Augustine: CONFESSIONES

per idem tempus annorum novem, ab undevicensimo anno aetatis meae usque ad duodetricensimum, seducebamur et seducebamus, falsi atque fallentes in variis cupiditatibus, et palam per doctrinas quas liberales vocant, occulte autem falso nomine religionis, hic superbi, ibi superstitiosi, ubique vani, hac popularis gloriae sectantes inanitatem, usque ad theatricos plausus et contentiosa carmina et agonem coronarum faenearum et spectaculorum nugas et intemperantiam libidinum, illac autem purgari nos ab istis sordibus expetentes, cum eis qui appellarentur electi et sancti afferremus escas de quibus nobis in officina aqualiculi sui fabricarent angelos et deos per quos liberaremur. et sectabar ista atque faciebam cum amicis meis per me ac mecum deceptis. inrideant me arrogantes et nondum salubriter prostrati et elisi a te, deus meus, ego tamen confitear tibi dedecora mea in laude tua.

during the same time of nine years, from the nineteenth year of my age up to the twenty-eighth, we were being seduced and we were seducing, deceived and deceiving in various cupidities, and openly through the doctrines which they call liberal, but covertly under the false name of religion—here proud, there superstitious, everywhere vain—on this side pursuing the emptiness of popular glory, even to theatrical applauses and contentious songs and the agon of crowns of hay, and the trifles of spectacles and the intemperance of lusts; on that side, however, seeking to be purged from these filths, we would, with those who were called Elect and Holy, bring foods from which for us, in the workshop of their stomach, they would fabricate angels and gods by whom we might be liberated. and I followed these things and did them with my friends, deceived by me and with me. let the arrogant laugh me to scorn—those not yet healthfully prostrated and crushed by you, my God—yet I will confess to you my disgraces in your praise.

sine me, obsecro, et da mihi circuire praesenti memoria praeteritos circuitus erroris mei et immolare tibi hostiam iubilationis. quid enim sum ego mihi sine te nisi dux in praeceps? aut quid sum, cum mihi bene est, nisi sugens lac tuum aut fruens te, cibo qui non corrumpitur?

Permit me, I beseech, and grant me to traverse with present memory the past circuits of my error, and to immolate to you a victim of jubilation. For what am I to myself without you except a guide into the precipice? Or what am I, when it is well with me, except suckling your milk or enjoying you, the food that is not corrupted?

et quis homo est quilibet homo, cum sit homo? sed inrideant nos fortes et potentes, nos autem infirmi et inopes confiteamur tibi.

and what is any man, since he is a man? but let the strong and potent deride us; yet we, weak and poor, let us confess to you.

4.2.2

docebam in illis annis artem rhetoricam, et victoriosam loquacitatem victus cupiditate vendebam. malebam tamen, domine, tu scis, bonos habere discipulos, sicut appellantur boni, et eos sine dolo docebam dolos, non quibus contra caput innocentis agerent sed aliquando pro capite nocentis. et deus, vidisti de longinquo lapsantem in lubrico et in multo fumo scintillantem fidem meam, quam exhibebam in illo magisterio diligentibus vanitatem et quaerentibus mendacium, socius eorum.

I was teaching in those years the art of rhetoric, and I was selling victorious loquacity, myself conquered by cupidity. I preferred, however, Lord, you know, to have good pupils, as they are called good, and I without guile was teaching them guiles, not by which they might proceed against the head of an innocent, but sometimes on behalf of the head of a guilty one. And you, God, saw from afar my faith slipping on the slippery and scintillating in much smoke, which I was exhibiting in that magistery to those loving vanity and seeking a lie, their associate.

in illis annis unam habebam non eo quod legitimum vocatur coniugio cognitam, sed quam indagaverat vagus ardor inops prudentiae, sed unam tamen, ei quoque servans tori fidem, in qua sane experirer exemplo meo quid distaret inter coniugalis placiti modum, quod foederatum esset generandi gratia, et pactum libidinosi amoris, ubi proles etiam contra votum nascitur, quamvis iam nata cogat se diligi.

in those years I had one woman, not known in that union which is called legitimate marriage, but one whom a wandering ardor, destitute of prudence, had tracked down; yet one only, keeping even to her the faith of the bed, in whom indeed I would experience by my own example what difference there is between the mode of a conjugal placitum, which would be federated for the sake of begetting, and the pact of libidinous love, where progeny is even born against the will, although, once born, it compels itself to be loved.

4.2.3

recolo etiam, cum mihi theatrici carminis certamen inire placuisset, mandasse mihi nescio quem haruspicem, quid ei dare vellem mercedis ut vincerem, me autem foeda illa sacramenta detestatum et abominatum respondisse, nec si corona illa esset immortaliter aurea muscam pro victoria mea necari sinere. necaturus enim erat ille in sacrificiis suis animantia, et illis honoribus invitaturus mihi suffragatura daemonia videbatur. sed hoc quoque malum non ex tua castitate repudiavi, deus cordis mei.

I recall also, when it had pleased me to enter upon a contest of theatrical song, that some haruspex had enjoined me to say what fee I would give him so that I might win; but that I, having detested and abominated those foul sacraments, replied that not even if that crown were imperishably golden would I allow a fly to be slain for my victory. For he was going to kill living creatures in his sacrifices, and by those honors he seemed about to invite demons, who would be giving me their suffrage. But this evil too I did not repudiate out of thy chastity, god of my heart.

non enim amare te noveram, qui nisi fulgores corporeos cogitare non noveram. talibus enim figmentis suspirans anima nonne fornicatur abs te et fidit in falsis et pascit ventos? sed videlicet sacrificari pro me nollem daemonibus, quibus me illa superstitione ipse sacrificabam.

For I did not know how to love you, I who knew how to think of nothing but corporeal splendors. For does not the soul, sighing after such figments, fornicate away from you and trust in false things and feed the winds? Yet, to be sure, I would not wish that sacrifice be offered for me to the daemons, to whom by that superstition I myself was sacrificing myself.

quid est enim aliud ventos pascere quam ipsos pascere, hoc est errando eis esse voluptati atque derisui?

for what is it to feed the winds other than to feed them themselves, that is, by erring to be for their pleasure and derision?

4.3.4

ideoque illos planos quos mathematicos vocant plane consulere non desistebam, quod quasi nullum eis esset sacrificium et nullae preces ad aliquem spiritum ob divinationem dirigerentur. quod tamen christiana et vera pietas consequenter repellit et damnat. bonum est enim confiteri tibi, domine, et dicere, 'miserere mei: cura animam meam, quoniam peccavi tibi,' neque ad licentiam peccandi abuti indulgentia tua, sed meminisse dominicae vocis: 'ecce sanus factus es; iam noli peccare, ne quid tibi deterius contingat.' quam totam illi salubritatem interficere conantur cum dicunt, 'de caelo tibi est inevitabilis causa peccandi' et 'Venus hoc fecit aut Saturnus aut Mars,' scilicet ut homo sine culpa sit, caro et sanguis et superba putredo, culpandus sit autem caeli ac siderum creator et ordinator.

and so I did not cease to consult those impostors whom they call mathematici (astrologers), quite simply because, as though, there were no sacrifice for them and no prayers were directed to any spirit for divination. yet Christian and true piety consequently repels and condemns this. for it is good to confess to you, lord, and to say, 'have mercy on me: care for my soul, for I have sinned against you,' and not to abuse your indulgence into a license for sinning, but to remember the Lord’s voice: 'behold, you have been made whole; now no longer sin, lest something worse befall you.' this whole healthfulness they strive to slay when they say, 'from heaven there is for you an inevitable cause of sinning,' and 'Venus did this, or Saturn, or Mars,' namely so that man may be without fault—flesh and blood and proud putrescence—while the creator and ordainer of heaven and the stars should be the one to be blamed.

et quis est hic nisi deus noster, suavitas et origo iustitiae, qui reddes unicuique secundum opera eius et cor contritum et humilatum non spernis?

and who is this if not our God, sweetness and origin of justice, who will render to each according to his works, and do not spurn a heart contrite and humbled?

4.3.5

erat eo tempore vir sagax, medicinae artis peritissimus atque in ea nobilissimus, qui proconsul manu sua coronam illam agonisticam imposuerat non sano capiti meo, sed non ut medicus. nam illius morbi tu sanator, qui resistis superbis, humilibus autem das gratiam. numquid tamen etiam per illum senem defuisti mihi aut destitisti mederi animae meae?

At that time there was a shrewd man, most skilled in the art of medicine and most noble in it, who, as proconsul, with his own hand had placed that agonistic crown upon my unsound head, but not as a physician. For of that malady you are the healer, you who resist the proud, but give grace to the humble. Did you, however, even through that old man fail me, or desist from healing my soul?

quia enim factus ei eram familiarior et eius sermonibus (erant enim sine verborum cultu vivacitate sententiarum iucundi et graves) adsiduus et fixus inhaerebam, ubi cognovit ex conloquio meo libris genethliacorum esse me deditum, benigne ac paterne monuit ut eos abicerem neque curam et operam rebus utilibus necessariam illi vanitati frustra impenderem, dicens ita se illa didicisse ut eius professionem primis annis aetatis suae deferre voluisset qua vitam degeret et, si Hippocraten intellexisset, et illas utique litteras potuisse intellegere; et tamen non ob aliam causam se postea illis relictis medicinam adsecutum, nisi quod eas falsissimas comperisset et nollet vir gravis decipiendis hominibus victum quaerere. 'at tu' inquit 'quo te in hominibus sustentas, rhetoricam tenes, hanc autem fallaciam libero studio, non necessitate rei familiaris, sectaris. quo magis mihi te oportet de illa credere, qui eam tam perfecte discere elaboravi, quam ex ea sola vivere volui.' a quo ego cum quaesissem quae causa ergo faceret ut multa inde vera pronuntiarentur, respondit ille ut potuit, vim sortis hoc facere in rerum natura usquequaque diffusam.

Because I had become more familiar to him and was assiduously and fixedly cleaving to his conversations (for they were, without cultivation of words, by the vivacity of sentiments both pleasant and weighty), when he learned from my talk that I was devoted to the books of genethliacs, he kindly and paternally warned me to cast them away and not to expend, in vain upon that vanity, the care and effort necessary for useful matters, saying that he had learned those things to such a degree that in the first years of his age he had wished to put forward that profession by which to pass his life, and that, if he had understood Hippocrates, he could surely have understood those letters too; and yet for no other cause had he afterward, those being abandoned, pursued medicine, except that he had found them most false and was unwilling, as a serious man, to seek a livelihood by deceiving human beings. “But you,” he says, “whereby you sustain yourself among men, you practice rhetoric; but this fallacy you follow by free study, not by the necessity of domestic means. All the more ought you to believe me about that, who labored to learn it so perfectly that I wished to live by that alone.” When I therefore asked him what cause made it that many truths were pronounced from there, he replied as he could, that the force of lot, diffused everywhere in the nature of things, does this.

si enim de paginis poetae cuiuspiam longe aliud canentis atque intendentis, cum forte quis consulit, mirabiliter consonus negotio saepe versus exiret, mirandum non esse dicebat si ex anima humana superiore aliquo instinctu nesciente quid in se fieret, non arte sed sorte, sonaret aliquid quod interrogantis rebus factisque concineret.

For if, from the pages of some poet singing and intending something far different, when someone happens by chance to consult, a verse would often come out wonderfully consonant with the business, he used to say it was not a wonder if from the human soul, by some higher instinct, not knowing what was being done within itself, not by art but by lot, something should sound forth that would harmonize with the questioner’s affairs and deeds.

4.3.6

et hoc quidem ab illo vel per illum procurasti mihi, et quid ipse postea per me ipsum quaererem, in memoria mea deliniasti. tunc autem nec ipse nec carissimus meus Nebridius, adulescens valde bonus et valde castus, inridens totum illud divinationis genus, persuadere mihi potuerunt ut haec abicerem, quoniam me amplius ipsorum auctorum movebat auctoritas et nullum certum quale quaerebam documentum adhuc inveneram, quo mihi sine ambiguitate appareret, quae ab eis consultis vera dicerentur, forte vel sorte non arte inspectorum siderum dici.

and this indeed by him or through him you procured for me, and what I myself should afterwards seek through my very self, you delineated in my memory. But at that time neither he himself nor my dearest Nebridius, a very good and very chaste young man, who was mocking that whole genus of divination, could persuade me to cast these things aside, since the authority of their very authors moved me more, and I had not yet found any certain document such as I was seeking, by which it might appear to me without ambiguity that whatever true things were said by them when consulted were said by chance or by lot, not by the art of the inspectors of the stars.

4.4.7

in illis annis quo primum tempore in municipio quo natus sum docere coeperam, comparaveram amicum societate studiorum nimis carum, coaevum mihi et conflorentem flore adulescentiae. mecum puer creverat et pariter in scholam ieramus pariterque luseramus. sed nondum erat sic amicus, quamquam ne tunc quidem sic, uti est vera amicitia, quia non est vera nisi cum eam tu agglutinas inter haerentes tibi caritate diffusa in cordibus nostris per spiritum sanctum, qui datus est nobis.

in those years when, for the first time, in the municipality where I was born I began to teach, I had acquired a friend through the society of studies, exceedingly dear, coeval with me and flourishing with the flower of adolescence. He had grown up with me as a boy, and we went to school together and played together. But he was not yet a friend thus, nor even then as true friendship is, because it is not true unless you agglutinate it to yourself among those adhering to you by the charity diffused in our hearts through the Holy Spirit, who has been given to us.

sed tamen dulcis erat nimis, cocta fervore parilium studiorum. nam et a fide vera, quam non germanitus et penitus adulescens tenebat, deflexeram eum in superstitiosas fabellas et perniciosas, propter quas me plangebat mater. mecum iam errabat in animo ille homo, et non poterat anima mea sine illo.

but yet he was exceedingly dear, tempered by the fervor of our twin studies. for I had even turned him away from the true faith, which as a youth he did not hold genuinely and deeply, into superstitious and pernicious little fables, on account of which my mother lamented me. with me already that man was wandering in mind, and my soul could not be without him.

et ecce tu imminens dorso fugitivorum tuorum, deus ultionum et fons misericordiarum simul, qui convertis nos ad te miris modis, ecce abstulisti hominem de hac vita, cum vix explevisset annum in amicitia mea, suavi mihi super omnes suavitates illius vitae meae.

and behold you, overhanging the back of your fugitives, God of vengeances and fountain of mercies at once, you who convert us to you by wondrous modes, behold, you took away the man from this life, when he had scarcely completed a year in my friendship, sweet to me above all the sweetnesses of that life of mine.

4.4.8

quis laudes tuas enumerat unus in se uno quas expertus est? quid tunc fecisti, deus meus, et quam investigabilis abyssus iudiciorum tuorum? cum enim laboraret ille febribus, iacuit diu sine sensu in sudore laetali et, cum desperaretur, baptizatus est nesciens, me non curante et praesumente id retinere potius animam eius quod a me acceperat, non quod in nescientis corpore fiebat.

Who enumerates your praises, each one in himself alone, which he has experienced? What then did you do, my God, and how unsearchable the abyss of your judgments? For when he was laboring with fevers, he lay long without sense in a lethal sweat, and, when he was despaired of, he was baptized unknowing, I not caring and presuming to retain his soul rather by that which he had received from me, not by what was being done in the body of one unknowing.

longe autem aliter erat. nam recreatus est et salvus factus, statimque, ut primo cum eo loqui potui (potui autem mox ut ille potuit, quando non discedebam et nimis pendebamus ex invicem), temptavi apud illum inridere, tamquam et illo inrisuro mecum baptismum quem acceperat mente atque sensu absentissimus, sed tamen iam se accepisse didicerat. at ille ita me exhorruit ut inimicum admonuitque mirabili et repentina libertate ut, si amicus esse vellem, talia sibi dicere desinerem.

But it was far otherwise. For he was restored and made safe; and immediately, as soon as I could first speak with him (and I could presently, as soon as he could, since I was not departing and we were hanging excessively upon one another), I tried in his presence to make a jest, as though he too would jest with me, about the baptism which he had received when utterly absent in mind and sense; yet he had already learned that he had received it. But he so shuddered at me as at an enemy, and with a marvelous and sudden liberty warned me that, if I wished to be a friend, I should cease to say such things to him.

ego autem stupefactus atque turbatus distuli omnes motus meos, ut convalesceret prius essetque idoneus viribus valetudinis, cum quo agere possem quod vellem. sed ille abreptus dementiae meae, ut apud te servaretur consolationi meae. post paucos dies me absente repetitur febribus et defungitur.

I, however, stupefied and troubled, deferred all my impulses, so that he might first recover and be made fit by the forces of health, with whom I might be able to deal as I willed. But he was snatched away from my madness, that with you he might be preserved for my consolation. After a few days, I being absent, he is again attacked by fevers and dies.

4.4.9

quo dolore contenebratum est cor meum, et quidquid aspiciebam mors erat. et erat mihi patria supplicium et paterna domus mira infelicitas, et quidquid cum illo communicaveram, sine illo in cruciatum immanem verterat. expetebant eum undique oculi mei, et non dabatur.

by which grief my heart was darkened, and whatever I looked upon was death. and my fatherland was a punishment to me and the paternal house a wondrous unhappiness, and whatever I had shared with him, without him had turned into immense torment. my eyes were seeking him on every side, and he was not given.

et oderam omnia, quod non haberent eum, nec mihi iam dicere poterant, 'ecce veniet,' sicut cum viveret, quando absens erat. factus eram ipse mihi magna quaestio, et interrogabam animam meam quare tristis esset et quare conturbaret me valde, et nihil noverat respondere mihi. et si dicebam, 'spera in deum,' iuste non obtemperabat, quia verior erat et melior homo quem carissimum amiserat quam phantasma in quod sperare iubebatur.

and I hated everything, because they did not have him, nor could they now say to me, 'behold, he will come,' as when he was living, when he was absent. I had become to myself a great question, and I was asking my soul why it was sad and why it was disturbing me greatly, and it knew nothing to answer me. And if I said, 'hope in God,' it justly did not obey, because the man whom it had lost, most dear, was truer and better than the phantasm in which it was being ordered to hope.

solus fletus erat dulcis mihi et successerat amico meo in deliciis animi mei.

Only weeping was sweet to me, and it had succeeded my friend in the delights of my mind.

4.5.10

et nunc, domine, iam illa transierunt, et tempore lenitum est vulnus meum. possumne audire abs te, qui veritas es, et admovere aurem cordis mei ori tuo, ut dicas mihi cur fletus dulcis sit miseris? an tu, quamvis ubique adsis, longe abiecisti a te miseriam nostram, et tu in te manes, nos autem in experimentis volvimur?

and now, lord, already those things have passed, and with time my wound has been softened. can I hear from you, who are truth, and move the ear of my heart to your mouth, that you may tell me why weeping is sweet to the wretched? or have you, although you are present everywhere, cast our misery far from yourself, and you remain in yourself, while we are rolled about in our experiences?

et tamen nisi ad aures tuas ploraremus, nihil residui de spe nostra fieret. unde igitur suavis fructus de amaritudine vitae carpitur, gemere et flere et suspirare et conqueri? an hoc ibi dulce est, quod speramus exaudire te? recte istuc in precibus, quia desiderium perveniendi habent.

and yet, unless we were to wail to your ears, nothing of our hope would remain. whence, then, is a sweet fruit plucked from the bitterness of life— to groan and to weep and to sigh and to complain? or is it sweet there because we hope to be favorably heard by you? rightly is that so in prayers, because they have the desire of attaining.

num in dolore amissae rei et luctu, quo tunc operiebar? neque enim sperabam revivescere illum aut hoc petebam lacrimis, sed tantum dolebam et flebam. miser enim eram et amiseram gaudium meum.

Was it in the pain of the lost thing and in the mourning with which I was then shrouded? For I was not hoping that he would revive, nor was I seeking this by tears, but only I was grieving and weeping. For I was miserable, and I had lost my joy.

an et fletus res amara est et, prae fastidio rerum quibus prius fruebamur et tunc ab eis abhorremus, delectat?

Or is even weeping both a bitter thing and, by reason of a distaste for the things which we previously enjoyed and then abhor, a delight?

4.6.11

quid autem ista loquor? non enim tempus quaerendi nunc est, sed confitendi tibi. miser eram, et miser est omnis animus vinctus amicitia rerum mortalium, et dilaniatur cum eas amittit, et tunc sentit miseriam qua miser est et antequam amittat eas.

But why am I saying these things? For now is not the time for inquiring, but for confessing to you. I was wretched, and wretched is every soul bound by amity with mortal things; it is torn asunder when it loses them, and then it feels the misery whereby it is wretched—even before it loses them.

sic ego eram illo tempore et flebam amarissime et requiescebam in amaritudine. ita miser eram et habebam cariorem illo amico meo vitam ipsam miseram. nam quamvis eam mutare vellem, nollem tamen amittere magis quam illum, et nescio an vellem vel pro illo, sicut de Oreste et Pylade traditur, si non fingitur, qui vellent pro invicem vel simul mori, qua morte peius eis erat non simul vivere.

Thus I was at that time, and I wept most bitterly and took my rest in bitterness. So miserable was I, and I held life itself—miserable as it was—dearer than that friend of mine. For although I wished to change it, yet I would not wish to lose it rather than him; and I do not know whether I would have wished even in his stead, as is handed down of Orestes and Pylades, if it is not a fiction, who for each other were willing either to die in one another’s place or to die together—for whom not to live together was worse than that death.

sed in me nescio quis affectus nimis huic contrarius ortus erat, et taedium vivendi erat in me gravissimum et moriendi metus. credo, quo magis illum amabam, hoc magis mortem, quae mihi eum abstulerat, tamquam atrocissimam inimicam oderam et timebam, et eam repente consumpturam omnes homines putabam, quia illum potuit. sic eram omnino, memini.

but in me some I-know-not-what affect had arisen, excessively contrary to this, and there was in me a most grievous tedium of living and a fear of dying. I believe, the more I loved him, the more I hated and feared death, which had taken him from me, as a most atrocious enemy, and I thought that it would suddenly consume all human beings, since it could do so to him. thus I was altogether, I remember.

ecce cor meum, deus meus, ecce intus. vide, quia memini, spes mea, qui me mundas a talium affectionum immunditia, dirigens oculos meos ad te et evellens de laqueo pedes meos. mirabar enim ceteros mortales vivere, quia ille, quem quasi non moriturum dilexeram, mortuus erat, et me magis, quia ille alter eram, vivere illo mortuo mirabar.

Behold my heart, my God, behold within. See, for I remember, my hope—you who cleanse me from the uncleanness of such affections, directing my eyes to you and plucking my feet out of the snare. For I marveled that the rest of mortals lived, because he whom I had loved as if not destined to die had died; and I marveled still more that I myself lived, since he was my other self, with him dead.

bene quidam dixit de amico suo: 'dimidium animae' suae. nam ego sensi animam meam et animam illius unam fuisse animam in duobus corporibus, et ideo mihi horrori erat vita, quia nolebam dimidius vivere, et ideo forte mori metuebam, ne totus ille moreretur quem multum amaveram.

Well has someone said of his friend: 'half of his soul.' For I felt that my soul and his soul had been one soul in two bodies, and therefore life was a horror to me, because I was unwilling to live as a half; and therefore perhaps I feared to die, lest he whom I had loved much should die wholly.

4.7.12

o dementiam nescientem diligere homines humaniter! o stultum hominem immoderate humana patientem! quod ego tunc eram.

o madness not knowing how to love human beings humanly! o foolish man immoderately enduring human things! which I then was.

itaque aestuabam, suspirabam, flebam, turbabar, nec requies erat nec consilium. portabam enim concisam et cruentam animam meam impatientem portari a me, et ubi eam ponerem non inveniebam. non in amoenis nemoribus, non in ludis atque cantibus, nec in suave olentibus locis, nec in conviviis apparatis, neque in voluptate cubilis et lecti, non denique in libris atque carminibus adquiescebat.

Thus I was seething, I was sighing, I was weeping, I was perturbed, and there was neither rest nor counsel. For I was carrying my soul cut to pieces and bloody, impatient of being carried by me, and I did not find where I might set it down. Not in pleasant groves, not in games and songs, nor in sweet-smelling places, nor at set-out banquets, nor in the pleasure of bed and couch, not, finally, in books and poems did it acquiesce.

horrebant omnia et ipsa lux, et quidquid non erat quod ille erat improbum et odiosum erat praeter gemitum et lacrimas: nam in eis solis aliquantula requies. ubi autem inde auferebatur anima mea, onerabat me grandi sarcina miseriae. ad te, domine, levanda erat et curanda, sciebam, sed nec volebam nec valebam, eo magis quia non mihi eras aliquid solidum et firmum, cum de te cogitabam.

everything shuddered, and light itself, and whatever was not what he was was depraved and odious, except for groaning and tears: for in these alone there was some small repose. But when my soul was taken away from there, it burdened me with a great burden of misery. To you, Lord, it had to be lifted and cured, I knew, but neither was I willing nor was I able, all the more because you were not to me something solid and firm, when I thought about you.

non enim tu eras, sed vanum phantasma et error meus erat deus meus. si conabar eam ibi ponere ut requiesceret, per inane labebatur et iterum ruebat super me, et ego mihi remanseram infelix locus, ubi nec esse possem nec inde recedere. quo enim cor meum fugeret a corde meo?

For it was not you, but a vain phantasm, and my error was my god. If I tried to set it there that it might rest, it would slip through the void and again plunge down upon me; and I had remained to myself an unhappy place, where I could neither be nor withdraw from it. For whither could my heart flee from my heart?

quo a me ipso fugerem? quo non me sequerer? et tamen fugi de patria.

Whither might I flee from my very self? Whither would I not follow myself? And yet I fled from my fatherland.

minus enim eum quaerebant oculi mei ubi videre non solebant, atque a Thagastensi oppido veni Carthaginem.

for my eyes were seeking him less where they were not accustomed to see him, and from the town of Thagaste I came to Carthage.

4.8.13

non vacant tempora nec otiose volvuntur per sensus nostros: faciunt in animo mira opera. ecce veniebant et praeteribant de die in diem, et veniendo et praetereundo inserebant mihi spes alias et alias memorias, et paulatim resarciebant me pristinis generibus delectationum, quibus cedebat dolor meus ille; sed succedebant non quidem dolores alii, causae tamen aliorum dolorum. nam unde me facillime et in intima dolor ille penetraverat, nisi quia fuderam in harenam animam meam diligendo moriturum acsi non moriturum?

times are not vacant nor are they idly rolled through our senses: they perform in the mind wondrous works. behold, they were coming and passing by from day to day, and by coming and by passing by they were engrafting in me other hopes and other memories, and little by little they were mending me with former kinds of delectations, to which that pain of mine was yielding; but succeeding to it were, not indeed other pains, yet the causes of other pains. for whence had that pain most easily, and into the inmost, penetrated me, if not because I had poured my soul into the sand by loving a mortal as though he were not mortal?

maxime quippe me reparabant atque recreabant aliorum amicorum solacia, cum quibus amabam quod pro te amabam, et hoc erat ingens fabula et longum mendacium, cuius adulterina confricatione corrumpebatur mens nostra pruriens in auribus. sed illa mihi fabula non moriebatur, si quis amicorum meorum moreretur. alia erant quae in eis amplius capiebant animum, conloqui et conridere et vicissim benivole obsequi, simul legere libros dulciloquos, simul nugari et simul honestari, dissentire interdum sine odio tamquam ipse homo secum atque ipsa rarissima dissensione condire consensiones plurimas, docere aliquid invicem aut discere ab invicem, desiderare absentes cum molestia, suscipere venientes cum laetitia: his atque huius modi signis a corde amantium et redamantium procedentibus per os, per linguam, per oculos et mille motus gratissimos, quasi fomitibus conflare animos et ex pluribus unum facere.

Most especially the consolations of other friends repaired and re-created me, with whom I loved what I loved for your sake; and this was a huge fable and a long mendacity, by whose adulterine rubbing our mind, itching in the ears, was being corrupted. But that fable did not die for me if any of my friends died. There were other things in them that more captured the soul: to converse and to laugh, and in turn to comply benevolently; to read together sweet-speaking books, to trifle together and together to be ennobled; to dissent sometimes without hatred, as a man with himself, and by that very most-rare dissent to season the many consensuses; to teach something in turn or to learn from one another; to long for the absent with distress, to welcome those coming with joy: by these and signs of this sort, proceeding from the heart of those loving and being loved in return, through the mouth, through the tongue, through the eyes, and a thousand most-pleasing motions, as with kindlings to blow together spirits and out of many to make one.

4.9.14

hoc est quod diligitur in amicis, et sic diligitur ut rea sibi sit humana conscientia si non amaverit redamantem aut si amantem non redamaverit, nihil quaerens ex eius corpore praeter indicia benivolentiae. hinc ille luctus si quis moriatur, et tenebrae dolorum, et versa dulcedine in amaritudinem cor madidum, et ex amissa vita morientium mors viventium. beatus qui amat te et amicum in te et inimicum propter te. solus enim nullum carum amittit cui omnes in illo cari sunt qui non amittitur.

this is what is loved in friends, and it is so loved that human conscience is guilty to itself if it has not loved one who loves back, or if it has not loved back one loving, seeking nothing from his body except indications of benevolence. hence that mourning if someone dies, and the darknesses of pains, and the heart soaked, sweetness having been turned into bitterness, and from the lost life of the dying, the death of the living. blessed is he who loves you and the friend in you and the enemy on account of you. for he alone loses no dear one, to whom all are dear in him who is not lost.

et quis est iste nisi deus noster, deus, qui fecit caelum et terram et implet ea, quia implendo ea fecit ea? te nemo amittit nisi qui dimittit, et quia dimittit, quo it aut quo fugit nisi a te placido ad te iratum? nam ubi non invenit legem tuam in poena sua? et lex tua veritas et veritas tu.

and who is this unless our God, God, who made heaven and earth and fills them, because by filling them he made them? no one loses you except the one who lets go, and because he lets go, where does he go or where does he flee except from you placid to you wrathful? for where does he not find your law in his own penalty? and your law is truth, and truth is you.

4.10.15

deus virtutum, converte nos et ostende faciem tuam, et salvi erimus. nam quoquoversum se verterit anima hominis, ad dolores figitur alibi praeterquam in te, tametsi figitur in pulchris extra te et extra se. quae tamen nulla essent, nisi essent abs te. quae oriuntur et occidunt et oriendo quasi esse incipiunt, et crescunt ut perficiantur, et perfecta senescunt et intereunt: et non omnia senescunt, et omnia intereunt. ergo cum oriuntur et tendunt esse, quo magis celeriter crescunt ut sint, eo magis festinant ut non sint: sic est modus eorum.

God of hosts, turn us and show your face, and we shall be saved. For whichever way the soul of man turns itself, it is fastened to pains elsewhere except in you, although it is fastened on beautiful things outside you and outside itself. Which nevertheless would be nothing, unless they were from you. They arise and set, and by arising they as it were begin to be, and they grow that they may be perfected, and, perfected, they grow old and perish: and not all things grow old, and all things perish. Therefore, when they arise and tend to be, the more swiftly they grow in order to be, the more they hasten not to be: such is their mode.

tantum dedisti eis, quia partes sunt rerum, quae non sunt omnes simul, sed decedendo ac succedendo agunt omnes universum, cuius partes sunt. (ecce sic peragitur et sermo noster per signa sonantia. non enim erit totus sermo, si unum verbum non decedat, cum sonuerit partes suas, ut succedat aliud.) laudet te ex illis anima mea, deus, creator omnium, sed non in eis figatur glutine amore per sensus corporis.

So much you have granted to them, because they are parts of things, which are not all at once, but by departing and succeeding they all perform the universe, of which they are parts. (Behold, thus too our discourse is carried through by sounding signs. For there will not be a whole discourse if one word does not withdraw, when it has sounded its own parts, so that another may succeed.) Let my soul praise you from them, O God, creator of all things, but let it not be fixed in them with the glue of love through the senses of the body.

eunt enim quo ibant, ut non sint, et conscindunt eam desideriis pestilentiosis, quoniam ipsa esse vult et requiescere amat in eis quae amat. in illis autem non est ubi, quia non stant: fugiunt, et quis ea sequitur sensu carnis? aut quis ea comprehendit, vel cum praesto sunt?

for they go where they were going, in order not to be, and they rend her with pestilential desires, since she herself wants to be and loves to rest in the things she loves. but in them there is no place, because they do not stand: they flee, and who follows them with the sense of the flesh? or who comprehends them, even when they are at hand?

tardus est enim sensus carnis, quoniam sensus carnis est: ipse est modus eius. sufficit ad aliud, ad quod factus est, ad illud autem non sufficit, ut teneat transcurrentia ab initio debito usque ad finem debitum. in verbo enim tuo, per quod creantur, ibi audiunt, 'hinc' et 'huc usque.'

For the carnal sense is slow, because it is a carnal sense: this is its mode. It suffices for another thing, for which it was made, but for that it does not suffice—to hold the transcurrent things from the due beginning to the due end. For in your Word, through which they are created, there they hear, 'hinc' and 'huc usque.'

4.11.16

noli esse vana, anima mea, et obsurdescere in aure cordis tumultu vanitatis tuae. audi et tu: verbum ipsum clamat ut redeas, et ibi est locus quietis imperturbabilis, ubi non deseritur amor si ipse non deserat. ecce illa discedunt ut alia succedant, et omnibus suis partibus constet infima universitas.

Do not be vain, my soul, nor grow deaf in the ear of the heart by the tumult of your vanity. Listen, you too: the Word itself cries out that you return, and there is the place of imperturbable quiet, where love is not deserted if he does not desert. Behold, those things depart so that others may succeed, and the lowest universe may stand constituted with all its parts.

'numquid ego aliquo discedo?' ait verbum dei. ibi fige mansionem tuam, ibi commenda quidquid inde habes, anima mea; saltem fatigata fallaciis, veritati commenda quidquid tibi est a veritate, et non perdes aliquid, et reflorescent putria tua, et sanabuntur omnes languores tui, et fluxa tua reformabuntur et renovabuntur et constringentur ad te, et non te deponent quo descendunt, sed stabunt tecum et permanebunt ad semper stantem ac permanentem deum.

'Do I in any way depart?' says the Word of God. There fix your dwelling, there commend whatever you have from there, my soul; at least, wearied by fallacies, commend to the Truth whatever you have from the Truth, and you will lose nothing, and your decayed things will refloresce, and all your languors will be healed, and your shifting things will be re-formed and renewed and bound to you, and they will not depose you to where they descend, but they will stand with you and will abide with the God who ever stands and remains.

4.11.17

ut quid perversa sequeris carnem tuam? ipsa te sequatur conversam. quidquid per illam sentis in parte est, et ignoras totum cuius hae partes sunt, et delectant te tamen.

why do you perversely follow your flesh? let it itself follow you, converted. whatever you sense through it is in part, and you are ignorant of the whole of which these are parts, and yet they delight you.

sed si ad totum comprehendendum esset idoneus sensus carnis tuae, ac non et ipse in parte universi accepisset pro tua poena iustum modum, velles ut transiret quidquid existit in praesentia, ut magis tibi omnia placerent. nam et quod loquimur per eundem sensum carnis audis, et non vis utique stare syllabas sed transvolare, ut aliae veniant et totum audias. ita semper omnia, quibus unum aliquid constat (et non sunt omnia simul ea quibus constat): plus delectant omnia quam singula, si possint sentiri omnia.

but if the sense of your flesh were adequate to comprehend the whole, and had not itself also, as a part of the universe, received a just measure as your penalty, you would wish whatever exists in the present to pass, so that all things might please you more. for even what we speak you hear through that same sense of the flesh, and you do not, of course, want the syllables to stand still but to fly across, so that others may come and you may hear the whole. thus always all the things of which any one thing consists (and the things of which it consists are not all at once): all things together delight more than the single things, if all could be sensed.

sed longe his melior qui fecit omnia, et ipse est deus noster, et non discedit, quia nec succeditur ei.

but far better than these is he who made all things, and he himself is our God, and he does not depart, because neither is he succeeded (by another).

4.12.18

si placent corpora, deum ex illis lauda et in artificem eorum retorque amorem, ne in his quae tibi placent tu displiceas. si placent animae, in deo amentur, quia et ipsae mutabiles sunt et in illo fixae stabiliuntur: alioquin irent et perirent. in illo ergo amentur, et rape ad eum tecum quas potes et dic eis: 'hunc amemus: ipse fecit haec et non est longe.

if bodies please, praise God from them and turn back the love to their artificer, lest in those things which please you, you displease yourself. if souls please, let them be loved in God, because they too are mutable and, fixed in him, are made stable: otherwise they would go and perish. therefore let them be loved in him, and snatch away to him with yourself those whom you can and say to them: 'let us love this one: he himself made these things and he is not far.

non enim fecit atque abiit, sed ex illo in illo sunt. ecce ubi est, ubi sapit veritas: intimus cordi est, sed cor erravit ab eo. redite, praevaricatores, ad cor et inhaerete illi qui fecit vos. state cum eo et stabitis, requiescite in eo et quieti eritis.

for he did not make and go away, but from him, in him they are. behold where he is, where truth is savored: he is innermost to the heart, but the heart has erred from him. return, transgressors, to the heart, and adhere to him who made you. stand with him and you will stand, rest in him and you will be at rest.

quo itis in aspera? quo itis? bonum quod amatis ab illo est: sed quantum est ad illum, bonum est et suave; sed amarum erit iuste, quia iniuste amatur deserto illo quidquid ab illo est.

Where are you going into the rough places? Where are you going? The good which you love is from him; but, to the extent that it is with respect to him, it is good and sweet; but it will be bitter justly, because, with him deserted, whatever is from him is loved unjustly.

quo vobis adhuc et adhuc ambulare vias difficiles et laboriosas? non est requies ubi quaeratis eam. quaerite quod quaeritis, sed ibi non est ubi quaeritis.

Why do you again and again walk the difficult and laborious ways? There is no rest where you seek it. Seek what you seek, but it is not there where you are seeking.

beatam vitam quaeritis in regione mortis: non est illic. quomodo enim beata vita, ubi nec vita?

you seek the blessed life in the region of death: it is not there. for how indeed could there be a blessed life, where there is not even life?

4.12.19

tulit mortem nostram et occidit eam de abundantia vitae suae, et tonuit, clamans ut redeamus hinc ad eum in illud secretum unde processit ad nos, in ipsum primum virginalem uterum ubi ei nupsit humana creatura, caro mortalis, ne semper mortalis. et inde velut sponsus procedens de thalamo suo exultavit ut gigans ad currendam viam. non enim tardavit, sed cucurrit clamans dictis, factis, morte, vita, descensu, ascensu, clamans ut redeamus ad eum: et discessit ab oculis, ut redeamus ad eum.

he bore our death and slew it by the abundance of his life, and he thundered, crying out that we should return from here to him into that secret whence he proceeded to us, into that very first virginal womb where the human creature, mortal flesh, was wedded to him, lest it be forever mortal. and thence, like a bridegroom proceeding from his thalamus, he exulted like a giant to run his way. for he did not tarry, but ran, crying out by words, deeds, death, life, descent, ascent, crying out that we should return to him: and he departed from our eyes, that we might return to him.

et discessit ab oculis, ut redeamus ad cor et inveniamus eum. abscessit enim et ecce hic est. noluit nobiscum diu esse et non reliquit nos.

and he departed from our eyes, so that we might return to the heart and find him. for he has withdrawn, and behold, he is here. he was unwilling to be with us for long, and he has not left us.

illuc enim abscessit unde numquam recessit, quia mundus per eum factus est, et in hoc mundo erat et venit in hunc mundum peccatores salvos facere. cui confitetur anima mea et sanat eam, quoniam peccavit illi. filii hominum, quo usque graves corde?

for thither indeed he withdrew whence he never departed, because the world was made through him, and in this world he was, and he came into this world to save sinners. to whom my soul confesses, and he heals it, since it has sinned against him. sons of men, how long will you be heavy of heart?

numquid et post descensum vitae non vultis ascendere et vivere? sed quo ascenditis, quando in alto estis et posuistis in caelo os vestrum? descendite, ut ascendatis, et ascendatis ad deum.

Is it that even after the descent of Life you do not wish to ascend and to live? But whither do you ascend, when you are on high and have set your mouth in heaven? Descend, that you may ascend, and ascend to God.

cecidistis enim ascendendo contra deum.' dic eis ista, ut plorent in convalle plorationis, et sic eos rape tecum ad deum, quia de spiritu eius haec dicis eis, si dicis ardens igne caritatis.

for you have fallen by ascending against God.' say these things to them, that they may weep in the valley of lamentation, and thus snatch them with you to God, because from his Spirit you say these things to them, if you speak burning with the fire of charity.

4.13.20

haec tunc non noveram, et amabam pulchra inferiora et ibam in profundum, et dicebam amicis meis, 'num amamus aliquid nisi pulchrum? quid est ergo pulchrum? et quid est pulchritudo?

these things I did not then know, and I loved lower beauties and was going into the depths, and I used to say to my friends, 'do we love anything except the beautiful? what then is the beautiful? and what is pulchritude?'

quid est quod nos allicit et conciliat rebus quas amamus? nisi enim esset in eis decus et species, nullo modo nos ad se moverent.' et animadvertebam et videbam in ipsis corporibus aliud esse quasi totum et ideo pulchrum, aliud autem quod ideo deceret, quoniam apte adcommodaretur alicui, sicut pars corporis ad universum suum aut calciamentum ad pedem et similia. et ista consideratio scaturrivit in animo meo ex intimo corde meo, et scripsi libros 'de pulchro et apto' — puto duos aut tres: tu scis, deus, nam excidit mihi.

what is it that allures us and conciliates us to the things we love? For unless there were in them decor and appearance, they would in no way move us to themselves.' And I observed and saw that in the bodies themselves one thing is, as it were, the whole and therefore beautiful, but another is that which is therefore becoming, since it is aptly accommodated to something, as a part of the body to its whole, or a shoe to the foot, and the like. And this consideration gushed forth in my mind from my inmost heart, and I wrote books 'On the Beautiful and the Apt' — I think two or three: you know, God, for it has slipped from me.

non enim habemus eos, sed aberraverunt a nobis nescio quo modo.

for we do not have them, but they have strayed from us in I know not what way.

4.14.21

quid est autem quod me movit, domine deus meus, ut ad Hierium, Romanae urbis oratorem, scriberem illos libros? quem non noveram facie, sed amaveram hominem ex doctrinae fama, quae illi clara erat, et quaedam verba eius audieram et placuerant mihi. sed magis quia placebat aliis et eum efferebant laudibus, stupentes quod ex homine Syro, docto prius graecae facundiae, post in latina etiam dictor mirabilis extitisset et esset scientissimus rerum ad studium sapientiae pertinentium, mihi placebat.

what was it, moreover, that moved me, O Lord my God, to write those books to Hierius, orator of the city of Rome? whom I had not known by face, but I had loved the man from the fame of his doctrine, which was renowned for him, and I had heard certain words of his and they had pleased me. But more because he was pleasing to others and they were extolling him with praises, astonished that from a Syrian man, trained first in Greek facundity, there had afterward arisen in Latin as well a marvelous speaker, and that he was most knowing in matters pertaining to the study of wisdom, he pleased me.

laudatur homo et amatur absens. utrumnam ab ore laudantis intrat in cor audientis amor ille? absit!

the man is praised and is loved though absent. does that love enter into the heart of the hearer from the mouth of the praiser? far be it!

sed ex amante alio accenditur alius. hinc enim amatur qui laudatur, dum non fallaci corde laudatoris praedicari creditur, id est cum amans eum laudat.

but from another lover another is enkindled. For hence he who is praised is loved, so long as he is believed to be proclaimed by the praiser with a non-fallacious heart, that is, when a lover praises him.

4.14.22

sic enim tunc amabam homines ex hominum iudicio, non enim ex tuo, deus meus, in quo nemo fallitur. sed tamen cur non sicut auriga nobilis, sicut venator studiis popularibus diffamatus, sed longe aliter et graviter et ita, quemadmodum et me laudari vellem? non autem vellem ita laudari et amari me ut histriones, quamquam eos et ipse laudarem et amarem, sed eligens latere quam ita notus esse et vel haberi odio quam sic amari.

For thus at that time I loved men by the judgment of men, not by yours, my God, in whom no one is deceived. But yet why not like a noble charioteer, like a hunter bruited about by popular zeal, but far otherwise and gravely, and in such a way as I too would wish to be praised? I did not, however, wish to be praised and loved as actors are—though I myself would praise and love them too—but choosing to lie hidden rather than be known thus, and rather to be held in hatred than to be loved in that way.

ubi distribuuntur ista pondera variorum et diversorum amorum in anima una? quid est quod amo in alio? quod rursus nisi odissem, non a me detestarer et repellerem, cum sit uterque nostrum homo?

Where are those weights of various and diverse loves distributed in the one soul? What is it that I love in another? That which, in turn, unless I hated, I would not detest and repel from me, since each of us is a man?

non enim sicut equus bonus amatur ab eo qui nollet hoc esse etiamsi posset. hoc et de histrione dicendum est, qui naturae nostrae socius est. ergone amo in homine quod odi esse, cum sim homo?

for it is not as a good horse is loved by one who would not wish to be this even if he could. This is to be said also of the actor, who is a fellow of our nature. Do I then love in a man what I hate to be, since I am a man?

grande profundum est ipse homo, cuius etiam capillos tu, domine, numeratos habes et non minuuntur in te: et tamen capilli eius magis numerabiles quam affectus eius et motus cordis eius.

man himself is a great deep, whose very hairs you, Lord, have numbered, and they are not diminished with you: and yet his hairs are more numerable than his affections and the motions of his heart.

4.14.23

at ille rhetor ex eo erat genere quem sic amabam ut vellem esse me talem. et errabam typho et circumferebar omni vento, et nimis occulte gubernabar abs te. et unde scio et unde certus confiteor tibi quod illum in amore laudantium magis amaveram quam in rebus ipsis de quibus laudabatur? quia si non laudatum vituperarent eum idem ipsi et vituperando atque spernendo ea ipsa narrarent, non accenderer in eo et non excitarer, et certe res non aliae forent nec homo ipse alius, sed tantummodo alius affectus narrantium.

but that rhetorician was of that kind whom I loved in such a way that I wished myself to be such. And I was wandering in typhos and was being carried about by every wind, and I was being steered by you all too secretly. And how do I know, and how do I confess to you with certainty, that I had loved him more in the love of those praising than in the very matters for which he was praised? Because if those same people, not praising him, were to censure him, and by censuring and spurning were to narrate those very same things, I would not be kindled in him nor stirred up; and certainly the facts would not be different nor the man himself another, but only a different affect of the narrators.

ecce ubi iacet anima infirma nondum haerens soliditati veritatis: sicut aurae linguarum flaverint a pectoribus opinantium, ita fertur et vertitur, torquetur ac retorquetur, et obnubilatur ei lumen et non cernitur veritas, et ecce est ante nos. et magnum quiddam mihi erat, si sermo meus et studia mea illi viro innotescerent. quae si probaret, flagrarem magis; si autem improbaret, sauciaretur cor vanum et inane soliditatis tuae.

Behold where the infirm soul lies, not yet clinging to the solidity of truth: as the breezes of tongues have blown from the breasts of those opining, so it is borne and turned, twisted and retwisted, and the light is overclouded for it and the truth is not discerned—and behold, it is before us. And it was a great thing to me, if my discourse and my studies should become known to that man. Which, if he should approve, I would blaze the more; but if he should disapprove, the heart vain and empty of your solidity would be wounded.

et tamen pulchrum illud atque aptum, unde ad eum scripseram, libenter animo versabam ob os contemplationis meae et nullo conlaudatore mirabar.

and yet that beautiful and apt piece, on account of which I had written to him, I gladly revolved in my mind before the face of my contemplation, and I marveled at it with no fellow-praiser.

4.15.24

sed tantae rei cardinem in arte tua nondum videbam, omnipotens, qui facis mirabilia solus, et ibat animus per formas corporeas et pulchrum, quod per se ipsum, aptum autem, quod ad aliquid adcommodatum deceret, definiebam et distinguebam et exemplis corporeis adstruebam. et converti me ad animi naturam, et non me sinebat falsa opinio quam de spiritalibus habebam verum cernere. et inruebat in oculos ipsa vis veri, et avertebam palpitantem mentem ab incorporea re ad liniamenta et colores et tumentes magnitudines et, quia non poteram ea videre in animo, putabam me non posse videre animum.

but the hinge of so great a matter in your art I did not yet see, O omnipotent, who alone do marvels; and my mind was going through corporeal forms, and I was defining and distinguishing the beautiful as that which is through itself, but the apt as that which, accommodated to something, would befit; and I was buttressing it with corporeal examples. and I turned myself to the nature of the mind, and a false opinion which I had about spiritual things did not allow me to discern the true. and the very force of the True was rushing upon my eyes, and I was turning my palpitating mind away from the incorporeal thing to lineaments and colors and swelling magnitudes, and because I could not see these in the mind, I supposed I could not see the mind.

et cum in virtute pacem amarem, in vitiositate autem odissem discordiam, in illa unitatem, in ista quandam divisionem notabam, inque illa unitate mens rationalis et natura veritatis ac summi boni mihi esse videbatur, in ista vero divisione inrationalis vitae nescioquam substantiam et naturam summi mali, quae non solum esset substantia sed omnino vita esset, et tamen abs te non esset, deus meus, ex quo sunt omnia, miser opinabar. et illam 'monadem' appellabam tamquam sine ullo sexu mentem, hanc vero 'dyadem', iram in facinoribus, libidinem in flagitiis, nesciens quid loquerer. non enim noveram neque didiceram nec ullam substantiam malum esse nec ipsam mentem nostram summum atque incommutabile bonum.

And when in virtue I loved peace, but in viciousness I hated discord, in the former I noted unity, in the latter a certain division; and in that unity the rational mind and the nature of truth and of the highest good seemed to me to be, but in this division some I-know-not-what substance of irrational life and the nature of the highest evil, which would not only be a substance but altogether would be life, and yet would not be from you, my God, from whom are all things—so wretchedly did I suppose. And that I called the ‘monad,’ as though a mind without any sex; but this the ‘dyad,’ anger in crimes, lust in flagitious acts, not knowing what I was saying. For I had neither known nor learned that no substance is evil, nor that our very mind is the highest and incommutable good.

4.15.25

sicut enim facinora sunt, si vitiosus est ille animi motus in quo est impetus et se iactat insolenter ac turbide, et flagitia, si est immoderata illa animae affectio qua carnales hauriuntur voluptates, ita errores et falsae opiniones vitam contaminant, si rationalis mens ipsa vitiosa est, qualis in me tunc erat nesciente alio lumine illam inlustrandam esse, ut sit particeps veritatis, quia non est ipsa natura veritatis, quoniam tu inluminabis lucernam meam, domine. deus meus, inluminabis tenebras meas, et de plenitudine tua omnes nos accepimus. es enim tu lumen verum quod inluminat omnem hominem venientem in hunc mundum, quia in te non est transmutatio nec momenti obumbratio.

for just as there are crimes, if that motion of the soul is vicious in which there is an impetus and it flings itself insolently and turbulently, and flagitious acts, if that affection of the soul is immoderate by which carnal pleasures are quaffed, so too errors and false opinions contaminate life, if the rational mind itself is vicious—such as then was in me, not knowing that it had to be illuminated by another light, that it might be a participant of truth, because it is not itself the nature of truth—for you will illumine my lamp, Lord. my God, you will illumine my darkness, and from your plenitude we all have received. for you are the true light that illumines every human coming into this world, because in you there is no transmutation nor shadow of a moment.

4.15.26

sed ego conabar ad te et repellebar abs te, ut saperem mortem, quoniam superbis resistis. quid autem superbius quam ut adsererem mira dementia me id esse naturaliter quod tu es? cum enim ego essem mutabilis et eo mihi manifestum esset, quod utique ideo sapiens esse cupiebam, ut ex deteriore melior fierem, malebam tamen etiam te opinari mutabilem quam me non hoc esse quod tu es. itaque repellebar et resistebas ventosae cervici meae, et imaginabar formas corporeas et caro carnem accusabam, et spiritus ambulans nondum revertebar ad te et ambulando ambulabam in ea quae non sunt, neque in te neque in me neque in corpore, neque mihi creabantur a veritate tua, sed a mea vanitate fingebantur ex corpore. et dicebam parvulis fidelibus tuis, civibus meis, a quibus nesciens exulabam, dicebam illis garrulus et ineptus, 'cur ergo errat anima quam fecit deus?' et mihi nolebam dici, 'cur ergo errat deus?' et contendebam magis incommutabilem tuam substantiam coactam errare quam meam mutabilem sponte deviasse et poena errare confitebar.

but I was trying to go to you and was repelled from you, so that I might have a savor of death, since you resist the proud. And what is more proud than that I should assert, with wondrous dementia, that I am by nature that which you are? For since I was mutable, and it was manifest to me for this very reason—indeed I longed to be wise, that from worse I might be made better—yet I preferred even to suppose you mutable rather than to think that I was not that which you are. And so I was repelled, and you were resisting my wind-puffed neck; and I was imagining corporeal forms, and, being flesh, I was accusing flesh; and, walking as a spirit, I had not yet returned to you, and by walking I was walking in those things which are not—neither in you, nor in me, nor in the body—nor were they being created for me by your truth, but by my vanity they were being feigned out of the body. And I used to say to your little faithful ones, my fellow-citizens, from whom, not knowing it, I was in exile—I used to say to them, garrulous and inept, ‘why then does the soul err which god made?’ and I was unwilling to be told, ‘why then does god err?’ and I contended rather that your incommutable substance was forced to err than that my mutable one had of its own accord deviated; and I was confessing that I erred under penalty.

4.15.27

et eram aetate annorum fortasse viginti sex aut septem, cum illa volumina scripsi, volvens apud me corporalia figmenta obstrepentia cordis mei auribus, quas intendebam, dulcis veritas, in interiorem melodiam tuam, cogitans de pulchro et apto, et stare cupiens et audire te et gaudio gaudere propter vocem sponsi, et non poteram, quia vocibus erroris mei rapiebar foras et pondere superbiae meae in ima decidebam. non enim dabas auditui meo gaudium et laetitiam, aut exultabant ossa, quae humilata non erant.

and I was perhaps twenty-six or twenty-seven years of age, when I wrote those volumes, turning over within myself corporeal figments, obstreperous to the ears of my heart, which I was directing, sweet Truth, toward your inner melody, thinking about the beautiful and the apt, and desiring to stand and to hear you and to rejoice with joy because of the voice of the bridegroom, and I could not, because by the voices of my error I was being snatched outward and by the weight of my pride I was falling down into the depths. for you were not giving to my hearing joy and gladness, nor did the bones exult which had not been humbled.

4.16.28

et quid mihi proderat quod annos natus ferme viginti, cum in manus meas venissent aristotelica quaedam, quas appellant decem categorias (quarum nomine, cum eas rhetor Carthaginiensis, magister meus, buccis typho crepantibus commemoraret et alii qui docti habebantur, tamquam in nescio quid magnum et divinum suspensus inhiabam), legi eas solus et intellexi? quas cum contulissem cum eis qui se dicebant vix eas magistris eruditissimis, non loquentibus tantum sed multa in pulvere depingentibus, intellexisse, nihil inde aliud mihi dicere potuerunt quam ego solus apud me ipsum legens cognoveram. et satis aperte mihi videbantur loquentes de substantiis, sicuti est homo, et quae in illis essent, sicuti est figura hominis, qualis sit, et statura, quot pedum sit, et cognatio, cuius frater sit, aut ubi sit constitutus aut quando natus, aut stet an sedeat, aut calciatus vel armatus sit, aut aliquid faciat aut patiatur aliquid, et quaecumque in his novem generibus, quorum exempli gratia quaedam posui, vel in ipso substantiae genere innumerabilia reperiuntur.

And what did it profit me that, at almost twenty years of age, when certain Aristotelian works had come into my hands, which they call the ten Categories (at whose very name, when the Carthaginian rhetor, my teacher, with cheeks resounding with typhonic puffing, would commemorate them, and others who were held learned did likewise, I, as if suspended, gaped after I-know-not-what great and divine thing), I read them by myself and understood? When I compared notes about them with those who said that hardly even with the most erudite masters—who not only spoke but also sketched many things in the dust—they had grasped them, they could tell me nothing from them other than what I, reading alone with myself, had come to know. And it seemed to me that they spoke quite plainly about substances, as man is, and about the things which are in them, as the figure of a man, of what sort he is, and stature, how many feet tall he is, and kinship, whose brother he is, or where he is situated or when born, or whether he stands or sits, or whether he is shod or armed, or does something or suffers something, and whatever things are found in these nine genera (of which, for example’s sake, I have set some), or in the very genus of substance, innumerable things.

4.16.29

quid hoc mihi proderat, quando et oberat, cum etiam te, deus meus, mirabiliter simplicem atque incommutabilem, illis decem praedicamentis putans quidquid esset omnino comprehensum, sic intellegere conarer, quasi et tu subiectus esses magnitudini tuae aut pulchritudini, ut illa essent in te quasi in subiecto sicut in corpore, cum tua magnitudo et tua pulchritudo tu ipse sis, corpus autem non eo sit magnum et pulchrum quo corpus est, quia etsi minus magnum et minus pulchrum esset, nihilominus corpus esset? falsitas enim erat quam de te cogitabam, non veritas, et figmenta miseriae meae, non firmamenta beatitudinis tuae. iusseras enim, et ita fiebat in me, ut terra spinas et tribulos pareret mihi et cum labore pervenirem ad panem meum.

What did this profit me, when it even harmed, since I too, thinking that whatever existed was altogether comprehended by those ten predicaments, tried thus to understand you, my God, wondrously simple and immutable, as though you also were subject to your magnitude or to your beauty, so that those would be in you as in a subject, as in a body, whereas your magnitude and your beauty are yourself; but a body is not great and beautiful by that whereby it is a body, for even if it were less great and less beautiful, nonetheless it would be a body? For what I was thinking about you was falsity, not truth, and figments of my misery, not the firmaments of your beatitude. For you had commanded, and so it was coming to pass in me, that the earth should bear thorns and thistles for me, and that with labor I should come to my bread.

4.16.30

et quid mihi proderat quod omnes libros artium quas liberales vocant tunc nequissimus malarum cupiditatum servus per me ipsum legi et intellexi, quoscumque legere potui? et gaudebam in eis, et nesciebam unde esset quidquid ibi verum et certum esset. dorsum enim habebam ad lumen et ad ea quae inluminantur faciem, unde ipsa facies mea, qua inluminata cernebam, non inluminabatur.

and what did it profit me that, then a most wicked servant of evil cupidities, I by myself read and understood all the books of the arts which they call liberal, whichever I could read? and I rejoiced in them, and I did not know whence there was whatever was true and certain in them. for I had my back to the light and my face to the things that are illuminated, whence my very face, by which, illuminated, I discerned, was not illuminated.

quidquid de arte loquendi et disserendi, quidquid de dimensionibus figurarum et de musicis et de numeris, sine magna difficultate nullo hominum tradente intellexi. scis tu, domine deus meus, quia et celeritas intellegendi et dispiciendi acumen donum tuum est. (sed non inde sacrificabam tibi; itaque mihi non ad usum sed ad perniciem magis valebat, quia tam bonam partem substantiae meae sategi habere in potestate et fortitudinem meam non ad te custodiebam, sed profectus sum abs te in longinquam regionem, ut eam dissiparem in meretrices cupiditates.) nam quid mihi proderat bona res non utenti bene?

whatever of the art of speaking and of discoursing, whatever of the dimensions of figures and of music and of numbers, without great difficulty, with no human being handing it down, I understood. you know, Lord my God, that both the swiftness of understanding and the sharpness of discerning are your gift. (but I was not from it sacrificing to you; and so it availed me not for use but rather for perdition, because I strove to have so good a part of my substance in my own power, and I did not keep my strength for you, but I set out away from you into a far country, that I might dissipate it on harlots—desires.) for what did a good thing profit me, not using it well?

non enim sentiebam illas artes etiam ab studiosis et ingeniosis difficillime intellegi, nisi cum eis eadem conabar exponere, et erat ille excellentissimus in eis qui me exponentem non tardius sequeretur.

For I did not perceive that those arts are understood with the greatest difficulty even by the studious and the ingenious, except when I tried to expound the same to them; and he was most excellent in them who would not follow me as expositor more slowly.

4.16.31

sed quid mihi hoc proderat, putanti quod tu, domine deus veritas, corpus esses lucidum et immensum et ego frustum de illo corpore? nimia perversitas! sed sic eram nec erubesco, deus meus, confiteri tibi in me misericordias tuas et invocare te, qui non erubui tunc profiteri hominibus blasphemias meas et latrare adversum te. quid ergo tunc mihi proderat ingenium per illas doctrinas agile et nullo adminiculo humani magisterii tot nodosissimi libri enodati, cum deformiter et sacrilega turpitudine in doctrina pietatis errarem?

but what did this profit me, when I was thinking that you, Lord God Truth, were a lucid and immense body and I a fragment of that body? excessive perversity! yet such I was, nor do I blush, my God, to confess to you your mercies in me and to invoke you—I who then did not blush to profess to men my blasphemies and to bark against you. what then did it profit me that my ingenium through those doctrines was agile, and, with no prop of human magistery, so many most-knotty books were unknotted, when I was erring deformedly and with sacrilegious turpitude in the doctrine of piety?

aut quid tantum oberat parvulis tuis longe tardius ingenium, cum a te longe non recederent, ut in nido ecclesiae tuae tuti plumescerent et alas caritatis alimento sanae fidei nutrirent? o domine deus noster, in velamento alarum tuarum speremus, et protege nos et porta nos. tu portabis et parvulos et usque ad canos tu portabis, quoniam firmitas nostra quando tu es, tunc est firmitas, cum autem nostra est, infirmitas est.

or what so greatly harmed your little ones in a far slower intelligence, since they did not withdraw far from you, that in the nest of your Church they might safely grow plumage and nourish the wings of charity with the aliment of sound faith? O Lord our God, let us hope under the covering of your wings, and protect us and carry us. You will carry both the little ones, and even unto gray hairs you will carry; because our firmness, when it is you, then it is firmness, but when it is ours, it is infirmity.

vivit apud te semper bonum nostrum, et quia inde aversi sumus, perversi sumus. revertamur iam, domine, ut non evertamur, quia vivit apud te sine ullo defectu bonum nostrum, quod tu ipse es, et non timemus ne non sit quo redeamus, quia nos inde ruimus. nobis autem absentibus non ruit domus nostra, aeternitas tua.

Our good lives always with you, and because we have turned away from it, we have been perverted. Let us revert now, O Lord, that we be not overturned, for our good, which you yourself are, lives with you without any defect; and we do not fear that there is not someplace to which we may return, for it is from there that we have rushed headlong. But though we are absent, our house does not collapse—your eternity.

Submitted by James J. O'Donnell (Univ. of Pennsylvania) from his new edition. Prof.

O'Donnell's introduction and commentary may be found at the original site: The Confessions of Augustine: An Electronic Edition