So I gave them up unto their own hearts' lust: and they walked in their own counsels.
Read Chapter 81
Augustine of Hippo
AD 430
16. "And I let them go according to the affections of their heart" (ver. 12). Behold the press: the orifices are open, the lees run. "And I let them go," not according to the healthfulness of My commands; but, according to the affections of their heart: I gave them up to themselves. The Apostle also saith, "God gave them up to the desires of their own hearts." "I let them go according to the affection of their heart, they shall go in their own affections." There is what ye shudder at, if at least ye are straining out into the hidden vats of the Lord, if at least ye have conceived a hearty love for His storehouses, there is what ye shudder at. Some stand up for the circus, some for the amphitheatre, some for the booths in the streets some for the theatres, some for this, some for that, some finally for their "new gods;" "they shall go in their own affections."
Inventions. Ancient psalters read, "wills. "This is the greatest (Calmet) of God's judgments, Romans i. 24. (Menochius)
He sometimes permits a person to go on, that he may be disgusted with sin. Ut saturati vitiis vel sic agant poenitentiam. (St. Jerome)
We ought all to dread this root of bitterness, (Hebrews xii. 15.) which may cause us to resist God's grace, and to be abandoned by him, as the Israelites seemed to be, before their ruin came on. (Berthier)
