The Confessions of St. Augustine

BOOK X

Let me know Thee, O Lord, who know­est me: let me know Thee, as I am known. Pow­er of my soul, en­ter in­to it, and fit it for Thee, that Thou mayest have and hold it with­out spot or wrin­kle. This is my hope, there­fore do I speak; and in this hope do I re­joice, when I re­joice health­ful­ly. Oth­er things of this life are the less to be sor­rowed for, the more they are sor­rowed for; and the more to be sor­rowed for, the less men sor­row for them. For be­hold, Thou lovest the truth, and he that doth it, cometh to the light. This would I do in my heart be­fore Thee in con­fes­sion: and in my writ­ing, be­fore many wit­ness­es.

And from Thee, O Lord, un­to whose eyes the abyss of man’s con­science is naked, what could be hid­den in me though I would not con­fess it? For I should hide Thee from me, not me from Thee. But now, for that my groan­ing is wit­ness, that I am dis­pleased with my­self, Thou shinest out, and art pleas­ing, and beloved, and longed for; that I may be ashamed of my­self, and re­nounce my­self, and choose Thee, and nei­ther please Thee nor my­self, but in Thee. To Thee there­fore, O Lord, am I open, what­ev­er I am; and with what fruit I con­fess un­to Thee, I have said. Nor do I it with words and sounds of the flesh, but with the words of my soul, and the cry of the thought which Thy ear knoweth. For when I am evil, then to con­fess to Thee is noth­ing else than to be dis­pleased with my­self; but when holy, noth­ing else than not to as­cribe it to my­self: be­cause Thou, O Lord, bless­est the god­ly, but first Thou jus­ti­fi­eth him when un­god­ly. My con­fes­sion then, O my God, in Thy sight, is made silent­ly, and not silent­ly. For in sound, it is silent; in af­fec­tion, it cries aloud. For nei­ther do I ut­ter any thing right un­to men, which Thou hast not be­fore heard from me; nor dost Thou hear any such thing from me, which Thou hast not first said un­to me.

What then have I to do with men, that they should hear my con­fes­sions- as if they could heal all my in­fir­mi­ties- a race, cu­ri­ous to know the lives of oth­ers, sloth­ful to amend their own? Why seek they to hear from me what I am; who will not hear from Thee what them­selves are? And how know they, when from my­self they hear of my­self, whether I say true; see­ing no man knows what is in man, but the spir­it of man which is in him? But if they hear from Thee of them­selves, they can­not say, “The Lord li­eth.” For what is it to hear from Thee of them­selves, but to know them­selves? and who knoweth and saith, “It is false,” un­less him­self li­eth? But be­cause char­ity be­lieveth all things (that is, among those whom knit­ting un­to it­self it maketh one), I al­so, O Lord, will in such wise con­fess un­to Thee, that men may hear, to whom I can­not demon­strate whether I con­fess tru­ly; yet they be­lieve me, whose ears char­ity openeth un­to me.

But do Thou, my in­most Physi­cian, make plain un­to me what fruit I may reap by do­ing it. For the con­fes­sions of my past sins, which Thou hast for­giv­en and cov­ered, that Thou might­est bless me in Thee, chang­ing my soul by Faith and Thy Sacra­ment, when read and heard, stir up the heart, that it sleep not in de­spair and say “I can­not,” but awake in the love of Thy mer­cy and the sweet­ness of Thy grace, where­by whoso is weak, is strong, when by it he be­came con­scious of his own weak­ness. And the good de­light to hear of the past evils of such as are now freed from them, not be­cause they are evils, but be­cause they have been and are not. With what fruit then, O Lord my God, to Whom my con­science dai­ly con­fes­seth, trust­ing more in the hope of Thy mer­cy than in her own in­no­cen­cy, with what fruit, I pray, do I by this book con­fess to men al­so in Thy pres­ence what I now am, not what I have been? For that oth­er fruit I have seen and spo­ken of. But what I now am, at the very time of mak­ing these con­fes­sions, divers de­sire to know, who have or have not known me, who have heard from me or of me; but their ear is not at my heart where I am, what­ev­er I am. They wish then to hear me con­fess what I am with­in; whith­er nei­ther their eye, nor ear, nor un­der­stand­ing can reach; they wish it, as ready to be­lieve- but will they know? For char­ity, where­by they are good, tel­leth them that in my con­fes­sions I lie not; and she in them, be­lieveth me.

But for what fruit would they hear this? Do they de­sire to joy with me, when they hear how near, by Thy gift, I ap­proach un­to Thee? and to pray for me, when they shall hear how much I am held back by my own weight? To such will I dis­cov­er my­self For it is no mean fruit, O Lord my God, that by many thanks should be giv­en to Thee on our be­half, and Thou be by many en­treat­ed for us. Let the broth­er­ly mind love in me what Thou teach­est is to be loved, and lament in me what Thou teach­est is to be lament­ed. Let a broth­er­ly, not a stranger, mind, not that of the strange chil­dren, whose mouth talketh of van­ity, and their right hand is a right hand of in­iq­ui­ty, but that broth­er­ly mind which when it ap­proveth, re­joiceth for me, and when it dis­ap­proveth me, is sor­ry for me; be­cause whether it ap­proveth or dis­ap­proveth, it loveth me. To such will I dis­cov­er my­self: they will breathe freely at my good deeds, sigh for my ill. My good deeds are Thine ap­point­ments, and Thy gifts; my evil ones are my of­fences, and Thy judg­ments. Let them breathe freely at the one, sigh at the oth­er; and let hymns and weep­ing go up in­to Thy sight, out of the hearts of my brethren, Thy censers. And do Thou, O Lord, he pleased with the in­cense of Thy holy tem­ple, have mer­cy up­on me ac­cord­ing to Thy great mer­cy for Thine own name’s sake; and no ways for­sak­ing what Thou hast be­gun, per­fect my im­per­fec­tions.

This is the fruit of my con­fes­sions of what I am, not of what I have been, to con­fess this, not be­fore Thee on­ly, in a se­cret ex­ul­ta­tion with trem­bling, and a se­cret sor­row with hope; but in the ears al­so of the be­liev­ing sons of men, shar­ers of my joy, and part­ners in my mor­tal­ity, my fel­low-​cit­izens, and fel­low-​pil­grims, who are gone be­fore, or are to fol­low on, com­pan­ions of my way. These are Thy ser­vants, my brethren, whom Thou willest to be Thy sons; my mas­ters, whom Thou com­man­dest me to serve, if I would live with Thee, of Thee. But this Thy Word were lit­tle did it on­ly com­mand by speak­ing, and not go be­fore in per­form­ing. This then I do in deed and word, this I do un­der Thy wings; in over great per­il, were not my soul sub­dued un­to Thee un­der Thy wings, and my in­fir­mi­ty known un­to Thee. I am a lit­tle one, but my Fa­ther ev­er liveth, and my Guardian is suf­fi­cient for me. For He is the same who be­gat me, and de­fends me: and Thou Thy­self art all my good; Thou, Almighty, Who are with me, yea, be­fore I am with Thee. To such then whom Thou com­man­dest me to serve will I dis­cov­er, not what I have been, but what I now am and what I yet am. But nei­ther do I judge my­self. Thus there­fore I would be heard.

For Thou, Lord, dost judge me: be­cause, al­though no man knoweth the things of a man, but the spir­it of a man which is in him, yet is there some­thing of man, which nei­ther the spir­it of man that is in him, it­self knoweth. But Thou, Lord, know­est all of him, Who hast made him. Yet I, though in Thy sight I de­spise my­self, and ac­count my­self dust and ash­es; yet know I some­thing of Thee, which I know not of my­self. And tru­ly, now we see through a glass dark­ly, not face to face as yet. So long there­fore as I be ab­sent from Thee, I am more present with my­self than with Thee; and yet know I Thee that Thou art in no ways pas­si­ble; but I, what temp­ta­tions I can re­sist, what I can­not, I know not. And there is hope, be­cause Thou art faith­ful, Who wilt not suf­fer us to be tempt­ed above that we are able; but wilt with the temp­ta­tion al­so make a way to es­cape, that we may be able to bear it. I will con­fess then what I know of my­self, I will con­fess al­so what I know not of my­self. And that be­cause what I do know of my­self, I know by Thy shin­ing up­on me; and what I know not of my­self, so long know I not it, un­til my dark­ness be made as the noon-​day in Thy coun­te­nance.

Not with doubt­ing, but with as­sured con­scious­ness, do I love Thee, Lord. Thou hast strick­en my heart with Thy word, and I loved Thee. Yea al­so heav­en, and earth, and all that there­in is, be­hold, on ev­ery side they bid me love Thee; nor cease to say so un­to all, that they may be with­out ex­cuse. But more deeply wilt Thou have mer­cy on whom Thou wilt have mer­cy, and wilt have com­pas­sion on whom Thou hast had com­pas­sion: else in deaf ears do the heav­en and the earth speak Thy prais­es. But what do I love, when I love Thee? not beau­ty of bod­ies, nor the fair har­mo­ny of time, nor the bright­ness of the light, so glad­some to our eyes, nor sweet melodies of var­ied songs, nor the fra­grant smell of flow­ers, and oint­ments, and spices, not man­na and hon­ey, not limbs ac­cept­able to em­brace­ments of flesh. None of these I love, when I love my God; and yet I love a kind of light, and melody, and fra­grance, and meat, and em­brace­ment when I love my God, the light, melody, fra­grance, meat, em­brace­ment of my in­ner man: where there shineth un­to my soul what space can­not con­tain, and there soundeth what time beareth not away, and there smelleth what breath­ing dis­per­seth not, and there tasteth what eat­ing di­min­isheth not, and there clingeth what sati­ety di­vorceth not. This is it which I love when I love my God.

And what is this? I asked the earth, and it an­swered me, “I am not He”; and what­so­ev­er are in it con­fessed the same. I asked the sea and the deeps, and the liv­ing creep­ing things, and they an­swered, “We are not thy God, seek above us.” I asked the mov­ing air; and the whole air with his in­hab­itants an­swered, “Anaximenes was de­ceived, I am not God. ” I asked the heav­ens, sun, moon, stars, “Nor (say they) are we the God whom thou seek­est.” And I replied un­to all the things which en­com­pass the door of my flesh: “Ye have told me of my God, that ye are not He; tell me some­thing of Him.” And they cried out with a loud voice, “He made us. ” My ques­tion­ing them, was my thoughts on them: and their form of beau­ty gave the an­swer. And I turned my­self un­to my­self, and said to my­self, “Who art thou?” And I an­swered, “A man.” And be­hold, in me there present them­selves to me soul, and body, one with­out, the oth­er with­in. By which of these ought I to seek my God? I had sought Him in the body from earth to heav­en, so far as I could send mes­sen­gers, the beams of mine eyes. But the bet­ter is the in­ner, for to it as pre­sid­ing and judg­ing, all the bod­ily mes­sen­gers re­port­ed the an­swers of heav­en and earth, and all things there­in, who said, “We are not God, but He made us.” These things did my in­ner man know by the min­istry of the out­er: I the in­ner knew them; I, the mind, through the sens­es of my body. I asked the whole frame of the world about my God; and it an­swered me, “I am not He, but He made me.

Is not this cor­po­re­al fig­ure ap­par­ent to all whose sens­es are per­fect? why then speaks it not the same to all? An­imals small and great see it, but they can­not ask it: be­cause no rea­son is set over their sens­es to judge on what they re­port. But men can ask, so that the in­vis­ible things of God are clear­ly seen, be­ing un­der­stood by the things that are made; but by love of them, they are made sub­ject un­to them: and sub­jects can­not judge. Nor yet do the crea­tures an­swer such as ask, un­less they can judge; nor yet do they change their voice (i.e., their ap­pear­ance), if one man on­ly sees, an­oth­er see­ing asks, so as to ap­pear one way to this man, an­oth­er way to that, but ap­pear­ing the same way to both, it is dumb to this, speaks to that; yea rather it speaks to all; but they on­ly un­der­stand, who com­pare its voice re­ceived from with­out, with the truth with­in. For truth saith un­to me, “Nei­ther heav­en, nor earth, nor any oth­er body is thy God.” This, their very na­ture saith to him that seeth them: “They are a mass; a mass is less in a part there­of than in the whole.” Now to thee I speak, O my soul, thou art my bet­ter part: for thou quick­en­est the mass of my body, giv­ing it life, which no body can give to a body: but thy God is even un­to thee the Life of thy life.

What then do I love, when I love my God? who is He above the head of my soul? By my very soul will I as­cend to Him. I will pass be­yond that pow­er where­by I am unit­ed to my body, and fill its whole frame with life. Nor can I by that pow­er find my God; for so horse and mule that have no un­der­stand­ing might find Him; see­ing it is the same pow­er, where­by even their bod­ies live. But an­oth­er pow­er there is, not that on­ly where­by I an­imate, but that too where­by I im­bue with sense my flesh, which the Lord hath framed for me: com­mand­ing the eye not to hear, and the ear not to see; but the eye, that through it I should see, and the ear, that through it I should hear; and to the oth­er sens­es sev­er­al­ly, what is to each their own pe­cu­liar seats and of­fices; which, be­ing divers, I the one mind, do through them en­act. I will pass be­yond this pow­er of mine al­so; for this al­so have the horse, and mule, for they al­so per­ceive through the body.

I will pass then be­yond this pow­er of my na­ture al­so, ris­ing by de­grees un­to Him Who made me. And I come to the fields and spa­cious palaces of my mem­ory, where are the trea­sures of in­nu­mer­able im­ages, brought in­to it from things of all sorts per­ceived by the sens­es. There is stored up, what­so­ev­er be­sides we think, ei­ther by en­larg­ing or di­min­ish­ing, or any oth­er way vary­ing those things which the sense hath come to; and what­ev­er else hath been com­mit­ted and laid up, which for­get­ful­ness hath not yet swal­lowed up and buried. When I en­ter there, I re­quire what I will to be brought forth, and some­thing in­stant­ly comes; oth­ers must be longer sought af­ter, which are fetched, as it were, out of some in­ner re­cep­ta­cle; oth­ers rush out in troops, and while one thing is de­sired and re­quired, they start forth, as who should say, “Is it per­chance I?” These I drive away with the hand of my heart, from the face of my re­mem­brance; un­til what I wish for be un­veiled, and ap­pear in sight, out of its se­cret place. Oth­er things come up read­ily, in un­bro­ken or­der, as they are called for; those in front mak­ing way for the fol­low­ing; and as they make way, they are hid­den from sight, ready to come when I will. All which takes place when I re­peat a thing by heart.

There are all things pre­served dis­tinct­ly and un­der gen­er­al heads, each hav­ing en­tered by its own av­enue: as light, and all colours and forms of bod­ies by the eyes; by the ears all sorts of sounds; all smells by the av­enue of the nos­trils; all tastes by the mouth; and by the sen­sa­tion of the whole body, what is hard or soft; hot or cold; or rugged; heavy or light; ei­ther out­ward­ly or in­ward­ly to the body. All these doth that great har­bour of the mem­ory re­ceive in her num­ber­less se­cret and in­ex­press­ible wind­ings, to be forth­com­ing, and brought out at need; each en­ter­ing in by his own gate, and there laid up. Nor yet do the things them­selves en­ter in; on­ly the im­ages of the things per­ceived are there in readi­ness, for thought to re­call. Which im­ages, how they are formed, who can tell, though it doth plain­ly ap­pear by which sense each hath been brought in and stored up? For even while I dwell in dark­ness and si­lence, in my mem­ory I can pro­duce colours, if I will, and dis­cern be­twixt black and white, and what oth­ers I will: nor yet do sounds break in and dis­turb the im­age drawn in by my eyes, which I am re­view­ing, though they al­so are there, ly­ing dor­mant, and laid up, as it were, apart. For these too I call for, and forth­with they ap­pear. And though my tongue be still, and my throat mute, so can I sing as much as I will; nor do those im­ages of colours, which notwith­stand­ing be there, in­trude them­selves and in­ter­rupt, when an­oth­er store is called for, which flowed in by the ears. So the oth­er things, piled in and up by the oth­er sens­es, I re­call at my plea­sure. Yea, I dis­cern the breath of lilies from vi­olets, though smelling noth­ing; and I pre­fer hon­ey to sweet wine, smooth be­fore rugged, at the time nei­ther tast­ing nor han­dling, but re­mem­ber­ing on­ly.

These things do I with­in, in that vast court of my mem­ory. For there are present with me, heav­en, earth, sea, and what­ev­er I could think on there­in, be­sides what I have for­got­ten. There al­so meet I with my­self, and re­call my­self, and when, where, and what I have done, and un­der what feel­ings. There be all which I re­mem­ber, ei­ther on my own ex­pe­ri­ence, or oth­er’s cred­it. Out of the same store do I my­self with the past con­tin­ual­ly com­bine fresh and fresh like­ness­es of things which I have ex­pe­ri­enced, or, from what I have ex­pe­ri­enced, have be­lieved: and thence again in­fer fu­ture ac­tions, events and hopes, and all these again I re­flect on, as present. “I will do this or that,” say I to my­self, in that great re­cep­ta­cle of my mind, stored with the im­ages of things so many and so great, “and this or that will fol­low.” “O that this or that might be!” “God avert this or that!” So speak I to my­self: and when I speak, the im­ages of all I speak of are present, out of the same trea­sury of mem­ory; nor would I speak of any there­of, were the im­ages want­ing.

Great is this force of mem­ory, ex­ces­sive great, O my God; a large and bound­less cham­ber! who ev­er sound­ed the bot­tom there­of? yet is this a pow­er of mine, and be­longs un­to my na­ture; nor do I my­self com­pre­hend all that I am. There­fore is the mind too strait to con­tain it­self. And where should that be, which it con­taineth not of it­self? Is it with­out it, and not with­in? how then doth it not com­pre­hend it­self? A won­der­ful ad­mi­ra­tion sur­pris­es me, amaze­ment seizes me up­on this. And men go abroad to ad­mire the heights of moun­tains, the mighty bil­lows of the sea, the broad tides of rivers, the com­pass of the ocean, and the cir­cuits of the stars, and pass them­selves by; nor won­der that when I spake of all these things, I did not see them with mine eyes, yet could not have spo­ken of them, un­less I then ac­tu­al­ly saw the moun­tains, bil­lows, rivers, stars which I had seen, and that ocean which I be­lieve to be, in­ward­ly in my mem­ory, and that, with the same vast spaces be­tween, as if I saw them abroad. Yet did not I by see­ing draw them in­to my­self, when with mine eyes I be­held them; nor are they them­selves with me, but their im­ages on­ly. And I know by what sense of the body each was im­pressed up­on me.

Yet not these alone does the un­mea­sur­able ca­pac­ity of my mem­ory re­tain. Here al­so is all, learnt of the lib­er­al sci­ences and as yet un­for­got­ten; re­moved as it were to some in­ner place, which is yet no place: nor are they the im­ages there­of, but the things them­selves. For, what is lit­er­ature, what the art of dis­put­ing, how many kinds of ques­tions there be, what­so­ev­er of these I know, in such man­ner ex­ists in my mem­ory, as that I have not tak­en in the im­age, and left out the thing, or that it should have sound­ed and passed away like a voice fixed on the ear by that im­press, where­by it might be re­called, as if it sound­ed, when it no longer sound­ed; or as a smell while it pass­es and evap­orates in­to air af­fects the sense of smell, whence it con­veys in­to the mem­ory an im­age of it­self, which re­mem­ber­ing, we re­new, or as meat, which ver­ily in the bel­ly hath now no taste, and yet in the mem­ory still in a man­ner tasteth; or as any thing which the body by touch per­ceiveth, and which when re­moved from us, the mem­ory still con­ceives. For those things are not trans­mit­ted in­to the mem­ory, but their im­ages on­ly are with an ad­mirable swift­ness caught up, and stored as it were in won­drous cab­inets, and thence won­der­ful­ly by the act of re­mem­ber­ing, brought forth.

But now when I hear that there be three kinds of ques­tions, “Whether the thing be? what it is? of what kind it is? I do in­deed hold the im­ages of the sounds of which those words be com­posed, and that those sounds, with a noise passed through the air, and now are not. But the things them­selves which are sig­ni­fied by those sounds, I nev­er reached with any sense of my body, nor ev­er dis­cerned them oth­er­wise than in my mind; yet in my mem­ory have I laid up not their im­ages, but them­selves. Which how they en­tered in­to me, let them say if they can; for I have gone over all the av­enues of my flesh, but can­not find by which they en­tered. For the eyes say, “If those im­ages were coloured, we re­port­ed of them.” The ears say, “If they sound, we gave knowl­edge of them.” The nos­trils say, “If they smell, they passed by us.” The taste says, “Un­less they have a savour, ask me not.” The touch says, “If it have not size, I han­dled it not; if I han­dled it not, I gave no no­tice of it.” Whence and how en­tered these things in­to my mem­ory? I know not how. For when I learned them, I gave not cred­it to an­oth­er man’s mind, but recog­nised them in mine; and ap­prov­ing them for true, I com­mend­ed them to it, lay­ing them up as it were, whence I might bring them forth when I willed. In my heart then they were, even be­fore I learned them, but in my mem­ory they were not. Where then? or where­fore, when they were spo­ken, did I ac­knowl­edge them, and said, “So is it, it is true,” un­less that they were al­ready in the mem­ory, but so thrown back and buried as it were in deep­er re­cess­es, that had not the sug­ges­tion of an­oth­er drawn them forth I had per­chance been un­able to con­ceive of them?

Where­fore we find, that to learn these things where­of we im­bibe nor the im­ages by our sens­es, but per­ceive with­in by them­selves, with­out im­ages, as they are, is noth­ing else, but by con­cep­tion, to re­ceive, and by mark­ing to take heed that those things which the mem­ory did be­fore con­tain at ran­dom and unar­ranged, be laid up at hand as it were in that same mem­ory where be­fore they lay un­known, scat­tered and ne­glect­ed, and so read­ily oc­cur to the mind fa­mil­iarised to them. And how many things of this kind does my mem­ory bear which have been al­ready found out, and as I said, placed as it were at hand, which we are said to have learned and come to know which were I for some short space of time to cease to call to mind, they are again so buried, and glide back, as it were, in­to the deep­er re­cess­es, that they must again, as if new, he thought out thence, for oth­er abode they have none: but they must be drawn to­geth­er again, that they may be known; that is to say, they must as it were be col­lect­ed to­geth­er from their dis­per­sion: whence the word “cog­ita­tion” is de­rived. For co­go (col­lect) and cog­ito (re-​col­lect) have the same re­la­tion to each oth­er as ago and ag­ito, fa­cio and fac­ti­to. But the mind hath ap­pro­pri­at­ed to it­self this word (cog­ita­tion), so that, not what is “col­lect­ed” any how, but what is “rec­ol­lect­ed,” i.e., brought to­geth­er, in the mind, is prop­er­ly said to be cog­itat­ed, or thought up­on.

The mem­ory con­taineth al­so rea­sons and laws in­nu­mer­able of num­bers and di­men­sions, none of which hath any bod­ily sense im­pressed; see­ing they have nei­ther colour, nor sound, nor taste, nor smell, nor touch. I have heard the sound of the words where­by when dis­cussed they are de­not­ed: but the sounds are oth­er than the things. For the sounds are oth­er in Greek than in Latin; but the things are nei­ther Greek, nor Latin, nor any oth­er lan­guage. I have seen the lines of ar­chi­tects, the very finest, like a spi­der’s thread; but those are still dif­fer­ent, they are not the im­ages of those lines which the eye of flesh showed me: he knoweth them, whoso­ev­er with­out any con­cep­tion what­so­ev­er of a body, recog­nis­es them with­in him­self. I have per­ceived al­so the num­bers of the things with which we num­ber all the sens­es of my body; but those num­bers where­with we num­ber are dif­fer­ent, nor are they the im­ages of these, and there­fore they in­deed are. Let him who seeth them not, de­ride me for say­ing these things, and I will pity him, while he de­rides me.

All these things I re­mem­ber, and how I learnt them I re­mem­ber. Many things al­so most false­ly ob­ject­ed against them have I heard, and re­mem­ber; which though they be false, yet is it not false that I re­mem­ber them; and I re­mem­ber al­so that I have dis­cerned be­twixt those truths and these false­hoods ob­ject­ed to them. And I per­ceive that the present dis­cern­ing of these things is dif­fer­ent from re­mem­ber­ing that I of­ten­times dis­cerned them, when I of­ten thought up­on them. I both re­mem­ber then to have of­ten un­der­stood these things; and what I now dis­cern and un­der­stand, I lay up in my mem­ory, that here­after I may re­mem­ber that I un­der­stand it now. So then I re­mem­ber al­so to have re­mem­bered; as if here­after I shall call to re­mem­brance, that I have now been able to re­mem­ber these things, by the force of mem­ory shall I call it to re­mem­brance.

The same mem­ory con­tains al­so the af­fec­tions of my mind, not in the same man­ner that my mind it­self con­tains them, when it feels them; but far oth­er­wise, ac­cord­ing to a pow­er of its own. For with­out re­joic­ing I re­mem­ber my­self to have joyed; and with­out sor­row do I rec­ol­lect my past sor­row. And that I once feared, I re­view with­out fear; and with­out de­sire call to mind a past de­sire. Some­times, on the con­trary, with joy do I re­mem­ber my fore-​past sor­row, and with sor­row, joy. Which is not won­der­ful, as to the body; for mind is one thing, body an­oth­er. If I there­fore with joy re­mem­ber some past pain of body, it is not so won­der­ful. But now see­ing this very mem­ory it­self is mind (for when we give a thing in charge, to be kept in mem­ory, we say, “See that you keep it in mind”; and when we for­get, we say, “It did not come to my mind,” and, “It slipped out of my mind,” call­ing the mem­ory it­self the mind); this be­ing so, how is it that when with joy I re­mem­ber my past sor­row, the mind hath joy, the mem­ory hath sor­row; the mind up­on the joy­ful­ness which is in it, is joy­ful, yet the mem­ory up­on the sad­ness which is in it, is not sad? Does the mem­ory per­chance not be­long to the mind? Who will say so? The mem­ory then is, as it were, the bel­ly of the mind, and joy and sad­ness, like sweet and bit­ter food; which, when com­mit­ted to the mem­ory, are as it were passed in­to the bel­ly, where they may be stowed, but can­not taste. Ridicu­lous it is to imag­ine these to be alike; and yet are they not ut­ter­ly un­like.

But, be­hold, out of my mem­ory I bring it, when I say there be four per­tur­ba­tions of the mind, de­sire, joy, fear, sor­row; and what­so­ev­er I can dis­pute there­on, by di­vid­ing each in­to its sub­or­di­nate species, and by defin­ing it, in my mem­ory find I what to say, and thence do I bring it: yet am I not dis­turbed by any of these per­tur­ba­tions, when by call­ing them to mind, I re­mem­ber them; yea, and be­fore I re­called and brought them back, they were there; and there­fore could they, by rec­ol­lec­tion, thence be brought. Per­chance, then, as meat is by chew­ing the cud brought up out of the bel­ly, so by rec­ol­lec­tion these out of the mem­ory. Why then does not the dis­put­er, thus rec­ol­lect­ing, taste in the mouth of his mus­ing the sweet­ness of joy, or the bit­ter­ness of sor­row? Is the com­par­ison un­like in this, be­cause not in all re­spects like? For who would will­ing­ly speak there­of, if so oft as we name grief or fear, we should be com­pelled to be sad or fear­ful? And yet could we not speak of them, did we not find in our mem­ory, not on­ly the sounds of the names ac­cord­ing to the im­ages im­pressed by the sens­es of the body, but no­tions of the very things them­selves which we nev­er re­ceived by any av­enue of the body, but which the mind it­self per­ceiv­ing by the ex­pe­ri­ence of its own pas­sions, com­mit­ted to the mem­ory, or the mem­ory of it­self re­tained, with­out be­ing com­mit­ted un­to it.

But whether by im­ages or no, who can read­ily say? Thus, I name a stone, I name the sun, the things them­selves not be­ing present to my sens­es, but their im­ages to my mem­ory. I name a bod­ily pain, yet it is not present with me, when noth­ing aches: yet un­less its im­age were present to my mem­ory, I should not know what to say there­of, nor in dis­cours­ing dis­cern pain from plea­sure. I name bod­ily health; be­ing sound in body, the thing it­self is present with me; yet, un­less its im­age al­so were present in my mem­ory, I could by no means re­call what the sound of this name should sig­ni­fy. Nor would the sick, when health were named, recog­nise what were spo­ken, un­less the same im­age were by the force of mem­ory re­tained, al­though the thing it­self were ab­sent from the body. I name num­bers where­by we num­ber; and not their im­ages, but them­selves are present in my mem­ory. I name the im­age of the sun, and that im­age is present in my mem­ory. For I re­call not the im­age of its im­age, but the im­age it­self is present to me, call­ing it to mind. I name mem­ory, and I recog­nise what I name. And where do I recog­nise it, but in the mem­ory it­self? Is it al­so present to it­self by its im­age, and not by it­self?

What, when I name for­get­ful­ness, and with­al recog­nise what I name? whence should I recog­nise it, did I not re­mem­ber it? I speak not of the sound of the name, but of the thing which it sig­ni­fies: which if I had for­got­ten, I could not recog­nise what that sound sig­ni­fies. When then I re­mem­ber mem­ory, mem­ory it­self is, through it­self, present with it­self: but when I re­mem­ber for­get­ful­ness, there are present both mem­ory and for­get­ful­ness; mem­ory where­by I re­mem­ber, for­get­ful­ness which I re­mem­ber. But what is for­get­ful­ness, but the pri­va­tion of mem­ory? How then is it present that I re­mem­ber it, since when present I can­not re­mem­ber? But if what we re­mem­ber we hold it in mem­ory, yet, un­less we did re­mem­ber for­get­ful­ness, we could nev­er at the hear­ing of the name recog­nise the thing there­by sig­ni­fied, then for­get­ful­ness is re­tained by mem­ory. Present then it is, that we for­get not, and be­ing so, we for­get. It is to be un­der­stood from this that for­get­ful­ness when we re­mem­ber it, is not present to the mem­ory by it­self but by its im­age: be­cause if it were present by it­self, it would not cause us to re­mem­ber, but to for­get. Who now shall search out this? who shall com­pre­hend how it is?

Lord, I, tru­ly, toil there­in, yea and toil in my­self; I am be­come a heavy soil re­quir­ing over much sweat of the brow. For we are not now search­ing out the re­gions of heav­en, or mea­sur­ing the dis­tances of the stars, or en­quir­ing the bal­anc­ings of the earth. It is I my­self who re­mem­ber, I the mind. It is not so won­der­ful, if what I my­self am not, be far from me. But what is near­er to me than my­self? And to, the force of mine own mem­ory is not un­der­stood by me; though I can­not so much as name my­self with­out it. For what shall I say, when it is clear to me that I re­mem­ber for­get­ful­ness? Shall I say that that is not in my mem­ory, which I re­mem­ber? or shall I say that for­get­ful­ness is for this pur­pose in my mem­ory, that I might not for­get? Both were most ab­surd. What third way is there? How can I say that the im­age of for­get­ful­ness is re­tained by my mem­ory, not for­get­ful­ness it­self, when I re­mem­ber it? How could I say this ei­ther, see­ing that when the im­age of any thing is im­pressed on the mem­ory, the thing it­self must needs be first present, whence that im­age may be im­pressed? For thus do I re­mem­ber Carthage, thus all places where I have been, thus men’s faces whom I have seen, and things re­port­ed by the oth­er sens­es; thus the health or sick­ness of the body. For when these things were present, my mem­ory re­ceived from them im­ages, which be­ing present with me, I might look on and bring back in my mind, when I re­mem­bered them in their ab­sence. If then this for­get­ful­ness is re­tained in the mem­ory through its im­age, not through it­self, then plain­ly it­self was once present, that its im­age might be tak­en. But when it was present, how did it write its im­age in the mem­ory, see­ing that for­get­ful­ness by its pres­ence ef­faces even what it finds al­ready not­ed? And yet, in what­ev­er way, al­though that way be past con­ceiv­ing and ex­plain­ing, yet cer­tain am I that I re­mem­ber for­get­ful­ness it­self al­so, where­by what we re­mem­ber is ef­faced.

Great is the pow­er of mem­ory, a fear­ful thing, O my God, a deep and bound­less man­ifold­ness; and this thing is the mind, and this am I my­self. What am I then, O my God? What na­ture am I? A life var­ious and man­ifold, and ex­ceed­ing im­mense. Be­hold in the plains, and caves, and cav­erns of my mem­ory, in­nu­mer­able and in­nu­mer­ably full of in­nu­mer­able kinds of things, ei­ther through im­ages, as all bod­ies; or by ac­tu­al pres­ence, as the arts; or by cer­tain no­tions or im­pres­sions, as the af­fec­tions of the mind, which, even when the mind doth not feel, the mem­ory re­taineth, while yet what­so­ev­er is in the mem­ory is al­so in the mind- over all these do I run, I fly; I dive on this side and on that, as far as I can, and there is no end. So great is the force of mem­ory, so great the force of life, even in the mor­tal life of man. What shall I do then, O Thou my true life, my God? I will pass even be­yond this pow­er of mine which is called mem­ory: yea, I will pass be­yond it, that I may ap­proach un­to Thee, O sweet Light. What sayest Thou to me? See, I am mount­ing up through my mind to­wards Thee who abidest above me. Yea, I now will pass be­yond this pow­er of mine which is called mem­ory, de­sirous to ar­rive at Thee, whence Thou mayest be ar­rived at; and to cleave un­to Thee, whence one may cleave un­to Thee. For even beasts and birds have mem­ory; else could they not re­turn to their dens and nests, nor many oth­er things they are used un­to: nor in­deed could they be used to any thing, but by mem­ory. I will pass then be­yond mem­ory al­so, that I may ar­rive at Him who hath sep­arat­ed me from the four-​foot­ed beasts and made me wis­er than the fowls of the air, I will pass be­yond mem­ory al­so, and where shall I find Thee, Thou tru­ly good and cer­tain sweet­ness? And where shall I find Thee? If I find Thee with­out my mem­ory, then do I not re­tain Thee in my mem­ory. And how shall I find Thee, if I re­mem­ber Thee not?

For the wom­an that had lost her groat, and sought it with a light; un­less she had re­mem­bered it, she had nev­er found it. For when it was found, whence should she know whether it were the same, un­less she re­mem­bered it? I re­mem­ber to have sought and found many a thing; and this I there­by know, that when I was seek­ing any of them, and was asked, “Is this it?” “Is that it?” so long said I “No,” un­til that were of­fered me which I sought. Which had I not re­mem­bered (what­ev­er it were) though it were of­fered me, yet should I not find it, be­cause I could not recog­nise it. And so it ev­er is, when we seek and find any lost thing. Notwith­stand­ing, when any thing is by chance lost from the sight, not from the mem­ory (as any vis­ible body), yet its im­age is still re­tained with­in, and it is sought un­til it be re­stored to sight; and when it is found, it is recog­nised by the im­age which is with­in: nor do we say that we have found what was lost, un­less we recog­nise it; nor can we recog­nise it, un­less we re­mem­ber it. But this was lost to the eyes, but re­tained in the mem­ory.

But what when the mem­ory it­self los­es any thing, as falls out when we for­get and seek that we may rec­ol­lect? Where in the end do we search, but in the mem­ory it­self? and there, if one thing be per­chance of­fered in­stead of an­oth­er, we re­ject it, un­til what we seek meets us; and when it doth, we say, “This is it”; which we should not un­less we recog­nised it, nor recog­nise it un­less we re­mem­bered it. Cer­tain­ly then we had for­got­ten it. Or, had not the whole es­caped us, but by the part where­of we had hold, was the lost part sought for; in that the mem­ory felt that it did not car­ry on to­geth­er all which it was wont, and maimed, as it were, by the cur­tail­ment of its an­cient habit, de­mand­ed the restora­tion of what it missed? For in­stance, if we see or think of some one known to us, and hav­ing for­got­ten his name, try to re­cov­er it; what­ev­er else oc­curs, con­nects it­self not there­with; be­cause it was not wont to be thought up­on to­geth­er with him, and there­fore is re­ject­ed, un­til that present it­self, where­on the knowl­edge re­pos­es equably as its wont­ed ob­ject. And whence does that present it­self, but out of the mem­ory it­self? for even when we recog­nise it, on be­ing re­mind­ed by an­oth­er, it is thence it comes. For we do not be­lieve it as some­thing new, but, up­on rec­ol­lec­tion, al­low what was named to be right. But were it ut­ter­ly blot­ted out of the mind, we should not re­mem­ber it, even when re­mind­ed. For we have not as yet ut­ter­ly for­got­ten that, which we re­mem­ber our­selves to have for­got­ten. What then we have ut­ter­ly for­got­ten, though lost, we can­not even seek af­ter.

How then do I seek Thee, O Lord? For when I seek Thee, my God, I seek a hap­py life. I will seek Thee, that my soul may live. For my body liveth by my soul; and my soul by Thee. How then do I seek a hap­py life, see­ing I have it not, un­til I can say, where I ought to say it, “It is enough”? How seek I it? By re­mem­brance, as though I had for­got­ten it, re­mem­ber­ing that I had for­got­ten it? Or, de­sir­ing to learn it as a thing un­known, ei­ther nev­er hav­ing known, or so for­got­ten it, as not even to re­mem­ber that I had for­got­ten it? is not a hap­py life what all will, and no one al­to­geth­er wills it not? where have they known it, that they so will it? where seen it, that they so love it? Tru­ly we have it, how, I know not. Yea, there is an­oth­er way, where­in when one hath it, then is he hap­py; and there are, who are blessed, in hope. These have it in a low­er kind, than they who have it in very deed; yet are they bet­ter off than such as are hap­py nei­ther in deed nor in hope. Yet even these, had they it not in some sort, would not so will to be hap­py, which that they do will, is most cer­tain. They have known it then, I know not how, and so have it by some sort of knowl­edge, what, I know not, and am per­plexed whether it be in the mem­ory, which if it be, then we have been hap­py once; whether all sev­er­al­ly, or in that man who first sinned, in whom al­so we all died, and from whom we are all born with mis­ery, I now en­quire not; but on­ly, whether the hap­py life be in the mem­ory? For nei­ther should we love it, did we not know it. We hear the name, and we all con­fess that we de­sire the thing; for we are not de­light­ed with the mere sound. For when a Greek hears it in Latin, he is not de­light­ed, not know­ing what is spo­ken; but we Latins are de­light­ed, as would he too, if he heard it in Greek; be­cause the thing it­self is nei­ther Greek nor Latin, which Greeks and Latins, and men of all oth­er tongues, long for so earnest­ly. Known there­fore it is to all, for they with one voice be asked, “would they be hap­py?” they would an­swer with­out doubt, “they would.” And this could not be, un­less the thing it­self where­of it is the name were re­tained in their mem­ory.

But is it so, as one re­mem­bers Carthage who hath seen it? No. For a hap­py life is not seen with the eye, be­cause it is not a body. As we re­mem­ber num­bers then? No. For these, he that hath in his knowl­edge, seeks not fur­ther to at­tain un­to; but a hap­py life we have in our knowl­edge, and there­fore love it, and yet still de­sire to at­tain it, that we may be hap­py. As we re­mem­ber elo­quence then? No. For al­though up­on hear­ing this name al­so, some call to mind the thing, who still are not yet elo­quent, and many who de­sire to be so, whence it ap­pears that it is in their knowl­edge; yet these have by their bod­ily sens­es ob­served oth­ers to be elo­quent, and been de­light­ed, and de­sire to be the like (though in­deed they would not be de­light­ed but for some in­ward knowl­edge there­of, nor wish to be the like, un­less they were thus de­light­ed); where­as a hap­py life, we do by no bod­ily sense ex­pe­ri­ence in oth­ers. As then we re­mem­ber joy? Per­chance; for my joy I re­mem­ber, even when sad, as a hap­py life, when un­hap­py; nor did I ev­er with bod­ily sense see, hear, smell, taste, or touch my joy; but I ex­pe­ri­enced it in my mind, when I re­joiced; and the knowl­edge of it clave to my mem­ory, so that I can re­call it with dis­gust some­times, at oth­ers with long­ing, ac­cord­ing to the na­ture of the things, where­in I re­mem­ber my­self to have joyed. For even from foul things have I been im­mersed in a sort of joy; which now re­call­ing, I de­test and ex­ecrate; oth­er­whiles in good and hon­est things, which I re­call with long­ing, al­though per­chance no longer present; and there­fore with sad­ness I re­call for­mer joy.

Where then and when did I ex­pe­ri­ence my hap­py life, that I should re­mem­ber, and love, and long for it? Nor is it I alone, or some few be­sides, but we all would fain be hap­py; which, un­less by some cer­tain knowl­edge we knew, we should not with so cer­tain a will de­sire. But how is this, that if two men be asked whether they would go to the wars, one, per­chance, would an­swer that he would, the oth­er, that he would not; but if they were asked whether they would be hap­py, both would in­stant­ly with­out any doubt­ing say they would; and for no oth­er rea­son would the one go to the wars, and the oth­er not, but to be hap­py. Is it per­chance that as one looks for his joy in this thing, an­oth­er in that, all agree in their de­sire of be­ing hap­py, as they would (if they were asked) that they wished to have joy, and this joy they call a hap­py life? Al­though then one ob­tains this joy by one means, an­oth­er by an­oth­er, all have one end, which they strive to at­tain, name­ly, joy. Which be­ing a thing which all must say they have ex­pe­ri­enced, it is there­fore found in the mem­ory, and recog­nised when­ev­er the name of a hap­py life is men­tioned.

Far be it, Lord, far be it from the heart of Thy ser­vant who here con­fes­seth un­to Thee, far be it, that, be the joy what it may, I should there­fore think my­self hap­py. For there is a joy which is not giv­en to the un­god­ly, but to those who love Thee for Thine own sake, whose joy Thou Thy­self art. And this is the hap­py life, to re­joice to Thee, of Thee, for Thee; this is it, and there is no oth­er. For they who think there is an­oth­er, pur­sue some oth­er and not the true joy. Yet is not their will turned away from some sem­blance of joy.

It is not cer­tain then that all wish to be hap­py, inas­much as they who wish not to joy in Thee, which is the on­ly hap­py life, do not tru­ly de­sire the hap­py life. Or do all men de­sire this, but be­cause the flesh lus­teth against the Spir­it, and the Spir­it against the flesh, that they can­not do what they would, they fall up­on that which they can, and are con­tent there­with; be­cause, what they are not able to do, they do not will so strong­ly as would suf­fice to make them able? For I ask any one, had he rather joy in truth, or in false­hood? They will as lit­tle hes­itate to say “in the truth,” as to say “that they de­sire to be hap­py,” for a hap­py life is joy in the truth: for this is a joy­ing in Thee, Who art the Truth, O God my light, health of my coun­te­nance, my God. This is the hap­py life which all de­sire; this life which alone is hap­py, all de­sire; to joy in the truth all de­sire. I have met with many that would de­ceive; who would be de­ceived, no one. Where then did they know this hap­py life, save where they know the truth al­so? For they love it al­so, since they would not be de­ceived. And when they love a hap­py life, which is no oth­er than joy­ing in the truth, then al­so do they love the truth; which yet they would not love, were there not some no­tice of it in their mem­ory. Why then joy they not in it? why are they not hap­py? be­cause they are more strong­ly tak­en up with oth­er things which have more pow­er to make them mis­er­able, than that which they so faint­ly re­mem­ber to make them hap­py. For there is yet a lit­tle light in men; let them walk, let them walk, that the dark­ness over­take them not.

But why doth “truth gen­er­ate ha­tred,” and the man of Thine, preach­ing the truth, be­come an en­emy to them? where­as a hap­py life is loved, which is noth­ing else but joy­ing in the truth; un­less that truth is in that kind loved, that they who love any­thing else would glad­ly have that which they love to be the truth: and be­cause they would not be de­ceived, would not be con­vinced that they are so? There­fore do they hate the truth for that thing’s sake which they loved in­stead of the truth. They love truth when she en­light­ens, they hate her when she re­proves. For since they would not be de­ceived, and would de­ceive, they love her when she dis­cov­ers her­self un­to them, and hate her when she dis­cov­ers them. Whence she shall so re­pay them, that they who would not be made man­ifest by her, she both against their will makes man­ifest, and her­self be­cometh not man­ifest un­to them. Thus, thus, yea thus doth the mind of man, thus blind and sick, foul and ill-​favoured, wish to be hid­den, but that aught should be hid­den from it, it wills not. But the con­trary is re­quit­ed it, that it­self should not be hid­den from the Truth; but the Truth is hid from it. Yet even thus mis­er­able, it had rather joy in truths than in false­hoods. Hap­py then will it be, when, no dis­trac­tion in­ter­pos­ing, it shall joy in that on­ly Truth, by Whom all things are true.

See what a space I have gone over in my mem­ory seek­ing Thee, O Lord; and I have not found Thee, with­out it. Nor have I found any thing con­cern­ing Thee, but what I have kept in mem­ory, ev­er since I learnt Thee. For since I learnt Thee, I have not for­got­ten Thee. For where I found Truth, there found I my God, the Truth it­self; which since I learnt, I have not for­got­ten. Since then I learnt Thee, Thou re­sidest in my mem­ory; and there do I find Thee, when I call Thee to re­mem­brance, and de­light in Thee. These be my holy de­lights, which Thou hast giv­en me in Thy mer­cy, hav­ing re­gard to my pover­ty.

But where in my mem­ory re­sidest Thou, O Lord, where re­sidest Thou there? what man­ner of lodg­ing hast Thou framed for Thee? what man­ner of sanc­tu­ary hast Thou build­ed for Thee? Thou hast giv­en this hon­our to my mem­ory, to re­side in it; but in what quar­ter of it Thou re­sidest, that am I con­sid­er­ing. For in think­ing on Thee, I passed be­yond such parts of it as the beasts al­so have, for I found Thee not there among the im­ages of cor­po­re­al things: and I came to those parts to which I com­mit­ted the af­fec­tions of my mind, nor found Thee there. And I en­tered in­to the very seat of my mind (which it hath in my mem­ory, inas­much as the mind re­mem­bers it­self al­so), nei­ther wert Thou there: for as Thou art not a cor­po­re­al im­age, nor the af­fec­tion of a liv­ing be­ing (as when we re­joice, con­dole, de­sire, fear, re­mem­ber, for­get, or the like); so nei­ther art Thou the mind it­self; be­cause Thou art the Lord God of the mind; and all these are changed, but Thou re­mainest un­change­able over all, and yet hast vouch­safed to dwell in my mem­ory, since I learnt Thee. And why seek I now in what place there­of Thou dwellest, as if there were places there­in? Sure I am, that in it Thou dwellest, since I have re­mem­bered Thee ev­er since I learnt Thee, and there I find Thee, when I call Thee to re­mem­brance.

Where then did I find Thee, that I might learn Thee? For in my mem­ory Thou wert not, be­fore I learned Thee. Where then did I find Thee, that I might learn Thee, but in Thee above me? Place there is none; we go back­ward and for­ward, and there is no place. Ev­ery where, O Truth, dost Thou give au­di­ence to all who ask coun­sel of Thee, and at once an­swer­est all, though on man­ifold mat­ters they ask Thy coun­sel. Clear­ly dost Thou an­swer, though all do not clear­ly hear. All con­sult Thee on what they will, though they hear not al­ways what they will. He is Thy best ser­vant who looks not so much to hear that from Thee which him­self wil­leth, as rather to will that, which from Thee he heareth.

Too late loved I Thee, O Thou Beau­ty of an­cient days, yet ev­er new! too late I loved Thee! And be­hold, Thou wert with­in, and I abroad, and there I searched for Thee; de­formed I, plung­ing amid those fair forms which Thou hadst made. Thou wert with me, but I was not with Thee. Things held me far from Thee, which, un­less they were in Thee, were not at all. Thou calledst, and shout­edst, and burstest my deaf­ness. Thou flashedst, shon­est, and scat­teredst my blind­ness. Thou breathedst odours, and I drew in breath and pant­ed for Thee. I tast­ed, and hunger and thirst. Thou touchedst me, and I burned for Thy peace.

When I shall with my whole self cleave to Thee, I shall no where have sor­row or labour; and my life shall whol­ly live, as whol­ly full of Thee. But now since whom Thou fillest, Thou liftest up, be­cause I am not full of Thee I am a bur­den to my­self. Lamentable joys strive with joy­ous sor­rows: and on which side is the vic­to­ry, I know not. Woe is me! Lord, have pity on me. My evil sor­rows strive with my good joys; and on which side is the vic­to­ry, I know not. Woe is me! Lord, have pity on me. Woe is me! lo! I hide not my wounds; Thou art the Physi­cian, I the sick; Thou mer­ci­ful, I mis­er­able. Is not the life of man up­on earth all tri­al? Who wish­es for trou­bles and dif­fi­cul­ties? Thou com­man­dest them to be en­dured, not to be loved. No man loves what he en­dures, though he love to en­dure. For though he re­joic­es that he en­dures, he had rather there were noth­ing for him to en­dure. In ad­ver­si­ty I long for pros­per­ity, in pros­per­ity I fear ad­ver­si­ty. What mid­dle place is there be­twixt these two, where the life of man is not all tri­al? Woe to the pros­per­ities of the world, once and again, through fear of ad­ver­si­ty, and cor­rup­tion of joy! Woe to the ad­ver­si­ties of the world, once and again, and the third time, from the long­ing for pros­per­ity, and be­cause ad­ver­si­ty it­self is a hard thing, and lest it shat­ter en­durance. Is not the life of man up­on earth all tri­al: with­out any in­ter­val?

And all my hope is no where but in Thy ex­ceed­ing great mer­cy. Give what Thou en­joinest, and en­join what Thou wilt. Thou en­joinest us con­ti­nen­cy; and when I knew, saith one, that no man can be con­ti­nent, un­less God give it, this al­so was a part of wis­dom to know whose gift she is. By con­ti­nen­cy ver­ily are we bound up and brought back in­to One, whence we were dis­si­pat­ed in­to many. For too lit­tle doth he love Thee, who loves any thing with Thee, which he loveth not for Thee. O love, who ev­er burnest and nev­er con­sumest! O char­ity, my God, kin­dle me. Thou en­joinest con­ti­nen­cy: give me what Thou en­joinest, and en­join what Thou wilt.

Ver­ily Thou en­joinest me con­ti­nen­cy from the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the am­bi­tion of the world. Thou en­joinest con­ti­nen­cy from con­cu­bi­nage; and for wed­lock it­self, Thou hast coun­selled some­thing bet­ter than what Thou hast per­mit­ted. And since Thou gavest it, it was done, even be­fore I be­came a dis­penser of Thy Sacra­ment. But there yet live in my mem­ory (where­of I have much spo­ken) the im­ages of such things as my ill cus­tom there fixed; which haunt me, strength­less when I am awake: but in sleep, not on­ly so as to give plea­sure, but even to ob­tain as­sent, and what is very like re­al­ity. Yea, so far pre­vails the il­lu­sion of the im­age, in my soul and in my flesh, that, when asleep, false vi­sions per­suade to that which when wak­ing, the true can­not. Am I not then my­self, O Lord my God? And yet there is so much dif­fer­ence be­twixt my­self and my­self, with­in that mo­ment where­in I pass from wak­ing to sleep­ing, or re­turn from sleep­ing to wak­ing! Where is rea­son then, which, awake, re­sisteth such sug­ges­tions? And should the things them­selves be urged on it, it re­maineth un­shak­en. Is it clasped up with the eyes? is it lulled asleep with the sens­es of the body? And whence is it that of­ten even in sleep we re­sist, and mind­ful of our pur­pose, and abid­ing most chaste­ly in it, yield no as­sent to such en­tice­ments? And yet so much dif­fer­ence there is, that when it hap­peneth oth­er­wise, up­on wak­ing we re­turn to peace of con­science: and by this very dif­fer­ence dis­cov­er that we did not, what yet we be sor­ry that in some way it was done in us.

Art Thou not mighty, God Almighty, so as to heal all the dis­eases of my soul, and by Thy more abun­dant grace to quench even the im­pure mo­tions of my sleep! Thou wilt in­crease, Lord, Thy gifts more and more in me, that my soul may fol­low me to Thee, dis­en­tan­gled from the birdlime of con­cu­pis­cence; that it rebel not against it­self, and even in dreams not on­ly not, through im­ages of sense, com­mit those de­bas­ing cor­rup­tions, even to pol­lu­tion of the flesh, but not even to con­sent un­to them. For that noth­ing of this sort should have, over the pure af­fec­tions even of a sleep­er, the very least in­flu­ence, not even such as a thought would re­strain, -to work this, not on­ly dur­ing life, but even at my present age, is not hard for the Almighty, Who art able to do above all that we ask or think. But what I yet am in this kind of my evil, have I con­fessed un­to my good Lord; re­joic­ing with trem­bling, in that which Thou hast giv­en me, and be­moan­ing that where­in I am still im­per­fect; hop­ing that Thou wilt per­fect Thy mer­cies in me, even to per­fect peace, which my out­ward and in­ward man shall have with Thee, when death shall be swal­lowed up in vic­to­ry.

There is an­oth­er evil of the day, which I would were suf­fi­cient for it. For by eat­ing and drink­ing we re­pair the dai­ly de­cays of our body, un­til Thou de­stroy both bel­ly and meat, when Thou shalt slay my empti­ness with a won­der­ful ful­ness, and clothe this in­cor­rupt­ible with an eter­nal in­cor­rup­tion. But now the ne­ces­si­ty is sweet un­to me, against which sweet­ness I fight, that I be not tak­en cap­tive; and car­ry on a dai­ly war by fast­ings; of­ten bring­ing my body in­to sub­jec­tion; and my pains are re­moved by plea­sure. For hunger and thirst are in a man­ner pains; they burn and kill like a fever, un­less the medicine of nour­ish­ments come to our aid. Which since it is at hand through the con­so­la­tions of Thy gifts, with which land, and wa­ter, and air serve our weak­ness, our calami­ty is termed grat­ifi­ca­tion.

This hast Thou taught me, that I should set my­self to take food as physic. But while I am pass­ing from the dis­com­fort of empti­ness to the con­tent of re­plen­ish­ing, in the very pas­sage the snare of con­cu­pis­cence be­sets me. For that pass­ing, is plea­sure, nor is there any oth­er way to pass thith­er, whith­er we needs must pass. And health be­ing the cause of eat­ing and drink­ing, there joineth it­self as an at­ten­dant a dan­ger­ous plea­sure, which most­ly en­deav­ours to go be­fore it, so that I may for her sake do what I say I do, or wish to do, for health’s sake. Nor have each the same mea­sure; for what is enough for health, is too lit­tle for plea­sure. And oft it is un­cer­tain, whether it be the nec­es­sary care of the body which is yet ask­ing for sus­te­nance, or whether a volup­tuous de­ceiv­able­ness of greed­iness is prof­fer­ing its ser­vices. In this un­cer­tain­ty the un­hap­py soul re­joiceth, and there­in pre­pares an ex­cuse to shield it­self, glad that it ap­peareth not what suf­ficeth for the mod­er­ation of health, that un­der the cloak of health, it may dis­guise the mat­ter of grat­ifi­ca­tion. These temp­ta­tions I dai­ly en­deav­our to re­sist, and I call on Thy right hand, and to Thee do I re­fer my per­plex­ities; be­cause I have as yet no set­tled coun­sel here­in.

I hear the voice of my God com­mand­ing, Let not your hearts be over­charged with sur­feit­ing and drunk­en­ness. Drunk­en­ness is far from me; Thou wilt have mer­cy, that it come not near me. But full feed­ing some­times creep­eth up­on Thy ser­vant; Thou wilt have mer­cy, that it may be far from me. For no one can be con­ti­nent un­less Thou give it. Many things Thou givest us, pray­ing for them; and what good so­ev­er we have re­ceived be­fore we prayed, from Thee we re­ceived it; yea to the end we might af­ter­wards know this, did we be­fore re­ceive it. Drunk­ard was I nev­er, but drunk­ards have I known made sober by Thee. >From Thee then it was, that they who nev­er were such, should not so be, as from Thee it was, that they who have been, should not ev­er so be; and from Thee it was, that both might know from Whom it was. I heard an­oth­er voice of Thine, Go not af­ter thy lusts, and from thy plea­sure turn away. Yea by Thy favour have I heard that which I have much loved; nei­ther if we eat, shall we abound; nei­ther if we eat not, shall we lack; which is to say, nei­ther shall the one make me plen­teous, nor the oth­er mis­er­able. I heard al­so an­oth­er, for I have learned in what­so­ev­er state I am, there­with to be con­tent; I know how to abound, and how to suf­fer need. I can do all things through Christ that strength­eneth me. Be­hold a sol­dier of the heav­en­ly camp, not the dust which we are. But re­mem­ber, Lord, that we are dust, and that of dust Thou hast made man; and he was lost and is found. Nor could he of him­self do this, be­cause he whom I so loved, say­ing this through the in-​breath­ing of Thy in­spi­ra­tion, was of the same dust. I can do all things (saith he) through Him that strength­eneth me. Strength­en me, that I can. Give what Thou en­joinest, and en­join what Thou wilt. He con­fess­es to have re­ceived, and when he glo­ri­eth, in the Lord he glo­ri­eth. An­oth­er have I heard beg­ging that he might re­ceive. Take from me (saith he) the de­sires of the bel­ly; whence it ap­peareth, O my holy God, that Thou givest, when that is done which Thou com­man­dest to be done.

Thou hast taught me, good Fa­ther, that to the pure, all things are pure; but that it is evil un­to the man that eateth with of­fence; and, that ev­ery crea­ture of Thine is good, and noth­ing to be re­fused, which is re­ceived with thanks­giv­ing; and that meat com­mendeth us not to God; and, that no man should judge us in meat or drink; and, that he which eateth, let him not de­spise him that eateth not; and let not him that eateth not, judge him that eateth. These things have I learned, thanks be to Thee, praise to Thee, my God, my Mas­ter, knock­ing at my ears, en­light­en­ing my heart; de­liv­er me out of all temp­ta­tion. I fear not un­clean­ness of meat, but the un­clean­ness of lust­ing. I know; that Noah was per­mit­ted to eat all kind of flesh that was good for food; that Eli­jah was fed with flesh; that en­dued with an ad­mirable ab­sti­nence, was not pol­lut­ed by feed­ing on liv­ing crea­tures, lo­custs. I know al­so that Esau was de­ceived by lust­ing for lentiles; and that David blamed him­self for de­sir­ing a draught of wa­ter; and that our King was tempt­ed, not con­cern­ing flesh, but bread. And there­fore the peo­ple in the wilder­ness al­so de­served to be re­proved, not for de­sir­ing flesh, but be­cause, in the de­sire of food, they mur­mured against the Lord.

Placed then amid these temp­ta­tions, I strive dai­ly against con­cu­pis­cence in eat­ing and drink­ing. For it is not of such na­ture that I can set­tle on cut­ting it off once for all, and nev­er touch­ing it af­ter­ward, as I could of con­cu­bi­nage. The bri­dle of the throat then is to be held at­tem­pered be­tween slack­ness and stiff­ness. And who is he, O Lord, who is not some whit trans­port­ed be­yond the lim­its of ne­ces­si­ty? who­ev­er he is, he is a great one; let him make Thy Name great. But I am not such, for I am a sin­ful man. Yet do I too mag­ni­fy Thy name; and He maketh in­ter­ces­sion to Thee for my sins who hath over­come the world; num­ber­ing me among the weak mem­bers of His body; be­cause Thine eyes have seen that of Him which is im­per­fect, and in Thy book shall all be writ­ten.

With the al­lure­ments of smells, I am not much con­cerned. When ab­sent, I do not miss them; when present, I do not refuse them; yet ev­er ready to be with­out them. So I seem to my­self; per­chance I am de­ceived. For that al­so is a mourn­ful dark­ness where­by my abil­ities with­in me are hid­den from me; so that my mind mak­ing en­quiry in­to her­self of her own pow­ers, ven­tures not read­ily to be­lieve her­self; be­cause even what is in it is most­ly hid­den, un­less ex­pe­ri­ence re­veal it. And no one ought to be se­cure in that life, the whole where­of is called a tri­al, that he who hath been ca­pa­ble of worse to be made bet­ter, may not like­wise of bet­ter be made worse. Our on­ly hope, on­ly con­fi­dence, on­ly as­sured promise is Thy mer­cy.

The de­lights of the ear had more firm­ly en­tan­gled and sub­dued me; but Thou didst loosen and free me. Now, in those melodies which Thy words breathe soul in­to, when sung with a sweet and at­tuned voice, I do a lit­tle re­pose; yet not so as to be held there­by, but that I can dis­en­gage my­self when I will. But with the words which are their life and where­by they find ad­mis­sion in­to me, them­selves seek in my af­fec­tions a place of some es­ti­ma­tion, and I can scarce­ly as­sign them one suit­able. For at one time I seem to my­self to give them more hon­our than is seem­ly, feel­ing our minds to be more ho­lily and fer­vent­ly raised un­to a flame of de­vo­tion, by the holy words them­selves when thus sung, than when not; and that the sev­er­al af­fec­tions of our spir­it, by a sweet va­ri­ety, have their own prop­er mea­sures in the voice and singing, by some hid­den cor­re­spon­dence where­with they are stirred up. But this con­tent­ment of the flesh, to which the soul must not be giv­en over to be en­er­vat­ed, doth oft be­guile me, the sense not so wait­ing up­on rea­son as pa­tient­ly to fol­low her; but hav­ing been ad­mit­ted mere­ly for her sake, it strives even to run be­fore her, and lead her. Thus in these things I un­awares sin, but af­ter­wards am aware of it.

At oth­er times, shun­ning over-​anx­ious­ly this very de­cep­tion, I err in too great strict­ness; and some­times to that de­gree, as to wish the whole melody of sweet mu­sic which is used to David’s Psalter, ban­ished from my ears, and the Church’s too; and that mode seems to me safer, which I re­mem­ber to have been of­ten told me of Athana­sius, Bish­op of Alexan­dria, who made the read­er of the psalm ut­ter it with so slight in­flec­tion of voice, that it was near­er speak­ing than singing. Yet again, when I re­mem­ber the tears I shed at the Psalmody of Thy Church, in the be­gin­ning of my re­cov­ered faith; and how at this time I am moved, not with the singing, but with the things sung, when they are sung with a clear voice and mod­ula­tion most suit­able, I ac­knowl­edge the great use of this in­sti­tu­tion. Thus I fluc­tu­ate be­tween per­il of plea­sure and ap­proved whole­some­ness; in­clined the rather (though not as pro­nounc­ing an ir­re­vo­ca­ble opin­ion) to ap­prove of the us­age of singing in the church; that so by the de­light of the ears the weak­er minds may rise to the feel­ing of de­vo­tion. Yet when it be­falls me to be more moved with the voice than the words sung, I con­fess to have sinned pe­nal­ly, and then had rather not hear mu­sic. See now my state; weep with me, and weep for me, ye, whoso reg­ulate your feel­ings with­in, as that good ac­tion en­sues. For you who do not act, these things touch not you. But Thou, O Lord my God, hear­ken; be­hold, and see, and have mer­cy and heal me, Thou, in whose pres­ence I have be­come a prob­lem to my­self; and that is my in­fir­mi­ty.

There re­mains the plea­sure of these eyes of my flesh, on which to make my con­fes­sions in the hear­ing of the ears of Thy tem­ple, those broth­er­ly and de­vout ears; and so to con­clude the temp­ta­tions of the lust of the flesh, which yet as­sail me, groan­ing earnest­ly, and de­sir­ing to be clothed up­on with my house from heav­en. The eyes love fair and var­ied forms, and bright and soft colours. Let not these oc­cu­py my soul; let God rather oc­cu­py it, who made these things, very good in­deed, yet is He my good, not they. And these af­fect me, wak­ing, the whole day, nor is any rest giv­en me from them, as there is from mu­si­cal, some­times in si­lence, from all voic­es. For this queen of colours, the light, bathing all which we be­hold, wher­ev­er I am through the day, glid­ing by me in var­ied forms, soothes me when en­gaged on oth­er things, and not ob­serv­ing it. And so strong­ly doth it en­twine it­self, that if it be sud­den­ly with­drawn, it is with long­ing sought for, and if ab­sent long, sad­deneth the mind.

O Thou Light, which To­bias saw, when, these eyes closed, he taught his son the way of life; and him­self went be­fore with the feet of char­ity, nev­er swerv­ing. Or which Isaac saw, when his flesh­ly eyes be­ing heavy and closed by old age, it was vouch­safed him, not know­ing­ly, to bless his sons, but by bless­ing to know them. Or which Ja­cob saw, when he al­so, blind through great age, with il­lu­mined heart, in the per­sons of his sons shed light on the dif­fer­ent races of the fu­ture peo­ple, in them fore­sig­ni­fied; and laid his hands, mys­ti­cal­ly crossed, up­on his grand­chil­dren by Joseph, not as their fa­ther by his out­ward eye cor­rect­ed them, but as him­self in­ward­ly dis­cerned. This is the light, it is one, and all are one, who see and love it. But that cor­po­re­al light where­of I spake, it sea­soneth the life of this world for her blind lovers, with an en­tic­ing and dan­ger­ous sweet­ness. But they who know how to praise Thee for it, “O all-​cre­at­ing Lord,” take it up in Thy hymns, and are not tak­en up with it in their sleep. Such would I be. These se­duc­tions of the eyes I re­sist, lest my feet where­with I walk up­on Thy way be en­snared; and I lift up mine in­vis­ible eyes to Thee, that Thou wouldest pluck my feet out of the snare. Thou dost ev­er and anon pluck them out, for they are en­snared. Thou ceas­est not to pluck them out, while I of­ten en­tan­gle my­self in the snares on all sides laid; be­cause Thou that keep­est Is­rael shalt nei­ther slum­ber nor sleep.

What in­nu­mer­able toys, made by divers arts and man­ufac­tures, in our ap­par­el, shoes, uten­sils and all sorts of works, in pic­tures al­so and divers im­ages, and these far ex­ceed­ing all nec­es­sary and mod­er­ate use and all pi­ous mean­ing, have men added to tempt their own eyes with­al; out­ward­ly fol­low­ing what them­selves make, in­ward­ly for­sak­ing Him by whom them­selves were made, and de­stroy­ing that which them­selves have been made! But I, my God and my Glo­ry, do hence al­so sing a hymn to Thee, and do con­se­crate praise to Him who con­se­crateth me, be­cause those beau­ti­ful pat­terns which through men’s souls are con­veyed in­to their cun­ning hands, come from that Beau­ty, which is above our souls, which my soul day and night sigheth af­ter. But the framers and fol­low­ers of the out­ward beau­ties de­rive thence the rule of judg­ing of them, but not of us­ing them. And He is there, though they per­ceive Him not, that so they might not wan­der, but keep their strength for Thee, and not scat­ter it abroad up­on plea­sur­able weari­ness. And I, though I speak and see this, en­tan­gle my steps with these out­ward beau­ties; but Thou pluck­est me out, O Lord, Thou pluck­est me out; be­cause Thy lov­ing-​kind­ness is be­fore my eyes. For I am tak­en mis­er­ably, and Thou pluck­est me out mer­ci­ful­ly; some­times not per­ceiv­ing it, when I had but light­ly light­ed up­on them; oth­er­whiles with pain, be­cause I had stuck fast in them.

To this is added an­oth­er form of temp­ta­tion more man­ifold­ly dan­ger­ous. For be­sides that con­cu­pis­cence of the flesh which con­sis­teth in the de­light of all sens­es and plea­sures, where­in its slaves, who go far from Thee, waste and per­ish, the soul hath, through the same sens­es of the body, a cer­tain vain and cu­ri­ous de­sire, veiled un­der the ti­tle of knowl­edge and learn­ing, not of de­light­ing in the flesh, but of mak­ing ex­per­iments through the flesh. The seat where­of be­ing in the ap­petite of knowl­edge, and sight be­ing the sense chiefly used for at­tain­ing knowl­edge, it is in Di­vine lan­guage called The lust of the eyes. For, to see, be­longeth prop­er­ly to the eyes; yet we use this word of the oth­er sens­es al­so, when we em­ploy them in seek­ing knowl­edge. For we do not say, hark how it flash­es, or smell how it glows, or taste how it shines, or feel how it gleams; for all these are said to be seen. And yet we say not on­ly, see how it shineth, which the eyes alone can per­ceive; but al­so, see how it soundeth, see how it smelleth, see how it tasteth, see how hard it is. And so the gen­er­al ex­pe­ri­ence of the sens­es, as was said, is called The lust of the eyes, be­cause the of­fice of see­ing, where­in the eyes hold the pre­rog­ative, the oth­er sens­es by way of simil­itude take to them­selves, when they make search af­ter any knowl­edge.

But by this may more ev­ident­ly be dis­cerned, where­in plea­sure and where­in cu­rios­ity is the ob­ject of the sens­es; for plea­sure seeketh ob­jects beau­ti­ful, melo­di­ous, fra­grant, savoury, soft; but cu­rios­ity, for tri­al’s sake, the con­trary as well, not for the sake of suf­fer­ing an­noy­ance, but out of the lust of mak­ing tri­al and know­ing them. For what plea­sure hath it, to see in a man­gled car­case what will make you shud­der? and yet if it be ly­ing near, they flock thith­er, to be made sad, and to turn pale. Even in sleep they are afraid to see it. As if when awake, any one forced them to see it, or any re­port of its beau­ty drew them thith­er! Thus al­so in the oth­er sens­es, which it were long to go through. From this dis­ease of cu­rios­ity are all those strange sights ex­hib­it­ed in the the­atre. Hence men go on to search out the hid­den pow­ers of na­ture (which is be­sides our end), which to know prof­its not, and where­in men de­sire noth­ing but to know. Hence al­so, if with that same end of per­vert­ed knowl­edge mag­ical arts be en­quired by. Hence al­so in re­li­gion it­self, is God tempt­ed, when signs and won­ders are de­mand­ed of Him, not de­sired for any good end, but mere­ly to make tri­al of.

In this so vast wilder­ness, full of snares and dan­gers, be­hold many of them I have cut off, and thrust out of my heart, as Thou hast giv­en me, O God of my sal­va­tion. And yet when dare I say, since so many things of this kind buzz on all sides about our dai­ly life- when dare I say that noth­ing of this sort en­gages my at­ten­tion, or caus­es in me an idle in­ter­est? True, the the­atres do not now car­ry me away, nor care I to know the cours­es of the stars, nor did my soul ev­er con­sult ghosts de­part­ed; all sac­ri­le­gious mys­ter­ies I de­test. From Thee, O Lord my God, to whom I owe hum­ble and sin­gle-​heart­ed ser­vice, by what ar­ti­fices and sug­ges­tions doth the en­emy deal with me to de­sire some sign! But I be­seech Thee by our King, and by our pure and holy coun­try, Jerusalem, that as any con­sent­ing there­to is far from me, so may it ev­er be fur­ther and fur­ther. But when I pray Thee for the sal­va­tion of any, my end and in­ten­tion is far dif­fer­ent. Thou givest and wilt give me to fol­low Thee will­ing­ly, do­ing what Thou wilt.

Notwith­stand­ing, in how many most pet­ty and con­temptible things is our cu­rios­ity dai­ly tempt­ed, and how of­ten we give way, who can re­count? How of­ten do we be­gin as if we were tol­er­at­ing peo­ple telling vain sto­ries, lest we of­fend the weak; then by de­grees we take in­ter­est there­in! I go not now to the cir­cus to see a dog cours­ing a hare; but in the field, if pass­ing, that cours­ing per­ad­ven­ture will dis­tract me even from some weighty thought, and draw me af­ter it: not that I turn aside the body of my beast, yet still in­cline my mind thith­er. And un­less Thou, hav­ing made me see my in­fir­mi­ty didst speed­ily ad­mon­ish me ei­ther through the sight it­self by some con­tem­pla­tion to rise to­wards Thee, or al­to­geth­er to de­spise and pass it by, I dul­ly stand fixed there­in. What, when sit­ting at home, a lizard catch­ing flies, or a spi­der en­tan­gling them rush­ing in­to her nets, oft-​times takes my at­ten­tion? Is the thing dif­fer­ent, be­cause they are but small crea­tures? I go on from them to praise Thee the won­der­ful Cre­ator and Or­der­er of all, but this does not first draw my at­ten­tion. It is one thing to rise quick­ly, an­oth­er not to fall. And of such things is my life full; and my one hope is Thy won­der­ful great mer­cy. For when our heart be­comes the re­cep­ta­cle of such things, and is over­charged with throngs of this abun­dant van­ity, then are our prayers al­so there­by of­ten in­ter­rupt­ed and dis­tract­ed, and whilst in Thy pres­ence we di­rect the voice of our heart to Thine ears, this so great con­cern is bro­ken off by the rush­ing in of I know not what idle thoughts. Shall we then ac­count this al­so among things of slight con­cern­ment, or shall aught bring us back to hope, save Thy com­plete mer­cy, since Thou hast be­gun to change us?

And Thou know­est how far Thou hast al­ready changed me, who first healedst me of the lust of vin­di­cat­ing my­self, that so Thou might­est for­give all the rest of my in­iq­ui­ties, and heal all my in­fir­mi­ties, and re­deem life from cor­rup­tion, and crown me with mer­cy and pity, and sat­is­fy my de­sire with good things: who didst curb my pride with Thy fear, and tame my neck to Thy yoke. And now I bear it and it is light un­to me, be­cause so hast Thou promised, and hast made it; and ver­ily so it was, and I knew it not, when I feared to take it.

But, O Lord, Thou alone Lord with­out pride, be­cause Thou art the on­ly true Lord, who hast no lord; hath this third kind of temp­ta­tion al­so ceased from me, or can it cease through this whole life? To wish, name­ly, to be feared and loved of men, for no oth­er end, but that we may have a joy there­in which is no joy? A mis­er­able life this and a foul boast­ful­ness! Hence es­pe­cial­ly it comes that men do nei­ther pure­ly love nor fear Thee. And there­fore dost Thou re­sist the proud, and givest grace to the hum­ble: yea, Thou thun­der­est down up­on the am­bi­tions of the world, and the foun­da­tions of the moun­tains trem­ble. Be­cause now cer­tain of­fices of hu­man so­ci­ety make it nec­es­sary to be loved and feared of men, the ad­ver­sary of our true blessed­ness layeth hard at us, ev­ery where spread­ing his snares of “well-​done, well-​done”; that greed­ily catch­ing at them, we may be tak­en un­awares, and sev­er our joy from Thy truth, and set it in the de­ceiv­ing­ness of men; and be pleased at be­ing loved and feared, not for Thy sake, but in Thy stead: and thus hav­ing been made like him, he may have them for his own, not in the bands of char­ity, but in the bonds of pun­ish­ment: who pur­posed to set his throne in the north, that dark and chilled they might serve him, per­vert­ed­ly and crooked­ly im­itat­ing Thee. But we, O Lord, be­hold we are Thy lit­tle flock; pos­sess us as Thine, stretch Thy wings over us, and let us fly un­der them. Be Thou our glo­ry; let us be loved for Thee, and Thy word feared in us. Who would be praised of men when Thou blamest, will not be de­fend­ed of men when Thou judgest; nor de­liv­ered when Thou con­demnest. But when- not the sin­ner is praised in the de­sires of his soul, nor he blessed who doth un­godlily, but- a man is praised for some gift which Thou hast giv­en him, and he re­joic­es more at the praise for him­self than that he hath the gift for which he is praised, he al­so is praised, while Thou dis­prais­est; bet­ter is he who praised than he who is praised. For the one took plea­sure in the gift of God in man; the oth­er was bet­ter pleased with the gift of man, than of God.

By these temp­ta­tions we are as­sailed dai­ly, O Lord; with­out ceas­ing are we as­sailed. Our dai­ly fur­nace is the tongue of men. And in this way al­so Thou com­man­dest us con­ti­nence. Give what Thou en­joinest, and en­join what Thou wilt. Thou know­est on this mat­ter the groans of my heart, and the floods of mine eyes. For I can­not learn how far I am more cleansed from this plague, and I much fear my se­cret sins, which Thine eyes know, mine do not. For in oth­er kinds of temp­ta­tions I have some sort of means of ex­am­in­ing my­self; in this, scarce any. For, in re­frain­ing my mind from the plea­sures of the flesh and idle cu­rios­ity, I see how much I have at­tained to, when I do with­out them; fore­go­ing, or not hav­ing them. For then I ask my­self how much more or less trou­ble­some it is to me not to have them? Then, rich­es, which are de­sired, that they may serve to some one or two or all of the three con­cu­pis­cences, if the soul can­not dis­cern whether, when it hath them, it de­spiseth them, they may be cast aside, that so it may prove it­self. But to be with­out praise, and there­in es­say our pow­ers, must we live ill, yea so aban­doned­ly and atro­cious­ly, that no one should know with­out de­test­ing us? What greater mad­ness can be said or thought of? But if praise useth and ought to ac­com­pa­ny a good life and good works, we ought as lit­tle to forego its com­pa­ny, as good life it­self. Yet I know not whether I can well or ill be with­out any­thing, un­less it be ab­sent.

What then do I con­fess un­to Thee in this kind of temp­ta­tion, O Lord? What, but that I am de­light­ed with praise, but with truth it­self, more than with praise? For were it pro­posed to me, whether I would, be­ing fren­zied in er­ror on all things, be praised by all men, or be­ing con­sis­tent and most set­tled in the truth be blamed by all, I see which I should choose. Yet fain would I that the ap­pro­ba­tion of an­oth­er should not even in­crease my joy for any good in me. Yet I own, it doth in­crease it, and not so on­ly, but dis­praise doth di­min­ish it. And when I am trou­bled at this my mis­ery, an ex­cuse oc­curs to me, which of what val­ue it is, Thou God know­est, for it leaves me un­cer­tain. For since Thou hast com­mand­ed us not con­ti­nen­cy alone, that is, from what things to re­frain our love, but righ­teous­ness al­so, that is, where­on to be­stow it, and hast willed us to love not Thee on­ly, but our neigh­bour al­so; of­ten, when pleased with in­tel­li­gent praise, I seem to my­self to be pleased with the pro­fi­cien­cy or to­ward­li­ness of my neigh­bour, or to be grieved for evil in him, when I hear him dis­praise ei­ther what he un­der­stands not, or is good. For some­times I am grieved at my own praise, ei­ther when those things be praised in me, in which I mis­like my­self, or even less­er and slight goods are more es­teemed than they ought. But again how know I whether I am there­fore thus af­fect­ed, be­cause I would not have him who praiseth me dif­fer from me about my­self; not as be­ing in­flu­enced by con­cern for him, but be­cause those same good things which please me in my­self, please me more when they please an­oth­er al­so? For some how I am not praised when my judg­ment of my­self is not praised; foras­much as ei­ther those things are praised, which dis­please me; or those more, which please me less. Am I then doubt­ful of my­self in this mat­ter?

Be­hold, in Thee, O Truth, I see that I ought not to be moved at my own prais­es, for my own sake, but for the good of my neigh­bour. And whether it be so with me, I know not. For here­in I know less of my­self than of Thee. I be­seech now, O my God, dis­cov­er to me my­self al­so, that I may con­fess un­to my brethren, who are to pray for me, where­in I find my­self maimed. Let me ex­am­ine my­self again more dili­gent­ly. If in my praise I am moved with the good of my neigh­bour, why am I less moved if an­oth­er be un­just­ly dis­praised than if it be my­self? Why am I more stung by re­proach cast up­on my­self, than at that cast up­on an­oth­er, with the same in­jus­tice, be­fore me? Know I not this al­so? or is it at last that I de­ceive my­self, and do not the truth be­fore Thee in my heart and tongue? This mad­ness put far from me, O Lord, lest mine own mouth be to me the sin­ner’s oil to make fat my head. I am poor and needy; yet best, while in hid­den groan­ings I dis­please my­self, and seek Thy mer­cy, un­til what is lack­ing in my de­fec­tive state be re­newed and per­fect­ed, on to that peace which the eye of the proud knoweth not.

Yet the word which cometh out of the mouth, and deeds known to men, bring with them a most dan­ger­ous temp­ta­tion through the love of praise: which, to es­tab­lish a cer­tain ex­cel­len­cy of our own, so­lic­its and col­lects men’s suf­frages. It tempts, even when it is re­proved by my­self in my­self, on the very ground that it is re­proved; and of­ten glo­ries more vain­ly of the very con­tempt of vain-​glo­ry; and so it is no longer con­tempt of vain-​glo­ry, where­of it glo­ries; for it doth not con­temn when it glo­ri­eth.

With­in al­so, with­in is an­oth­er evil, aris­ing out of a like temp­ta­tion; where­by men be­come vain, pleas­ing them­selves in them­selves, though they please not, or dis­please or care not to please oth­ers. But pleas­ing them­selves, they much dis­please Thee, not on­ly tak­ing plea­sure in things not good, as if good, but in Thy good things, as though their own; or even if as Thine, yet as though for their own mer­its; or even if as though from Thy grace, yet not with broth­er­ly re­joic­ing, but en­vy­ing that grace to oth­ers. In all these and the like per­ils and tra­vails, Thou seest the trem­bling of my heart; and I rather feel my wounds to be cured by Thee, than not in­flict­ed by me.

Where hast Thou not walked with me, O Truth, teach­ing me what to be­ware, and what to de­sire; when I re­ferred to Thee what I could dis­cov­er here be­low, and con­sult­ed Thee? With my out­ward sens­es, as I might, I sur­veyed the world, and ob­served the life, which my body hath from me, and these my sens­es. Thence en­tered I the re­cess­es of my mem­ory, those man­ifold and spa­cious cham­bers, won­der­ful­ly fur­nished with in­nu­mer­able stores; and I con­sid­ered, and stood aghast; be­ing able to dis­cern noth­ing of these things with­out Thee, and find­ing none of them to be Thee. Nor was I my­self, who found out these things, who went over them all, and laboured to dis­tin­guish and to val­ue ev­ery thing ac­cord­ing to its dig­ni­ty, tak­ing some things up­on the re­port of my sens­es, ques­tion­ing about oth­ers which I felt to be min­gled with my­self, num­ber­ing and dis­tin­guish­ing the re­porters them­selves, and in the large trea­sure-​house of my mem­ory re­volv­ing some things, stor­ing up oth­ers, draw­ing out oth­ers. Nor yet was I my­self when I did this, i.e., that my pow­er where­by I did it, nei­ther was it Thou, for Thou art the abid­ing light, which I con­sult­ed con­cern­ing all these, whether they were, what they were, and how to be val­ued; and I heard Thee di­rect­ing and com­mand­ing me; and this I of­ten do, this de­lights me, and as far as I may be freed from nec­es­sary du­ties, un­to this plea­sure have I re­course. Nor in all these which I run over con­sult­ing Thee can I find any safe place for my soul, but in Thee; whith­er my scat­tered mem­bers may be gath­ered, and noth­ing of me de­part from Thee. And some­times Thou ad­mittest me to an af­fec­tion, very un­usu­al, in my in­most soul; ris­ing to a strange sweet­ness, which if it were per­fect­ed in me, I know not what in it would not be­long to the life to come. But through my mis­er­able en­cum­brances I sink down again in­to these low­er things, and am swept back by for­mer cus­tom, and am held, and great­ly weep, but am great­ly held. So much doth the bur­den of a bad cus­tom weigh us down. Here I can stay, but would not; there I would, but can­not; both ways, mis­er­able.

Thus then have I con­sid­ered the sick­ness­es of my sins in that three­fold con­cu­pis­cence, and have called Thy right hand to my help. For with a wound­ed heart have I be­held Thy bright­ness, and strick­en back I said, “Who can at­tain thith­er? I am cast away from the sight of Thine eyes.” Thou art the Truth who pre­sidest over all, but I through my cov­etous­ness would not in­deed forego Thee, but would with Thee pos­sess a lie; as no man would in such wise speak false­ly, as him­self to be ig­no­rant of the truth. So then I lost Thee, be­cause Thou vouch­safest not to be pos­sessed with a lie.

Whom could I find to rec­on­cile me to Thee? was I to have re­course to An­gels? by what prayers? by what sacra­ments? Many en­deav­our­ing to re­turn un­to Thee, and of them­selves un­able, have, as I hear, tried this, and fall­en in­to the de­sire of cu­ri­ous vi­sions, and been ac­count­ed wor­thy to be de­lud­ed. For they, be­ing high mind­ed, sought Thee by the pride of learn­ing, swelling out rather than smit­ing up­on their breasts, and so by the agree­ment of their heart, drew un­to them­selves the princes of the air, the fel­low-​con­spir­ators of their pride, by whom, through mag­ical in­flu­ences, they were de­ceived, seek­ing a me­di­ator, by whom they might be purged, and there was none. For the dev­il it was, trans­form­ing him­self in­to an An­gel of light. And it much en­ticed proud flesh, that he had no body of flesh. For they were mor­tal, and sin­ners; but thou, Lord, to whom they proud­ly sought to be rec­on­ciled, art im­mor­tal, and with­out sin. But a me­di­ator be­tween God and man must have some­thing like to God, some­thing like to men; lest be­ing in both like to man, he should he far from God: or if in both like God, too un­like man: and so not be a me­di­ator. That de­ceit­ful me­di­ator then, by whom in Thy se­cret judg­ments pride de­served to be de­lud­ed, hath one thing in com­mon with man, that is sin; an­oth­er he would seem to have in com­mon with God; and not be­ing clothed with the mor­tal­ity of flesh, would vaunt him­self to be im­mor­tal. But since the wages of sin is death, this hath he in com­mon with men, that with them he should be con­demned to death.

But the true Me­di­ator, Whom in Thy se­cret mer­cy Thou hast showed to the hum­ble, and sen­test, that by His ex­am­ple al­so they might learn that same hu­mil­ity, that Me­di­ator be­tween God and man, the Man Christ Je­sus, ap­peared be­twixt mor­tal sin­ners and the im­mor­tal just One; mor­tal with men, just with God: that be­cause the wages of righ­teous­ness is life and peace, He might by a righ­teous­ness con­joined with God make void that death of sin­ners, now made righ­teous, which He willed to have in com­mon with them. Hence He was showed forth to holy men of old; that so they, through faith in His Pas­sion to come, as we through faith of it passed, might be saved. For as Man, He was a Me­di­ator; but as the Word, not in the mid­dle be­tween God and man, be­cause equal to God, and God with God, and to­geth­er one God.

How hast Thou loved us, good Fa­ther, who sparedst not Thine on­ly Son, but de­liv­eredst Him up for us un­god­ly! How hast Thou loved us, for whom He that thought it no rob­bery to be equal with Thee, was made sub­ject even to the death of the cross, He alone, free among the dead, hav­ing pow­er to lay down His life, and pow­er to take it again: for us to Thee both Vic­tor and Vic­tim, and there­fore Vic­tor, be­cause the Vic­tim; for us to Thee Priest and Sac­ri­fice, and there­fore Priest be­cause the Sac­ri­fice; mak­ing us to Thee, of ser­vants, sons by be­ing born of Thee, and serv­ing us. Well then is my hope strong in Him, that Thou wilt heal all my in­fir­mi­ties, by Him Who sit­teth at Thy right hand and maketh in­ter­ces­sion for us; else should I de­spair. For many and great are my in­fir­mi­ties, many they are, and great; but Thy medicine is might­ier. We might imag­ine that Thy Word was far from any union with man, and de­spair of our­selves, un­less He had been made flesh and dwelt among us.

Af­fright­ed with my sins and the bur­den of my mis­ery, I had cast in my heart, and had pur­posed to flee to the wilder­ness: but Thou for­badest me, and strength­enedst me, say­ing, There­fore Christ died for all, that they which live may now no longer live un­to them­selves, but un­to Him that died for them. See, Lord, I cast my care up­on Thee, that I may live, and con­sid­er won­drous things out of Thy law. Thou know­est my un­skil­ful­ness, and my in­fir­mi­ties; teach me, and heal me. He, Thine on­ly Son, in Whom are hid all the trea­sures of wis­dom and knowl­edge, hath re­deemed me with His blood. Let not the proud speak evil of me; be­cause I med­itate on my ran­som, and eat and drink, and com­mu­ni­cate it; and poor, de­sired to be sat­is­fied from Him, amongst those that eat and are sat­is­fied, and they shall praise the Lord who seek Him.