Key Arguments

• He affirms the real beauty of physical goods: "There is beauty in lovely physical objects, as in gold and silver and all other such things. When the body touches such things, much significance attaches to the rapport of the object with the touch. Each of the other senses has its own appropriate mode of response to physical things."
• He notes that temporal honour and power have their own dignity, though they tempt to self‑assertion: "Temporal honour and the power of giving orders and of being in command have their own kind of dignity, though this is also the origin of the urge to self-assertion."
• He grants that earthly life itself has an attractiveness due to a kind of measured harmony with these inferior goods: "The life which we live in this world has its attractiveness because of a certain measure in its beauty and its harmony with all these inferior objects that are beautiful."
• He praises human friendship as a genuine good: "Human friendship is also a nest of love and gentleness because of the unity it brings about between many souls."
• He then defines sin structurally as immoderate desire for low goods that leads to abandonment of the highest good: "Yet sin is committed for the sake of all these things and others of this kind when, in consequence of an immoderate urge towards those things which are at the bottom end of the scale of good, we abandon the higher and supreme goods, that is you, Lord God, and your truth and your law (Ps. 118: 142)."
• He concludes by relativizing the delights of these inferior goods in comparison with God, their maker, in whom the just take delight: "These inferior goods have their delights, but not comparable to my God who has made them all. It is in him that the just person takes delight;"

Source Quotes

I loved the self-destruction, I loved my fall, not the object for which I had fallen but my fall itself. My depraved soul leaped down from your firmament to ruin.12 I was seeking not to gain anything by shameful means, but shame for its own sake. v (10) There is beauty in lovely physical objects, as in gold and silver and all other such things. When the body touches such things, much significance attaches to the rapport of the object with the touch.

Each of the other senses has its own appropriate mode of response to physical things. Temporal honour and the power of giving orders and of being in command have their own kind of dignity, though this is also the origin of the urge to self-assertion. Yet in the acquisition of all these sources of social status, one must not depart from you, Lord, nor deviate from your law.

Yet in the acquisition of all these sources of social status, one must not depart from you, Lord, nor deviate from your law. The life which we live in this world has its attractiveness because of a certain measure in its beauty and its harmony with all these inferior objects that are beautiful. Human friendship is also a nest of love and gentleness because of the unity it brings about between many souls.

The life which we live in this world has its attractiveness because of a certain measure in its beauty and its harmony with all these inferior objects that are beautiful. Human friendship is also a nest of love and gentleness because of the unity it brings about between many souls. Yet sin is committed for the sake of all these things and others of this kind when, in consequence of an immoderate urge towards those things which are at the bottom end of the scale of good,13 we abandon the higher and supreme goods, that is you, Lord God, and your truth and your law (Ps.

Human friendship is also a nest of love and gentleness because of the unity it brings about between many souls. Yet sin is committed for the sake of all these things and others of this kind when, in consequence of an immoderate urge towards those things which are at the bottom end of the scale of good,13 we abandon the higher and supreme goods, that is you, Lord God, and your truth and your law (Ps. 118: 142).

118: 142). These inferior goods have their delights, but not comparable to my God who has made them all. It is in him that the just person takes delight;

Key Concepts

• There is beauty in lovely physical objects, as in gold and silver and all other such things.
• Temporal honour and the power of giving orders and of being in command have their own kind of dignity, though this is also the origin of the urge to self-assertion.
• The life which we live in this world has its attractiveness because of a certain measure in its beauty and its harmony with all these inferior objects that are beautiful.
• Human friendship is also a nest of love and gentleness because of the unity it brings about between many souls.
• Yet sin is committed for the sake of all these things and others of this kind when, in consequence of an immoderate urge towards those things which are at the bottom end of the scale of good,13 we abandon the higher and supreme goods, that is you, Lord God, and your truth and your law (Ps.
• These inferior goods have their delights, but not comparable to my God who has made them all. It is in him that the just person takes delight;

Context

Book II, section v (10): After the pear‑theft episode, Augustine offers a general account of created goods and the nature of sin as disordered love, integrating his earlier analysis into a broader metaphysical and moral theory of the hierarchy of goods.