The Confessions of St. Augustine

BOOK XIII

I call up­on Thee, O my God, my mer­cy, Who cre­at­edst me, and for­gottest not me, for­get­ting Thee. I call Thee in­to my soul which, by the long­ing Thy­self in­spirest in­to her, Thou pre­parest for Thee. For­sake me not now call­ing up­on Thee, whom Thou pre­vent­edst be­fore I called, and urgedst me with much va­ri­ety of re­peat­ed calls, that I would hear Thee from afar, and be con­vert­ed, and call up­on Thee, that calledst af­ter me; for Thou, Lord, blot­tedst out all my evil de­serv­ings, so as not to re­pay in­to my hands, where­with I fell from Thee; and Thou hast pre­vent­ed all my well de­serv­ings, so as to re­pay the work of Thy hands where­with Thou madest me; be­cause be­fore I was, Thou wert; nor was I any thing, to which Thou might­est grant to be; and yet be­hold, I am, out of Thy good­ness, pre­vent­ing all this which Thou hast made me, and where­of Thou hast made me. For nei­ther hadst Thou need of me, nor am I any such good, as to be help­ful un­to Thee, my Lord and God; not in serv­ing Thee, as though Thou wouldest tire in work­ing; or lest Thy pow­er might be less, if lack­ing my ser­vice: nor cul­ti­vat­ing Thy ser­vice, as a land, that must re­main un­cul­ti­vat­ed, un­less I cul­ti­vat­ed Thee: but serv­ing and wor­ship­ping Thee, that I might re­ceive a well-​be­ing from Thee, from whom it comes, that I have a be­ing ca­pa­ble of well-​be­ing.

For of the ful­ness of Thy good­ness, doth Thy crea­ture sub­sist, that so a good, which could no ways prof­it Thee, nor was of Thee (lest so it should be equal to Thee), might yet be since it could be made of Thee. For what did heav­en and earth, which Thou madest in the Be­gin­ning, de­serve of Thee? Let those spir­itu­al and cor­po­re­al na­tures which Thou madest in Thy Wis­dom, say where­in they de­served of Thee, to de­pend there­on (even in that their sev­er­al in­choate and form­less state, whether spir­itu­al or cor­po­re­al, ready to fall away in­to an im­mod­er­ate lib­er­ty and far-​dis­tant un­like­li­ness un­to Thee; -the spir­itu­al, though with­out form, su­pe­ri­or to the cor­po­re­al though formed, and the cor­po­re­al though with­out form, bet­ter than were it al­to­geth­er noth­ing), and so to de­pend up­on Thy Word, as form­less, un­less by the same Word they were brought back to Thy Uni­ty, in­dued with form and from Thee the One Sovereign Good were made all very good. How did they de­serve of Thee, to be even with­out form, since they had not been even this, but from Thee?

How did cor­po­re­al mat­ter de­serve of Thee, to be even in­vis­ible and with­out form? see­ing it were not even this, but that Thou madest it, and there­fore be­cause it was not, could not de­serve of Thee to be made. Or how could the in­choate spir­itu­al crea­ture de­serve of Thee, even to ebb and flow dark­some­ly like the deep, -un­like Thee, un­less it had been by the same Word turned to that, by Whom it was cre­at­ed, and by Him so en­light­ened, be­come light; though not equal­ly, yet con­formably to that Form which is equal un­to Thee? For as in a body, to be, is not one with be­ing beau­ti­ful, else could it not be de­formed; so like­wise to a cre­at­ed spir­it to live, is not one with liv­ing wise­ly; else should it be wise un­change­ably. But good it is for it al­ways to hold fast to Thee; lest what light it hath ob­tained by turn­ing to Thee, it lose by turn­ing from Thee, and re­lapse in­to life re­sem­bling the dark­some deep. For we our­selves al­so, who as to the soul are a spir­itu­al crea­ture, turned away from Thee our light, were in that life some­times dark­ness; and still labour amidst the relics of our dark­ness, un­til in Thy On­ly One we be­come Thy righ­teous­ness, like the moun­tains of God. For we have been Thy judg­ments, which are like the great deep.

That which Thou saidst in the be­gin­ning of the cre­ation, Let there be light, and there was light; I do, not un­suit­ably, un­der­stand of the spir­itu­al crea­ture: be­cause there was al­ready a sort of life, which Thou might­est il­lu­mi­nate. But as it had no claim on Thee for a life, which could be en­light­ened, so nei­ther now that it was, had it any, to be en­light­ened. For nei­ther could its form­less es­tate be pleas­ing un­to Thee, un­less it be­came light, and that not by ex­ist­ing sim­ply, but by be­hold­ing the il­lu­mi­nat­ing light, and cleav­ing to it; so that, that it lived, and lived hap­pi­ly, it owes to noth­ing but Thy grace, be­ing turned by a bet­ter change un­to That which can­not be changed in­to worse or bet­ter; which Thou alone art, be­cause Thou alone sim­ply art; un­to Thee it be­ing not one thing to live, an­oth­er to live bless­ed­ly, see­ing Thy­self art Thine own Blessed­ness.

What then could he want­ing un­to Thy good, which Thou Thy­self art, al­though these things had ei­ther nev­er been, or re­mained with­out form; which thou madest, not out of any want, but out of the ful­ness of Thy good­ness, re­strain­ing them and con­vert­ing them to form, not as though Thy joy were ful­filled by them? For to Thee be­ing per­fect, is their im­per­fec­tion dis­pleas­ing, and hence were they per­fect­ed by Thee, and please Thee; not as wert Thou im­per­fect, and by their per­fect­ing wert al­so to be per­fect­ed. For Thy good Spir­it in­deed was borne over the wa­ters, not borne up by them, as if He rest­ed up­on them. For those, on whom Thy good Spir­it is said to rest, He caus­es to rest in Him­self. But Thy in­cor­rupt­ible and un­change­able will, in it­self all-​suf­fi­cient for it­self, was borne up­on that life which Thou hadst cre­at­ed; to which, liv­ing is not one with hap­py liv­ing, see­ing it liveth al­so, ebbing and flow­ing in its own dark­ness: for which it re­maineth to be con­vert­ed un­to Him, by Whom it was made, and to live more and more by the foun­tain of life, and in His light to see light, and to be per­fect­ed, and en­light­ened, and beau­ti­fied.

Lo, now the Trin­ity ap­pears un­to me in a glass dark­ly, which is Thou my God, be­cause Thou, O Fa­ther, in Him Who is the Be­gin­ning of our wis­dom, Which is Thy Wis­dom, born of Thy­self, equal un­to Thee and co­eter­nal, that is, in Thy Son, cre­at­edst heav­en and earth. Much now have we said of the Heav­en of heav­ens, and of the earth in­vis­ible and with­out form, and of the dark­some deep, in ref­er­ence to the wan­der­ing in­sta­bil­ity of its spir­itu­al de­for­mi­ty, un­less it had been con­vert­ed un­to Him, from Whom it had its then de­gree of life, and by His en­light­en­ing be­came a beau­teous life, and the heav­en of that heav­en, which was af­ter­wards set be­tween wa­ter and wa­ter. And un­der the name of God, I now held the Fa­ther, who made these things, and un­der the name of Be­gin­ning, the Son, in whom He made these things; and be­liev­ing, as I did, my God as the Trin­ity, I searched fur­ther in His holy words, and to, Thy Spir­it moved up­on the wa­ters. Be­hold the Trin­ity, my God, Fa­ther, and Son, and Holy Ghost, Cre­ator of all cre­ation.

But what was the cause, O true-​speak­ing Light? -un­to Thee lift I up my heart, let it not teach me van­ities, dis­pel its dark­ness; and tell me, I be­seech Thee, by our moth­er char­ity, tell me the rea­son, I be­seech Thee, why af­ter the men­tion of heav­en, and of the earth in­vis­ible and with­out form, and dark­ness up­on the deep, Thy Scrip­ture should then at length men­tion Thy Spir­it? Was it be­cause it was meet that the knowl­edge of Him should be con­veyed, as be­ing “borne above”; and this could not be said, un­less that were first men­tioned, over which Thy Spir­it may be un­der­stood to have been borne. For nei­ther was He borne above the Fa­ther, nor the Son, nor could He right­ly be said to be borne above, if He were borne over noth­ing. First then was that to be spo­ken of, over which He might be borne; and then He, whom it was meet not oth­er­wise to be spo­ken of than as be­ing borne. But where­fore was it not meet that the knowl­edge of Him should be con­veyed oth­er­wise, than as be­ing borne above?

Hence let him that is able, fol­low with his un­der­stand­ing Thy Apos­tle, where he thus speaks, Be­cause Thy love is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is giv­en un­to us: and where con­cern­ing spir­itu­al gifts, he tea­cheth and showeth un­to us a more ex­cel­lent way of char­ity; and where he bows his knee un­to Thee for us, that we may know the su­perem­inent knowl­edge of the love of Christ. And there­fore from the be­gin­ning, was He borne su­perem­inent above the wa­ters. To whom shall I speak this? how speak of the weight of evil de­sires, down­wards to the steep abyss; and how char­ity rais­es up again by Thy Spir­it which was borne above the wa­ters? to whom shall I speak it? how speak it? For it is not in space that we are merged and emerge. What can be more, and yet what less like? They be af­fec­tions, they be loves; the un­clean­ness of our spir­it flow­ing away down­wards with the love of cares, and the ho­li­ness of Thine rais­ing us up­ward by love of unanx­ious re­pose; that we may lift our hearts un­to Thee, where Thy Spir­it is borne above the wa­ters; and come to that su­perem­inent re­pose, when our soul shall have passed through the wa­ters which yield no sup­port.

An­gels fell away, man’s soul fell away, and there­by point­ed the abyss in that dark depth, ready for the whole spir­itu­al cre­ation, hadst not Thou said from the be­gin­ning, Let there be light, and there had been light, and ev­ery obe­di­ent in­tel­li­gence of Thy heav­en­ly City had cleaved to Thee, and rest­ed in Thy Spir­it, Which is borne un­change­ably over ev­ery thing change­able. Oth­er­wise, had even the heav­en of heav­ens been in it­self a dark­some deep; but now it is light in the Lord. For even in that mis­er­able rest­less­ness of the spir­its, who fell away and dis­cov­ered their own dark­ness, when bared of the cloth­ing of Thy light, dost Thou suf­fi­cient­ly re­veal how no­ble Thou madest the rea­son­able crea­ture; to which noth­ing will suf­fice to yield a hap­py rest, less than Thee; and so not even her­self. For Thou, O our God, shalt light­en our dark­ness: from Thee riseth our gar­ment of light; and then shall our dark­ness be as the noon day. Give Thy­self un­to me, O my God, re­store Thy­self un­to me: be­hold I love, and if it be too lit­tle, I would love more strong­ly. I can­not mea­sure so as to know, how much love there yet lack­eth to me, ere my life may run in­to Thy em­brace­ments, nor turn away, un­til it be hid­den in the hid­den place of Thy Pres­ence. This on­ly I know, that woe is me ex­cept in Thee: not on­ly with­out but with­in my­self al­so; and all abun­dance, which is not my God, is empti­ness to me.

But was not ei­ther the Fa­ther, or the Son, borne above the wa­ters? if this means, in space, like a body, then nei­ther was the Holy Spir­it; but if the un­change­able su­perem­inence of Di­vin­ity above all things change­able, then were both Fa­ther, and Son, and Holy Ghost borne up­on the wa­ters. Why then is this said of Thy Spir­it on­ly, why is it said on­ly of Him? As if He had been in place, Who is not in place, of Whom on­ly it is writ­ten, that He is Thy gift? In Thy Gift we rest; there we en­joy Thee. Our rest is our place. Love lifts us up thith­er, and Thy good Spir­it lifts up our low­li­ness from the gates of death. In Thy good plea­sure is our peace. The body by its own weight strives to­wards its own place. Weight makes not down­ward on­ly, but to his own place. Fire tends up­ward, a stone down­ward. They are urged by their own weight, they seek their own places. Oil poured be­low wa­ter, is raised above the wa­ter; wa­ter poured up­on oil, sinks be­low the oil. They are urged by their own weights to seek their own places. When out of their or­der, they are rest­less; re­stored to or­der, they are at rest. My weight, is my love; there­by am I borne, whith­er­so­ev­er I am borne. We are in­flamed, by Thy Gift we are kin­dled; and are car­ried up­wards; we glow in­ward­ly, and go for­wards. We as­cend Thy ways that be in our heart, and sing a song of de­grees; we glow in­ward­ly with Thy fire, with Thy good fire, and we go; be­cause we go up­wards to the peace of Jerusalem: for glad­dened was I in those who said un­to me, We will go up to the house of the Lord. There hath Thy good plea­sure placed us, that we may de­sire noth­ing else, but to abide there for ev­er.

Blessed crea­ture, which be­ing it­self oth­er than Thou, has known no oth­er con­di­tion, than that, so soon as it was made, it was, with­out any in­ter­val, by Thy Gift, Which is borne above ev­ery thing change­able, borne aloft by that call­ing where­by Thou saidst, Let there be light, and there was light. Where­as in us this took place at dif­fer­ent times, in that we were dark­ness, and are made light: but of that is on­ly said, what it would have been, had it not been en­light­ened. And, this is so spo­ken, as if it had been un­set­tled and dark­some be­fore; that so the cause where­by it was made oth­er­wise, might ap­pear, name­ly, that be­ing turned to the Light un­fail­ing it be­came light. Whoso can, let him un­der­stand this; let him ask of Thee. Why should he trou­ble me, as if I could en­light­en any man that cometh in­to this world?

Which of us com­pre­hen­deth the Almighty Trin­ity? and yet which speaks not of It, if in­deed it be It? Rare is the soul, which while it speaks of It, knows what it speaks of. And they con­tend and strive, yet, with­out peace, no man sees that vi­sion. I would that men would con­sid­er these three, that are in them­selves. These three be in­deed far oth­er than the Trin­ity: I do but tell, where they may prac­tise them­selves, and there prove and feel how far they be. Now the three I spake of are, To Be, to Know, and to Will. For I Am, and Know, and Will: I Am Know­ing and Will­ing: and I Know my­self to Be, and to Will: and I Will to Be, and to Know. In these three then, let him dis­cern that can, how in­sep­ara­ble a life there is, yea one life, mind, and one essence, yea last­ly how in­sep­ara­ble a dis­tinc­tion there is, and yet a dis­tinc­tion. Sure­ly a man hath it be­fore him; let him look in­to him­self, and see, and tell me. But when he dis­cov­ers and can say any thing of these, let him not there­fore think that he has found that which is above these Un­change­able, which Is un­change­ably, and Knows un­change­ably, and Wills un­change­ably; and whether be­cause of these three, there is in God al­so a Trin­ity, or whether all three be in Each, so that the three be­long to Each; or whether both ways at once, won­drous­ly, sim­ply and yet man­ifold­ly, It­self a bound un­to It­self with­in It­self, yet un­bound­ed; where­by It is, and is Known un­to It­self and suf­ficeth to it­self, un­change­ably the Self-​same, by the abun­dant great­ness of its Uni­ty, -who can read­ily con­ceive this? who could any ways ex­press it? who would, any way, pro­nounce there­on rash­ly?

Pro­ceed in thy con­fes­sion, say to the Lord thy God, O my faith, Holy, Holy, Holy, O Lord my God, in Thy Name have we been bap­tised, Fa­ther, Son, and Holy Ghost; in Thy Name do we bap­tise, Fa­ther, Son, and Holy Ghost, be­cause among us al­so, in His Christ did God make heav­en and earth, name­ly, the spir­itu­al and car­nal peo­ple of His Church. Yea and our earth, be­fore it re­ceived the form of doc­trine, was in­vis­ible and with­out form; and we were cov­ered with the dark­ness of ig­no­rance. For Thou chas­tenedst man for in­iq­ui­ty, and Thy judg­ments were like the great deep un­to him. But be­cause Thy Spir­it was borne above the wa­ters, Thy mer­cy for­sook not our mis­ery, and Thou saidst, Let there be light, Re­pent ye, for the king­dom of heav­en is at hand. Re­pent ye, let there be light. And be­cause our soul was trou­bled with­in us, we re­mem­bered Thee, O Lord, from the land of Jor­dan, and that moun­tain equal un­to Thy­self, but lit­tle for our sakes: and our dark­ness dis­pleased us, we turned un­to Thee and there was light. And, be­hold, we were some­times dark­ness, but now light in the Lord.

But as yet by faith and not by sight, for by hope we are saved; but hope that is seen, is not hope. As yet doth deep call un­to deep, but now in the voice of Thy wa­ter-​spouts. As yet doth he that saith, I could not speak un­to you as un­to spir­itu­al, but as un­to car­nal, even he as yet, doth not think him­self to have ap­pre­hend­ed, and for­get­teth those things which are be­hind, and rea­cheth forth to those which are be­fore, and groaneth be­ing bur­thened, and his soul thirsteth af­ter the Liv­ing God, as the hart af­ter the wa­ter-​brooks, and saith, When shall I come? de­sir­ing to be clothed up­on with his house which is from heav­en, and cal­leth up­on this low­er deep, say­ing, Be not con­formed to this world, but be ye trans­formed by the re­new­ing of your mind. And, be not chil­dren in un­der­stand­ing, but in mal­ice, be ye chil­dren, that in un­der­stand­ing ye may be per­fect; and O fool­ish Gala­tians, who hath be­witched you? But now no longer in his own voice; but in Thine who sen­test Thy Spir­it from above; through Him who as­cend­ed up on high, and set open the flood-​gates of His gifts, that the force of His streams might make glad the city of God. Him doth this friend of the Bride­groom sigh af­ter, hav­ing now the first-​fruits of the Spir­it laid up with Him, yet still groan­ing with­in him­self, wait­ing for the adop­tion, to wit, the re­demp­tion of his body; to Him he sighs, a mem­ber of the Bride; for Him he is jeal­ous, as be­ing a friend of the Bride­groom; for Him he is jeal­ous, not for him­self; be­cause in the voice of Thy wa­ter-​spouts, not in his own voice, doth he call to that oth­er depth, over whom be­ing jeal­ous he feareth, lest as the ser­pent be­guiled Eve through his sub­tilty, so their minds should be cor­rupt­ed from the pu­ri­ty that is in our Bride­groom Thy on­ly Son. O what a light of beau­ty will that be, when we shall see Him as He is, and those tears be passed away, which have been my meat day and night, whilst they dai­ly say un­to me, Where is now Thy God?

Be­hold, I too say, O my God, Where art Thou? see, where Thou art! in Thee I breathe a lit­tle, when I pour out my soul by my­self in the voice of joy and praise, the sound of him that keeps holy-​day. And yet again it is sad, be­cause it re­lapseth, and be­comes a deep, or rather per­ceives it­self still to be a deep. Un­to it speaks my faith which Thou hast kin­dled to en­light­en my feet in the night, Why art thou sad, O my soul, and why dost thou trou­ble me? Hope in the Lord; His word is a lan­thorn un­to thy feet: hope and en­dure, un­til the night, the moth­er of the wicked, un­til the wrath of the Lord, be over­past, where­of we al­so were once chil­dren, who were some­times dark­ness, relics where­of we bear about us in our body, dead be­cause of sin; un­til the day break, and the shad­ows fly away. Hope thou in the Lord; in the morn­ing I shall stand in Thy pres­ence, and con­tem­plate Thee: I shall for ev­er con­fess un­to Thee. In the morn­ing I shall stand in Thy pres­ence, and shall see the health of my coun­te­nance, my God, who al­so shall quick­en our mor­tal bod­ies, by the Spir­it that dwelleth in us, be­cause He hath in mer­cy been borne over our in­ner dark­some and float­ing deep: from Whom we have in this pil­grim­age re­ceived an earnest, that we should now be light: whilst we are saved by hope, and are the chil­dren of light, and the chil­dren of the day, not the chil­dren of the night, nor of the dark­ness, which yet some­times we were. Be­twixt whom and us, in this un­cer­tain­ty of hu­man knowl­edge, Thou on­ly di­videst; Thou, who provest our hearts, and callest the light, day, and the dark­ness, night. For who dis­cer­neth us, but Thou? And what have we, that we have not re­ceived of Thee? out of the same lump ves­sels are made un­to hon­our, where­of oth­ers al­so are made un­to dis­hon­our.

Or who, ex­cept Thou, our God, made for us that fir­ma­ment of au­thor­ity over us in Thy Di­vine Scrip­ture? as it is said, For heav­en shall be fold­ed up like a scroll; and now is it stretched over us like a skin. For Thy Di­vine Scrip­ture is of more em­inent au­thor­ity, since those mor­tals by whom Thou dis­pens­est it un­to us, un­der­went mor­tal­ity. And Thou know­est, Lord, Thou know­est, how Thou with skins didst clothe men, when they by sin be­came mor­tal. Whence Thou hast like a skin stretched out the fir­ma­ment of Thy book, that is, Thy har­mo­niz­ing words, which by the min­istry of mor­tal men Thou spread­est over us. For by their very death was that sol­id fir­ma­ment of au­thor­ity, in Thy dis­cours­es set forth by them, more em­inent­ly ex­tend­ed over all that be un­der it; which whilst they lived here, was not so em­inent­ly ex­tend­ed. Thou hadst not as yet spread abroad the heav­en like a skin; Thou hadst not as yet en­larged in all di­rec­tions the glo­ry of their deaths.

Let us look, O Lord, up­on the heav­ens, the work of Thy fin­gers; clear from our eyes that cloud, which Thou hast spread un­der them. There is Thy tes­ti­mo­ny, which giveth wis­dom un­to the lit­tle ones: per­fect, O my God, Thy praise out of the mouth of babes and suck­lings. For we know no oth­er books, which so de­stroy pride, which so de­stroy the en­emy and the de­fend­er, who re­sisteth Thy rec­on­cil­ia­tion by de­fend­ing his own sins. I know not, Lord, I know not any oth­er such pure words, which so per­suade me to con­fess, and make my neck pli­ant to Thy yoke, and in­vite me to serve Thee for nought. Let me un­der­stand them, good Fa­ther: grant this to me, who am placed un­der them: be­cause for those placed un­der them, hast Thou es­tab­lished them.

Oth­er wa­ters there be above this fir­ma­ment, I be­lieve im­mor­tal, and sep­arat­ed from earth­ly cor­rup­tion. Let them praise Thy Name, let them praise Thee, the su­perce­les­tial peo­ple, Thine an­gels, who have no need to gaze up at this fir­ma­ment, or by read­ing to know of Thy Word. For they al­ways be­hold Thy face, and there read with­out any syl­la­bles in time, what wil­leth Thy eter­nal will; they read, they choose, they love. They are ev­er read­ing; and that nev­er pass­es away which they read; for by choos­ing, and by lov­ing, they read the very un­change­able­ness of Thy coun­sel. Their book is nev­er closed, nor their scroll fold­ed up; see­ing Thou Thy­self art this to them, and art eter­nal­ly; be­cause Thou hast or­dained them above this fir­ma­ment, which Thou hast firm­ly set­tled over the in­fir­mi­ty of the low­er peo­ple, where they might gaze up and learn Thy mer­cy, an­nounc­ing in time Thee Who madest times. For Thy mer­cy, O Lord, is in the heav­ens, and Thy truth rea­cheth un­to the clouds. The clouds pass away, but the heav­en abideth. The preach­ers of Thy word pass out of this life in­to an­oth­er; but Thy Scrip­ture is spread abroad over the peo­ple, even un­to the end of the world. Yet heav­en and earth al­so shall pass away, but Thy words shall not pass away. Be­cause the scroll shall be rolled to­geth­er: and the grass over which it was spread, shall with the good­li­ness of it pass away; but Thy Word re­maineth for ev­er, which now ap­peareth un­to us un­der the dark im­age of the clouds, and through the glass of the heav­ens, not as it is: be­cause we al­so, though the well-​beloved of Thy Son, yet it hath not yet ap­peared what we shall be. He looketh through the lat­tice of our flesh, and He spake us ten­der­ly, and kin­dled us, and we ran af­ter His odours. But when He shall ap­pear, then shall we be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is. As He is, Lord, will our sight be.

For al­to­geth­er, as Thou art, Thou on­ly know­est; Who art un­change­ably, and know­est un­change­ably, and willest un­change­ably. And Thy Essence Knoweth, and Wil­leth un­change­ably; and Thy Knowl­edge Is, and Wil­leth un­change­ably; and Thy Will Is, and Knoweth un­change­ably. Nor seemeth it right in Thine eyes, that as the Un­change­able Light knoweth It­self, so should it be known by the thing en­light­ened, and change­able. There­fore is my soul like a land where no wa­ter is, be­cause as it can­not of it­self en­light­en it­self, so can it not of it­self sat­is­fy it­self. For so is the foun­tain of life with Thee, like as in Thy light we shall see light.

Who gath­ered the em­bit­tered to­geth­er in­to one so­ci­ety? For they have all one end, a tem­po­ral and earth­ly fe­lic­ity, for at­tain­ing where­of they do all things, though they wa­ver up and down with an in­nu­mer­able va­ri­ety of cares. Who, Lord, but Thou, saidst, Let the wa­ters be gath­ered to­geth­er in­to one place, and let the dry land ap­pear, which thirsteth af­ter Thee? For the sea al­so is Thine, and Thou hast made it, and Thy hands pre­pared the dry land. Nor is the bit­ter­ness of men’s wills, but the gath­er­ing to­geth­er of the wa­ters, called sea; for Thou re­strainest the wicked de­sires of men’s souls, and settest them their bounds, how far they may be al­lowed to pass, that their waves may break one against an­oth­er: and thus mak­est Thou it a sea, by the or­der of Thy do­min­ion over all things.

But the souls that thirst af­ter Thee, and that ap­pear be­fore Thee (be­ing by oth­er bounds di­vid­ed from the so­ci­ety of the sea), Thou wa­ter­est by a sweet spring, that the earth may bring forth her fruit, and Thou, Lord God, so com­mand­ing, our soul may bud forth works of mer­cy ac­cord­ing to their kind, lov­ing our neigh­bour in the re­lief of his bod­ily ne­ces­si­ties, hav­ing seed in it­self ac­cord­ing to its like­ness, when from feel­ing of our in­fir­mi­ty, we com­pas­sion­ate so as to re­lieve the needy; help­ing them, as we would be helped; if we were in like need; not on­ly in things easy, as in herb yield­ing seed, but al­so in the pro­tec­tion of our as­sis­tance, with our best strength, like the tree yield­ing fruit: that is, well-​do­ing in res­cu­ing him that suf­fers wrong, from the hand of the pow­er­ful, and giv­ing him the shel­ter of pro­tec­tion, by the mighty strength of just judg­ment.

So, Lord, so, I be­seech Thee, let there spring up, as Thou doest, as Thou givest cheer­ful­ness and abil­ity, let truth spring out of the earth, and righ­teous­ness look down from heav­en, and let there be lights in the fir­ma­ment. Let us break our bread to the hun­gry, and bring the house­less poor to our house. Let us clothe the naked, and de­spise not those of our own flesh. Which fruits hav­ing sprung out of the earth, see it is good: and let our tem­po­rary light break forth; and our­selves, from this low­er fruit­ful­ness of ac­tion, ar­riv­ing at the de­light­ful­ness of con­tem­pla­tion, ob­tain­ing the Word of Life above, ap­pear like lights in the world, cleav­ing to the fir­ma­ment of Thy Scrip­ture. For there Thou in­structest us, to di­vide be­tween the things in­tel­lec­tu­al, and things of sense, as be­twixt the day and the night; or be­tween souls, giv­en ei­ther to things in­tel­lec­tu­al, or things of sense, so that now not Thou on­ly in the se­cret of Thy judg­ment, as be­fore the fir­ma­ment was made, di­videst be­tween the light and the dark­ness, but Thy spir­itu­al chil­dren al­so set and ranked in the same fir­ma­ment (now that Thy grace is laid open through­out the world), may give light up­on the earth, and di­vide be­twixt the day and the night, and be for signs of times, that old things are passed away, and, be­hold, all things are be­come new; and that our sal­va­tion is near­er than when we be­lieved: and that the night is far spent, and the day is at hand: and that Thou wilt crown Thy year with bless­ing, send­ing the labour­ers of Thy good­ness in­to Thy har­vest, in sow­ing where­of, oth­ers have laboured, send­ing al­so in­to an­oth­er field, whose har­vest shall be in the end. Thus grantest Thou the prayers of him that as­keth, and bless­est the years of the just; but Thou art the same, and in Thy years which fail not, Thou pre­parest a gar­ner for our pass­ing years. For Thou by an eter­nal coun­sel dost in their prop­er sea­sons be­stow heav­en­ly bless­ings up­on the earth. For to one is giv­en by the Spir­it the word of wis­dom, as it were the less­er light: to an­oth­er faith; to an­oth­er the gift with the light of per­spic­uous truth, as it were for the rule of the day. To an­oth­er the word of knowl­edge by the same Spir­it, as it were the less­er light: to an­oth­er faith; to an­oth­er the gift of heal­ing; to an­oth­er the work­ing of mir­acles; to an­oth­er prophe­cy; to an­oth­er dis­cern­ing of spir­its; to an­oth­er divers kinds of tongues. And all these as it were stars. For all these wor­keth the one and self-​same spir­it, di­vid­ing to ev­ery man his own as He will; and caus­ing stars to ap­pear man­ifest­ly, to prof­it with­al. But the word of knowl­edge, where­in are con­tained all Sacra­ments, which are var­ied in their sea­sons as it were the moon, and those oth­er no­tices of gifts, which are reck­oned up in or­der, as it were stars, inas­much as they come short of that bright­ness of wis­dom, which glad­dens the fore­men­tioned day, are on­ly for the rule of the night. For they are nec­es­sary to such, as that Thy most pru­dent ser­vant could not speak un­to as un­to spir­itu­al, but as un­to car­nal; even he, who speaketh wis­dom among those that are per­fect. But the nat­ural man, as it were a babe in Christ and fed on milk, un­til he be strength­ened for sol­id meat and his eye be en­abled to be­hold the Sun, let him not dwell in a night for­sak­en of all light, but be con­tent with the light of the moon and the stars. So dost Thou speak to us, our All-​wise God, in Thy Book, Thy fir­ma­ment; that we may dis­cern all things, in an ad­mirable con­tem­pla­tion; though as yet in signs and in times, and in days, and in years.

But first, wash you, be clean; put away evil from your souls, and from be­fore mine eyes, that the dry land may ap­pear. Learn to do good, judge the fa­ther­less, plead for the wid­ow, that the earth may bring forth the green herb for meat, and the tree bear­ing fruit; and come, let us rea­son to­geth­er, saith the Lord, that there may be lights in the fir­ma­ment of the heav­en, and they may shine up­on the earth. That rich man asked of the good Mas­ter, what he should do to at­tain eter­nal life. Let the good Mas­ter tell him (whom he thought no more than man; but He is good be­cause He is God), let Him tell him, if he would en­ter in­to life, he must keep the com­mand­ments: let him put away from him the bit­ter­ness of mal­ice and wicked­ness; not kill, not com­mit adul­tery, not steal, not bear false wit­ness; that the dry land may ap­pear, and bring forth the hon­our­ing of fa­ther and moth­er, and the love of our neigh­bour. All these (saith he) have I kept. Whence then so many thorns, if the earth be fruit­ful? Go, root up the spread­ing thick­ets of cov­etous­ness; sell that thou hast, and be filled with fruit, by giv­ing to the poor, and thou shalt have trea­sure in heav­en; and fol­low the Lord if thou wilt be per­fect, as­so­ci­at­ed with them, among whom He speaketh wis­dom, Who knoweth what to dis­tribute to the day, and to the night, that thou al­so mayest know it, and for thee there may be lights in the fir­ma­ment of heav­en; which will not be, un­less thy heart be there: nor will that ei­ther be, un­less there thy trea­sure be; as thou hast heard of the good Mas­ter. But that bar­ren earth was grieved; and the thorns choked the word.

But you, cho­sen gen­er­ation, you weak things of the world, who have for­sak­en all, that ye may fol­low the Lord; go af­ter Him, and con­found the mighty; go af­ter Him, ye beau­ti­ful feet, and shine ye in the fir­ma­ment, that the heav­ens may de­clare His glo­ry, di­vid­ing be­tween the light of the per­fect, though not as the an­gels, and the dark­ness of the lit­tle ones, though not de­spised. Shine over the earth; and let the day, light­ened by the sun, ut­ter un­to day, speech of wis­dom; and night, shin­ing with the moon, show un­to night, the word of knowl­edge. The moon and stars shine for the night; yet doth not the night ob­scure them, see­ing they give it light in its de­gree. For be­hold God say­ing, as it were, Let there be lights in the fir­ma­ment of heav­en; there came sud­den­ly a sound from heav­en, as it had been the rush­ing of a mighty wind, and there ap­peared cloven tongues like as of fire, and it sat up­on each of them. And there were made lights in the fir­ma­ment of heav­en, hav­ing the word of life. Run ye to and fro ev­ery where, ye holy fires, ye beau­teous fires; for ye are the light of the world, nor are ye put un­der a bushel; He whom you cleave un­to, is ex­alt­ed, and hath ex­alt­ed you. Run ye to and fro, and be known un­to all na­tions.

Let the sea al­so con­ceive and bring forth your works; and let the wa­ters bring forth the mov­ing crea­ture that hath life. For ye, sep­arat­ing the pre­cious from the vile, are made the mouth of God, by whom He saith, Let the wa­ters bring forth, not the liv­ing crea­ture which the earth brings forth, but the mov­ing crea­ture hav­ing life, and the fowls that fly above the earth. For Thy Sacra­ments, O God, by the min­istry of Thy holy ones, have moved amid the waves of temp­ta­tions of the world, to hal­low the Gen­tiles in Thy Name, in Thy Bap­tism. And amid these things, many great won­ders were wrought, as it were great whales: and the voic­es of Thy mes­sen­gers fly­ing above the earth, in the open fir­ma­ment of Thy Book; that be­ing set over them, as their au­thor­ity un­der which they were to fly, whith­er­so­ev­er they went. For there is no speech nor lan­guage, where their voice is not heard: see­ing their sound is gone through all the earth, and their words to the end of the world, be­cause Thou, Lord, mul­ti­pliedst them by bless­ing.

Speak I un­tru­ly, or do I min­gle and con­found, and not dis­tin­guish be­tween the lu­cid knowl­edge of these things in the fir­ma­ment of heav­en, and the ma­te­ri­al works in the wavy sea, and un­der the fir­ma­ment of heav­en? For of those things where­of the knowl­edge is sub­stan­tial and de­fined, with­out any in­crease by gen­er­ation, as it were lights of wis­dom and knowl­edge, yet even of them, the ma­te­ri­al op­er­ations are many and divers; and one thing grow­ing out of an­oth­er, they are mul­ti­plied by Thy bless­ing, O God, who hast re­freshed the fas­tid­ious­ness of mor­tal sens­es; that so one thing in the un­der­stand­ing of our mind, may, by the mo­tions of the body, be many ways set out, and ex­pressed. These Sacra­ments have the wa­ters brought forth; but in Thy word. The ne­ces­si­ties of the peo­ple es­tranged from the eter­ni­ty of Thy truth, have brought them forth, but in Thy Gospel; be­cause the wa­ters them­selves cast them forth, the dis­eased bit­ter­ness where­of was the cause, why they were sent forth in Thy Word.

Now are all things fair that Thou hast made; but be­hold, Thy­self art un­ut­ter­ably fair­er, that madest all; from whom had not Adam fall­en, the brack­ish­ness of the sea had nev­er flowed out of him, that is, the hu­man race so pro­found­ly cu­ri­ous, and tem­pes­tu­ous­ly swelling, and rest­less­ly tum­bling up and down; and then had there been no need of Thy dis­pensers to work in many wa­ters, af­ter a cor­po­re­al and sen­si­ble man­ner, mys­te­ri­ous do­ings and say­ings. For such those mov­ing and fly­ing crea­tures now seem to me to mean, where­by peo­ple be­ing ini­ti­at­ed and con­se­crat­ed by cor­po­re­al Sacra­ments, should not fur­ther prof­it, un­less their soul had a spir­itu­al life, and un­less af­ter the word of ad­mis­sion, it looked for­wards to per­fec­tion.

And here­by, in Thy Word, not the deep­ness of the sea, but the earth sep­arat­ed from the bit­ter­ness of the wa­ters, brings forth, not the mov­ing crea­ture that hath life, but the liv­ing soul. For now hath it no more need of bap­tism, as the hea­then have, and as it­self had, when it was cov­ered with the wa­ters; (for no oth­er en­trance is there in­to the king­dom of heav­en, since Thou hast ap­point­ed that this should be the en­trance:) nor does it seek af­ter won­der­ful­ness of mir­acles to work be­lief; for it is not such, that un­less it sees signs and won­ders, it will not be­lieve, now that the faith­ful earth is sep­arat­ed from the wa­ters that were bit­ter with in­fi­deli­ty; and tongues are for a sign, not to them that be­lieve, but to them that be­lieve not. Nei­ther then does that earth which Thou hast found­ed up­on the wa­ters, need that fly­ing kind, which at Thy word the wa­ters brought forth. Send Thou Thy word in­to it by Thy mes­sen­gers: for we speak of their work­ing, yet it is Thou that work­est in them that they may work out a liv­ing soul in it. The earth brings it forth, be­cause the earth is the cause that they work this in the soul; as the sea was the cause that they wrought up­on the mov­ing crea­tures that have life, and the fowls that fly un­der the fir­ma­ment of heav­en, of whom the earth hath no need; al­though it feeds up­on that fish which was tak­en out of the deep, up­on that ta­ble which Thou hast pre­pared in the pres­ence of them that be­lieve. For there­fore was He tak­en out of the deep, that He might feed the dry land; and the fowl, though bred in the sea, is yet mul­ti­plied up­on the earth. For of the first preach­ings of the Evan­ge­lists, man’s in­fi­deli­ty was the cause; yet are the faith­ful al­so ex­hort­ed and blessed by them man­ifold­ly, from day to day. But the liv­ing soul takes his be­gin­ning from the earth: for it prof­its on­ly those al­ready among the Faith­ful, to con­tain them­selves from the love of this world, that so their soul may live un­to Thee, which was dead while it lived in plea­sures; in death-​bring­ing plea­sures, Lord, for Thou, Lord, art the life-​giv­ing de­light of the pure heart.

Now then let Thy min­is­ters work up­on the earth, -not as up­on the wa­ters of in­fi­deli­ty, by preach­ing and speak­ing by mir­acles, and Sacra­ments, and mys­tic words; where­in ig­no­rance, the moth­er of ad­mi­ra­tion, might be in­tent up­on them, out of a rev­er­ence to­wards those se­cret signs. For such is the en­trance un­to the Faith for the sons of Adam for­get­ful of Thee, while they hide them­selves from Thy face, and be­come a dark­some deep. But- let Thy min­is­ters work now as on the dry land, sep­arat­ed from the whirlpools of the great deep: and let them be a pat­tern un­to the Faith­ful, by liv­ing be­fore them, and stir­ring them up to im­ita­tion. For thus do men hear, so as not to hear on­ly, but to do al­so. Seek the Lord, and your soul shall live, that the earth may bring forth the liv­ing soul. Be not con­formed to the world. Con­tain your­selves from it: the soul lives by avoid­ing what it dies by af­fect­ing. Con­tain your­selves from the un­governed wild­ness of pride, the slug­gish volup­tuous­ness of lux­ury, and the false name of knowl­edge: that so the wild beasts may be tamed, the cat­tle bro­ken to the yoke, the ser­pents, harm­less. For these be the mo­tions of our mind un­der an al­le­go­ry; that is to say, the haugh­ti­ness of pride, the de­light of lust, and the poi­son of cu­rios­ity, are the mo­tions of a dead soul; for the soul dies not so as to lose all mo­tion; be­cause it dies by for­sak­ing the foun­tain of life, and so is tak­en up by this tran­si­to­ry world, and is con­formed un­to it.

But Thy word, O God, is the foun­tain of life eter­nal; and pas­seth not away: where­fore this de­par­ture of the soul is re­strained by Thy word, when it is said un­to us, Be not con­formed un­to this world; that so the earth may in the foun­tain of life bring forth a liv­ing soul; that is, a soul made con­ti­nent in Thy Word, by Thy Evan­ge­lists, by fol­low­ing the fol­low­ers of Thy Christ. For this is af­ter his kind; be­cause a man is wont to im­itate his friend. Be ye (saith he) as I am, for I al­so am as you are. Thus in this liv­ing soul shall there be good beasts, in meek­ness of ac­tion (for Thou hast com­mand­ed, Go on with thy busi­ness in meek­ness, so shalt thou be beloved by all men); and good cat­tle, which nei­ther if they eat, shall they over-​abound, nor, if they eat not, have any lack; and good ser­pents, not dan­ger­ous, to do hurt, but wise to take heed; and on­ly mak­ing so much search in­to this tem­po­ral na­ture, as may suf­fice that eter­ni­ty be clear­ly seen, be­ing un­der­stood by the things that are made. For these crea­tures are obe­di­ent un­to rea­son, when be­ing re­strained from dead­ly pre­vail­ing up­on us, they live, and are good.

For be­hold, O Lord, our God, our Cre­ator, when our af­fec­tions have been re­strained from the love of the world, by which we died through evil-​liv­ing; and be­gun to be a liv­ing soul, through good liv­ing; and Thy word which Thou spok­est by Thy apos­tle, is made good in us, Be not con­formed to this world: there fol­lows that al­so, which Thou present­ly sub­joinedst, say­ing, But be ye trans­formed by the re­new­ing of your mind; not now af­ter your kind, as though fol­low­ing your neigh­bour who went be­fore you, nor as liv­ing af­ter the ex­am­ple of some bet­ter man (for Thou saidst not, “Let man be made af­ter his kind,” but, Let us make man af­ter our own im­age and simil­itude), that we might prove what Thy will is. For to this pur­pose said that dis­penser of Thine (who be­gat chil­dren by the Gospel), that he might not for ev­er have them babes, whom he must be fain to feed with milk, and cher­ish as a nurse; be ye trans­formed (saith he) by the re­new­ing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good and ac­cept­able and per­fect will of God. Where­fore Thou sayest not, “Let man be made,” but Let us make man. Nor saidst Thou, “ac­cord­ing to his kind”; but, af­ter our im­age and like­ness. For man be­ing re­newed in his mind, and be­hold­ing and un­der­stand­ing Thy truth, needs not man as his di­rec­tor, so as to fol­low af­ter his kind; but by Thy di­rec­tion proveth what is that good, that ac­cept­able, and per­fect will of Thine: yea, Thou teach­est him, now made ca­pa­ble, to dis­cern the Trin­ity of the Uni­ty, and the Uni­ty of the Trin­ity. Where­fore to that said in the plu­ral. Let us make man, is yet sub­joined in the sin­gu­lar, And God made man: and to that said in the plu­ral. Af­ter our like­ness, is sub­joined in the sin­gu­lar, Af­ter the im­age of God. Thus is man re­newed in the knowl­edge of God, af­ter the im­age of Him that cre­at­ed him: and be­ing made spir­itu­al, he jud­geth all things (all things which are to be judged), yet him­self is judged of no man.

But that he jud­geth all things, this an­swers to his hav­ing do­min­ion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowls of the air, and over all cat­tle and wild beasts, and over all the earth, and over ev­ery creep­ing thing that creep­eth up­on the earth. For this he doth by the un­der­stand­ing of his mind, where­by he per­ceiveth the things of the Spir­it of God; where­as oth­er­wise, man be­ing placed in hon­our, had no un­der­stand­ing, and is com­pared un­to the brute beasts, and is be­come like un­to them. In Thy Church there­fore, O our God, ac­cord­ing to Thy grace which Thou hast be­stowed up­on it (for we are Thy work­man­ship cre­at­ed un­to good works), not those on­ly who are spir­itu­al­ly set over, but they al­so who spir­itu­al­ly are sub­ject to those that are set over them, -for in this way didst Thou make man male and fe­male, in Thy grace spir­itu­al, where, ac­cord­ing to the sex of body, there is nei­ther male nor fe­male, be­cause nei­ther Jew nor Gre­cian, nei­ther bond nor free. -Spir­itu­al per­sons (whether such as are set over, or such as obey); do judge spir­itu­al­ly; not of that spir­itu­al knowl­edge which shines in the fir­ma­ment (for they ought not to judge as to so supreme au­thor­ity), nor may they judge of Thy Book it­self, even though some­thing there shineth not clear­ly; for we sub­mit our un­der­stand­ing un­to it, and hold for cer­tain, that even what is closed to our sight, is yet right­ly and tru­ly spo­ken. For so man, though now spir­itu­al and re­newed in the knowl­edge of God af­ter His im­age that cre­at­ed him, ought to be a do­er of the law, not a judge. Nei­ther doth he judge of that dis­tinc­tion of spir­itu­al and car­nal men, who are known un­to Thine eyes, O our God, and have not as yet dis­cov­ered them­selves un­to us by works, that by their fruits we might know them: but Thou, Lord, dost even now know them, and hast di­vid­ed and called them in se­cret, or ev­er the fir­ma­ment was made. Nor doth he, though spir­itu­al, judge the un­qui­et peo­ple of this world; for what hath he to do, to judge them that are with­out, know­ing not which of them shall here­after come in­to the sweet­ness of Thy grace; and which con­tin­ue in the per­pet­ual bit­ter­ness of un­god­li­ness?

Man there­fore, whom Thou hast made af­ter Thine own im­age, re­ceived not do­min­ion over the lights of heav­en, nor over that hid­den heav­en it­self, nor over the day and the night, which Thou calledst be­fore the foun­da­tion of the heav­en, nor over the gath­er­ing to­geth­er of the wa­ters, which is the sea; but He re­ceived do­min­ion over the fish­es of the sea, and the fowls of the air, and over all cat­tle, and over all the earth, and over all creep­ing things which creep up­on the earth. For He jud­geth and ap­proveth what He find­eth right, and He dis­al­loweth what He find­eth amiss, whether in the cel­ebra­tion of those Sacra­ments by which such are ini­ti­at­ed, as Thy mer­cy search­es out in many wa­ters: or in that, in which that Fish is set forth, which, tak­en out of the deep, the de­vout earth feedeth up­on: or in the ex­pres­sions and signs of words, sub­ject to the au­thor­ity of Thy Book, -such signs, as pro­ceed out of the mouth, and sound forth, fly­ing as it were un­der the fir­ma­ment, by in­ter­pret­ing, ex­pound­ing, dis­cours­ing dis­put­ing, con­se­crat­ing, or pray­ing un­to Thee, so that the peo­ple may an­swer, Amen. The vo­cal pro­nounc­ing of all which words, is oc­ca­sioned by the deep of this world, and the blind­ness of the flesh, which can­not see thoughts; So that there is need to speak aloud in­to the ears; so that, al­though fly­ing fowls be mul­ti­plied up­on the earth, yet they de­rive their be­gin­ning from the wa­ters. The spir­itu­al man jud­geth al­so by al­low­ing of what is right, and dis­al­low­ing what he finds amiss, in the works and lives of the faith­ful; their alms, as it were the earth bring­ing forth fruit, and of the liv­ing soul, liv­ing by the tam­ing of the af­fec­tions, in chasti­ty, in fast­ing, in holy med­ita­tions; and of those things, which are per­ceived by the sens­es of the body. Up­on all these is he now said to judge, where­in he hath al­so pow­er of cor­rec­tion.

But what is this, and what kind of mys­tery? Be­hold, Thou bless­est mankind, O Lord, that they may in­crease and mul­ti­ply, and re­plen­ish the earth; dost Thou not there­by give us a hint to un­der­stand some­thing? why didst Thou not as well bless the light, which Thou calledst day; nor the fir­ma­ment of heav­en, nor the lights, nor the stars, nor the earth, nor the sea? I might say that Thou, O God, who cre­at­ed cre­at­ed us af­ter Thine Im­age, I might say, that it had been Thy good plea­sure to be­stow this bless­ing pe­cu­liar­ly up­on man; hadst Thou not in like man­ner blessed the fish­es and the whales, that they should in­crease and mul­ti­ply, and re­plen­ish the wa­ters of the sea, and that the fowls should be mul­ti­plied up­on the earth. I might say like­wise, that this bless­ing per­tained prop­er­ly un­to such crea­tures, as are bred of their own kind, had I found it giv­en to the fruit-​trees, and plants, and beasts of the earth. But now nei­ther un­to the herbs, nor the trees, nor the beasts, nor ser­pents is it said, In­crease and mul­ti­ply; notwith­stand­ing all these as well as the fish­es, fowls, or men, do by gen­er­ation in­crease and con­tin­ue their kind.

What then shall I say, O Truth my Light? “that it was idly said, and with­out mean­ing?” Not so, O Fa­ther of piety, far he it from a min­is­ter of Thy word to say so. And if I un­der­stand not what Thou mean­est by that phrase, let my bet­ters, that is, those of more un­der­stand­ing than my­self, make bet­ter use of it, ac­cord­ing as Thou, my God, hast giv­en to each man to un­der­stand. But let my con­fes­sion al­so be pleas­ing in Thine eyes, where­in I con­fess un­to Thee, that I be­lieve, O Lord, that Thou spok­est not so in vain; nor will I sup­press, what this les­son sug­gests to me. For it is true, nor do I see what should hin­der me from thus un­der­stand­ing the fig­ura­tive say­ings of Thy Bible. For I know a thing to be man­ifold­ly sig­ni­fied by cor­po­re­al ex­pres­sions, which is un­der­stood one way by the mind; and that un­der­stood many ways in the mind, which is sig­ni­fied one way by cor­po­re­al ex­pres­sion. Be­hold, the sin­gle love of God and our neigh­bour, by what man­ifold sacra­ments, and in­nu­mer­able lan­guages, and in each sev­er­al lan­guage, in how in­nu­mer­able modes of speak­ing, it is cor­po­re­al­ly ex­pressed. Thus do the off­spring of the wa­ters in­crease and mul­ti­ply. Ob­serve again, whoso­ev­er read­est this; be­hold, what Scrip­ture de­liv­ers, and the voice pro­nounces one on­ly way, In the Be­gin­ning God cre­at­ed heav­en and earth; is it not un­der­stood man­ifold­ly, not through any de­ceit of er­ror, but by var­ious kinds of true sens­es? Thus do man’s off­spring in­crease and mul­ti­ply.

If there­fore we con­ceive of the na­tures of the things them­selves, not al­le­gor­ical­ly, but prop­er­ly, then does the phrase in­crease and mul­ti­ply, agree un­to all things, that come of seed. But if we treat of the words as fig­ura­tive­ly spo­ken (which I rather sup­pose to be the pur­pose of the Scrip­ture, which doth not, sure­ly, su­per­flu­ous­ly as­cribe this bene­dic­tion to the off­spring of aquat­ic an­imals and man on­ly); then do we find “mul­ti­tude” to be­long to crea­tures spir­itu­al as well as cor­po­re­al, as in heav­en and earth, and to righ­teous and un­righ­teous, as in light and dark­ness; and to holy au­thors who have been the min­is­ters of the Law un­to us, as in the fir­ma­ment which is set­tled be­twixt the wa­ters and the wa­ters; and to the so­ci­ety of peo­ple yet in the bit­ter­ness of in­fi­deli­ty, as in the sea; and to the zeal of holy souls, as in the dry land; and to works of mer­cy be­long­ing to this present life, as in the herbs bear­ing seed, and in trees bear­ing fruit; and to spir­itu­al gifts set forth for ed­ifi­ca­tion, as in the lights of heav­en; and to af­fec­tions formed un­to tem­per­ance, as in the liv­ing soul. In all these in­stances we meet with mul­ti­tudes, abun­dance, and in­crease; but what shall in such wise in­crease and mul­ti­ply that one thing may be ex­pressed many ways, and one ex­pres­sion un­der­stood many ways; we find not, ex­cept in signs cor­po­re­al­ly ex­pressed, and in things men­tal­ly con­ceived. By signs cor­po­re­al­ly pro­nounced we un­der­stand the gen­er­ations of the wa­ters, nec­es­sar­ily oc­ca­sioned by the depth of the flesh; by things men­tal­ly con­ceived, hu­man gen­er­ations, on ac­count of the fruit­ful­ness of rea­son. And for this end do we be­lieve Thee, Lord, to have said to these kinds, In­crease and mul­ti­ply. For in this bless­ing, I con­ceive Thee to have grant­ed us a pow­er and a fac­ul­ty, both to ex­press sev­er­al ways what we un­der­stand but one; and to un­der­stand sev­er­al ways, what we read to be ob­scure­ly de­liv­ered but in one. Thus are the wa­ters of the sea re­plen­ished, which are not moved but by sev­er­al sig­ni­fi­ca­tions: thus with hu­man in­crease is the earth al­so re­plen­ished, whose dry­ness ap­peareth in its long­ing, and rea­son ruleth over it.

I would al­so say, O Lord my God, what the fol­low­ing Scrip­ture minds me of; yea, I will say, and not fear. For I will say the truth, Thy­self in­spir­ing me with what Thou willedst me to de­liv­er out of those words. But by no oth­er in­spi­ra­tion than Thine, do I be­lieve my­self to speak truth, see­ing Thou art the Truth, and ev­ery man a liar. He there­fore that speaketh a lie, speaketh of his own; that there­fore I may speak truth, I will speak of Thine. Be­hold, Thou hast giv­en un­to us for food ev­ery herb bear­ing seed which is up­on all the earth; and ev­ery tree, in which is the fruit of a tree yield­ing seed. And not to us alone, but al­so to all the fowls of the air, and to the beasts of the earth, and to all creep­ing things; but un­to the fish­es and to the great whales, hast Thou not giv­en them. Now we said that by these fruits of the earth were sig­ni­fied, and fig­ured in an al­le­go­ry, the works of mer­cy which are pro­vid­ed for the ne­ces­si­ties of this life out of the fruit­ful earth. Such an earth was the de­vout One­sipho­rus, un­to whose house Thou gavest mer­cy, be­cause he of­ten re­freshed Thy Paul, and was not ashamed of his chain. Thus did al­so the brethren, and such fruit did they bear, who out of Mace­do­nia sup­plied what was lack­ing to him. But how grieved he for some trees, which did not af­ford him the fruit due un­to him, where he saith, At my first an­swer no man stood by me, but all men for­sook me. I pray God that it may not be laid to their charge. For these fruits are due to such as min­is­ter the spir­itu­al doc­trine un­to us out of their un­der­stand­ing of the di­vine mys­ter­ies; and they are due to them, as men; yea and due to them al­so, as the liv­ing soul, which giveth it­self as an ex­am­ple, in all con­ti­nen­cy; and due un­to them al­so, as fly­ing crea­tures, for their bless­ings which are mul­ti­plied up­on the earth, be­cause their sound went out in­to all lands.

But they are fed by these fruits, that are de­light­ed with them; nor are they de­light­ed with them, whose God is their bel­ly. For nei­ther in them that yield them, are the things yield­ed the fruit, but with what mind they yield them. He there­fore that served God, and not his own bel­ly, I plain­ly see why he re­joiced; I see it, and I re­joice with him. For he had re­ceived from the Philip­pi­ans, what they had sent by Epa­phrodi­tus un­to him: and yet I per­ceive why he re­joiced. For where­at he re­joiced up­on that he fed; for, speak­ing in truth, I re­joiced (saith he) great­ly in the Lord, that now at the last your care of me hath flour­ished again, where­in ye were al­so care­ful, but it had be­come weari­some un­to you. These Philip­pi­ans then had now dried up, with a long weari­ness, and with­ered as it were as to bear­ing this fruit of a good work; and he re­joiceth for them, that they flour­ished again, not for him­self, that they sup­plied his wants. There­fore sub­joins he, not that I speak in re­spect of want, for I have learned in what­so­ev­er state I am, there­with to be con­tent. I know both how to be abased, and I know how to abound; ev­ery where and in all things I am in­struct­ed both to be full, and to be hun­gry; both to abound, and to suf­fer need. I can do all things through Him which strength­eneth me.

Where­at then re­joic­est thou, O great Paul? where­at re­joic­est thou? where­on feedest thou, O man, re­newed in the knowl­edge of God, af­ter the im­age of Him that cre­at­ed thee, thou liv­ing soul, of so much con­ti­nen­cy, thou tongue like fly­ing fowls, speak­ing mys­ter­ies? (for to such crea­tures, is this food due;) what is it that feeds thee? joy. Hear we what fol­lows: notwith­stand­ing, ye have well done, that ye did com­mu­ni­cate with my af­flic­tion. Here­at he re­joiceth, here­on feedeth; be­cause they had well done, not be­cause his strait was eased, who saith un­to Thee, Thou hast en­larged me when I was in dis­tress; for that he knew to abound, and to suf­fer want, in Thee Who strength­en­est him. For ye Philip­pi­ans al­so know (saith he), that in the be­gin­ning of the Gospel, when I de­part­ed from Mace­do­nia, no Church com­mu­ni­cat­ed with me as con­cern­ing giv­ing and re­ceiv­ing, but ye on­ly. For even in Thes­sa­loni­ca ye sent once and again un­to my ne­ces­si­ty. Un­to these good works, he now re­joiceth that they are re­turned; and is glad­dened that they flour­ished again, as when a fruit­ful field re­sumes its green.

Was it for his own ne­ces­si­ties, be­cause he said, Ye sent un­to my ne­ces­si­ty? Re­joiceth he for that? Ver­ily not for that. But how know we this? Be­cause him­self says im­me­di­ate­ly, not be­cause I de­sire a gift, but I de­sire fruit. I have learned of Thee, my God, to dis­tin­guish be­twixt a gift, and fruit. A gift, is the thing it­self which he gives, that im­parts these nec­es­saries un­to us; as mon­ey, meat, drink, cloth­ing, shel­ter, help: but the fruit, is the good and right will of the giv­er. For the Good Mas­ter said not on­ly, He that re­ceiveth a prophet, but added, in the name of a prophet: nor did He on­ly say, He that re­ceiveth a righ­teous man, but added, in the name of a righ­teous man. So ver­ily shall the one re­ceive the re­ward of a prophet, the oth­er, the re­ward of a righ­teous man: nor saith He on­ly, He that shall give to drink a cup of cold wa­ter to one of my lit­tle ones; but added, in the name of a dis­ci­ple: and so con­cludeth, Ver­ily I say un­to you, he shall not lose his re­ward. The gift is, to re­ceive a prophet, to re­ceive a righ­teous man, to give a cup of cold wa­ter to a dis­ci­ple: but the fruit, to do this in the name of a prophet, in the name of a righ­teous man, in the name of a dis­ci­ple. With fruit was Eli­jah fed by the wid­ow that knew she fed a man of God, and there­fore fed him: but by the raven was he fed with a gift. Nor was the in­ner man of Eli­jah so fed, but the out­er on­ly; which might al­so for want of that food have per­ished.

I will then speak what is true in Thy sight, O Lord, that when car­nal men and in­fi­dels (for the gain­ing and ini­ti­at­ing whom, the ini­tia­to­ry Sacra­ments and the mighty work­ings of mir­acles are nec­es­sary, which we sup­pose to be sig­ni­fied by the name of fish­es and whales) un­der­take the bod­ily re­fresh­ment, or oth­er­wise suc­cour Thy ser­vant with some­thing use­ful for this present life; where­as they be ig­no­rant, why this is to be done, and to what end; nei­ther do they feed these, nor are these fed by them; be­cause nei­ther do the one do it out of an holy and right in­tent; nor do the oth­er re­joice at their gifts, whose fruit they as yet be­hold not. For up­on that is the mind fed, of which it is glad. And there­fore do not the fish­es and whales feed up­on such meats, as the earth brings not forth un­til af­ter it was sep­arat­ed and di­vid­ed from the bit­ter­ness of the waves of the sea.

And Thou, O God, sawest ev­ery thing that Thou hadst made, and, be­hold, it was very good. Yea we al­so see the same, and be­hold, all things are very good. Of the sev­er­al kinds of Thy works, when Thou hadst said “let them be,” and they were, Thou sawest each that it was good. Sev­en times have I count­ed it to be writ­ten, that Thou sawest that that which Thou madest was good: and this is the eighth, that Thou sawest ev­ery thing that Thou hadst made, and, be­hold, it was not on­ly good, but al­so very good, as be­ing now al­to­geth­er. For sev­er­al­ly, they were on­ly good; but al­to­geth­er, both good, and very good. All beau­ti­ful bod­ies ex­press the same; by rea­son that a body con­sist­ing of mem­bers all beau­ti­ful, is far more beau­ti­ful than the same mem­bers by them­selves are, by whose well-​or­dered blend­ing the whole is per­fect­ed; notwith­stand­ing that the mem­bers sev­er­al­ly be al­so beau­ti­ful.

And I looked nar­row­ly to find, whether sev­en, or eight times Thou sawest that Thy works were good, when they pleased Thee; but in Thy see­ing I found no times, where­by I might un­der­stand that Thou sawest so of­ten, what Thou madest. And I said, “Lord, is not this Thy Scrip­ture true, since Thou art true, and be­ing Truth, hast set it forth? why then dost Thou say un­to me, ‘that in Thy see­ing there be no times’; where­as this Thy Scrip­ture tells me, that what Thou madest each day, Thou sawest that it was good: and when I count­ed them, I found how of­ten.” Un­to this Thou an­swer­est me, for Thou art my God, and with a strong voice tellest Thy ser­vant in his in­ner ear, break­ing through my deaf­ness and cry­ing, “O man, that which My Scrip­ture saith, I say: and yet doth that speak in time; but time has no re­la­tion to My Word; be­cause My Word ex­ists in equal eter­ni­ty with My­self. So the things which ye see through My Spir­it, I see; like as what ye speak by My Spir­it, I speak. And so when ye see those things in time, I see them not in time; as when ye speak in time, I speak them not in time.”

And I heard, O Lord my God, and drank up a drop of sweet­ness out of Thy truth, and un­der­stood, that cer­tain men there be who mis­like Thy works; and say, that many of them Thou madest, com­pelled by ne­ces­si­ty; such as the fab­ric of the heav­ens, and har­mo­ny of the stars; and that Thou madest them not of what was Thine, but that they were oth­er­where and from oth­er sources cre­at­ed, for Thee to bring to­geth­er and com­pact and com­bine, when out of Thy con­quered en­emies Thou raisedst up the walls of the uni­verse; that they, bound down by the struc­ture, might not again be able to rebel against Thee. For oth­er things, they say Thou nei­ther madest them, nor even com­pact­edst them, such as all flesh and all very minute crea­tures, and what­so­ev­er hath its root in the earth; but that a mind at en­mi­ty with Thee, and an­oth­er na­ture not cre­at­ed by Thee, and con­trary un­to Thee, did, in these low­er stages of the world, beget and frame these things. Fren­zied are they who say thus, be­cause they see not Thy works by Thy Spir­it, nor recog­nise Thee in them.

But they who by Thy Spir­it see these things, Thou seest in them. There­fore when they see that these things are good, Thou seest that they are good; and what­so­ev­er things for Thy sake please, Thou pleas­est in them, and what through Thy Spir­it please us, they please Thee in us. For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spir­it of a man, which is in him? even so the things of God knoweth no one, but the Spir­it of God. Now we (saith he) have re­ceived, not the spir­it of this world, but the Spir­it which is of God, that we might know the things that are freely giv­en to us of God. And I am ad­mon­ished, “Tru­ly the things of God knoweth no one, but the Spir­it of God: how then do we al­so know, what things are giv­en us of God?” An­swer is made me; “be­cause the things which we know by His Spir­it, even these no one knoweth, but the Spir­it of God. For as it is right­ly said un­to those that were to speak by the Spir­it of God, it is not ye that speak: so is it right­ly said to them that know through the Spir­it of God, ‘It is not ye that know.’ And no less then is it right­ly said to those that see through the Spir­it of God, ‘It is not ye that see’; so what­so­ev­er through the Spir­it of God they see to be good, it is not they, but God that sees that it is good.” It is one thing then for a man to think that to be ill which is good, as the fore­named do; an­oth­er, that that which is good, a man should see that it is good (as Thy crea­tures be pleas­ing un­to many, be­cause they be good, whom yet Thou pleas­est not in them, when they pre­fer to en­joy them, to Thee); and an­oth­er, that when a man sees a thing that it is good, God should in him see that it is good, so, name­ly, that He should be loved in that which He made, Who can­not be loved, but by the Holy Ghost which He hath giv­en. Be­cause the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost, Which is giv­en un­to us: by Whom we see that what­so­ev­er in any de­gree is, is good. For from Him it is, who Him­self Is not in de­gree, but what He Is, Is.

Thanks to Thee, O Lord. We be­hold the heav­en and earth, whether the cor­po­re­al part, su­pe­ri­or and in­fe­ri­or, or the spir­itu­al and cor­po­re­al crea­ture; and in the adorn­ing of these parts, where­of the uni­ver­sal pile of the world, or rather the uni­ver­sal cre­ation, doth con­sist, we see light made, and di­vid­ed from the dark­ness. We see the fir­ma­ment of heav­en, whether that pri­ma­ry body of the world, be­tween the spir­itu­al up­per wa­ters and the in­fe­ri­or cor­po­re­al wa­ters, or (since this al­so is called heav­en) this space of air through which wan­der the fowls of heav­en, be­twixt those wa­ters which are in vapours borne above them, and in clear nights dis­till down in dew; and those heav­ier wa­ters which flow along the earth. We be­hold a face of wa­ters gath­ered to­geth­er in the fields of the sea; and the dry land both void, and formed so as to be vis­ible and har­mo­nized, yea and the mat­ter of herbs and trees. We be­hold the lights shin­ing from above, the sun to suf­fice for the day, the moon and the stars to cheer the night; and that by all these, times should be marked and sig­ni­fied. We be­hold on all sides a moist el­ement, re­plen­ished with fish­es, beasts, and birds; be­cause the gross­ness of the air, which bears up the flights of birds, thick­eneth it­self by the ex­ha­la­tion of the wa­ters. We be­hold the face of the earth decked out with earth­ly crea­tures, and man, cre­at­ed af­ter Thy im­age and like­ness, even through that Thy very im­age and like­ness (that is the pow­er of rea­son and un­der­stand­ing), set over all ir­ra­tional crea­tures. And as in his soul there is one pow­er which has do­min­ion by di­rect­ing, an­oth­er made sub­ject, that it might obey; so was there for the man, cor­po­re­al­ly al­so, made a wom­an, who in the mind of her rea­son­able un­der­stand­ing should have a par­ity of na­ture, but in the sex of her body, should be in like man­ner sub­ject to the sex of her hus­band, as the ap­petite of do­ing is fain to con­ceive the skill of right-​do­ing from the rea­son of the mind. These things we be­hold, and they are sev­er­al­ly good, and al­to­geth­er very good.

Let Thy works praise Thee, that we may love Thee; and let us love Thee, that Thy works may praise Thee, which from time have be­gin­ning and end­ing, ris­ing and set­ting, growth and de­cay, form and pri­va­tion. They have then their suc­ces­sion of morn­ing and evening, part se­cret­ly, part ap­par­ent­ly; for they were made of noth­ing, by Thee, not of Thee; not of any mat­ter not Thine, or that was be­fore, but of mat­ter con­cre­at­ed (that is, at the same time cre­at­ed by Thee), be­cause to its state with­out form, Thou with­out any in­ter­val of time didst give form. For see­ing the mat­ter of heav­en and earth is one thing, and the form an­oth­er, Thou madest the mat­ter of mere­ly noth­ing, but the form of the world out of the mat­ter with­out form: yet both to­geth­er, so that the form should fol­low the mat­ter, with­out any in­ter­val of de­lay.

We have al­so ex­am­ined what Thou willedst to be shad­owed forth, whether by the cre­ation, or the re­la­tion of things in such an or­der. And we have seen, that things singly are good, and to­geth­er very good, in Thy Word, in Thy On­ly-​Be­got­ten, both heav­en and earth, the Head and the body of the Church, in Thy pre­des­ti­na­tion be­fore all times, with­out morn­ing and evening. But when Thou be­gannest to ex­ecute in time the things pre­des­ti­nat­ed, to the end Thou might­est re­veal hid­den things, and rec­ti­fy our dis­or­ders; for our sins hung over us, and we had sunk in­to the dark deep; and Thy good Spir­it was borne over us, to help us in due sea­son; and Thou didst jus­ti­fy the un­god­ly, and di­videst them from the wicked; and Thou madest the fir­ma­ment of au­thor­ity of Thy Book be­tween those placed above, who were to he docile un­to Thee, and those un­der, who were to be sub­ject to them: and Thou gath­eredst to­geth­er the so­ci­ety of un­be­liev­ers in­to one con­spir­acy, that the zeal of the faith­ful might ap­pear, and they might bring forth works of mer­cy, even dis­tribut­ing to the poor their earth­ly rich­es, to ob­tain heav­en­ly. And af­ter this didst Thou kin­dle cer­tain lights in the fir­ma­ment, Thy Holy ones, hav­ing the word of life; and shin­ing with an em­inent au­thor­ity set on high through spir­itu­al gifts; af­ter that again, for the ini­ti­ation of the un­be­liev­ing Gen­tiles, didst Thou out of cor­po­re­al mat­ter pro­duce the Sacra­ments, and vis­ible mir­acles, and forms of words ac­cord­ing to the fir­ma­ment of Thy Book, by which the faith­ful should be blessed and mul­ti­plied. Next didst Thou form the liv­ing soul of the faith­ful, through af­fec­tions well or­dered by the vigour of con­ti­nen­cy: and af­ter that, the mind sub­ject­ed to Thee alone and need­ing to im­itate no hu­man au­thor­ity, hast Thou re­newed af­ter Thy im­age and like­ness; and didst sub­ject its ra­tio­nal ac­tions to the ex­cel­len­cy of the un­der­stand­ing, as the wom­an to the man; and to all Of­fices of Thy Min­istry, nec­es­sary for the per­fect­ing of the faith­ful in this life, Thou willedst, that for their tem­po­ral us­es, good things, fruit­ful to them­selves in time to come, be giv­en by the same faith­ful. All these we see, and they are very good, be­cause Thou seest them in us, Who hast giv­en un­to us Thy Spir­it, by which we might see them, and in them love Thee.

O Lord God, give peace un­to us: (for Thou hast giv­en us all things;) the peace of rest, the peace of the Sab­bath, which hath no evening. For all this most good­ly ar­ray of things very good, hav­ing fin­ished their cours­es, is to pass away, for in them there was morn­ing and evening.

But the sev­enth day hath no evening, nor hath it set­ting; be­cause Thou hast sanc­ti­fied it to an ev­er­last­ing con­tin­uance; that that which Thou didst af­ter Thy works which were very good, rest­ing the sev­enth day, al­though Thou madest them in un­bro­ken rest, that may the voice of Thy Book an­nounce be­fore­hand un­to us, that we al­so af­ter our works (there­fore very good, be­cause Thou hast giv­en them us), shall rest in Thee al­so in the Sab­bath of eter­nal life.

For then shalt Thou rest in us, as now Thou work­est in us; and so shall that be Thy rest through us, as these are Thy works through us. But Thou, Lord, ev­er work­est, and art ev­er at rest. Nor dost Thou see in time, nor art moved in time, nor restest in a time; and yet Thou mak­est things seen in time, yea the times them­selves, and the rest which re­sults from time.

We there­fore see these things which Thou madest, be­cause they are: but they are, be­cause Thou seest them. And we see with­out, that they are, and with­in, that they are good, but Thou sawest them there, when made, where Thou sawest them, yet to be made. And we were at a lat­er time moved to do well, af­ter our hearts had con­ceived of Thy Spir­it; but in the for­mer time we were moved to do evil, for­sak­ing Thee; but Thou, the One, the Good God, didst nev­er cease do­ing good. And we al­so have some good works, of Thy gift, but not eter­nal; af­ter them we trust to rest in Thy great hal­low­ing. But Thou, be­ing the Good which needeth no good, art ev­er at rest, be­cause Thy rest is Thou Thy­self. And what man can teach man to un­der­stand this? or what An­gel, an An­gel? or what An­gel, a man? Let it be asked of Thee, sought in Thee, knocked for at Thee; so, so shall it be re­ceived, so shall it be found, so shall it be opened. Amen.

GRA­TIAS TIBI DOMINE

End ofThe Project Guten­berg Etext the The Con­fes­sions of Saint Au­gus­tine