Re: Dec. Update #1

are equally sound and certain. Scripture manifestly
declares this to us, when it says in some places: Deliciae meae esse cum
filiis hominum.65 Effundam spiritum meum super omnem carnem.66 Dii estis,67
etc.; and in other places, Omnis caro faenum.68 Homo assimilatus est
jumentis insipientibus, et similis factus est illis.69 Dixi in corde meo de
filiis hominum.70

Whence it clearly seems that man by grace is made like unto God, and a
partaker in His divinity, and that without grace he is like unto the brute
beasts.

435. Without this divine knowledge what could men do but either become
elated by the inner feeling of their past greatness which still remains to
them, or become despondent at the sight of their present weakness? For, not
seeing the whole truth, they could not attain to perfect virtue. Some
considering nature as incorrupt, others as incurable, they could not escape
either pride or sloth, the two sources of all vice; since they cannot but
either abandon themselves to it through cowardice, or escape it by pride.
For if they knew the excellence of man, they were ignorant of his
corruption; so that they easily avoided sloth, but fell into pride. And if
they recognized the infirmity of nature, they were ignorant of its dignity;
so that they could easily avoid vanity, but it was to fall into despair.
Thence arise the different schools of the Stoics and Epicureans,