The difference between things and signs

2. All teaching is either about things or signs; but things are learned about through signs. What I have now called things, though, in the strict sense, are those that are not mentioned in order to signify something, such as wood, a stone, an animal, and other things like that. Not, however, that piece of wood which we read of Moses throwing into the bitter water to remove its bitterness; nor that stone which Jacob placed under his head; nor that animal which Abraham sacrificed instead of his son. All these, in fact, are things in such a way as also to be signs of other things. There are, however, other signs which are only used for signifying, such as words. Nobody, after all, uses words except for the sake of signifying something.

From this it will be easy to understand what I am calling signs; those things, that is, what are used in order to signify something else. Thus every sign is also a thing, because if it is not a thing at all then it is simply nothing. But not ever single thing is also a sign. And therefore, in this distinction between things and signs, when we are speaking of things let us so speak that even if some of them can be employed to signify, this will not prevent us from dividing up the work in such a way, that we first discuss things, later on signs; and let us bear in mind all the time that what has to be considered about things is that they are, not that they signify something else besides themselves.

The division of things; what is meant by enjoying and using

3. So then, there are some things which are meant to be enjoyed, others which are meant to be used, yet others which do both the enjoying and the using. Things that are to be enjoyed make us happy; things which are to be used help us on our way to happiness, providing us, so to say, with crutches and props for reaching the things that will make us happy, and enabling us to keep them.

We ourselves, however, both enjoy and use things, and find ourselves in the middle, in a position to choose which to do. So if we wish to enjoy things that are meant to be used, we are impeding our own progress, and sometimes are also deflected from our course, because we are thereby delayed in obtaining what we should be enjoying, or turned back from it altogether, blocked by our love for inferior things.

4. Enjoyment, after all, consists in clinging to something lovingly for its own sake, which use consists in referring what has come your way to what your love aims at obtaining, provided, that is, it deserves to be loved. Because unlawful use, surely, should rather be termed abuse or misuse. Supposing then we were exiles in a foreign land, and could only live happily in our own country, and that being unhappy in exile we longed to put an end to our unhappiness and to return to our own country, we would of course need land vehicles or sea-going vessels, which we would have to make use of in order to be able to reach our own country, where we could find true enjoyment. And then suppose we were delighted with the pleasures of the journey, and with the very experience of being conveyed in carriages or ships, and that we were converted to enjoying what we ought to have been using, and were unwilling to finish the journey quickly, and that by being perversely captivated by such agreeable experiences we lost interest in our own country, where alone we could find real happiness in its agreeable familiarity. Well that's how it is in this mortal life in which we are exiles away from the Lord (2 Cor 5:6); if we wish to return to our home country, where alone we are truly happy, we have to use this world, not enjoy it, so that we may behold the invisible things of God, brought to our knowledge through the things that have been made (Rom 1:20); that is, so that we may proceed from temporal and bodily things to grasp those that are eternal and spiritual.

ASSIGNMENT

1. Compare and Contrast what Augustine says here with what Aristotle says in the paragraphs we read from the Nicomachean Ethics.

2. In particular try to MAP the ideas that Augustine expresses to the ideas that Aristotle expresses.

3. Are the ideas coherent? That is do the ideas agree with one another. How does the reading from Augustine differ from that of Aristotle? Does Augustine extend what you see in the Aristotle reading? Do you suppose that Augustine was influenced by Aristotle?

4. Reflect on the significance of these ideas for your own life. What do you enjoy that should be something you use, or use that you should be enjoying? What ought you to seek to use to obtain that which you ought to enjoy?

5. Briefly summarize your thought on a 3x5 card to turn in next time.