the obedience owed to God, must by no means be omitted. But it would be inept for anyone to introduce mention of these or similar things when expounding that teaching concerning morals which now prevails in the schools. What darkness, what fluctuation and uncertainty, what confusion of things and notions a doctrine so diverse on the same subject and the same matters can and does ordinarily produce in the minds of men, anyone may conjecture.
XXI. 5. Furthermore: the teaching of this moral philosophy — especially that which, derived from the genius and method of its author, now everywhere most widely prevails — is false in many points, and corrupt, uncertain, wholly useless, indeed even pernicious. For (1.) it confines the end of virtue within the limits of this earthly life, which is nothing other than to destroy the whole nature of virtue, to eradicate virtue itself, and to bind all its students with the horror and despair of that great Brutus, who cried out, "O wretched virtue, you are nothing other than a name!"
(2.) It teaches that all men possess a sufficiency of moral powers for every exercise of virtue that is necessary for obtaining its proper end — a position which contains an open denial of the entire gospel.
(3.) It teaches man to trust in himself and to expect all blessedness from himself — which is also the sum of Epictetan wisdom, and the highest contempt of God.
(4.) It asserts that virtue is a certain mean between extremes — than which nothing more inept can be imagined.
(5.) It proposes or acknowledges no certain, stable, universal rule of virtue: that which pleases the majority, that which pleases the wise, that which is most agreeable to those who divine uncertainly — that is virtue.
(6.) It discharges moral duties without any regard to grace, justice, or divine providence.
(7.) It denies that friendship between God and men is possible.
(8.) It is ignorant of eternal reward and punishment.
XXII. But I do not wish to plunge myself into the midst of the controversies of learned men; I will only add this: if this moral philosophy still seems to learned and good men to deserve its place, though for my own part I cannot but desire it to be banished beyond the bounds of the church, I most earnestly wish that diligent care be taken against these two evils — the first, that the minds of the young not be occupied with prejudices against the purity, simplicity, and indeed every mystery of the gospel; how this can be avoided when they have been trained in the form of this doctrine, I plainly do not know; the second, that the principles on which it rests not creep gradually into the theology of the schools — unless these things are thought to have been said too late.
XXIII. And indeed I favor the efforts of those who have endeavored to forge new hypotheses in this moral science. For it must be acknowledged that they have given those enslaved to Peripatetic philosophy occasion to inquire more deeply into the natures of these things. Whether they have actually attained the truth, let others judge. Nor indeed ought those who reject the meaning of one or two obscure little words in Aristotle to be said for that reason to embrace more readily a position that is thus laid open to the human intellect. A certain learned man, in a book he published on duties, contends that the end of moral philosophy is for a man to dwell in tranquility and joy of soul without the goading of conscience. But we know — and that learned man knows — that such a state of soul can by no means be obtained by any performance of duties whatever. For we are sinners, and we cannot become partakers of any true tranquility or joy except through the blood of Christ. Since the entrance of sin, no other way to peace or tranquility has been set forth. Furthermore, in order to obtain this end, the same learned man enjoins that each person diligently observe the laws and maxims of his own nature. But that this means is by no means sufficient to attain that end, all Christians know; that there is some law of nature, we contend along with the learned man. But since human nature itself is so far corrupted and vitiated by sin that it is not able either to understand or to correct its own vice, we must necessarily deny that the law which holds sway in that nature alone is suited to the use that is claimed for it. XXIV. There are very few things that I find it worthwhile to add separately regarding metaphysics. Whatever we have said about the rise and corruption of ethics applies equally to it as well; there is no need to repeat those things. But this science I plainly judge to be useless in human life — indeed, harmful. For once those things that properly and necessarily belong to logic on the one hand, and those things that belong to theology on the other, are removed, what remains will be nothing but a laborious and useless hodgepodge of terms, notions, words, and abstractions, which will never make any man better, more learned, wiser, or more fitted to his duty toward God or others. Let those who seem most practiced in it consult the innermost recesses of their own hearts and declare sincerely whether, through its benefit and aid, any degree of piety, uprightness, wisdom, prudence, or any true doctrine has ever accrued to them. Why then must we still afflict those wretched little men who daily cry out that life is short and art is long, with this thorny hodgepodge of useless and perplexing notions — which ought, if they have any wisdom, to be committed to oblivion as quickly as possible? XXV. Furthermore, the mixture of this science with supernatural theology — upon contemplating which Duns Scotus once exclaimed that "the theological doctors had mixed philosophy with theology with the greatest profit" — has nearly brought destruction to evangelical truth. Surely spiritual things would not bear the fetters and chains of metaphysical notions and terms; the freedom and breadth of that spiritual understanding which God freely gives us rightly to understand the mystery of the gospel also perishes, when it is entangled in the snares of this worldly wisdom (for such it is, if indeed it ought to be called wisdom). The noble, sublime, spiritual, heavenly, and divinely savored evangelical truth — bound by the rules of this science and delivered in the words it teaches — is rendered sterile, dry, thorny, lean, withered, and philosophical, and is cast down from its heavenly beauty and spiritual sweetness. The mystery of the gospel and that doctrine which is according to godliness has within itself something higher, greater, and more divine than that it should be confined within the barriers of human wisdom. If I therefore wished to perpetuate theological quarrels and to draw the souls of men away from the simplicity of the gospel, I would not hesitate to commend this source, material, and instrument of strife to students. What Prudentius once sang in his Apotheosis concerning certain ancient philosophers fits no less aptly the countless theologians puffed up with this empty wisdom:
"They assail the majesty of almighty God with slanderous contentions. They dissect faith with petty quibbles, each one more wicked in tongue than the last. They loose and bind the knots of questions through pliant syllogisms."
XXVI. But we must return to our path. We have traced the origin, development, and abuse of ethics and metaphysics. Contemplative men undertook to use the remnants of innate theology toward its original end, and accordingly to arouse, cultivate, and advance them. From this source there flowed forth all the doctrine of the nations concerning vices and virtues, and their contemplations concerning the nature and perfections of God. Men sophistically learned and acute, having forgotten the origin, end, and scope of these contemplations, produced those arts which we cultivate under these names; and these, in themselves, are certain masks of wisdom, but when mixed with supernatural theology they are pernicious.
XXVII. Furthermore: since the works of God make that which is known of Him manifest, sinners, diligently and carefully scrutinizing the natures of those works, sought to find by groping the Lord and Creator of all things. And this was the second part of natural theology. Human ingenuity, laboring under its innate corruption, also endeavored to cultivate this part. To seek God Himself from the works of God — both of creation and of providence — that was the inner impulse that perpetually urged them on. But the matter came to the same end. For as the vanity of mind from which they universally suffered grew stronger in natural philosophy and astronomy, that endeavor too gradually and learnedly vanished away.
XXVIII. This, I say, was the origin of astronomy and of that vanity which is called astrology. The contemplation and knowledge of the beauty, order, and courses of the heavens, of the stars, and of all celestial bodies was a part of natural theology. From it all men ought to have learned the greatness, infinite power, wisdom, and goodness of the Creator, and thus to have been stirred up to His natural worship. After the entrance of sin and the universal apostasy of the human race from the true God, that contemplation gradually fell into disuse everywhere, and the knowledge born of it vanished. For the majority, being wise in earthly things only, had cast aside all care for the things that were above them. Others were drawn by Satan's craft into the worship of the stars. Indeed, the dull and gross contemplation of the order, courses, and beauty of the heavens — things that strike the outward senses — became an incitement to idolatry for those who had cast off the knowledge and discipline of the living God, as we shall demonstrate at length hereafter. Thus at last, among many, the heaven itself became the first, if not the only, God. And the very name θεός appears to have been derived from no other source than ἀπὸ τοῦ θεῖν, that is, from the running of the stars. Between these two extremes, there arose at length certain theoretical men who devoted themselves to the contemplation of the celestial bodies for entirely different ends. For they had no intention either of pursuing them with religious worship or of seeking the living God through knowledge of them and obeying Him; rather, they appear to have taken this study upon themselves in order to satisfy the innate desire of learning the causes and natures of things. For observing that celestial bodies presented themselves to the eyes with an incredible variety and change of appearances, they investigated what order the bodies observed among themselves and what were the hidden causes and reasons of these phenomena. From the observations and conjectures of such men, with certain invented terms of arbitrary meaning applied to explain them (for most of the foundations on which it rests are invented), which they attempted to apply to the things themselves as best they could, arose the art we call astronomy — "gold," as it were, "was cast into the fire, and out came this calf." In the contemplation of the heavens, the stars, and all celestial bodies — the investigation of their nature, order, courses, influence, and the law implanted in them by the Creator of all — I judge that labor is very well employed. For even the bare and common sight of those things that immediately strike everyone's eyes strikes the minds of men at once with a certain silent admiration of the infinite wisdom and power of God. Far more effective is that contemplation which is joined with serious meditation and careful inquiry. And it would be desirable that the knowledge of the celestial bodies and of the perpetual law by which they are moved — insofar as anything certain can be known from it — were communicated to more people than is now done. Some things, however, I must add — briefly, I will say — adhering to my proposed purpose, without giving offense to anyone, as I hope. As it is now taught, and as it has held its place of authority among the learned for some centuries, astronomy has almost entirely lost its proper place, order, and usefulness. With natural theology removed, with respect to the end of true theology, who, I ask, could astronomy maintain its proper place? What was its purpose, if we human beings are created for the glory of God? It must therefore either be restored through Christ (in whom all things are to be renewed) to a different place under the covenant, or it must be entirely cast aside. Indeed, that the whole encyclopaedia of the sciences, directed toward a new end by new means, ought to be subordinated to the glory of God in Christ — whoever would deny this does not deserve to be called a Christian. But what this restoration of knowledge or of the cognition of natural things, or of the works of creation, for the use of men who sincerely worship God in Christ, is and ought to be; and what place all knowledge holds in supernatural or revealed theology, and especially this expertise in the stars and their courses — that is a longer account than I have leisure to tell or perhaps ability to expound.
XXIX. In this manner, therefore, with a truly futile effort, the human race endeavored as best it could to restore that primeval theology of which we have treated above, and in the attempt to restore it, destroyed it. This was the rational creature's effort to free itself from the curse of ignorance and blindness that weighed upon it on account of sin — an effort by which it accomplished nothing other than to become more miserably entangled. For since we are renewed to the image of God only in Christ, and since that theology was a distinguished part of that image, it is evident that without such renewal every attempt to restore it is utterly in vain. Hence it came about that those who were without experience of that renewal, or who were ignorant of the place it ought to occupy in philosophy, and yet undertook to refine and teach it — twisting it away from its proper end and use — scarcely advanced any further than to fasten a cross upon themselves and others with a mass of thorny and useless questions and disputes. And so from this first attempt, natural theology, though already corrupted, appears to have been not so much further corrupted as simply lost. Its total corruption, therefore, and how it degenerated further into paganism, must be investigated. But here let us see what sinners have done by deliberate design.
