Contents
Introduction
Book One: The Way of Life of the Catholic Church
1. How the pretenses of the Manichaeans are to be exposed. Two ways in which the Manichaeans deceive.
3. Happiness lies in the enjoyment of man's supreme good. The conditions of this good: (1) that nothing is better than it; (2) that it cannot be lost against one's will.
4. What is man?
5. Man's supreme good is not the supreme good of the body alone, but the supreme good of the soul.
6. Virtue perfects the soul. The soul acquires virtue by following after God. To follow after God is to achieve the happy life.
7. In seeking to know God, we must appeal to the authority of the Scriptures. The plan and principal mysteries of the divine economy with reference to our salvation. A summary of the faith.
8. God is the supreme good whom we must strive after with perfect love.
9. The harmony between the Old and the New Testaments on the precept of the love of God.
10. What the Church teaches about God. The two gods of the Manichaeans.
11. God alone should be loved, and, therefore, He is man's supreme good. Nothing is better than God. We cannot lose God against our will.
12. We are united to God by love when we are subject to Him.
13. Through Christ and His Spirit, we are joined inseparably to God.
14. It is by love that we adhere to our supreme good, which is the Holy Trinity.
15. The Christian definition of the four virtues.
16. The harmony of the Old and New Testaments.
17. An appeal to the Manichaeans to come to their senses.
18. Only in the Catholic Church is there to be found perfect truth in the harmony of both Testaments.
19. Temperance as described in the Sacred Scriptures.
20. We are commanded to disdain all sensible things and to love God alone.
21. Human glory and curiosity are condemned in the Sacred Scriptures.
22. The love of God produces fortitude.
23. Counsels and examples of fortitude drawn from the Scriptures.
24. Justice and Prudence.
25. The four virtues in their relation to the love of God. The reward of this love is eternal life and the knowledge of truth.
26. Love of ourselves and of our neighbor.
27. Doing good for our neighbor's body.
28. Doing good for our neighbor's soul. The two parts of discipline: coercion and instruction. Through good conduct, we come to a knowledge of the truth.
29. The authority of the Sacred Scriptures.
30. Apostrophe to the Church, teacher of all wisdom. The doctrine of the Catholic Church.
31. The continence of the Manichaeans compared with the life of the Anchorites and Cenobites.
33. Another kind of communal living found in the city. Three-day fasts.
34. The Church should not be blamed for the conduct of bad Christians. Worshipers of tombs and pictures.
35. Even the baptized were permitted by the Apostle to marry and have possessions.
Book Two: The Way of Life of the Manichaeans
1. The supreme good is that which possesses supreme existence.
2. What evil is. The Manichaeans speak the truth when they say evil is that which is contrary to nature, but in saying this they overthrow their own heresy.
3. If evil be defined as that which is harmful, the Manichaeans are again refuted.
4. The difference between that which is good in itself and that which is good by participation.
5. Even if evil be defined as corruption, the Manichaean heresy is completely undermined.
6. What corruption affects and what it is.
7. The goodness of God prevents anything from being brought by corruption to the point of not being. The difference between creating and forming.
8. Evil is not a substance but an incompatibility harmful to substance.
9. The inconsistency of certain Manichaean fables concerning good and evil things.
10. Three false moral symbols invented by the Manichaeans.
11. What sort of thing the symbol of the mouth must be for the Manichaeans when they are guilty of blaspheming God.
12. The Manichaeans have no way out of their dilemma.
13. An action must be judged, not by outward appearance, but by the intention. We must keep this in mind in passing judgment on the abstinence of the Manichaeans.
14. Three praiseworthy reasons for abstaining from certain kinds of food.
15. Why the Manichaeans prohibit the eating of meat.
16. The monstrous mysteries of the Manichaeans are exposed.
17. The Manichaean symbol of the hands.
18. The symbol of the breast and the vile mysteries of the Manichaeans.
19. The disgraceful actions of the Manichaeans.
Indices
General Index
Index of Holy Scripture
