Mozley: A Treatise on the Augustinian Doctrine of

CHAP. VHl. of Freewill. 2 1 7
when man had a self-determining will. The root or origin,
therefore, of sin is entirely free, and it must be judged by
its root or origin. Subsequently, indeed, to its origin, sin
becomes not free in this sense, but necessary, and our nature
is captive to it : but this does not undo the freedom of its
origin. Sin cannot be without the will, in the same way
in which we say that the fruit cannot be without the root.
. . . Without the will of him (Adam) from whom is the
origin of all that live, the original sin was not committed.
But the contagion of it could pass to others without the
will. It must exist with the will, in order that it might
pass to others without the will, as a tree must have a root
below, in order that it may be above without a root. . . .
Sin is both with the will and without the will : it is with
the will in so far as it must begin to be with it ;
* out the will in so far as it remains without it.
it is with
When it
is said in this passage that sin remains without the will, it
is not of course meant that it remains apart from all will
whatever, for some kind of will must go along with a sinful
act to make it the man s act ; but will is here used in the
highest sense as a self-determining will, such a will as the
first man in his perfect state had. The meaning of this
passage, then, is this : that sin began in a self-determining
will ; and that, therefore, though when once existing, it
remains in the human race without such a will, it ever
carries about with it the freedom and responsibility of its
commencement. The human will is viewed as one stream
of will, so to call it, flowing first from a fountain head in
the will of the first man, as he came from the hands of his
Creator, undergoing a change of its powers and condition at
the fall, and with that internal change passing into all the
individual members of the human race, as they are succes-
1
Ego sic dixi peccatum sine vo- alia loca transire sine radicibus
luntate esse non . . . posse, quoraodo possent. Sine voluntate non
dicimus poma vel frumenta sine potest esse, nam sine voluntate non
radicibus esse non . . . posse. Sine potrst existere ut sit sine autem
;
voluntate esse non posset, ut esset voluntate potest esse, quia sine vo-
quod in alios sine voluntate tran- luntate potest manere quod existit.
siret ; sicut frumenta sine radicibus Op. Imp. 1. 4. cc. 97. 99.
esse non possent, ut essent quae in