To Florus 5.39

Not content to win in only one way, I will expose the falsehood of the argument whose impiety I have revealed. When you wrote, ‘An evil will could arise in God’s work not because it was made by God, but because it was made from nothing’ (Augustine, Marriage and Desire 2.28.48), you should have seen how powerfully the examples of other creatures argue against you. They too were brought forth from nothing, yet are incapable of an evil will. Indeed, the elements themselves, which truly were made from nothing, can have no consciousness of any will, so as to attest through evil movements the necessity of their origin. Living creatures, however, and the other things filling the world, came forth not from nothing but from something already existing. Where, then, is the power of ancient emptiness that compelled an evil will to exist, when it is clear that no being except a rational creature can sin?