HE ADVANCES TO
PUBERTY, AND INDEED TO THE EARLY PART OF THE SIXTEENTH YEAR OF
HIS AGE, IN WHICH, HAVING ABANDONED HIS STUDIES, HE INDULGED IN
LUSTFUL PLEASURES, AND, WITH HIS COMPANIONS, COMMITTED
THEFT.
CHAP. I. HE DEPLORES THE
WICKEDNESS OF HIS YOUTH.
1. I WILL now call to mind
my past foulness, and the carnal corruptions of my soul, not
because I love them, but that I may love Thee, O my God. For
love of Thy love do I it, recalling, in the very bitterness of my
remembrance, my most vicious ways, that Thou mayest grow sweet to
me, Thou sweetness without deception! Thou sweetness happy and
assured !and re-collecting myself out of that my dissipation, in
which I was torn to pieces, while, turned away from Thee the One,
I lost myself among many vanities. For I even longed in my youth
formerly to be satisfied with worldly things, and I dared to grow
wild again with various and shadowy loves; my form consumed
away,x and I became corrupt in Thine eyes, pleasing myself, and
eager to please in the eyes of men.
CHAP. II. STRICKEN WITH
EXCEEDING GRIEF, HE REMEMBERS THE DISSOLUTE PASSIONS IN WHICH, IN
HIS SIXTEENTH YEAR, HE USED TO INDULGE.
2. But what was it that I delighted in save to love and to
be beloved ? But I held it not in moderation, mind to mind, the
bright path of friendship, but out of the dark concupiscence of
the flesh and the effervescence of youth exhalations came forth
which obscured and overcast my heart, so that I was unable to
discern pure affection from unholy desire. Both boiled
confusedly within me, and dragged away my unstable youth into the
rough places of unchaste desires, and plunged me into a gulf of
infamy. Thy anger had overshadowed me, and I knew it not. I was
become deaf by the rattling of the chins of my mortality, the
punishment for my soul's pride; and I wandered farther from Thee,
and Thou didst "suffer" me; and I was tossed to and fro, and
wasted, and poured out, and boiled over in my fornications, and
Thou didst hold Thy peace, O Thou my tardy joy ! Thou then didst
hold Thy peace, and I wandered still farther from Thee, into more
and more barren seed-plots of sorrows, with proud dejection and
restless lassitude.
3. Oh for one to have regulated my
disorder, and turned to my profit the fleeting beauties of the
things around me, and fixed a bound to their sweetness, so that
the tides of my youth might have spent themselves upon the
conjugal shore, if so be they could not be tranquillized and
satisfied within the object of a family, as Thy law appoints, O
Lord, who thus formest the offspring of our death, being able
also with a tender hand to blunt the thorns which were excluded
from Thy paradise! For Thy omnipotency is not far from us even
when we are far from Thee, else in truth ought I more vigilantly
to have given heed to the voice from the clouds: "Nevertheless,
such shall have trouble in the flesh, but I spare you;" and, "It
is good for a man not to touch a woman; " and, "He that is
unmarried careth for the things that belong to the Lord, how he
may please the Lord; but he that is married careth for the things
that are of the world, how he may please his wife."(5) I should,
therefore, have listened more attentively to these words, and,
being severed "for the kingdom of heaven's sake," I would with
greater happiness have expected Thy embraces.
4. But I,
poor fool, seethed as does the sea, and, forsaking Thee, followed
the violent course of my own stream, and exceeded all Thy
limitations; nor did I escape Thy scourges. For what mortal can
do so ? But Thou weft always by me, mercifully angry, and dashing
with the bitterest vexations all my illicit pleasures, in order
that I might seek pleasures free from vexation. But where I
could meet with such except in Thee, O Lord, I could not
find,except in Thee, who teachest by sorrow, (8) woundest us to
heal us, and killest us that we may not die from Thee. Where was
I, and how far was I exiled from the delights of Thy house, in
that sixteenth year of the age of my flesh, when the madness of
lust to the which human shamelessness granteth full freedom,
although forbidden by Thy laws held complete away over me, and I
resigned myself entirely to it? Those about me meanwhile took no
care to save me from ruin by marriage, their sole care being that
I should learn to make a powerful speech, and become a persuasive
orator.
CHAP. III. -CONCERNING HIS
FATHER, A FREEMAN OF THAGASTE, THE ASSISTER OF HIS SON'S STUDIES,
AND ON THE ADMONITIONS OF HIS MOTHER ON THE PRESERVATION OF
CHASTITY.
5. And for that year my studies were intermitted, while
after my return from Madaura (2) (a neighbouring city, whither I
had begun to go in order to learn grammar and rhetoric), the
expenses for a further residence at Carthage were provided for
me; and that was rather by the determination than the means of my
father, who was but a poor freeman of Thagaste. To whom do I
narrate this ? Not unto Thee, my God; but before Thee unto my own
kind, even to that small part of the human race who may: chance
to light upon these my writings. And to what end ? That I and
all who read the same may reflect out of what depths we are to
cry unto Thee. For what cometh nearer to Thine ears than a
confessing heart and a life of faith ? For who did not extol and
praise my father, in that he went even beyond his means to supply
his son with all the necessaries for a far journey for the sake
of his studies ? For many far richer citizens did not the like
for their children. But yet this same father did not trouble
himself how I grew towards Thee, nor how chaste I was, so long as
I was skilful in speaking however barren I was to Thy tilling, O
God, who art the sole true and good Lord of my heart, which is
Thy field.
6. But while, in that sixteenth year of my age,
I resided with my parents, having holiday from school for a time
(this idleness being imposed upon me by my parents necessitous
circumstances), the thorns of lust grew rank over my head, and
there was no hand to pluck them out. Moreover when my father,
seeing me at the baths, perceived that I was becoming a man, and
was stirred with a restless youthfulness, he, as if from this
anticipating future descendants, joyfully told it to my mother;
rejoicing in that intoxication wherein the world so often forgets
Thee, its Creator, and fails in love with Thy creature instead of
Thee, from the invisible wine of its own perversity turning and
bowing down to the most infamous things. But in my mother's
breast Thou hadst even now begun Thy temple, and the commencement
of Thy holy habitation, whereas my father was only a catechumen
as yet, and that but recently. She then started up with a pious
fear and trembling; and, although I had not yet been baptized,
(4) she feared those crooked ways in which they walk who turn
their back to Thee, and not their face?
7. Woe is me! and
dare I affirm that Thou heldest Thy peace, O my God, while I
strayed farther from Thee ? Didst Thou then hold Thy peace to me?
And whose words were they but Thine which by my mother, Thy
faithful handmaid, Thou pouredst into my ears, none of which sank
into my heart to make me do it ? For she desired, and I remember
privately warned me, with great solicitude, "not to commit
fornication; but above all things never to defile another man's
wife." These appeared to me but womanish counsels, which I
should blush to obey. But they were Thine, and I knew it not,
and I thought that Thou heldest Thy peace, and that it was she
who spoke, through whom Thou heldest not Thy peace to me, and in
her person wast despised by me, her son, "the son of Thy
handmaid, Thy servant." (6) But this I knew not; and rushed on
headlong with such blindness, that amongst my equals I was
ashamed to be less shameless, when I heard them pluming
themselves upon their disgraceful acts, yea, and glorying all the
more in proportion to the greatness of their baseness; and I took
pleasure in doing it, not for the pleasure's sake only, but for
the praise. What is worthy of dispraise but vice ? But I made
myself out worse than I was, in order that I might not be
dispraised; and when in anything I had not sinned as the
abandoned ones, I would affirm that I had done what I had not,
that I might not appear abject for being more innocent, or of
less esteem for being more chaste.
8. Behold with what
companions I walked the streets of Babylon, in whose filth I was
rolled, as if in cinnamon and precious ointments. And that I
might cleave the more tenaciously to its very centre, my
invisible enemy trod me down, and seduced me, I being easily
seduced. Nor did the mother of my flesh, although she herself
had ere this fled "out of the midst of Babylon,"(1)
progressing, however, but slowly in the skirts of it, in
counselling me to chastity, so bear in mind what she had been
told about me by her husband as to restrain in the limits of
conjugal affection (if it could not be cut away to the quick)
what she knew to be destructive in the present and dangerous in
the future. But she took no heed of this, for she was afraid
lest a wife should prove a hindrance and a clog to my hopes. Not
those hopes of the future world, which my mother had in Thee; but
the hope of learning, which both my parents were too anxious that
I should acquire,-he, because he had little or no thought of
Thee, and but vain thoughts for me she, because she calculated
that those usual courses of learning would not only be no
drawback, but rather a. furtherance towards my attaining Thee.
For thus I conjecture, recalling as well as I can the
dispositions of my parents. The reins, meantime, were slackened
towards me beyond the restraint of due severity, that I might
play, yea, even to dissoluteness, in whatsoever I fancied. And
in all there was a mist, shutting out from my sight the
brightness of Thy truth, O my God; and my iniquity displayed
itself as from very "fatness."
CHAP. IV. HE COMMITS THEFT
WITH HIS COMPANIONS, NOT URGED ON BY POVERTY, BUT FROM A CERTAIN
DISTASTE OF WELL-DOING.
9. Theft is punished by Thy law, O Lord, and by the law
written in men's hearts, which iniquity itself cannot blot out.
For what thief will suffer a thief? Even a rich thief will not
suffer him who is driven to it by want. Yet had L a desire to
commit robbery, and did so, compelled neither by hunger, nor
poverty through a distaste for well-doing, and a lustiness of
iniquity. For I pilfered that of which I had already sufficient,
and much better. Nor did I desire to enjoy what I pilfered, but
the theft and sin itself. There was a pear-tree close to our
vineyard, heavily laden with fruit, which was tempting neither
for its colour nor its flavour. To shake and rob this some of us
wanton young fellows went, late one night (having, according to
our disgraceful habit, prolonged our games in the streets until
then), and carried away great loads, not to eat ourselves, but to
fling to the very swine, having only eaten some of them; and to
do this pleased us all the more because it was not permitted.
Behold my heart, O my God; behold my heart, which Thou hadst pity
upon when in the bottomless pit. Behold, now, let my heart tell
Thee what it was seeking there, that I should be gratuitously
wanton, having no inducement to evil but the evil itself. It was
foul, and I loved it. I loved to perish. I loved my own error
not that for which I erred, but the error itself. Base soul,
falling from Thy firmament to utter destruction not seeking
aught through the shame but the shame itself 1
CHAP. V. -CONCERNING THE
MOTIVES TO SIN, WHICH ARE NOT IN THE LOVE OF EVIL, BUT IN THE
DESIRE OF OBTAINING THE PROPERTY OF OTHERS.
10. There is a desirableness in all beautiful bodies, and in
gold, and silver, and all things; and in bodily contact sympathy
is powerful, and each other sense hath his proper adaptation of
body. Worldly honour hath also its glory, and the power of
command, and of overcoming; whence proceeds also the desire for
revenge. And yet to acquire all these, we must not depart from
Thee, O Lord, nor deviate from Thy law. The life which we live
here hath also its peculiar attractiveness, through a certain
measure of comeliness of its own, and harmony with all things
here below. The friendships of men also are endeared by a sweet
bond, in the oneness of many souls. On account of all these, and
such as these, is sin committed; while through an inordinate
preference for these goods of a lower kind, the better and higher
are neglected, -even Thou, our Lord God, Thy truth, and Thy law.
For these meaner things have their delights, but not like unto my
God, who hath created all things; for in Him doth the righteous
delight, and He is the sweetness of the upright in heart.3
11. When, therefore, we inquire why a crime was committed, we do
not believe it, unless it appear that there might have been the
wish to obtain some of those which we designated meaner things,
or else a fear of losing them. For truly they are beautiful and
comely, although in comparison with those higher and celestial
goods they be abject and contemptible. A man hath murdered
another; what was his motive ? He desired his wife or his estate;
or would steal to support himself; or he was afraid of losing
something of the kind by him; or, being injured, he was burning
to be revenged. Would he commit murder without a motive, taking
delight simply in the act of murder? Who would credit it ? For
as for that savage and brutal man, of whom it is declared that he
was gratuitously wicked and cruel, there is yet a motive
assigned. "Lest through idleness," he says, "hand or heart
should grow inactive." And to what purpose ? Why, even that,
having once got possession of the city through that practice of
wickedness, he might attain unto honours, empire, and wealth, and
be exempt from the fear of the laws, and his difficult
circumstances from the needs of his family, and the consciousness
of his own wickedness. So it seems that even Catiline himself
loved not his own villanies, but something else, which gave him
the motive for committing them.
CHAP. VI. WHY HE DELIGHTED
IN THAT THEFT, WHEN ALL THINGS WHICH UNDER THE APPEARANCE OF GOOD
INVITE TO VICE ARE TRUE AND PERFECT IN GOD ALONE.
12. What was it, then, that I, miserable one, so doted on in
thee, thou theft of mine, thou deed of darkness, in that
sixteenth year of my age ? Beautiful thou weft not, since thou
weft theft. But art thou anything, that so I may argue the case
with thee ? Those pears that we stole were fair to the sight,
because they were Thy creation, Thou fairests of all, Creator of
all, Thou good God God, the highest good, and my true good.
Those pears truly were pleasant to the sight; but it was not for
them that my miserable soul lusted, for I had abundance of
better, but those I plucked simply that I might steal. For,
having plucked them, I threw them away, my sole gratification in
them being my own sin, which I was pleased to enjoy. For if any
of these pears entered my mouth, the sweetener of it was my sin
in eating it. And now, O Lord my God, I ask what it was in that
theft of mine that caused me such delight; and behold it hath no
beauty in it not such, I mean, as exists in justice and wisdom;
nor such as is in the mind, memory, Senses, and animal life of
man; nor yet such as is the glory and beauty of the stars in
their courses; or the earth, or the sea, teeming with incipient
life, to replace, as it is born, that which decayeth; nor,
indeed, that false and shadowy beauty which pertaineth to
deceptive vices.
13. For thus cloth pride imitate high
estate, I whereas Thou alone art God, high above all. [ And what
does ambition seek but honours and l renown, whereas Thou alone
art to be honoured i above all, and renowned for evermore? The
cruelty of the powerful wishes to be feared ;i but who is to be
feared but God only, out of whose power what can be forced away
or with-drawn when, or where, or whither, or by whom ? The
enticements of the wanton would fain be deemed love; and yet is
naught more enticing than Thy charity, nor is aught loved more
healthfully than that, Thy truth, bright and beautiful above all.
Curiosity affects a desire for knowledge, whereas it is Thou who
supremely knowest all things. Yea, ignorance and foolishness
themselves are concealed under the names of ingenuousness and
harmlessness, because nothing can be found more ingenuous than
Thou; and what is more harmless, since it is a sinner's own works
by which he is harmed?(4) And sloth seems to long for rest; but
what sure rest is there besides the Lord ? Luxury would fain be
called plenty and abundance; but Thou art the fellness and
unfailing plenteousness of unfading joys. Prodigality presents a
shadow of liberality; but Thou art the most lavish giver of all
good. Covetousness desires to possess much; and Thou art the
Possessor of all things. Envy contends for excellence; but what
so excellent as Thou ? Anger seeks revenge; who avenges more
justly than Thou ? Fear starts at unwonted and sudden chances
which threaten things beloved, and is wary for their security;
but what can happen that is unwonted or sudden to Thee ? or who
can deprive Thee of what Thou lovest? or where is there unshaken
security save with Thee ? Grief languishes for things lost in
which desire had delighted itself, even because it would have
nothing taken from it, as nothing can be from Thee.
14.
Thus doth the soul commit fornication when she turns away from
Thee, and seeks without Thee what she cannot find pure and
untainted until she returns to Thee. Thus all pervertedly
imitate Thee who separate themselves far from Thee (4) and raise
themselves up against Thee. But even by thus imitating Thee they
acknowledge Thee to be the Creator of all nature, and so that
there is no place whither they can altogether retire from Thee.
What, then, was it that I loved in that theft ? And wherein did
I, even corruptedly and pervertedly, imitate my Lord ? Did I
wish, if only by artifice, to act contrary to Thy law, because by
power I could not, so that, being a captive, I might imitate an
imperfect liberty by doing with impunity things which I was not
allowed to do, in obscured likeness of Thy omnipotency?(6) Behold
this servant of Thine, fleeing from his Lord, and following a
shadow!(7) O rottenness (1) O monstrosity of life and profundity
of death I Could I like that which was unlawful only because it
was unlawful ?
CHAP. VII. HE GIVES THANKS
TO GOD FOR THE REMISSION OF HIS SINS, AND REMINDS EVERY ONE THAT
THE SUPREME GOD MAY HAVE PRESERVED us FROM GREATER SINS.
15. "What shall I render unto the Lord," that whilst my
memory recalls these things my soul is not appalled at them ? I
will love Thee, O Lord, and thank Thee, and confess unto Thy
name, because Thou hast put away from me these so wicked and
nefarious acts of mine. To Thy grace I attribute it, and to Thy
mercy, that Thou hast melted away my sin as it were ice. To Thy
grace also I attribute whatsoever of evil I have hot committed;
for what might I not have committed, loving as I did the sin for
the sin's sake? Yea, all I confess to have been pardoned me,
both those which I committed by my own perverseness, and those
which, by Thy guidance, I committed not. Where is he who,
reflecting upon his own infirmity, dares to ascribe his chastity
and innocency to his own strength, so that he should love Thee
the less, as if he had been in less need of Thy mercy, whereby
Thou dost forgive the transgressions of those that turn to Thee ?
For whosoever, called by Thee, obeyed Thy voice, and shunned
those things which he reads me recalling and confessing of
myself, let him not despise me, who, being sick, was healed by
that same Physician by whose aid it was that he was not sick, or
rather was less sick. And for this let him love Thee as much,
yea, all the more, since by whom he sees me to have been restored
from so great a feebleness of sin, by Him he sees himself from a
like feebleness to have been preserved.
CHAP. VIII. IN HIS THEFT
HE LOVED THE COMPANY OF HIS FELLOW-SINNERS.
16. "What fruit had I then,"* wretched one, in those things
which, when I remember them, cause me shame above all in that
theft, which I loved only for the theft's sake ? And as the theft
itself was nothing, all the more wretched was I who loved it.
Yet by myself alone I would not have done it I recall what my
heart was -alone I could not have done it. I loved, then, in it
the companionship of my accomplices with whom I did it. I did
not, therefore, love the theft alone yea, rather, it was that
alone that I loved, for the companionship was nothing. What is
the fact? Who is it that can teach me, but He who illuminateth
mine heart and searcheth out the dark corners thereof? What is
it that hath come into my mind to inquire about, to discuss, and
to reflect upon ? For had I at that time loved the pears I stole,
and wished to enjoy them, I might have done so alone, if I could
have been satisfied with the mere commission of the theft by
which my pleasure was secured; nor needed I have provoked that
itching of my own passions, by the encouragement of accomplices.
But as my enjoyment was not in those pears, it was in the crime
itself, which the company of my fellow-sinners produced.
CHAP. IX. IT WAS A PLEASURE
TO HIM ALSO TO LAUGH WHEN SERIOUSLY DECEIVING OTHERS.
17. By what feelings, then, was I animated ? For it was in
truth too shameful; and woe was me who had it. But still what
was it ? "Who can understand his errors?"(5) We laughed, because
our hearts were tickled at the thought of deceiving those who
little imagined what we were doing, and would have vehemently
disapproved of it. Yet, again, why did I so rejoice in this,
that I did it not alone ? Is it that no one readily laughs alone?
No one does so readily; but yet sometimes, when men are alone by
themselves, nobody being by, a fit of laughter overcomes them
when anything very droll presents itself to their senses or mind.
Yet alone I would not have done it alone I could not at all have
done it. Behold, my God, the lively recollection of my soul is
laid bare before Thee alone I had not committed that theft,
wherein what I stole pleased me not, but rather the act of
stealing; nor to have done it alone would I have liked so well,
neither would I have done it. O Friendship too unfriendly! thou
mysterious seducer of the soul, thou greediness to do mischief
out of mirth and wantonness, thou craving for others' loss,
without desire for my own profit or revenge; but when they say,
"Let us go, let us do it," we are ashamed not to be shameless.
CHAP. X. WITH GOD THERE IS
TRUE REST AND LIFE UNCHANGING.
18. Who can unravel
that twisted and tangled knottiness ? It is foul. I hate to
reflect on it. I hate to look on it. But thee do I long for, O
righteousness and innocency, fair and comely to all virtuous
eyes, and of a satisfaction that never palls! With thee is
perfect rest, and life unchanging. He who enters into thee
enters into the joy of his Lord, a and shall have no fear, and
shall do excellently in the most Excellent. I sank away from
Thee, O my God, and I wandered too far from Thee, my stay, in my
youth, and became to myself an unfruitful land.
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