Chapter 21.—Error, Though
Not Always a Sin, is Always an Evil.
But as to those matters in regard
to which our belief or disbelief, and indeed their truth or
supposed truth or falsity, are of no importance whatever, so far as
attaining the kingdom of God is concerned: to make a mistake in
such matters is not to be looked on as a sin, or at least as a very
small and trifling sin. In short, a mistake in matters of this
kind, whatever its nature and magnitude, does not relate to the way
of approach to God, which is the faith of Christ that “worketh by
love.” For the
“mistake pleasing to parents” in the case of the twin children
was no deviation from this way; nor did the Apostle Peter deviate
from this way, when, thinking that he saw a vision, he so mistook
one thing for another, that, till the angel who delivered him had
departed from him, he did not distinguish the real objects among
which he was moving from the visionary objects of a dream; nor did
the patriarch Jacob deviate from this way, when he believed that
his son, who was really alive, had been slain by a beast. In the
case of these and other false impressions of the same kind, we are
indeed deceived, but our faith in God remains secure. We go astray, but we do not leave the way that leads us to Him. But yet these errors, though they are not sinful, are to be reckoned among the evils of this life which is so far made subject to vanity, that we receive what is false as if it were true, reject what is true as if it were false, and cling to what is uncertain as if it were certain. And although they do not trench upon that true and certain faith through which we reach eternal blessedness, yet they have much to do with that misery in which we are now living. And assuredly, if we were now in the enjoyment of the true and perfect happiness that lies before us, we should not be subject to any deception through any sense, whether of body or of mind.