immutable to the mutable good._
This I do know, that the nature of God can never, nowhere,
nowise be defective, and that natures made of nothing can. These
latter, however, the more being they have, and the more good they
do (for then they do something positive), the more they have
efficient causes; but in so far as they are defective in being, and
consequently do evil (for then what is their work but vanity?), they
have deficient causes. And I know likewise, that the will could
not become evil, were it unwilling to become so; and therefore its
failings are justly punished, being not necessary, but voluntary.
For its defections are not to evil things, but are themselves evil;
that is to say, are not towards things that are naturally and in
themselves evil, but the defection of the will is evil, because it
is contrary to the order of nature, and an abandonment of that which
has supreme being for that which has less. For avarice is not a
fault inherent in gold, but in the man who inordinately loves gold,
to the detriment of justice, which ought to be held in incomparably
higher regard than gold. Neither is luxury the fault of lovely and
charming objects, but of the heart that inordinately loves sensual
pleasures, to the neglect of temperance, which attaches us to objects
more lovely in their spirituality, and more delectable by their
incorruptibility. Nor yet is boasting the fault of human praise, but
of the soul that is inordinately fond of the applause of men, and
that makes light of the voice of conscience. Pride, too, is not the
fault of him who delegates power, nor of power itself, but of the
soul that is inordinately enamoured of its own power, and despises
the more just dominion of a higher authority. Consequently he who
inordinately loves the good which any nature possesses, even though
he obtain it, himself becomes evil in the good, and wretched because
deprived of a greater good.