The City of God/Book IX

The City of God Augustine of Hippo translated by Marcus Dods Book IX

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Argument—Having in the preceding book shown that the worship of demons must be abjured, since they in a thousand ways proclaim themselves to be wicked spirits, Augustin in this book meets those who allege a distinction among demons, some being evil, while others are good; and, having exploded this distinction, he proves that to no demon, but to Christ alone, belongs the office of providing men with eternal blessedness.

Book IX

1. The Point at Which the Discussion Has Arrived, and What Remains to Be Handled.
2. Whether Among the Demons, Inferior to the Gods, There are Any Good Spirits Under Whose Guardianship the Human Soul Might Reach True Blessedness.
3. What Apuleius Attributes to the Demons, to Whom, Though He Does Not Deny Them Reason, He Does Not Ascribe Virtue.
4. The Opinion of the Peripatetics and Stoics About Mental Emotions.
5. That the Passions Which Assail the Souls of Christians Do Not Seduce Them to Vice, But Exercise Their Virtue.
6. Of the Passions Which, According to Apuleius, Agitate the Demons Who Are Supposed by Him to Mediate Between Gods and Men.
7. That the Platonists Maintain that the Poets Wrong the Gods by Representing Them as Distracted by Party Feeling, to Which the Demons and Not the Gods, are Subject.
8. How Apuleius Defines the Gods Who Dwell in Heaven, the Demons Who Occupy the Air, and Men Who Inhabit Earth.
9. Whether the Intercession of the Demons Can Secure for Men the Friendship of the Celestial Gods.
10. That, According to Plotinus, Men, Whose Body is Mortal, are Less Wretched Than Demons, Whose Body is Eternal.
11. Of the Opinion of the Platonists, that the Souls of Men Become Demons When Disembodied.
12. Of the Three Opposite Qualities by Which the Platonists Distinguish Between the Nature of Men and that of Demons.
13. How the Demons Can Mediate Between Gods and Men If They Have Nothing in Common with Both, Being Neither Blessed Like the Gods, Nor Miserable Like Men.
14. Whether Men, Though Mortal, Can Enjoy True Blessedness.
15. Of the Man Christ Jesus, the Mediator Between God and Men.
16. Whether It is Reasonable in the Platonists to Determine that the Celestial Gods Decline Contact with Earthly Things and Intercourse with Men, Who Therefore Require the Intercession of the Demons.
17. That to Obtain the Blessed Life, Which Consists in Partaking of the Supreme Good, Man Needs Such Mediation as is Furnished Not by a Demon, But by Christ Alone.
18. That the Deceitful Demons, While Promising to Conduct Men to God by Their Intercession, Mean to Turn Them from the Path of Truth.
19. That Even Among Their Own Worshippers the Name “Demon” Has Never a Good Signification.
20. Of the Kind of Knowledge Which Puffs Up the Demons.
21. To What Extent the Lord Was Pleased to Make Himself Known to the Demons.
22. The Difference Between the Knowledge of the Holy Angels and that of the Demons.
23. That the Name of Gods is Falsely Given to the Gods of the Gentiles, Though Scripture Applies It Both to the Holy Angels and Just Men.