BOOK I
Great
art Thou, O Lord, and greatly to be praised; great is Thy power, and
Thy wisdom infinite. And Thee would man praise; man, but a particle
of Thy creation; man, that bears about him his mortality, the witness
of his sin, the witness that Thou resistest the proud: yet would man
praise Thee; he, but a particle of Thy creation. Thou awakest us to
delight in Thy praise; for Thou madest us for Thyself, and our heart
is restless, until it repose in Thee. Grant me, Lord, to know and
understand which is first, to call on Thee or to praise Thee? and,
again, to know Thee or to call on Thee? for who can call on Thee, not
knowing Thee? for he that knoweth Thee not, may call on Thee as other
than Thou art. Or, is it rather, that we call on Thee that we may
know Thee? but how shall they call on Him in whom they have not
believed? or how shall they believe without a preacher? and they that
seek the Lord shall praise Him: for they that seek shall find Him,
and they that find shall praise Him. I will seek Thee, Lord, by
calling on Thee; and will call on Thee, believing in Thee; for to us
hast Thou been preached. My faith, Lord, shall call on Thee, which
Thou hast given me, wherewith Thou hast inspired me, through the
Incarnation of Thy Son, through the ministry of the Preacher.And
how shall I call upon my God, my God and Lord, since, when I call for
Him, I shall be calling Him to myself? and what room is there within
me, whither my God can come into me? whither can God come into me,
God who made heaven and earth? is there, indeed, O Lord my God, aught
in me that can contain Thee? do then heaven and earth, which Thou
hast made, and wherein Thou hast made me, contain Thee? or, because
nothing which exists could exist without Thee, doth therefore
whatever exists contain Thee? Since, then, I too exist, why do I seek
that Thou shouldest enter into me, who were not, wert Thou not in me?
Why? because I am not gone down in hell, and yet Thou art there also.
For if I go down into hell, Thou art there. I could not be then, O my
God, could not be at all, wert Thou not in me; or, rather, unless I
were in Thee, of whom are all things, by whom are all things, in whom
are all things? Even so, Lord, even so. Whither do I call Thee, since
I am in Thee? or whence canst Thou enter into me? for whither can I
go beyond heaven and earth, that thence my God should come into me,
who hath said, I fill the heaven and the earth.Do
the heaven and earth then contain Thee, since Thou fillest them? or
dost Thou fill them and yet overflow, since they do not contain Thee?
And whither, when the heaven and the earth are filled, pourest Thou
forth the remainder of Thyself? or hast Thou no need that aught
contain Thee, who containest all things, since what Thou fillest Thou
fillest by containing it? for the vessels which Thou fillest uphold
Thee not, since, though they were broken, Thou wert not poured out.
And when Thou art poured out on us, Thou art not cast down, but Thou
upliftest us; Thou art not dissipated, but Thou gatherest us. But
Thou who fillest all things, fillest Thou them with Thy whole self?
or, since all things cannot contain Thee wholly, do they contain part
of Thee? and all at once the same part? or each its own part, the
greater more, the smaller less? And is, then one part of Thee
greater, another less? or, art Thou wholly every where, while nothing
contains Thee wholly?What
art Thou then, my God? what, but the Lord God? For who is Lord but
the Lord? or who is God save our God? Most highest, most good, most
potent, most omnipotent; most merciful, yet most just; most hidden,
yet most present; most beautiful, yet most strong, stable, yet
incomprehensible; unchangeable, yet all-changing; never new, never
old; all-renewing, and bringing age upon the proud, and they know it
not; ever working, ever at rest; still gathering, yet nothing
lacking; supporting, filling, and overspreading; creating,
nourishing, and maturing; seeking, yet having all things. Thou
lovest, without passion; art jealous, without anxiety; repentest, yet
grievest not; art angry, yet serene; changest Thy works, Thy purpose
unchanged; receivest again what Thou findest, yet didst never lose;
never in need, yet rejoicing in gains; never covetous, yet exacting
usury. Thou receivest over and above, that Thou mayest owe; and who
hath aught that is not Thine? Thou payest debts, owing nothing;
remittest debts, losing nothing. And what had I now said, my God, my
life, my holy joy? or what saith any man when he speaks of Thee? Yet
woe to him that speaketh not, since mute are even the most eloquent.Oh!
that I might repose on Thee! Oh! that Thou wouldest enter into my
heart, and inebriate it, that I may forget my ills, and embrace Thee,
my sole good! What art Thou to me? In Thy pity, teach me to utter it.
Or what am I to Thee that Thou demandest my love, and, if I give it
not, art wroth with me, and threatenest me with grievous woes? Is it
then a slight woe to love Thee not? Oh! for Thy mercies' sake, tell
me, O Lord my God, what Thou art unto me. Say unto my soul, I am thy
salvation. So speak, that I may hear. Behold, Lord, my heart is
before Thee; open Thou the ears thereof, and say unto my soul, I am
thy salvation. After this voice let me haste, and take hold on Thee.
Hide not Thy face from me. Let me die—lest I die—only let me see
Thy face.Narrow
is the mansion of my soul; enlarge Thou it, that Thou mayest enter
in. It is ruinous; repair Thou it. It has that within which must
offend Thine eyes; I confess and know it. But who shall cleanse it?
or to whom should I cry, save Thee? Lord, cleanse me from my secret
faults, and spare Thy servant from the power of the enemy. I believe,
and therefore do I speak. Lord, Thou knowest. Have I not confessed
against myself my transgressions unto Thee, and Thou, my God, hast
forgiven the iniquity of my heart? I contend not in judgment with
Thee, who art the truth; I fear to deceive myself; lest mine iniquity
lie unto itself. Therefore I contend not in judgment with Thee; for
if Thou, Lord, shouldest mark iniquities, O Lord, who shall abide it?Yet
suffer me to speak unto Thy mercy, me, dust and ashes. Yet suffer me
to speak, since I speak to Thy mercy, and not to scornful man. Thou
too, perhaps, despisest me, yet wilt Thou return and have compassion
upon me. For what would I say, O Lord my God, but that I know not
whence I came into this dying life (shall I call it?) or living
death. Then immediately did the comforts of Thy compassion take me
up, as I heard (for I remember it not) from the parents of my flesh,
out of whose substance Thou didst sometime fashion me. Thus there
received me the comforts of woman's milk. For neither my mother nor
my nurses stored their own breasts for me; but Thou didst bestow the
food of my infancy through them, according to Thine ordinance,
whereby Thou distributest Thy riches through the hidden springs of
all things. Thou also gavest me to desire no more than Thou gavest;
and to my nurses willingly to give me what Thou gavest them. For
they, with a heaven-taught affection, willingly gave me what they
abounded with from Thee. For this my good from them, was good for
them. Nor, indeed, from them was it, but through them; for from Thee,
O God, are all good things, and from my God is all my health. This I
since learned, Thou, through these Thy gifts, within me and without,
proclaiming Thyself unto me. For then I knew but to suck; to repose
in what pleased, and cry at what offended my flesh; nothing more.Afterwards
I began to smile; first in sleep, then waking: for so it was told me
of myself, and I believed it; for we see the like in other infants,
though of myself I remember it not. Thus, little by little, I became
conscious where I was; and to have a wish to express my wishes to
those who could content them, and I could not; for the wishes were
within me, and they without; nor could they by any sense of theirs
enter within my spirit. So I flung about at random limbs and voice,
making the few signs I could, and such as I could, like, though in
truth very little like, what I wished. And when I was not presently
obeyed (my wishes being hurtful or unintelligible), then I was
indignant with my elders for not submitting to me, with those owing
me no service, for not serving me; and avenged myself on them by
tears. Such have I learnt infants to be from observing them; and that
I was myself such, they, all unconscious, have shown me better than
my nurses who knew it.And,
lo! my infancy died long since, and I live. But Thou, Lord, who for
ever livest, and in whom nothing dies: for before the foundation of
the worlds, and before all that can be called "before,"
Thou art, and art God and Lord of all which Thou hast created: in
Thee abide, fixed for ever, the first causes of all things unabiding;
and of all things changeable, the springs abide in Thee unchangeable:
and in Thee live the eternal reasons of all things unreasoning and
temporal. Say, Lord, to me, Thy suppliant; say, all-pitying, to me,
Thy pitiable one; say, did my infancy succeed another age of mine
that died before it? was it that which I spent within my mother's
womb? for of that I have heard somewhat, and have myself seen women
with child? and what before that life again, O God my joy, was I any
where or any body? For this have I none to tell me, neither father
nor mother, nor experience of others, nor mine own memory. Dost Thou
mock me for asking this, and bid me praise Thee and acknowledge Thee,
for that I do know?I
acknowledge Thee, Lord of heaven and earth, and praise Thee for my
first rudiments of being, and my infancy, whereof I remember nothing;
for Thou hast appointed that man should from others guess much as to
himself; and believe much on the strength of weak females. Even then
I had being and life, and (at my infancy's close) I could seek for
signs whereby to make known to others my sensations. Whence could
such a being be, save from Thee, Lord? Shall any be his own
artificer? or can there elsewhere be derived any vein, which may
stream essence and life into us, save from thee, O Lord, in whom
essence and life are one? for Thou Thyself art supremely Essence and
Life. For Thou art most high, and art not changed, neither in Thee
doth to-day come to a close; yet in Thee doth it come to a close;
because all such things also are in Thee. For they had no way to pass
away, unless Thou upheldest them. And since Thy years fail not, Thy
years are one to-day. How many of ours and our fathers' years have
flowed away through Thy "to-day," and from it received the
measure and the mould of such being as they had; and still others
shall flow away, and so receive the mould of their degree of being.
But Thou art still the same, and all things of tomorrow, and all
beyond, and all of yesterday, and all behind it, Thou hast done
to-day. What is it to me, though any comprehend not this? Let him
also rejoice and say, What thing is this? Let him rejoice even thus!
and be content rather by not discovering to discover Thee, than by
discovering not to discover Thee.Hear,
O God. Alas, for man's sin! So saith man, and Thou pitiest him; for
Thou madest him, but sin in him Thou madest not. Who remindeth me of
the sins of my infancy? for in Thy sight none is pure from sin, not
even the infant whose life is but a day upon the earth. Who remindeth
me? doth not each little infant, in whom I see what of myself I
remember not? What then was my sin? was it that I hung upon the
breast and cried? for should I now so do for food suitable to my age,
justly should I be laughed at and reproved. What I then did was
worthy reproof; but since I could not understand reproof, custom and
reason forbade me to be reproved. For those habits, when grown, we
root out and cast away. Now no man, though he prunes, wittingly casts
away what is good. Or was it then good, even for a while, to cry for
what, if given, would hurt? bitterly to resent, that persons free,
and its own elders, yea, the very authors of its birth, served it
not? that many besides, wiser than it, obeyed not the nod of its good
pleasure? to do its best to strike and hurt, because commands were
not obeyed, which had been obeyed to its hurt? The weakness then of
infant limbs, not its will, is its innocence. Myself have seen and
known even a baby envious; it could not speak, yet it turned pale and
looked bitterly on its foster-brother. Who knows not this? Mothers
and nurses tell you that they allay these things by I know not what
remedies. Is that too innocence, when the fountain of milk is flowing
in rich abundance, not to endure one to share it, though in extremest
need, and whose very life as yet depends thereon? We bear gently with
all this, not as being no or slight evils, but because they will
disappear as years increase; for, though tolerated now, the very same
tempers are utterly intolerable when found in riper years.Thou,
then, O Lord my God, who gavest life to this my infancy, furnishing
thus with senses (as we see) the frame Thou gavest, compacting its
limbs, ornamenting its proportions, and, for its general good and
safety, implanting in it all vital functions, Thou commandest me to
praise Thee in these things, to confess unto Thee, and sing unto Thy
name, Thou most Highest. For Thou art God, Almighty and Good, even
hadst Thou done nought but only this, which none could do but Thou:
whose Unity is the mould of all things; who out of Thy own fairness
makest all things fair; and orderest all things by Thy law. This age
then, Lord, whereof I have no remembrance, which I take on others'
word, and guess from other infants that I have passed, true though
the guess be, I am yet loth to count in this life of mine which I
live in this world. For no less than that which I spent in my
mother's womb, is it hid from me in the shadows of forgetfulness. But
if I was shapen in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me,
where, I beseech Thee, O my God, where, Lord, or when, was I Thy
servant guiltless? But, lo! that period I pass by; and what have I
now to do with that, of which I can recall no vestige?Passing
hence from infancy, I came to boyhood, or rather it came to me,
displacing infancy. Nor did that depart,—(for whither went it?)—and
yet it was no more. For I was no longer a speechless infant, but a
speaking boy. This I remember; and have since observed how I learned
to speak. It was not that my elders taught me words (as, soon after,
other learning) in any set method; but I, longing by cries and broken
accents and various motions of my limbs to express my thoughts, that
so I might have my will, and yet unable to express all I willed, or
to whom I willed, did myself, by the understanding which Thou, my
God, gavest me, practise the sounds in my memory. When they named any
thing, and as they spoke turned towards it, I saw and remembered that
they called what they would point out by the name they uttered. And
that they meant this thing and no other was plain from the motion of
their body, the natural language, as it were, of all nations,
expressed by the countenance, glances of the eye, gestures of the
limbs, and tones of the voice, indicating the affections of the mind,
as it pursues, possesses, rejects, or shuns. And thus by constantly
hearing words, as they occurred in various sentences, I collected
gradually for what they stood; and having broken in my mouth to these
signs, I thereby gave utterance to my will. Thus I exchanged with
those about me these current signs of our wills, and so launched
deeper into the stormy intercourse of human life, yet depending on
parental authority and the beck of elders.O
God my God, what miseries and mockeries did I now experience, when
obedience to my teachers was proposed to me, as proper in a boy, in
order that in this world I might prosper, and excel in
tongue-science, which should serve to the "praise of men,"
and to deceitful riches. Next I was put to school to get learning, in
which I (poor wretch) knew not what use there was; and yet, if idle
in learning, I was beaten. For this was judged right by our
forefathers; and many, passing the same course before us, framed for
us weary paths, through which we were fain to pass; multiplying toil
and grief upon the sons of Adam. But, Lord, we found that men called
upon Thee, and we learnt from them to think of Thee (according to our
powers) as of some great One, who, though hidden from our senses,
couldest hear and help us. For so I began, as a boy, to pray to Thee,
my aid and refuge; and broke the fetters of my tongue to call on
Thee, praying Thee, though small, yet with no small earnestness, that
I might not be beaten at school. And when Thou heardest me not (not
thereby giving me over to folly), my elders, yea my very parents, who
yet wished me no ill, mocked my stripes, my then great and grievous
ill.Is
there, Lord, any of soul so great, and cleaving to Thee with so
intense affection (for a sort of stupidity will in a way do it); but
is there any one who, from cleaving devoutly to Thee, is endued with
so great a spirit, that he can think as lightly of the racks and
hooks and other torments (against which, throughout all lands, men
call on Thee with extreme dread), mocking at those by whom they are
feared most bitterly, as our parents mocked the torments which we
suffered in boyhood from our masters? For we feared not our torments
less; nor prayed we less to Thee to escape them. And yet we sinned,
in writing or reading or studying less than was exacted of us. For we
wanted not, O Lord, memory or capacity, whereof Thy will gave enough
for our age; but our sole delight was play; and for this we were
punished by those who yet themselves were doing the like. But elder
folks' idleness is called "business"; that of boys, being
really the same, is punished by those elders; and none commiserates
either boys or men. For will any of sound discretion approve of my
being beaten as a boy, because, by playing a ball, I made less
progress in studies which I was to learn, only that, as a man, I
might play more unbeseemingly? and what else did he who beat me? who,
if worsted in some trifling discussion with his fellow-tutor, was
more embittered and jealous than I when beaten at ball by a
play-fellow?And
yet, I sinned herein, O Lord God, the Creator and Disposer of
allthings in
nature, of sin the Disposer only, O Lord my God, I sinned
intransgressing the
commands of my parents and those of my masters. Forwhat
they, with whatever motive, would have me learn, I might
afterwardshave put
to good use. For I disobeyed, not from a better choice, butfrom
love of play, loving the pride of victory in my contests, and tohave
my ears tickled with lying fables, that they might itch the more;the
same curiosity flashing from my eyes more and more, for the showsand
games of my elders. Yet those who give these shows are in
suchesteem, that
almost all wish the same for their children, and yet arevery
willing that they should be beaten, if those very games detain
themfrom the
studies, whereby they would have them attain to be the giversof
them. Look with pity, Lord, on these things, and deliver us who
callupon Thee now;
deliver those too who call not on Thee yet, that they maycall
on Thee, and Thou mayest deliver them.
As a boy, then, I had already heard of an eternal life, promisedus
through the humility of the Lord our God stooping to our pride;
andeven from the
womb of my mother, who greatly hoped in Thee, I was sealedwith
the mark of His cross and salted with His salt. Thou sawest,
Lord,how while yet
a boy, being seized on a time with sudden oppression ofthe
stomach, and like near to death—Thou sawest, my God (for Thou
wertmy keeper),
with what eagerness and what faith I sought, from the piouscare
of my mother and Thy Church, the mother of us all, the baptism ofThy
Christ, my God and Lord. Whereupon the mother of my flesh, beingmuch
troubled (since, with a heart pure in Thy faith, she even
morelovingly
travailed in birth of my salvation), would in eager hastehave
provided for my consecration and cleansing by the
health-givingsacraments,
confessing Thee, Lord Jesus, for the remission of sins,unless
I had suddenly recovered. And so, as if I must needs beagain
polluted should I live, my cleansing was deferred, because
thedefilements of
sin would, after that washing, bring greater and moreperilous
guilt. I then already believed: and my mother, and the
wholehousehold,
except my father: yet did not he prevail over the power of
mymother's piety in
me, that as he did not yet believe, so neithershould
I. For it was her earnest care that Thou my God, rather than
he,shouldest be my
father; and in this Thou didst aid her to prevail overher
husband, whom she, the better, obeyed, therein also obeying Thee,who
hast so commanded.
I beseech Thee, my God, I would fain know, if so Thou willest,
forwhat purpose my
baptism was then deferred? was it for my good that therein
was laid loose, as it were, upon me, for me to sin? or was it
notlaid loose? If
not, why does it still echo in our ears on all sides,"Let
him alone, let him do as he will, for he is not yet baptised?"
butas to bodily
health, no one says, "Let him be worse wounded, for he isnot
yet healed." How much better then, had I been at once healed;
andthen, by my
friends' and my own, my soul's recovered health had beenkept
safe in Thy keeping who gavest it. Better truly. But how many
andgreat waves of
temptation seemed to hang over me after my boyhood! Thesemy
mother foresaw; and preferred to expose to them the clay whence
Imight afterwards
be moulded, than the very cast, when made.
In boyhood itself, however (so much less dreaded for me than
youth),I loved not
study, and hated to be forced to it. Yet I was forced; andthis
was well done towards me, but I did not well; for, unless forced,
Ihad not learnt.
But no one doth well against his will, even though whathe
doth, be well. Yet neither did they well who forced me, but what
waswell came to me
from Thee, my God. For they were regardless how I shouldemploy
what they forced me to learn, except to satiate the insatiatedesires
of a wealthy beggary, and a shameful glory. But Thou, by whomthe
very hairs of our head are numbered, didst use for my good the
errorof all who
urged me to learn; and my own, who would not learn, Thoudidst
use for my punishment—a fit penalty for one, so small a boy andso
great a sinner. So by those who did not well, Thou didst well for
me;and by my own
sin Thou didst justly punish me. For Thou hast commanded,and
so it is, that every inordinate affection should be its
ownpunishment.But
why did I so much hate the Greek, which I studied as a boy? I do not
yet fully know. For the Latin I loved; not what my first masters, but
what the so-called grammarians taught me. For those first lessons,
reading, writing and arithmetic, I thought as great a burden and
penalty as any Greek. And yet whence was this too, but from the sin
and vanity of this life, because I was flesh, and a breath that
passeth away and cometh not again? For those first lessons were
better certainly, because more certain; by them I obtained, and still
retain, the power of reading what I find written, and myself writing
what I will; whereas in the others, I was forced to learn the
wanderings of one Aeneas, forgetful of my own, and to weep for dead
Dido, because she killed herself for love; the while, with dry eyes,
I endured my miserable self dying among these things, far from Thee,
O God my life.For
what more miserable than a miserable being who commiserates not
himself; weeping the death of Dido for love to Aeneas, but weeping
not his own death for want of love to Thee, O God. Thou light of my
heart, Thou bread of my inmost soul, Thou Power who givest vigour to
my mind, who quickenest my thoughts, I loved Thee not. I committed
fornication against Thee, and all around me thus fornicating there
echoed "Well done! well done!" for the friendship of this
world is fornication against Thee; and "Well done! well done!"
echoes on till one is ashamed not to be thus a man. And for all this
I wept not, I who wept for Dido slain, and "seeking by the sword
a stroke and wound extreme," myself seeking the while a worse
extreme, the extremest and lowest of Thy creatures, having forsaken
Thee, earth passing into the earth. And if forbid to read all this, I
was grieved that I might not read what grieved me. Madness like this
is thought a higher and a richer learning, than that by which I
learned to read and write.But
now, my God, cry Thou aloud in my soul; and let Thy truth tell me,
"Not so, not so. Far better was that first study." For, lo,
I would readily forget the wanderings of Aeneas and all the rest,
rather than how to read and write. But over the entrance of the
Grammar School is a vail drawn! true; yet is this not so much an
emblem of aught recondite, as a cloak of error. Let not those, whom I
no longer fear, cry out against me, while I confess to Thee, my God,
whatever my soul will, and acquiesce in the condemnation of my evil
ways, that I may love Thy good ways. Let not either buyers or sellers
of grammar-learning cry out against me. For if I question them
whether it be true that Aeneas came on a time to Carthage, as the
poet tells, the less learned will reply that they know not, the more
learned that he never did. But should I ask with what letters the
name "Aeneas" is written, every one who has learnt this
will answer me aright, as to the signs which men have conventionally
settled. If, again, I should ask which might be forgotten with least
detriment to the concerns of life, reading and writing or these
poetic fictions? who does not foresee what all must answer who have
not wholly forgotten themselves? I sinned, then, when as a boy I
preferred those empty to those more profitable studies, or rather
loved the one and hated the other. "One and one, two"; "two
and two, four"; this was to me a hateful singsong: "the
wooden horse lined with armed men," and "the burning of
Troy," and "Creusa's shade and sad similitude," were
the choice spectacle of my vanity.Why
then did I hate the Greek classics, which have the like tales? For
Homer also curiously wove the like fictions, and is most sweetly
vain, yet was he bitter to my boyish taste. And so I suppose would
Virgil be to Grecian children, when forced to learn him as I was
Homer. Difficulty, in truth, the difficulty of a foreign tongue,
dashed, as it were, with gall all the sweetness of Grecian fable. For
not one word of it did I understand, and to make me understand I was
urged vehemently with cruel threats and punishments. Time was also
(as an infant) I knew no Latin; but this I learned without fear or
suffering, by mere observation, amid the caresses of my nursery and
jests of friends, smiling and sportively encouraging me. This I
learned without any pressure of punishment to urge me on, for my
heart urged me to give birth to its conceptions, which I could only
do by learning words not of those who taught, but of those who talked
with me; in whose ears also I gave birth to the thoughts, whatever I
conceived. No doubt, then, that a free curiosity has more force in
our learning these things, than a frightful enforcement. Only this
enforcement restrains the rovings of that freedom, through Thy laws,
O my God, Thy laws, from the master's cane to the martyr's trials,
being able to temper for us a wholesome bitter, recalling us to
Thyself from that deadly pleasure which lures us from Thee.Hear,
Lord, my prayer; let not my soul faint under Thy discipline, nor let
me faint in confessing unto Thee all Thy mercies, whereby Thou hast
drawn me out of all my most evil ways, that Thou mightest become a
delight to me above all the allurements which I once pursued; that I
may most entirely love Thee, and clasp Thy hand with all my
affections, and Thou mayest yet rescue me from every temptation, even
unto the end. For lo, O Lord, my King and my God, for Thy service be
whatever useful thing my childhood learned; for Thy service, that I
speak, write, read, reckon. For Thou didst grant me Thy discipline,
while I was learning vanities; and my sin of delighting in those
vanities Thou hast forgiven. In them, indeed, I learnt many a useful
word, but these may as well be learned in things not vain; and that
is the safe path for the steps of youth.But
woe is thee, thou torrent of human custom! Who shall stand against
thee? how long shalt thou not be dried up? how long roll the sons of
Eve into that huge and hideous ocean, which even they scarcely
overpass who climb the cross? Did not I read in thee of Jove the
thunderer and the adulterer? both, doubtless, he could not be; but so
the feigned thunder might countenance and pander to real adultery.
And now which of our gowned masters lends a sober ear to one who from
their own school cries out, "These were Homer's fictions,
transferring things human to the gods; would he had brought down
things divine to us!" Yet more truly had he said, "These
are indeed his fictions; but attributing a divine nature to wicked
men, that crimes might be no longer crimes, and whoso commits them
might seem to imitate not abandoned men, but the celestial gods."And
yet, thou hellish torrent, into thee are cast the sons of men with
rich rewards, for compassing such learning; and a great solemnity is
made of it, when this is going on in the forum, within sight of laws
appointing a salary beside the scholar's payments; and thou lashest
thy rocks and roarest, "Hence words are learnt; hence eloquence;
most necessary to gain your ends, or maintain opinions." As if
we should have never known such words as "golden shower,"
"lap," "beguile," "temples of the heavens,"
or others in that passage, unless Terence had brought a lewd youth
upon the stage, setting up Jupiter as his example of seduction."Viewing a picture, where
the tale was drawn,
Of Jove's descending in a golden shower
To Danae's lap a woman to beguile."And
then mark how he excites himself to lust as by celestial authority:"And what God?
Great Jove,
Who shakes heaven's highest temples with his thunder,
And I, poor mortal man, not do the same!
I did it, and with all my heart I did it."Not
one whit more easily are the words learnt for all this vileness; but
by their means the vileness is committed with less shame. Not that I
blame the words, being, as it were, choice and precious vessels; but
that wine of error which is drunk to us in them by intoxicated
teachers; and if we, too, drink not, we are beaten, and have no sober
judge to whom we may appeal. Yet, O my God (in whose presence I now
without hurt may remember this), all this unhappily I learnt
willingly with great delight, and for this was pronounced a hopeful
boy.Bear
with me, my God, while I say somewhat of my wit, Thy gift, and on
what dotages I wasted it. For a task was set me, troublesome enough
to my soul, upon terms of praise or shame, and fear of stripes, to
speak the words of Juno, as she raged and mourned that she could not"This Trojan prince from
Latinum turn."Which
words I had heard that Juno never uttered; but we were forced to go
astray in the footsteps of these poetic fictions, and to say in prose
much what he expressed in verse. And his speaking was most applauded,
in whom the passions of rage and grief were most preeminent, and
clothed in the most fitting language, maintaining the dignity of the
character. What is it to me, O my true life, my God, that my
declamation was applauded above so many of my own age and class? is
not all this smoke and wind? and was there nothing else whereon to
exercise my wit and tongue? Thy praises, Lord, Thy praises might have
stayed the yet tender shoot of my heart by the prop of Thy
Scriptures; so had it not trailed away amid these empty trifles, a
defiled prey for the fowls of the air. For in more ways than one do
men sacrifice to the rebellious angels.But
what marvel that I was thus carried away to vanities, and went out
from Thy presence, O my God, when men were set before me as models,
who, if in relating some action of theirs, in itself not ill, they
committed some barbarism or solecism, being censured, were abashed;
but when in rich and adorned and well-ordered discourse they related
their own disordered life, being bepraised, they gloried? These
things Thou seest, Lord, and holdest Thy peace; long-suffering, and
plenteous in mercy and truth. Wilt Thou hold Thy peace for ever? and
even now Thou drawest out of this horrible gulf the soul that seeketh
Thee, that thirsteth for Thy pleasures, whose heart saith unto Thee,
I have sought Thy face; Thy face, Lord, will I seek. For darkened
affections is removal from Thee. For it is not by our feet, or change
of place, that men leave Thee, or return unto Thee. Or did that Thy
younger son look out for horses or chariots, or ships, fly with
visible wings, or journey by the motion of his limbs, that he might
in a far country waste in riotous living all Thou gavest at his
departure? a loving Father, when Thou gavest, and more loving unto
him, when he returned empty. So then in lustful, that is, in darkened
affections, is the true distance from Thy face.Behold,
O Lord God, yea, behold patiently as Thou art wont how carefully the
sons of men observe the covenanted rules of letters and syllables
received from those who spake before them, neglecting the eternal
covenant of everlasting salvation received from Thee. Insomuch, that
a teacher or learner of the hereditary laws of pronunciation will
more offend men by speaking without the aspirate, of a "uman
being," in despite of the laws of grammar, than if he, a "human
being," hate a "human being" in despite of Thine. As
if any enemy could be more hurtful than the hatred with which he is
incensed against him; or could wound more deeply him whom he
persecutes, than he wounds his own soul by his enmity. Assuredly no
science of letters can be so innate as the record of conscience,
"that he is doing to another what from another he would be loth
to suffer." How deep are Thy ways, O God, Thou only great, that
sittest silent on high and by an unwearied law dispensing penal
blindness to lawless desires. In quest of the fame of eloquence, a
man standing before a human judge, surrounded by a human throng,
declaiming against his enemy with fiercest hatred, will take heed
most watchfully, lest, by an error of the tongue, he murder the word
"human being"; but takes no heed, lest, through the fury of
his spirit, he murder the real human being.This
was the world at whose gate unhappy I lay in my boyhood; this the
stage where I had feared more to commit a barbarism, than having
committed one, to envy those who had not. These things I speak and
confess to Thee, my God; for which I had praise from them, whom I
then thought it all virtue to please. For I saw not the abyss of
vileness, wherein I was cast away from Thine eyes. Before them what
more foul than I was already, displeasing even such as myself? with
innumerable lies deceiving my tutor, my masters, my parents, from
love of play, eagerness to see vain shows and restlessness to imitate
them! Thefts also I committed, from my parents' cellar and table,
enslaved by greediness, or that I might have to give to boys, who
sold me their play, which all the while they liked no less than I. In
this play, too, I often sought unfair conquests, conquered myself
meanwhile by vain desire of preeminence. And what could I so ill
endure, or, when I detected it, upbraided I so fiercely, as that I
was doing to others? and for which if, detected, I was upbraided, I
chose rather to quarrel than to yield. And is this the innocence of
boyhood? Not so, Lord, not so; I cry Thy mercy, my God. For these
very sins, as riper years succeed, these very sins are transferred
from tutors and masters, from nuts and balls and sparrows, to
magistrates and kings, to gold and manors and slaves, just as severer
punishments displace the cane. It was the low stature then of
childhood which Thou our King didst commend as an emblem of
lowliness, when Thou saidst, Of such is the kingdom of heaven.Yet,
Lord, to Thee, the Creator and Governor of the universe, most
excellent and most good, thanks were due to Thee our God, even hadst
Thou destined for me boyhood only. For even then I was, I lived, and
felt; and had an implanted providence over my well-being—a trace of
that mysterious Unity whence I was derived; I guarded by the inward
sense the entireness of my senses, and in these minute pursuits, and
in my thoughts on things minute, I learnt to delight in truth, I
hated to be deceived, had a vigorous memory, was gifted with speech,
was soothed by friendship, avoided pain, baseness, ignorance. In so
small a creature, what was not wonderful, not admirable? But all are
gifts of my God: it was not I who gave them me; and good these are,
and these together are myself. Good, then, is He that made me, and He
is my good; and before Him will I exult for every good which of a boy
I had. For it was my sin, that not in Him, but in His
creatures-myself and others—I sought for pleasures, sublimities,
truths, and so fell headlong into sorrows, confusions, errors. Thanks
be to Thee, my joy and my glory and my confidence, my God, thanks be
to Thee for Thy gifts; but do Thou preserve them to me. For so wilt
Thou preserve me, and those things shall be enlarged and perfected
which Thou hast given me, and I myself shall be with Thee, since even
to be Thou hast given me.
BOOK II
I
will now call to mind my past foulness, and the carnal corruptions of
my soul; not because I love them, but that I may love Thee, O my God.
For love of Thy love I do it; reviewing my most wicked ways in the
very bitterness of my remembrance, that Thou mayest grow sweet unto
me (Thou sweetness never failing, Thou blissful and assured
sweetness); and gathering me again out of that my dissipation,
wherein I was torn piecemeal, while turned from Thee, the One Good, I
lost myself among a multiplicity of things. For I even burnt in my
youth heretofore, to be satiated in things below; and I dared to grow
wild again, with these various and shadowy loves: my beauty consumed
away, and I stank in Thine eyes; pleasing myself, and desirous to
please in the eyes of men.
And
what was it that I delighted in, but to love, and be loved? but I
kept not the measure of love, of mind to mind, friendship's bright
boundary: but out of the muddy concupiscence of the flesh, and the
bubblings of youth, mists fumed up which beclouded and overcast my
heart, that I could not discern the clear brightness of love from the
fog of lustfulness. Both did confusedly boil in me, and hurried my
unstayed youth over the precipice of unholy desires, and sunk me in a
gulf of flagitiousnesses. Thy wrath had gathered over me, and I knew
it not. I was grown deaf by the clanking of the chain of my
mortality, the punishment of the pride of my soul, and I strayed
further from Thee, and Thou lettest me alone, and I was tossed about,
and wasted, and dissipated, and I boiled over in my fornications, and
Thou heldest Thy peace, O Thou my tardy joy! Thou then heldest Thy
peace, and I wandered further and further from Thee, into more and
more fruitless seed-plots of sorrows, with a proud dejectedness, and
a restless weariness.
Oh!
that some one had then attempered my disorder, and turned to account
the fleeting beauties of these, the extreme points of Thy creation!
had put a bound to their pleasureableness, that so the tides of my
youth might have cast themselves upon the marriage shore, if they
could not be calmed, and kept within the object of a family, as Thy
law prescribes, O Lord: who this way formest the offspring of this
our death, being able with a gentle hand to blunt the thorns which
were excluded from Thy paradise? For Thy omnipotency is not far from
us, even when we be far from Thee. Else ought I more watchfully to
have heeded the voice from the clouds: Nevertheless such shall have
trouble in the flesh, but I spare you. And it is good for a man not
to touch a woman. And, he that is unmarried thinketh of the things of
the Lord, how he may please the Lord; but he that is married careth
for the things of this world, how he may please his wife.
To
these words I should have listened more attentively, and being
severed for the kingdom of heaven's sake, had more happily awaited
Thy embraces; but I, poor wretch, foamed like a troubled sea,
following the rushing of my own tide, forsaking Thee, and exceeded
all Thy limits; yet I escaped not Thy scourges. For what mortal can?
For Thou wert ever with me mercifully rigorous, and besprinkling with
most bitter alloy all my unlawful pleasures: that I might seek
pleasures without alloy. But where to find such, I could not
discover, save in Thee, O Lord, who teachest by sorrow, and woundest
us, to heal; and killest us, lest we die from Thee. Where was I, and
how far was I exiled from the delights of Thy house, in that
sixteenth year of the age of my flesh, when the madness of lust (to
which human shamelessness giveth free licence, though unlicensed by
Thy laws) took the rule over me, and I resigned myself wholly to it?
My friends meanwhile took no care by marriage to save my fall; their
only care was that I should learn to speak excellently, and be a
persuasive orator.
For
that year were my studies intermitted: whilst after my return from
Madaura (a neighbour city, whither I had journeyed to learn grammar
and rhetoric), the expenses for a further journey to Carthage were
being provided for me; and that rather by the resolution than the
means of my father, who was but a poor freeman of Thagaste. To whom
tell I this? not to Thee, my God; but before Thee to mine own kind,
even to that small portion of mankind as may light upon these
writings of mine. And to what purpose? that whosoever reads this, may
think out of what depths we are to cry unto Thee. For what is nearer
to Thine ears than a confessing heart, and a life of faith? Who did
not extol my father, for that beyond the ability of his means, he
would furnish his son with all necessaries for a far journey for his
studies' sake? For many far abler citizens did no such thing for
their children. But yet this same father had no concern how I grew
towards Thee, or how chaste I were; so that I were but copious in
speech, however barren I were to Thy culture, O God, who art the only
true and good Lord of Thy field, my heart.
But
while in that my sixteenth year I lived with my parents, leaving all
school for a while (a season of idleness being interposed through the
narrowness of my parents' fortunes), the briers of unclean desires
grew rank over my head, and there was no hand to root them out. When
that my father saw me at the baths, now growing towards manhood, and
endued with a restless youthfulness, he, as already hence
anticipating his descendants, gladly told it to my mother; rejoicing
in that tumult of the senses wherein the world forgetteth Thee its
Creator, and becometh enamoured of Thy creature, instead of Thyself,
through the fumes of that invisible wine of its self-will, turning
aside and bowing down to the very basest things. But in my mother's
breast Thou hadst already begun Thy temple, and the foundation of Thy
holy habitation, whereas my father was as yet but a Catechumen, and
that but recently. She then was startled with a holy fear and
trembling; and though I was not as yet baptised, feared for me those
crooked ways in which they walk who turn their back to Thee, and not
their face.
Woe
is me! and dare I say that Thou heldest Thy peace, O my God, while I
wandered further from Thee? Didst Thou then indeed hold Thy peace to
me? And whose but Thine were these words which by my mother, Thy
faithful one, Thou sangest in my ears? Nothing whereof sunk into my
heart, so as to do it. For she wished, and I remember in private with
great anxiety warned me, "not to commit fornication; but
especially never to defile another man's wife." These seemed to
me womanish advices, which I should blush to obey. But they were
Thine, and I knew it not: and I thought Thou wert silent and that it
was she who spake; by whom Thou wert not silent unto me; and in her
wast despised by me, her son, the son of Thy handmaid, Thy servant.
But I knew it not; and ran headlong with such blindness, that amongst
my equals I was ashamed of a less shamelessness, when I heard them
boast of their flagitiousness, yea, and the more boasting, the more
they were degraded: and I took pleasure, not only in the pleasure of
the deed, but in the praise. What is worthy of dispraise but vice?
But I made myself worse than I was, that I might not be dispraised;
and when in any thing I had not sinned as the abandoned ones, I would
say that I had done what I had not done, that I might not seem
contemptible in proportion as I was innocent; or of less account, the
more chaste.
Behold
with what companions I walked the streets of Babylon, and wallowed in
the mire thereof, as if in a bed of spices and precious ointments.
And that I might cleave the faster to its very centre, the invisible
enemy trod me down, and seduced me, for that I was easy to be
seduced. Neither did the mother of my flesh (who had now fled out of
the centre of Babylon, yet went more slowly in the skirts thereof as
she advised me to chastity, so heed what she had heard of me from her
husband, as to restrain within the bounds of conjugal affection, if
it could not be pared away to the quick) what she felt to be
pestilent at present and for the future dangerous. She heeded not
this, for she feared lest a wife should prove a clog and hindrance to
my hopes. Not those hopes of the world to come, which my mother
reposed in Thee; but the hope of learning, which both my parents were
too desirous I should attain; my father, because he had next to no
thought of Thee, and of me but vain conceits; my mother, because she
accounted that those usual courses of learning would not only be no
hindrance, but even some furtherance towards attaining Thee. For thus
I conjecture, recalling, as well as I may, the disposition of my
parents. The reins, meantime, were slackened to me, beyond all temper
of due severity, to spend my time in sport, yea, even unto
dissoluteness in whatsoever I affected. And in all was a mist,
intercepting from me, O my God, the brightness of Thy truth; and mine
iniquity burst out as from very fatness.
Theft
is punished by Thy law, O Lord, and the law written in the hearts of
men, which iniquity itself effaces not. For what thief will abide a
thief? not even a rich thief, one stealing through want. Yet I lusted
to thieve, and did it, compelled by no hunger, nor poverty, but
through a cloyedness of well-doing, and a pamperedness of iniquity.
For I stole that, of which I had enough, and much better. Nor cared I
to enjoy what I stole, but joyed in the theft and sin itself. A pear
tree there was near our vineyard, laden with fruit, tempting neither
for colour nor taste. To shake and rob this, some lewd young fellows
of us went, late one night (having according to our pestilent custom
prolonged our sports in the streets till then), and took huge loads,
not for our eating, but to fling to the very hogs, having only tasted
them. And this, but to do what we liked only, because it was
misliked. Behold my heart, O God, behold my heart, which Thou hadst
pity upon in the bottom of the bottomless pit. Now, behold, let my
heart tell Thee what it sought there, that I should be gratuitously
evil, having no temptation to ill, but the ill itself. It was foul,
and I loved it; I loved to perish, I loved mine own fault, not that
for which I was faulty, but my fault itself. Foul soul, falling from
Thy firmament to utter destruction; not seeking aught through the
shame, but the shame itself!
For
there is an attractiveness in beautiful bodies, in gold and silver,
and all things; and in bodily touch, sympathy hath much influence,
and each other sense hath his proper object answerably tempered.
Worldy honour hath also its grace, and the power of overcoming, and
of mastery; whence springs also the thirst of revenge. But yet, to
obtain all these, we may not depart from Thee, O Lord, nor decline
from Thy law. The life also which here we live hath its own
enchantment, through a certain proportion of its own, and a
correspondence with all things beautiful here below. Human friendship
also is endeared with a sweet tie, by reason of the unity formed of
many souls. Upon occasion of all these, and the like, is sin
committed, while through an immoderate inclination towards these
goods of the lowest order, the better and higher are forsaken,—Thou,
our Lord God, Thy truth, and Thy law. For these lower things have
their delights, but not like my God, who made all things; for in Him
doth the righteous delight, and He is the joy of the upright in
heart.
When,
then, we ask why a crime was done, we believe it not, unless it
appear that there might have been some desire of obtaining some of
those which we called lower goods, or a fear of losing them. For they
are beautiful and comely; although compared with those higher and
beatific goods, they be abject and low. A man hath murdered another;
why? he loved his wife or his estate; or would rob for his own
livelihood; or feared to lose some such things by him; or, wronged,
was on fire to be revenged. Would any commit murder upon no cause,
delighted simply in murdering? who would believe it? for as for that
furious and savage man, of whom it is said that he was gratuitously
evil and cruel, yet is the cause assigned; "lest" (saith
he) "through idleness hand or heart should grow inactive."
And to what end? that, through that practice of guilt, he might,
having taken the city, attain to honours, empire, riches, and be
freed from fear of the laws, and his embarrassments from domestic
needs, and consciousness of villainies. So then, not even Catiline
himself loved his own villainies, but something else, for whose sake
he did them.
What
then did wretched I so love in thee, thou theft of mine, thou deed of
darkness, in that sixteenth year of my age? Lovely thou wert not,
because thou wert theft. But art thou any thing, that thus I speak to
thee? Fair were the pears we stole, because they were Thy creation,
Thou fairest of all, Creator of all, Thou good God; God, the
sovereign good and my true good. Fair were those pears, but not them
did my wretched soul desire; for I had store of better, and those I
gathered, only that I might steal. For, when gathered, I flung them
away, my only feast therein being my own sin, which I was pleased to
enjoy. For if aught of those pears came within my mouth, what
sweetened it was the sin. And now, O Lord my God, I enquire what in
that theft delighted me; and behold it hath no loveliness; I mean not
such loveliness as in justice and wisdom; nor such as is in the mind
and memory, and senses, and animal life of man; nor yet as the stars
are glorious and beautiful in their orbs; or the earth, or sea, full
of embryo-life, replacing by its birth that which decayeth; nay, nor
even that false and shadowy beauty which belongeth to deceiving
vices.
