But I pressed towards Thee, and was thrust
from Thee, that I might taste of death: for thou resistest the
proud. But what prouder, than for me with a strange madness to
maintain myself to be that by nature which Thou art? For whereas
I was subject to change (so much being manifest to me, my very
desire to become wise, being the wish, of worse to become better),
yet chose I rather to imagine Thee subject to change, than myself
not to be that which Thou art. Therefore I was repelled by Thee,
and Thou resistedst my vain stiff-neckedness, and I imagined corporeal
forms, and, myself flesh, I accused flesh; and, a wind that passeth
away, I returned not to Thee, but I passed on and on to things
which have no being, neither in Thee, nor in me, nor in the body.
Neither were they created for me by Thy truth, but by my vanity
devised out of things corporeal. And I was wont to ask Thy faithful
little ones, my fellow-citizens (from whom, unknown to myself,
I stood exiled), I was wont, prating and foolishly, to ask them,
"Why then doth the soul err which God created?" But
I would not be asked, "Why then doth God err?" And I
maintained that Thy unchangeable substance did err upon constraint,
rather than confess that my changeable substance had gone astray
voluntarily, and now, in punishment, lay in error.
I was then some six or seven and twenty years old when I wrote
those volumes; revolving within me corporeal fictions, buzzing
in the ears of my heart, which I turned, O sweet truth, to thy
inward melody, meditating on the "fair and fit," and
longing to stand and hearken to Thee, and to rejoice greatly at
the Bridegroom's voice, but could not; for by the voices of mine
own errors, I was hurried abroad, and through the weight of my
own pride, I was sinking into the lowest pit. For Thou didst not
make me to hear joy and gladness, nor did the bones exult which
were not yet humbled.
And what did it profit me, that scarce twenty years old, a book
of Aristotle, which they call the ten Predicaments, falling into
my hands (on whose very name I hung, as on something great and
divine, so often as my rhetoric master of Carthage, and others,
accounted learned, mouthed it with cheeks bursting with pride),
I read and understood it unaided? And on my conferring with others,
who said that they scarcely understood it with very able tutors,
not only orally explaining it, but drawing many things in sand,
they could tell me no more of it than I had learned, reading it
by myself. And the book appeared to me to speak very clearly of
substances, such as "man," and of their qualities, as
the figure of a man, of what sort it is; and stature, how many
feet high; and his relationship, whose brother he is; or where
placed; or when born; or whether he stands or sits; or be shod
or armed; or does, or suffers anything; and all the innumerable
things which might be ranged under these nine Predicaments, of
which I have given some specimens, or under that chief Predicament
of Substance.
What did all this further me, seeing it even hindered me? When,
imagining whatever was, was comprehended under those ten Predicaments,
I essayed in such wise to understand, O my God, Thy wonderful
and unchangeable Unity also, as if Thou also hadst been subjected
to Thine own greatness or beauty; so that (as in bodies) they
should exist in Thee, as their subject: whereas Thou Thyself art
Thy greatness and beauty; but a body is not great or fair in that
it is a body, seeing that, though it were less great or fair,
it should notwithstanding be a body. But it was falsehood which
of Thee I conceived, not truth, fictions of my misery, not the
realities of Thy Blessedness. For Thou hadst commanded, and it
was done in me, that the earth should bring forth briars and thorns
to me, and that in the sweat of my brows I should eat my bread.
And what did it profit me, that all the books I could procure
of the so-called liberal arts, I, the vile slave of vile affections,
read by myself, and understood? And I delighted in them, but knew
not whence came all, that therein was true or certain. For I had
my back to the light, and my face to the things enlightened; whence
my face, with which I discerned the things enlightened, itself
was not enlightened. Whatever was written, either on rhetoric,
or logic, geometry, music, and arithmetic, by myself without much
difficulty or any instructor, I understood, Thou knowest, O Lord
my God; because both quickness of understanding, and acuteness
in discerning, is Thy gift: yet did I not thence sacrifice to
Thee. So then it served not to my use, but rather to my perdition,
since I went about to get so good a portion of my substance into
my own keeping; and I kept not my strength for Thee, but wandered
from Thee into a far country, to spend it upon harlotries. For
what profited me good abilities, not employed to good uses? For
I felt not that those arts were attained with great difficulty,
even by the studious and talented, until I attempted to explain
them to such; when he most excelled in them who followed me not
altogether slowly.
But what did this further me, imagining that Thou, O Lord God,
the Truth, wert a vast and bright body, and I a fragment of that
body? Perverseness too great! But such was I. Nor do I blush,
O my God, to confess to Thee Thy mercies towards me, and to call
upon Thee, who blushed not then to profess to men my blasphemies,
and to bark against Thee. What profited me then my nimble wit
in those sciences and all those most knotty volumes, unravelled
by me, without aid from human instruction; seeing I erred so foully,
and with such sacrilegious shamefulness, in the doctrine of piety?
Or what hindrance was a far slower wit to Thy little ones, since
they departed not far from Thee, that in the nest of Thy Church
they might securely be fledged, and nourish the wings of charity,
by the food of a sound faith. O Lord our God, under the shadow
of Thy wings let us hope; protect us, and carry us. Thou wilt
carry us both when little, and even to hoar hairs wilt Thou carry
us; for our firmness, when it is Thou, then is it firmness; but
when our own, it is infirmity. Our good ever lives with Thee;
from which when we turn away, we are turned aside. Let us now,
O Lord, return, that we may not be overturned, because with Thee
our good lives without any decay, which good art Thou; nor need
we fear, lest there be no place whither to return, because we
fell from it: for through our absence, our mansion fell not--Thy
eternity.