Breviloquium

The mode of transmission of original sin, moreover, is this: although the soul does not come by generation, the original fault nevertheless passes from Adam's soul to the souls of his descendants, through the flesh generated by concupiscence as intermediary, so that, just as Adam's flesh was infected by his sinning soul and made prone to lust, so the flesh, sown through lust and dragging along with it a vicious infection, infects and corrupts the soul; and this infection in the soul is not only punishment but also fault. Thus the person corrupts nature, and corrupted nature corrupts the person¹, while divine justice is preserved in all respects, and the infection of the soul can in no way be imputed to it, although, in creating the soul, God infuses it and, in infusing it, unites it to infected flesh.

The reason for understanding the foregoing is this: since the first principle made man in its own image for the expression of itself, it established him as regards the body so that all human beings would be propagated from the first man as from one radical principle; and as regards the soul, because of its expressed likeness, so that all rational spirits would emanate immediately from God himself as from their first and immediate principle, both in existing and enduring and in understanding and loving. And since the spirit, as more excellent, approaches the first principle more closely, God created man so that the spirit would preside over the body, and the body would be subject to the created spirit², as long as the latter obeyed the uncreated Spirit; and conversely, if the spirit did not obey God, by the just judgment of God its body would begin to rebel against it; and this is what happened when Adam sinned.

As therefore, if Adam had stood firm, his body would have been obedient to the spirit, and he would have transmitted such a body to posterity, and God would have infused a soul into him, so that, united to an immortal body obedient to it, the soul would have had the order of justice and immunity from every punishment; so, once Adam sinned and the flesh became rebellious against the spirit, it is necessary that he transmit such flesh to posterity, and that God infuse the soul according to the original institution; but the soul, when united to rebellious flesh, incurs a defect in the order of natural justice, by which it ought to rule all lower things. And because the soul is united to flesh, it is necessary that it either draw it or be drawn by it; and because it cannot draw it as rebellious, it must be drawn by it and incur the disease of concupiscence. Thus it incurs at once both the lack of due justice and the disease of concupiscence; from these two, as from aversion and conversion, original sin is said, according to Augustine and Anselm, to consist³.

Since, therefore, it was most orderly that human nature be so created, that once created it be propagated in this way, and that, when it sinned, it be punished in this way, as was said earlier⁴, so that in creation the order of wisdom is preserved, in propagation the order of nature, and in punishment the order of justice, it is clear that it is not contrary to divine justice if fault is transmitted to posterity.

Again, because original fault could not be transfused into the soul unless the punishment of rebellion preceded in the flesh; and there would be no punishment unless fault had preceded; nor did fault proceed from an ordered will but from a disordered one, and hence not from divine will but human⁵: it is clear, therefore, that the transmission of original sin comes from the sin of the first man, not from God, not from created nature, but from the vice perpetrated. And thus what Augustine says is true⁶, that «propagation does not transmit original sin to posterity, but lust».