si. Qua in re si quid
perperam dictum est, non ita sum amator mei, ut ea quae semel effuderim
meliori sententiae anteferre contendam. Si enim nihil est ex nobis boni,
nihil est quod in nostris sententiis amare debeamus. Quod si ex illo cuncta
sunt bona qui solus est bonus, illud potius bonum esse credendum est quod
illa incommutabilis bonitas atque omnium bonorum causa perscribit.

VIII.

Nevertheless there remains yet another question which can be advanced by
those who do not believe that the human body was taken from Mary, but
that the body was in some other way set apart and prepared, which in the
moment of union appeared to be conceived and born of Mary's womb. For
they say: if the body was taken from man while every man was, from the
time of the first disobedience, not only enslaved by sin and death but
also involved in sinful desires, and if his punishment for sin was that,
although he was held in chains of death, yet at the same time he should
be guilty because of the will to sin, why was there in Christ neither
sin nor any will to sin? And certainly such a question is attended by a
difficulty which deserves attention. For if the body of Christ was
assumed from human flesh, it is open to doubt of what kind we must
consider that flesh to be which was assumed.

In truth, the manhood which He assumed He likewise saved; but if He
assumed such manhood as Adam had before sin, He appears to have assumed
a human nature complete indeed, but one which was in no need of healing.
But how can it be that He assumed such manhood as Adam had when there
could be in Adam both the will and the desire to sin, whence it came to
pass that even after the divine commands had been broken, he was still
held captive to sins of disobedience? But we believe that in Christ
there was never any will to sin, because especially if He assumed such a
human body as Adam had before his sin, He could not be mortal, since
Adam, had he not sinned, would in no wise have suffered death. Since,
then, Christ never sinned, it must be asked why He suffered death if He
assumed the body of Adam before sin. But if He accepted human conditions
such as Adam's were after sin, it seems that Christ could not avoid
being subject to sin, perplexed by passions, and, since the canons of
judgment were obscured, prevented from distinguishing with unclouded
reason between good and evil, since Adam by his dis