The Confessions of St. Augustine

BOOK IX

O Lord, I am Thy ser­vant; I am Thy ser­vant, and the son of Thy hand­maid: Thou hast bro­ken my bonds in sun­der. I will of­fer to Thee the sac­ri­fice of Let my heart and my tongue praise Thee; yea, let all my bones say, O Lord, who is like un­to Thee? Let them say, and an­swer Thou me, and say un­to my soul, I am thy sal­va­tion. Who am I, and what am I? What evil have not been ei­ther my deeds, or if not my deeds, my words, or if not my words, my will? But Thou, O Lord, are good and mer­ci­ful, and Thy right hand had re­spect un­to the depth of my death, and from the bot­tom of my heart emp­tied that abyss of cor­rup­tion. And this Thy whole gift was, to nill what I willed, and to will what Thou willedst. But where through all those years, and out of what low and deep re­cess was my free-​will called forth in a mo­ment, where­by to sub­mit my neck to Thy easy yoke, and my shoul­ders un­to Thy light bur­den, O Christ Je­sus, my Helper and my Re­deemer? How sweet did it at once be­come to me, to want the sweet­ness­es of those toys! and what I feared to be part­ed from, was now a joy to part with. For Thou didst cast them forth from me, Thou true and high­est sweet­ness. Thou castest them forth, and for them en­teredst in Thy­self, sweet­er than all plea­sure, though not to flesh and blood; brighter than all light, but more hid­den than all depths, high­er than all hon­our, but not to the high in their own con­ceits. Now was my soul free from the bit­ing cares of can­vass­ing and get­ting, and wel­ter­ing in filth, and scratch­ing off the itch of lust. And my in­fant tongue spake freely to Thee, my bright­ness, and my rich­es, and my health, the Lord my God.

And I re­solved in Thy sight, not tu­mul­tuous­ly to tear, but gen­tly to with­draw, the ser­vice of my tongue from the marts of lip-​labour: that the young, no stu­dents in Thy law, nor in Thy peace, but in ly­ing dotages and law-​skir­mish­es, should no longer buy at my mouth arms for their mad­ness. And very sea­son­ably, it now want­ed but very few days un­to the Va­ca­tion of the Vin­tage, and I re­solved to en­dure them, then in a reg­ular way to take my leave, and hav­ing been pur­chased by Thee, no more to re­turn for sale. Our pur­pose then was known to Thee; but to men, oth­er than our own friends, was it not known. For we had agreed among our­selves not to let it out abroad to any: al­though to us, now as­cend­ing from the val­ley of tears, and singing that song of de­grees, Thou hadst giv­en sharp ar­rows, and de­stroy­ing coals against the sub­tle tongue, which as though ad­vis­ing for us, would thwart, and would out of love de­vour us, as it doth its meat.

Thou hadst pierced our hearts with Thy char­ity, and we car­ried Thy words as it were fixed in our en­trails: and the ex­am­ples of Thy ser­vants, whom for black Thou hadst made bright, and for dead, alive, be­ing piled to­geth­er in the re­cep­ta­cle of our thoughts, kin­dled and burned up that our heavy tor­por, that we should not sink down to the abyss; and they fired us so ve­he­ment­ly, that all the blasts of sub­tle tongues from gain­say­ers might on­ly in­flame us the more fierce­ly, not ex­tin­guish us. Nev­er­the­less, be­cause for Thy Name’s sake which Thou hast hal­lowed through­out the earth, this our vow and pur­pose might al­so find some to com­mend it, it seemed like os­ten­ta­tion not to wait for the va­ca­tion now so near, but to quit be­fore­hand a pub­lic pro­fes­sion, which was be­fore the eyes of all; so that all look­ing on this act of mine, and ob­serv­ing how near was the time of vin­tage which I wished to an­tic­ipate, would talk much of me, as if I had de­sired to ap­pear some great one. And what end had it served me, that peo­ple should re­pute and dis­pute up­on my pur­pose, and that our good should be evil spo­ken of.

More­over, it had at first trou­bled me that in this very sum­mer my lungs be­gan to give way, amid too great lit­er­ary labour, and to breathe deeply with dif­fi­cul­ty, and by the pain in my chest to show that they were in­jured, and to refuse any full or length­ened speak­ing; this had trou­bled me, for it al­most con­strained me of ne­ces­si­ty to lay down that bur­den of teach­ing, or, if I could be cured and re­cov­er, at least to in­ter­mit it. But when the full wish for leisure, that I might see how that Thou art the Lord, arose, and was fixed, in me; my God, Thou know­est, I be­gan even to re­joice that I had this sec­ondary, and that no feigned, ex­cuse, which might some­thing mod­er­ate the of­fence tak­en by those who, for their sons’ sake, wished me nev­er to have the free­dom of Thy sons. Full then of such joy, I en­dured till that in­ter­val of time were run; it may have been some twen­ty days, yet they were en­dured man­ful­ly; en­dured, for the cov­etous­ness which afore­time bore a part of this heavy busi­ness, had left me, and I re­mained alone, and had been over­whelmed, had not pa­tience tak­en its place. Per­chance, some of Thy ser­vants, my brethren, may say that I sinned in this, that with a heart ful­ly set on Thy ser­vice, I suf­fered my­self to sit even one hour in the chair of lies. Nor would I be con­tentious. But hast not Thou, O most mer­ci­ful Lord, par­doned and re­mit­ted this sin al­so, with my oth­er most hor­ri­ble and dead­ly sins, in the holy wa­ter?

Vere­cun­dus was worn down with care about this our blessed­ness, for that be­ing held back by bonds, where­by he was most strait­ly bound, he saw that he should be sev­ered from us. For him­self was not yet a Chris­tian, his wife one of the faith­ful; and yet here­by, more rigid­ly than by any oth­er chain, was he let and hin­dered from the jour­ney which we had now es­sayed. For he would not, he said, be a Chris­tian on any oth­er terms than on those he could not. How­ev­er, he of­fered us cour­te­ous­ly to re­main at his coun­try-​house so long as we should stay there. Thou, O Lord, shalt re­ward him in the res­ur­rec­tion of the just, see­ing Thou hast al­ready giv­en him the lot of the righ­teous. For al­though, in our ab­sence, be­ing now at Rome, he was seized with bod­ily sick­ness, and there­in be­ing made a Chris­tian, and one of the faith­ful, he de­part­ed this life; yet hadst Thou mer­cy not on him on­ly, but on us al­so: lest re­mem­ber­ing the ex­ceed­ing kind­ness of our friend to­wards us, yet un­able to num­ber him among Thy flock, we should be ag­onised with in­tol­er­able sor­row. Thanks un­to Thee, our God, we are Thine: Thy sug­ges­tions and con­so­la­tions tell us, Faith­ful in promis­es, Thou now re­quitest Vere­cun­dus for his coun­try-​house of Cas­si­acum, where from the fever of the world we re­posed in Thee, with the eter­nal fresh­ness of Thy Par­adise: for that Thou hast for­giv­en him his sins up­on earth, in that rich moun­tain, that moun­tain which yield­eth milk, Thine own moun­tain.

He then had at that time sor­row, but Ne­brid­ius joy. For al­though he al­so, not be­ing yet a Chris­tian, had fall­en in­to the pit of that most per­ni­cious er­ror, be­liev­ing the flesh of Thy Son to be a phan­tom: yet emerg­ing thence, he be­lieved as we did; not as yet en­dued with any Sacra­ments of Thy Church, but a most ar­dent searcher out of truth. Whom, not long af­ter our con­ver­sion and re­gen­er­ation by Thy Bap­tism, be­ing al­so a faith­ful mem­ber of the Church Catholic, and serv­ing Thee in per­fect chasti­ty and con­ti­nence amongst his peo­ple in Africa, his whole house hav­ing through him first been made Chris­tian, didst Thou re­lease from the flesh; and now he lives in Abra­ham’s bo­som. What­ev­er that be, which is sig­ni­fied by that bo­som, there lives my Ne­brid­ius, my sweet friend, and Thy child, O Lord, adopt­ed of a freed man: there he liveth. For what oth­er place is there for such a soul? There he liveth, where­of he asked much of me, a poor in­ex­pe­ri­enced man. Now lays he not his ear to my mouth, but his spir­itu­al mouth un­to Thy foun­tain, and drin­keth as much as he can re­ceive, wis­dom in pro­por­tion to his thirst, end­less­ly hap­py. Nor do I think that he is so ine­bri­at­ed there­with, as to for­get me; see­ing Thou, Lord, Whom he drin­keth, art mind­ful of us. So were we then, com­fort­ing Vere­cun­dus, who sor­rowed, as far as friend­ship per­mit­ted, that our con­ver­sion was of such sort; and ex­hort­ing him to be­come faith­ful, ac­cord­ing to his mea­sure, name­ly, of a mar­ried es­tate; and await­ing Ne­brid­ius to fol­low us, which, be­ing so near, he was all but do­ing: and so, lo! those days rolled by at length; for long and many they seemed, for the love I bare to the ease­ful lib­er­ty, that I might sing to Thee, from my in­most mar­row, My heart hath said un­to Thee, I have sought Thy face: Thy face, Lord, will I seek.

Now was the day come where­in I was in deed to be freed of my Rhetoric Pro­fes­sor­ship, where­of in thought I was al­ready freed. And it was done. Thou didst res­cue my tongue, whence Thou hadst be­fore res­cued my heart. And I blessed Thee, re­joic­ing; re­tir­ing with all mine to the vil­la. What I there did in writ­ing, which was now en­list­ed in Thy ser­vice, though still, in this breath­ing-​time as it were, pant­ing from the school of pride, my books may wit­ness, as well what I de­bat­ed with oth­ers, as what with my­self alone, be­fore Thee: what with Ne­brid­ius, who was ab­sent, my Epis­tles bear wit­ness. And when shall I have time to re­hearse all Thy great ben­efits to­wards us at that time, es­pe­cial­ly when hast­ing on to yet greater mer­cies? For my re­mem­brance re­calls me, and pleas­ant is it to me, O Lord, to con­fess to Thee, by what in­ward goads Thou tamedst me; and how Thou hast evened me, low­er­ing the moun­tains and hills of my high imag­ina­tions, straight­en­ing my crooked­ness, and smooth­ing my rough ways; and how Thou al­so sub­duedst the broth­er of my heart, Alyp­ius, un­to the name of Thy On­ly Be­got­ten, our Lord and Saviour Je­sus Christ, which he would not at first vouch­safe to have in­sert­ed in our writ­ings. For rather would he have them savour of the lofty cedars of the Schools, which the Lord hath now bro­ken down, than of the whole­some herbs of the Church, the an­ti­dote against ser­pents.

Oh, in what ac­cents spake I un­to Thee, my God, when I read the Psalms of David, those faith­ful songs, and sounds of de­vo­tion, which al­low of no swelling spir­it, as yet a Cat­echu­men, and a novice in Thy re­al love, rest­ing in that vil­la, with Alyp­ius a Cat­echu­men, my moth­er cleav­ing to us, in fe­male garb with mas­cu­line faith, with the tran­quil­li­ty of age, moth­er­ly love, Chris­tian piety! Oh, what ac­cents did I ut­ter un­to Thee in those Psalms, and how was I by them kin­dled to­wards Thee, and on fire to re­hearse them, if pos­si­ble, through the whole world, against the pride of mankind! And yet they are sung through the whole world, nor can any hide him­self from Thy heat. With what ve­he­ment and bit­ter sor­row was I an­gered at the Manichees! and again I pitied them, for they knew not those Sacra­ments, those medicines, and were mad against the an­ti­dote which might have re­cov­ered them of their mad­ness. How I would they had then been some­where near me, and with­out my know­ing that they were there, could have be­held my coun­te­nance, and heard my words, when I read the fourth Psalm in that time of my rest, and how that Psalm wrought up­on me: When I called, the God of my righ­teous­ness heard me; in tribu­la­tion Thou en­largedst me. Have mer­cy up­on me, O Lord, and hear my prayer. Would that what I ut­tered on these words, they could hear, with­out my know­ing whether they heard, lest they should think I spake it for their sakes! Be­cause in truth nei­ther should I speak the same things, nor in the same way, if I per­ceived that they heard and saw me; nor if I spake them would they so re­ceive them, as when I spake by and for my­self be­fore Thee, out of the nat­ural feel­ings of my soul.

I trem­bled for fear, and again kin­dled with hope, and with re­joic­ing in Thy mer­cy, O Fa­ther; and all is­sued forth both by mine eyes and voice, when Thy good Spir­it turn­ing un­to us, said, O ye sons of men, how long slow of heart? why do ye love van­ity, and seek af­ter leas­ing? For I had loved van­ity, and sought af­ter leas­ing. And Thou, O Lord, hadst al­ready mag­ni­fied Thy Holy One, rais­ing Him from the dead, and set­ting Him at Thy right hand, whence from on high He should send His promise, the Com­forter, the Spir­it of truth. And He had al­ready sent Him, but I knew it not; He had sent Him, be­cause He was now mag­ni­fied, ris­ing again from the dead, and as­cend­ing in­to heav­en. For till then, the Spir­it was not yet giv­en, be­cause Je­sus was not yet glo­ri­fied. And the prophet cries out, How long, slow of heart? why do ye love van­ity, and seek af­ter leas­ing? Know this, that the Lord hath mag­ni­fied His Holy One. He cries out, How long? He cries out, Know this: and I so long, not know­ing, loved van­ity, and sought af­ter leas­ing: and there­fore I heard and trem­bled, be­cause it was spo­ken un­to such as I re­mem­bered my­self to have been. For in those phan­toms which I had held for truths, was there van­ity and leas­ing; and I spake aloud many things earnest­ly and forcibly, in the bit­ter­ness of my re­mem­brance. Which would they had heard, who yet love van­ity and seek af­ter leas­ing! They would per­chance have been trou­bled, and have vom­it­ed it up; and Thou wouldest hear them when they cried un­to Thee; for by a true death in the flesh did He die for us, who now in­ter­cedeth un­to Thee for us.

I fur­ther read, Be an­gry, and sin not. And how was I moved, O my God, who had now learned to be an­gry at my­self for things past, that I might not sin in time to come! Yea, to be just­ly an­gry; for that it was not an­oth­er na­ture of a peo­ple of dark­ness which sinned for me, as they say who are not an­gry at them­selves, and trea­sure up wrath against the day of wrath, and of the rev­ela­tion of Thy just judg­ment. Nor were my good things now with­out, nor sought with the eyes of flesh in that earth­ly sun; for they that would have joy from with­out soon be­come vain, and waste them­selves on the things seen and tem­po­ral, and in their fam­ished thoughts do lick their very shad­ows. Oh that they were wea­ried out with their famine, and said, Who will show us good things? And we would say, and they hear, The light of Thy coun­te­nance is sealed up­on us. For we are not that light which en­light­eneth ev­ery man, but we are en­light­ened by Thee; that hav­ing been some­times dark­ness, we may be light in Thee. Oh that they could see the eter­nal In­ter­nal, which hav­ing tast­ed, I was grieved that I could not show It them, so long as they brought me their heart in their eyes rov­ing abroad from Thee, while they said, Who will show us good things? For there, where I was an­gry with­in my­self in my cham­ber, where I was in­ward­ly pricked, where I had sac­ri­ficed, slay­ing my old man and com­menc­ing the pur­pose of a new life, putting my trust in Thee,- there hadst Thou be­gun to grow sweet un­to me, and hadst put glad­ness in my heart. And I cried out, as I read this out­ward­ly, find­ing it in­ward­ly. Nor would I be mul­ti­plied with world­ly goods; wast­ing away time, and wast­ed by time; where­as I had in Thy eter­nal Sim­ple Essence oth­er corn, and wine, and oil.

And with a loud cry of my heart I cried out in the next verse, O in peace, O for The Self-​same! O what said he, I will lay me down and sleep, for who shall hin­der us, when cometh to pass that say­ing which is writ­ten, Death is swal­lowed up in vic­to­ry? And Thou sur­pass­ing­ly art the Self-​same, Who art not changed; and in Thee is rest which for­get­teth all toil, for there is none oth­er with Thee, nor are we to seek those many oth­er things, which are not what Thou art: but Thou, Lord, alone hast made me dwell in hope. I read, and kin­dled; nor found I what to do to those deaf and dead, of whom my­self had been, a pesti­lent per­son, a bit­ter and a blind bawler against those writ­ings, which are honied with the hon­ey of heav­en, and light­some with Thine own light: and I was con­sumed with zeal at the en­emies of this Scrip­ture.

When shall I re­call all which passed in those holy-​days? Yet nei­ther have I for­got­ten, nor will I pass over the sever­ity of Thy scourge, and the won­der­ful swift­ness of Thy mer­cy. Thou didst then tor­ment me with pain in my teeth; which when it had come to such height that I could not speak, it came in­to my heart to de­sire all my friends present to pray for me to Thee, the God of all man­ner of health. And this I wrote on wax, and gave it them to read. Present­ly so soon as with hum­ble de­vo­tion we had bowed our knees, that pain went away. But what pain? or how went it away? I was af­fright­ed, O my Lord, my God; for from in­fan­cy I had nev­er ex­pe­ri­enced the like. And the pow­er of Thy Nod was deeply con­veyed to me, and re­joic­ing in faith, I praised Thy Name. And that faith suf­fered me not to be at ease about my past sins, which were not yet for­giv­en me by Thy bap­tism.

The vin­tage-​va­ca­tion end­ed, I gave no­tice to the Mi­lanese to pro­vide their schol­ars with an­oth­er mas­ter to sell words to them; for that I had both made choice to serve Thee, and through my dif­fi­cul­ty of breath­ing and pain in my chest was not equal to the Pro­fes­sor­ship. And by let­ters I sig­ni­fied to Thy Prelate, the holy man Am­brose, my for­mer er­rors and present de­sires, beg­ging his ad­vice what of Thy Scrip­tures I had best read, to be­come read­ier and fit­ter for re­ceiv­ing so great grace. He rec­om­mend­ed Isa­iah the Prophet: I be­lieve, be­cause he above the rest is a more clear fore­show­er of the Gospel and of the call­ing of the Gen­tiles. But I, not un­der­stand­ing the first les­son in him, and imag­in­ing the whole to be like it, laid it by, to be re­sumed when bet­ter prac­tised in our Lord’s own words.

Thence, when the time was come where­in I was to give in my name, we left the coun­try and re­turned to Mi­lan. It pleased Alyp­ius al­so to be with me born again in Thee, be­ing al­ready clothed with the hu­mil­ity be­fit­ting Thy Sacra­ments; and a most valiant tamer of the body, so as, with un­wont­ed ven­ture, to wear the frozen ground of Italy with his bare feet. We joined with us the boy Adeo­da­tus, born af­ter the flesh, of my sin. Ex­cel­lent­ly hadst Thou made him. He was not quite fif­teen, and in wit sur­passed many grave and learned men. I con­fess un­to Thee Thy gifts, O Lord my God, Cre­ator of all, and abun­dant­ly able to re­form our de­for­mi­ties: for I had no part in that boy, but the sin. For that we brought him up in Thy dis­ci­pline, it was Thou, none else, had in­spired us with it. I con­fess un­to Thee Thy gifts. There is a book of ours en­ti­tled The Mas­ter; it is a di­alogue be­tween him and me. Thou know­est that all there as­cribed to the per­son con­vers­ing with me were his ideas, in his six­teenth year. Much be­sides, and yet more ad­mirable, I found in him. That tal­ent struck awe in­to me. And who but Thou could be the work­mas­ter of such won­ders? Soon didst Thou take his life from the earth: and I now re­mem­ber him with­out anx­iety, fear­ing noth­ing for his child­hood or youth, or his whole self. Him we joined with us, our con­tem­po­rary in grace, to he brought up in Thy dis­ci­pline: and we were bap­tised, and anx­iety for our past life van­ished from us. Nor was I sat­ed in those days with the won­drous sweet­ness of con­sid­er­ing the depth of Thy coun­sels con­cern­ing the sal­va­tion of mankind. How did I weep, in Thy Hymns and Can­ti­cles, touched to the quick by the voic­es of Thy sweet-​at­tuned Church! The voic­es flowed in­to mine ears, and the Truth dis­tilled in­to my heart, whence the af­fec­tions of my de­vo­tion over­flowed, and tears ran down, and hap­py was I there­in.

Not long had the Church of Mi­lan be­gun to use this kind of con­so­la­tion and ex­hor­ta­tion, the brethren zeal­ous­ly join­ing with har­mo­ny of voice and hearts. For it was a year, or not much more, that Justi­na, moth­er to the Em­per­or Valen­tini­an, a child, per­se­cut­ed Thy ser­vant Am­brose, in favour of her heresy, to which she was se­duced by the Ar­ians. The de­vout peo­ple kept watch in the Church, ready to die with their Bish­op Thy ser­vant. There my moth­er Thy hand­maid, bear­ing a chief part of those anx­ieties and watch­ings, lived for prayer. We, yet un­warmed by the heat of Thy Spir­it, still were stirred up by the sight of the amazed and dis­qui­et­ed city. Then it was first in­sti­tut­ed that af­ter the man­ner of the East­ern Church­es, Hymns and Psalms should be sung, lest the peo­ple should wax faint through the te­dious­ness of sor­row: and from that day to this the cus­tom is re­tained, divers (yea, al­most all) Thy con­gre­ga­tions, through­out oth­er parts of the world fol­low­ing here­in.

Then didst Thou by a vi­sion dis­cov­er to Thy fore­named Bish­op where the bod­ies of Ger­va­sius and Pro­ta­sius the mar­tyrs lay hid (whom Thou hadst in Thy se­cret trea­sury stored un­cor­rupt­ed so many years), whence Thou might­est sea­son­ably pro­duce them to re­press the fury of a wom­an, but an Em­press. For when they were dis­cov­ered and dug up, and with due hon­our trans­lat­ed to the Am­brosian Basil­ica, not on­ly they who were vexed with un­clean spir­its (the dev­ils con­fess­ing them­selves) were cured, but a cer­tain man who had for many years been blind, a cit­izen, and well known to the city, ask­ing and hear­ing the rea­son of the peo­ple’s con­fused joy, sprang forth de­sir­ing his guide to lead him thith­er. Led thith­er, he begged to be al­lowed to touch with his hand­ker­chief the bier of Thy saints, whose death is pre­cious in Thy sight. Which when he had done, and put to his eyes, they were forth­with opened. Thence did the fame spread, thence Thy prais­es glowed, shone; thence the mind of that en­emy, though not turned to the sound­ness of be­liev­ing, was yet turned back from her fury of per­se­cut­ing. Thanks to Thee, O my God. Whence and whith­er hast Thou thus led my re­mem­brance, that I should con­fess these things al­so un­to Thee? which great though they be, I had passed by in for­get­ful­ness. And yet then, when the odour of Thy oint­ments was so fra­grant, did we not run af­ter Thee. There­fore did I more weep among the singing of Thy Hymns, for­mer­ly sigh­ing af­ter Thee, and at length breath­ing in Thee, as far as the breath may en­ter in­to this our house of grass.

Thou that mak­est men to dwell of one mind in one house, didst join with us Eu­odius al­so, a young man of our own city. Who be­ing an of­fi­cer of Court, was be­fore us con­vert­ed to Thee and bap­tised: and quit­ting his sec­ular war­fare, gird­ed him­self to Thine. We were to­geth­er, about to dwell to­geth­er in our de­vout pur­pose. We sought where we might serve Thee most use­ful­ly, and were to­geth­er re­turn­ing to Africa: whith­er­ward be­ing as far as Os­tia, my moth­er de­part­ed this life. Much I omit, as has­ten­ing much. Re­ceive my con­fes­sions and thanks­giv­ings, O my God, for in­nu­mer­able things where­of I am silent. But I will not omit what­so­ev­er my soul would bring forth con­cern­ing that Thy hand­maid, who brought me forth, both in the flesh, that I might be born to this tem­po­ral light, and in heart, that I might be born to Light eter­nal. Not her gifts, but Thine in her, would I speak of; for nei­ther did she make nor ed­ucate her­self. Thou cre­at­edst her; nor did her fa­ther and moth­er know what a one should come from them. And the scep­tre of Thy Christ, the dis­ci­pline of Thine on­ly Son, in a Chris­tian house, a good mem­ber of Thy Church, ed­ucat­ed her in Thy fear. Yet for her good dis­ci­pline was she wont to com­mend not so much her moth­er’s dili­gence, as that of a cer­tain de­crepit maid-​ser­vant, who had car­ried her fa­ther when a child, as lit­tle ones used to be car­ried at the backs of el­der girls. For which rea­son, and for her great age, and ex­cel­lent con­ver­sa­tion, was she, in that Chris­tian fam­ily, well re­spect­ed by its heads. Whence al­so the charge of her mas­ter’s daugh­ters was en­trust­ed to her, to which she gave dili­gent heed, re­strain­ing them earnest­ly, when nec­es­sary, with a holy sever­ity, and teach­ing them with a grave dis­cre­tion. For, ex­cept at those hours where­in they were most tem­po­rate­ly fed at their par­ents’ ta­ble, she would not suf­fer them, though parched with thirst, to drink even wa­ter; pre­vent­ing an evil cus­tom, and adding this whole­some ad­vice: “Ye drink wa­ter now, be­cause you have not wine in your pow­er; but when you come to be mar­ried, and be made mis­tress­es of cel­lars and cup­boards, you will scorn wa­ter, but the cus­tom of drink­ing will abide.” By this method of in­struc­tion, and the au­thor­ity she had, she re­frained the greed­iness of child­hood, and mould­ed their very thirst to such an ex­cel­lent mod­er­ation that what they should not, that they would not.

And yet (as Thy hand­maid told me her son) there had crept up­on her a love of wine. For when (as the man­ner was) she, as though a sober maid­en, was bid­den by her par­ents to draw wine out of the hogshed, hold­ing the ves­sel un­der the open­ing, be­fore she poured the wine in­to the flagon, she sipped a lit­tle with the tip of her lips; for more her in­stinc­tive feel­ings re­fused. For this she did, not out of any de­sire of drink, but out of the ex­uber­ance of youth, where­by it boils over in mirth­ful freaks, which in youth­ful spir­its are wont to be kept un­der by the grav­ity of their el­ders. And thus by adding to that lit­tle, dai­ly lit­tles (for whoso de­spiseth lit­tle things shall fall by lit­tle and lit­tle), she had fall­en in­to such a habit as greed­ily to drink off her lit­tle cup brim-​full al­most of wine. Where was then that dis­creet old wom­an, and that her earnest coun­ter­mand­ing? Would aught avail against a se­cret dis­ease, if Thy heal­ing hand, O Lord, watched not over us? Fa­ther, moth­er, and gov­er­nors ab­sent, Thou present, who cre­at­edst, who callest, who al­so by those set over us, work­est some­thing to­wards the sal­va­tion of our souls, what didst Thou then, O my God? how didst Thou cure her? how heal her? didst Thou not out of an­oth­er soul bring forth a hard and a sharp taunt, like a lancet out of Thy se­cret store, and with one touch re­move all that foul stuff? For a maid-​ser­vant with whom she used to go to the cel­lar, falling to words (as it hap­pens) with her lit­tle mis­tress, when alone with her, taunt­ed her with this fault, with most bit­ter in­sult, call­ing her wine-​bib­ber. With which taunt she, stung to the quick, saw the foul­ness of her fault, and in­stant­ly con­demned and for­sook it. As flat­ter­ing friends per­vert, so re­proach­ful en­emies most­ly cor­rect. Yet not what by them Thou doest, but what them­selves pur­posed, dost Thou re­pay them. For she in her anger sought to vex her young mis­tress, not to amend her; and did it in pri­vate, ei­ther for that the time and place of the quar­rel so found them; or lest her­self al­so should have anger, for dis­cov­er­ing it thus late. But Thou, Lord, Gov­er­nor of all in heav­en and earth, who turnest to Thy pur­pos­es the deep­est cur­rents, and the ruled tur­bu­lence of the tide of times, didst by the very un­health­iness of one soul heal an­oth­er; lest any, when he ob­serves this, should as­cribe it to his own pow­er, even when an­oth­er, whom he wished to be re­formed, is re­formed through words of his.

Brought up thus mod­est­ly and sober­ly, and made sub­ject rather by Thee to her par­ents, than by her par­ents to Thee, so soon as she was of mar­riage­able age, be­ing be­stowed up­on a hus­band, she served him as her lord; and did her dili­gence to win him un­to Thee, preach­ing Thee un­to him by her con­ver­sa­tion; by which Thou or­na­ment­edst her, mak­ing her rev­er­ent­ly ami­able, and ad­mirable un­to her hus­band. And she so en­dured the wrong­ing of her bed as nev­er to have any quar­rel with her hus­band there­on. For she looked for Thy mer­cy up­on him, that be­liev­ing in Thee, he might be made chaste. But be­sides this, he was fer­vid, as in his af­fec­tions, so in anger: but she had learnt not to re­sist an an­gry hus­band, not in deed on­ly, but not even in word. On­ly when he was smoothed and tran­quil, and in a tem­per to re­ceive it, she would give an ac­count of her ac­tions, if hap­ly he had over­hasti­ly tak­en of­fence. In a word, while many ma­trons, who had milder hus­bands, yet bore even in their faces marks of shame, would in fa­mil­iar talk blame their hus­bands’ lives, she would blame their tongues, giv­ing them, as in jest, earnest ad­vice: “That from the time they heard the mar­riage writ­ings read to them, they should ac­count them as in­den­tures, where­by they were made ser­vants; and so, re­mem­ber­ing their con­di­tion, ought not to set them­selves up against their lords.” And when they, know­ing what a cho­ler­ic hus­band she en­dured, mar­velled that it had nev­er been heard, nor by any to­ken per­ceived, that Patri­cius had beat­en his wife, or that there had been any do­mes­tic dif­fer­ence be­tween them, even for one day, and con­fi­den­tial­ly ask­ing the rea­son, she taught them her prac­tice above men­tioned. Those wives who ob­served it found the good, and re­turned thanks; those who ob­served it not, found no re­lief, and suf­fered.

Her moth­er-​in-​law al­so, at first by whis­per­ings of evil ser­vants in­censed against her, she so over­came by ob­ser­vance and per­se­ver­ing en­durance and meek­ness, that she of her own ac­cord dis­cov­ered to her son the med­dling tongues where­by the do­mes­tic peace be­twixt her and her daugh­ter-​in-​law had been dis­turbed, ask­ing him to cor­rect them. Then, when in com­pli­ance with his moth­er, and for the well-​or­der­ing of the fam­ily, he had with stripes cor­rect­ed those dis­cov­ered, at her will who had dis­cov­ered them, she promised the like re­ward to any who, to please her, should speak ill of her daugh­ter-​in-​law to her: and none now ven­tur­ing, they lived to­geth­er with a re­mark­able sweet­ness of mu­tu­al kind­ness.

This great gift al­so thou be­stowedst, O my God, my mer­cy, up­on that good hand­maid of Thine, in whose womb Thou cre­at­edst me, that be­tween any dis­agree­ing and dis­cor­dant par­ties where she was able, she showed her­self such a peace­mak­er, that hear­ing on both sides most bit­ter things, such as swelling and in­di­gest­ed choler us­es to break out in­to, when the cru­di­ties of en­mi­ties are breathed out in sour dis­cours­es to a present friend against an ab­sent en­emy, she nev­er would dis­close aught of the one un­to the oth­er, but what might tend to their rec­on­cile­ment. A small good this might ap­pear to me, did I not to my grief know num­ber­less per­sons, who through some hor­ri­ble and wide-​spread­ing con­ta­gion of sin, not on­ly dis­close to per­sons mu­tu­al­ly an­gered things said in anger, but add with­al things nev­er spo­ken, where­as to hu­mane hu­man­ity, it ought to seem a light thing not to to­ment or in­crease ill will by ill words, un­less one study with­al by good words to quench it. Such was she, Thy­self, her most in­ward In­struc­tor, teach­ing her in the school of the heart.

Fi­nal­ly, her own hus­band, to­wards the very end of his earth­ly life, did she gain un­to Thee; nor had she to com­plain of that in him as a be­liev­er, which be­fore he was a be­liev­er she had borne from him. She was al­so the ser­vant of Thy ser­vants; whoso­ev­er of them knew her, did in her much praise and hon­our and love Thee; for that through the wit­ness of the fruits of a holy con­ver­sa­tion they per­ceived Thy pres­ence in her heart. For she had been the wife of one man, had re­quit­ed her par­ents, had gov­emed her house pi­ous­ly, was well re­port­ed of for good works, had brought up chil­dren, so of­ten tra­vail­ing in birth of them, as she saw them swerv­ing from Thee. Last­ly, of all of us Thy ser­vants, O Lord (whom on oc­ca­sion of Thy own gift Thou suf­fer­est to speak), us, who be­fore her sleep­ing in Thee lived unit­ed to­geth­er, hav­ing re­ceived the grace of Thy bap­tism, did she so take care of, as though she had been moth­er of us all; so served us, as though she had been child to us all.

The day now ap­proach­ing where­on she was to de­part this life (which day Thou well knewest, we knew not), it came to pass, Thy­self, as I be­lieve, by Thy se­cret ways so or­der­ing it, that she and I stood alone, lean­ing in a cer­tain win­dow, which looked in­to the gar­den of the house where we now lay, at Os­tia; where re­moved from the din of men, we were re­cruit­ing from the fa­tigues of a long jour­ney, for the voy­age. We were dis­cours­ing then to­geth­er, alone, very sweet­ly; and for­get­ting those things which are be­hind, and reach­ing forth un­to those things which are be­fore, we were en­quir­ing be­tween our­selves in the pres­ence of the Truth, which Thou art, of what sort the eter­nal life of the saints was to be, which eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, nor hath it en­tered in­to the heart of man. But yet we gasped with the mouth of our heart, af­ter those heav­en­ly streams of Thy foun­tain, the foun­tain of life, which is with Thee; that be­ing be­dewed thence ac­cord­ing to our ca­pac­ity, we might in some sort med­itate up­on so high a mys­tery.

And when our dis­course was brought to that point, that the very high­est de­light of the earth­ly sens­es, in the very purest ma­te­ri­al light, was, in re­spect of the sweet­ness of that life, not on­ly not wor­thy of com­par­ison, but not even of men­tion; we rais­ing up our­selves with a more glow­ing af­fec­tion to­wards the “Self-​same,” did by de­grees pass through all things bod­ily, even the very heav­en whence sun and moon and stars shine up­on the earth; yea, we were soar­ing high­er yet, by in­ward mus­ing, and dis­course, and ad­mir­ing of Thy works; and we came to our own minds, and went be­yond them, that we might ar­rive at that re­gion of nev­er-​fail­ing plen­ty, where Thou feedest Is­rael for ev­er with the food of truth, and where life is the Wis­dom by whom all these things are made, and what have been, and what shall be, and she is not made, but is, as she hath been, and so shall she be ev­er; yea rather, to “have been,” and “here­after to be,” are not in her, but on­ly “to be,” see­ing she is eter­nal. For to “have been,” and to “be here­after,” are not eter­nal. And while we were dis­cours­ing and pant­ing af­ter her, we slight­ly touched on her with the whole ef­fort of our heart; and we sighed, and there we leave bound the first fruits of the Spir­it; and re­turned to vo­cal ex­pres­sions of our mouth, where the word spo­ken has be­gin­ning and end. And what is like un­to Thy Word, our Lord, who en­dureth in Him­self with­out be­com­ing old, and maketh all things new?

We were say­ing then: If to any the tu­mult of the flesh were hushed, hushed the im­ages of earth, and wa­ters, and air, hushed al­so the pole of heav­en, yea the very soul be hushed to her­self, and by not think­ing on self sur­mount self, hushed all dreams and imag­inary rev­ela­tions, ev­ery tongue and ev­ery sign, and what­so­ev­er ex­ists on­ly in tran­si­tion, since if any could hear, all these say, We made not our­selves, but He made us that abideth for ev­er- If then hav­ing ut­tered this, they too should be hushed, hav­ing roused on­ly our ears to Him who made them, and He alone speak, not by them but by Him­self, that we may hear His Word, not through any tongue of flesh, nor An­gel’s voice, nor sound of thun­der, nor in the dark rid­dle of a simil­itude, but might hear Whom in these things we love, might hear His Very Self with­out these (as we two now strained our­selves, and in swift thought touched on that Eter­nal Wis­dom which abideth over all); -could this be con­tin­ued on, and oth­er vi­sions of kind far un­like be with­drawn, and this one rav­ish, and ab­sorb, and wrap up its be­hold­er amid these in­ward joys, so that life might be for ev­er like that one mo­ment of un­der­stand­ing which now we sighed af­ter; were not this, En­ter in­to thy Mas­ter’s joy? And when shall that be? When we shall all rise again, though we shall not all be changed?

Such things was I speak­ing, and even if not in this very man­ner, and these same words, yet, Lord, Thou know­est that in that day when we were speak­ing of these things, and this world with all its de­lights be­came, as we spake, con­temptible to us, my moth­er said, “Son, for mine own part I have no fur­ther de­light in any thing in this life. What I do here any longer, and to what I am here, I know not, now that my hopes in this world are ac­com­plished. One thing there was for which I de­sired to linger for a while in this life, that I might see thee a Catholic Chris­tian be­fore I died. My God hath done this for me more abun­dant­ly, that I should now see thee with­al, de­spis­ing earth­ly hap­pi­ness, be­come His ser­vant: what do I here?”

What an­swer I made her un­to these things, I re­mem­ber not. For scarce five days af­ter, or not much more, she fell sick of a fever; and in that sick­ness one day she fell in­to a swoon, and was for a while with­drawn from these vis­ible things. We has­tened round her; but she was soon brought back to her sens­es; and look­ing on me and my broth­er stand­ing by her, said to us en­quir­ing­ly, “Where was I?” And then look­ing fixed­ly on us, with grief amazed: “Here,” saith she, “shall you bury your moth­er.” I held my peace and re­frained weep­ing; but my broth­er spake some­thing, wish­ing for her, as the hap­pi­er lot, that she might die, not in a strange place, but in her own land. Where­at, she with anx­ious look, check­ing him with her eyes, for that he still savoured such things, and then look­ing up­on me: “Be­hold,” saith she, “what he saith”: and soon af­ter to us both, “Lay,” she saith, “this body any where; let not the care for that any way dis­qui­et you: this on­ly I re­quest, that you would re­mem­ber me at the Lord’s al­tar, wher­ev­er you be.” And hav­ing de­liv­ered this sen­ti­ment in what words she could, she held her peace, be­ing ex­er­cised by her grow­ing sick­ness.

But I, con­sid­er­ing Thy gifts, Thou un­seen God, which Thou in­stillest in­to the hearts of Thy faith­ful ones, whence won­drous fruits do spring, did re­joice and give thanks to Thee, re­call­ing what I be­fore knew, how care­ful and anx­ious she had ev­er been as to her place of buri­al, which she had pro­vid­ed and pre­pared for her­self by the body of her hus­band. For be­cause they had lived in great har­mo­ny to­geth­er, she al­so wished (so lit­tle can the hu­man mind em­brace things di­vine) to have this ad­di­tion to that hap­pi­ness, and to have it re­mem­bered among men, that af­ter her pil­grim­age be­yond the seas, what was earth­ly of this unit­ed pair had been per­mit­ted to be unit­ed be­neath the same earth. But when this empti­ness had through the ful­ness of Thy good­ness be­gun to cease in her heart, I knew not, and re­joiced ad­mir­ing what she had so dis­closed to me; though in­deed in that our dis­course al­so in the win­dow, when she said, “What do I here any longer?” there ap­peared no de­sire of dy­ing in her own coun­try. I heard af­ter­wards al­so, that when we were now at Os­tia, she with a moth­er’s con­fi­dence, when I was ab­sent, one day dis­coursed with cer­tain of my friends about the con­tempt of this life, and the bless­ing of death: and when they were amazed at such courage which Thou hadst giv­en to a wom­an, and asked, “Whether she were not afraid to leave her body so far from her own city?” she replied, “Noth­ing is far to God; nor was it to be feared lest at the end of the world, He should not recog­nise whence He were to raise me up.” On the ninth day then of her sick­ness, and the fifty-​sixth year of her age, and the three-​and-​thir­ti­eth of mine, was that re­li­gious and holy soul freed from the body.

I closed her eyes; and there flowed with­al a mighty sor­row in­to my heart, which was over­flow­ing in­to tears; mine eyes at the same time, by the vi­olent com­mand of my mind, drank up their foun­tain whol­ly dry; and woe was me in such a strife! But when she breathed her last, the boy Adeo­da­tus burst out in­to a loud lament; then, checked by us all, held his peace. In like man­ner al­so a child­ish feel­ing in me, which was, through my heart’s youth­ful voice, find­ing its vent in weep­ing, was checked and si­lenced. For we thought it not fit­ting to solem­nise that fu­ner­al with tear­ful lament, and groan­ings; for there­by do they for the most part ex­press grief for the de­part­ed, as though un­hap­py, or al­to­geth­er dead; where­as she was nei­ther un­hap­py in her death, nor al­to­geth­er dead. Of this we were as­sured on good grounds, the tes­ti­mo­ny of her good con­ver­sa­tion and her faith un­feigned.

What then was it which did grievous­ly pain me with­in, but a fresh wound wrought through the sud­den wrench of that most sweet and dear cus­tom of liv­ing to­geth­er? I joyed in­deed in her tes­ti­mo­ny, when, in that her last sick­ness, min­gling her en­dear­ments with my acts of du­ty, she called me “du­ti­ful,” and men­tioned, with great af­fec­tion of love, that she nev­er had heard any harsh or re­proach­ful sound ut­tered by my mouth against her. But yet, O my God, Who madest us, what com­par­ison is there be­twixt that hon­our that I paid to her, and her slav­ery for me? Be­ing then for­sak­en of so great com­fort in her, my soul was wound­ed, and that life rent asun­der as it were, which, of hers and mine to­geth­er, had been made but one.

The boy then be­ing stilled from weep­ing, Eu­odius took up the Psalter, and be­gan to sing, our whole house an­swer­ing him, the Psalm, I will sing of mer­cy and judg­ments to Thee, O Lord. But hear­ing what we were do­ing, many brethren and re­li­gious wom­en came to­geth­er; and whilst they (whose of­fice it was) made ready for the buri­al, as the man­ner is, I (in a part of the house, where I might prop­er­ly), to­geth­er with those who thought not fit to leave me, dis­coursed up­on some­thing fit­ting the time; and by this balm of truth as­suaged that tor­ment, known to Thee, they un­know­ing and lis­ten­ing in­tent­ly, and con­ceiv­ing me to be with­out all sense of sor­row. But in Thy ears, where none of them heard, I blamed the weak­ness of my feel­ings, and re­frained my flood of grief, which gave way a lit­tle un­to me; but again came, as with a tide, yet not so as to burst out in­to tears, nor to change of coun­te­nance; still I knew what I was keep­ing down in my heart. And be­ing very much dis­pleased that these hu­man things had such pow­er over me, which in the due or­der and ap­point­ment of our nat­ural con­di­tion must needs come to pass, with a new grief I grieved for my grief, and was thus worn by a dou­ble sor­row.

And be­hold, the corpse was car­ried to the buri­al; we went and re­turned with­out tears. For nei­ther in those prayers which we poured forth un­to Thee, when the Sac­ri­fice of our ran­som was of­fered for her, when now the corpse was by the grave’s side, as the man­ner there is, pre­vi­ous to its be­ing laid there­in, did I weep even dur­ing those prayers; yet was I the whole day in se­cret heav­ily sad, and with trou­bled mind prayed Thee, as I could, to heal my sor­row, yet Thou didst not; im­press­ing, I be­lieve, up­on my mem­ory by this one in­stance, how strong is the bond of all habit, even up­on a soul, which now feeds up­on no de­ceiv­ing Word. It seemed al­so good to me to go and bathe, hav­ing heard that the bath had its name (bal­neum) from the Greek Bal­aneion for that it drives sad­ness from the mind. And this al­so I con­fess un­to Thy mer­cy, Fa­ther of the fa­ther­less, that I bathed, and was the same as be­fore I bathed. For the bit­ter­ness of sor­row could not ex­ude out of my heart. Then I slept, and woke up again, and found my grief not a lit­tle soft­ened; and as I was alone in my bed, I re­mem­bered those true vers­es of Thy Am­brose. For Thou art the

“Mak­er of all, the Lord, And Ruler of the height, Who, rob­ing day in light, hast poured Soft slum­bers o’er the night, That to our limbs the pow­er Of toil may be re­new’d, And hearts be rais’d that sink and cow­er, And sor­rows be sub­du’d.”

And then by lit­tle and lit­tle I re­cov­ered my for­mer thoughts of Thy hand­maid, her holy con­ver­sa­tion to­wards Thee, her holy ten­der­ness and ob­ser­vance to­wards us, where­of I was sud­den­ly de­prived: and I was mind­ed to weep in Thy sight, for her and for my­self, in her be­half and in my own. And I gave way to the tears which I be­fore re­strained, to over­flow as much as they de­sired; repos­ing my heart up­on them; and it found rest in them, for it was in Thy ears, not in those of man, who would have scorn­ful­ly in­ter­pret­ed my weep­ing. And now, Lord, in writ­ing I con­fess it un­to Thee. Read it, who will, and in­ter­pret it, how he will: and if he finds sin there­in, that I wept my moth­er for a small por­tion of an hour (the moth­er who for the time was dead to mine eyes, who had for many years wept for me that I might live in Thine eyes), let him not de­ride me; but rather, if he be one of large char­ity, let him weep him­self for my sins un­to Thee, the Fa­ther of all the brethren of Thy Christ.

But now, with a heart cured of that wound, where­in it might seem blame­wor­thy for an earth­ly feel­ing, I pour out un­to Thee, our God, in be­half of that Thy hand­maid, a far dif­fer­ent kind of tears, flow­ing from a spir­it shak­en by the thoughts of the dan­gers of ev­ery soul that di­eth in Adam. And al­though she hav­ing been quick­ened in Christ, even be­fore her re­lease from the flesh, had lived to the praise of Thy name for her faith and con­ver­sa­tion; yet dare I not say that from what time Thou re­gen­er­at­edst her by bap­tism, no word is­sued from her mouth against Thy Com­mand­ment. Thy Son, the Truth, hath said, Whoso­ev­er shall say un­to his broth­er, Thou fool, shall be in dan­ger of hell fire. And woe be even un­to the com­mend­able life of men, if, lay­ing aside mer­cy, Thou shouldest ex­am­ine it. But be­cause Thou art not ex­treme in en­quir­ing af­ter sins, we con­fi­dent­ly hope to find some place with Thee. But whoso­ev­er reck­ons up his re­al mer­its to Thee, what reck­ons he up to Thee but Thine own gifts? O that men would know them­selves to be men; and that he that glo­ri­eth would glo­ry in the Lord.

I there­fore, O my Praise and my Life, God of my heart, lay­ing aside for a while her good deeds, for which I give thanks to Thee with joy, do now be­seech Thee for the sins of my moth­er. Hear­ken un­to me, I en­treat Thee, by the Medicine of our wounds, Who hung up­on the tree, and now sit­ting at Thy right hand maketh in­ter­ces­sion to Thee for us. I know that she dealt mer­ci­ful­ly, and from her heart for­gave her debtors their debts; do Thou al­so for­give her debts, what­ev­er she may have con­tract­ed in so many years, since the wa­ter of sal­va­tion. For­give her, Lord, for­give, I be­seech Thee; en­ter not in­to judg­ment with her. Let Thy mer­cy be ex­alt­ed above Thy jus­tice, since Thy words are true, and Thou hast promised mer­cy un­to the mer­ci­ful; which Thou gavest them to be, who wilt have mer­cy on whom Thou wilt have mer­cy; and wilt have com­pas­sion on whom Thou hast had com­pas­sion.

And, I be­lieve, Thou hast al­ready done what I ask; but ac­cept, O Lord, the free-​will of­fer­ings of my mouth. For she, the day of her dis­so­lu­tion now at hand, took no thought to have her body sump­tu­ous­ly wound up, or em­balmed with spices; nor de­sired she a choice mon­ument, or to be buried in her own land. These things she en­joined us not; but de­sired on­ly to have her name com­mem­orat­ed at Thy Al­tar, which she had served with­out in­ter­mis­sion of one day: whence she knew the holy Sac­ri­fice to be dis­pensed, by which the hand-​writ­ing that was against us is blot­ted out; through which the en­emy was tri­umphed over, who sum­ming up our of­fences, and seek­ing what to lay to our charge, found noth­ing in Him, in Whom we con­quer. Who shall re­store to Him the in­no­cent blood? Who re­pay Him the price where­with He bought us, and so take us from Him? Un­to the Sacra­ment of which our ran­som, Thy hand­maid bound her soul by the bond of faith. Let none sev­er her from Thy pro­tec­tion: let nei­ther the li­on nor the drag­on in­ter­pose him­self by force or fraud. For she will not an­swer that she owes noth­ing, lest she be con­vict­ed and seized by the crafty ac­cus­er: but she will an­swer that her sins are for­giv­en her by Him, to Whom none can re­pay that price which He, Who owed noth­ing, paid for us.

May she rest then in peace with the hus­band be­fore and af­ter whom she had nev­er any; whom she obeyed, with pa­tience bring­ing forth fruit un­to Thee, that she might win him al­so un­to Thee. And in­spire, O Lord my God, in­spire Thy ser­vants my brethren, Thy sons my mas­ters, whom with voice, and heart, and pen I serve, that so many as shall read these Con­fes­sions, may at Thy Al­tar re­mem­ber Mon­ni­ca Thy hand­maid, with Patri­cius, her some­times hus­band, by whose bod­ies Thou brought­est me in­to this life, how I know not. May they with de­vout af­fec­tion re­mem­ber my par­ents in this tran­si­to­ry light, my brethren un­der Thee our Fa­ther in our Catholic Moth­er, and my fel­low-​cit­izens in that eter­nal Jerusalem which Thy pil­grim peo­ple sigheth af­ter from their Ex­odus, even un­to their re­turn thith­er. That so my moth­er’s last re­quest of me, may through my con­fes­sions, more than through my prayers, be, through the prayers of many, more abun­dant­ly ful­filled to her.