Anti-Climacus

SO TRUE: Sara Butler (who can totally call me Nick if she likes):

"So, all that is kind of true, but I think it neglects something important, which is that Augustine does not hate this life or the things of this world. He doesn't say that the good Christian will despise his temporal existence; in fact, he spends some time explaining why Christians shouldn't just commit suicide after being baptised. Rather, it is that you cannot appreciate this world in the right way, if you don't appreciate the City of God in the right way, which is to say, more. The only reason the evils of this world appear to be evils is because one has the wrong orientation. If you value everything justly, then you can both enjoy this life when it's good and not be too grieved when it's bad. The character of the sufferer is far more important than the nature of the suffering. It's a matter of proper ordering, not picking one over the other."

My own run through Augustine last term (on his attitude toward images, which abuts nicely his views on the material world) left me with the distinct impression that he did not, in any reasonable sense, dislike the realities of the world being as it is (and occasionally was able to turn them around to great rhetorical effect). He just thought that you had to like them after you liked the relevant spiritual realities. Granted, he'd probably say that if you were forced to make a choice, you should give up on the earthly (so he's not really impartial), but most of the time, you won't have to make those choices.