Augustine
Confessions Book Ten, Chapter 1-40
about memory and the knowledge of God
For text + commentary see this link
Introductory remarks
For some time I planned to reread this fragment
from the Confessions of Augustine and analyze it. It is a
text that fascinates me in particular. In this chapters he is in search
for the source of religiosity in his inner consciousness. I believe that
these chapters can still give inspiration for those who are interested in
religiosity as inner experience.
I chose these particular chapters of the Tenth Book of Confessions of Augustine, because I feel that they can be read separately. They treat the foundations of his philosophy and they deal with his inner quest for the ultimate truth as a fact that is universal and therefore accessible to everyone.
To really understand the text I have translated these chapters again. Gradually the translation proved me how soon you almost instinctively interprets the text from the rails of a certain Christian and ecclesiastical tradition of the time you grew up. To avoid this, I read them as much possible as a literary text, a general human, if you like philosophical text, but without immediately going into his theological implications.
The position of the tenth book
The thirteen books which are included in
the Confessions can be divided into two groups. The first
nine books, which describe the history of his conversion and for most readers
are the main part and the last four books that deal with more general
philosophical and theological issues.
At first glance there seems little connection
between the first nine more biographical books and the four books which
follow. Particularly because the Tenth Book takes within
the last four again a special place. It has twice the size of the other
books of the Confessions and the detailed elaboration of
memory and the search for God creates the assumption that this is a separate
tract that was added later.
The Tenth Book of the Confessions is a sort of hinge
But by a closer look, the Tenth Book has
still a clear connection to what precedes and follows. Within
the Confessions, it has the function of a sort of hinge between
the first nine books, in which Augustine tells the story of his conversion and
on the other hand the later books. They go in his own words not
more about he was, but how he now is, at the time he
was writing the Confessions. They describe in fact his actual
religious vision and experience.
The Confessions are more than a personal
conversion story
In the Tenth Book and also in
the following books it becomes more and more clear that Augustine in his Confessions, and
hence in the autobiographical books, aims at more than a description of his
personal life.
The later books show that you should see his life
in a more universal and cosmic context. His history is in a way typical of
the history of every man, who wandering away from his origin, finds back his
original destination after much searching and struggle. Here are the
Platonic and Christian vision on the destiny of man and cosmos combined.
The summary
In the Tenth Book seeks
Augustine extensively for the place where God dwells. His journey goes through
the entire physical world outside him. But, although the whole creation
speaks of God, she testifies also that she is not God. He then passes the
world outside him and looks for God in the depths of the human soul. He
searches in the vast spaces of memory for a place where he can remember God.
But the memory has its many layers and he ascends
from the lower parts to the very area where a notion of God's is
present. He finds this notion in the universal desire
for truth and happiness, which is in principle innate in every
human being.
His quest appears to be a journey
from the many in which man is lost to the One,
the only truth which is God. It is also a journey from the lower
regions upwards, from an animal life to a more spiritual
life. That this journey is at the same time an awareness of the hidden
depths of consciousness, a movement inward and downward to the
depths of the soul, is here not in contradiction.
Why the first forty chapters?
Within the chapters of the Tenth Book the first
forty chapters form again a separate entity, as I already
indicated. They describe the above mentioned inner search for
God. This is in fact the objective and aspiration of every man.
The chapters that follow describe how Augustine
personally advanced in achieving this goal. Here is asceticism an
important factor. And although asceticism is an important condition in the
search for God, this will be a separate story that deserves attention on its
own.
Text Confessions Book Ten
Chapter 1
The desire to know God
Lord, you know me fully. May I know you, like you know me. May I know you as I am known1.
You are the power of my soul. Enter into it and
make her to your own home, without spot or wrinkle 2.
This is my hope and that is why I speak. And this
hope is my real joy.
As to the other pleasures in this life, we regret
the most what we not should regret, and the least what we really should regret.
See, you love the truth and he who does the truth
comes to the light3. This I like to do, in my heart by my confession
to you and in my book before many witnesses.
1 Cor. 13:12; 2Ef. 3 5: 27; 3Joh 3: 21
Chapter 2
Why this confession?
Before your eyes, Lord, the abyss of human consciousness is open.4 How could I hide something in my confession before you? I would hide me for myself, but myself not for you.
And now my groaning is witness that I find no
peace in myself, you are my radiant light, my peace, my love and my desire. I'm
ashamed of myself, and reject myself, and choose you. And I can find only peace
with myself and with you in you.
To you, Lord, all what I am is manifest. I have
already mentioned what the benefit is of my confession. I do this not with the
words of my voice, but with the words of my soul and the crying of my mind,
which is well known to your ears.
When I am evil, I confess to you that I am
displeased with myself. When I am good, I confess that I do not ascribe it to
myself. For you, Lord, give your blessing to the righteous5, but
only after that you made him from an unjust to a just man.6
Therefore I do my confession to you both in
silence and not in silence: my voice is silent, but my heart cries.
And I say here nothing right, or you have it
already heard of me. And you will hear from me nothing right, or you have it
already told to me.
4Heb.4: 13; 5 Ps.5:13; 6 Rom.4:5
Chapter 3
May my readers have a open heart for my confessions
What is my concern with men? What is the benefit that they hear my confession, as if they could heal all my sicknesses? It is a race, eager to know the lives of others, but reluctant to improve their own.
Why do they want to hear from me who I am, when they refuse to hear from you who they are? And when they hear me talking about myself, how can they know that I am talking the truth? Because nobody knows what's going on in man except the spirit of man which is in him.1
But if they hear from you about themselves, they cannot say: ‘The Lord is lying’. To hear you speaking about oneself is nothing else than to know oneself. Therefore anyone who knows himself and says: ‘That is not true’, is a liar to himself.
But because love believes all things2, at least among those who are bonded and unified by love, I want to make my confession to you in such a way, Lord, that these people may hear it. I cannot prove that my confession is true, but they will believe me, if love opens their ears for me.
1 1 Cor. 2:11; 2 1 Cor. 13:7
Chapter 4
My confession may be useful for my readers
You are the physician of my inner self. Make me see clearly with what benefit I do this confession. You have forgiven and covered up my past mistakes, and so you let me find happiness in you by transforming my soul by faith and your sacrament. It will stir up the hearts of others who hear or read these confessions, so that they don’t sleep in despair, saying: I cannot do this. And the love of your mercy and the sweetness of your grace. will encourage them. For your grace gives force to any weak person who is conscious of his weakness.
It is a delight for good people to hear the past evils of those who are now free of them. They are not delighted in those evils, but that they were in the past and do not exist any more.
My Lord, I open my conscience to you every day, relying more on your mercy than on my own innocence. What benefit is it, I ask you, what benefit, that I confess in this book before your eyes and all the people not who I was but who I now am?
I have seen and mentioned the benefit of my confession of the past. But many people too want to know who I am now, at this moment when I am writing my confessions. Some people know me, others do not. Sometimes they have heard something from me or about me. But their ear is not at my heart, where I am who I am
So they want to learn from my confessions who I am in my inner self, where they cannot penetrate with their eyes or ears or mind They want to do that by believing me, because how else could they know me? The love, by which they are good people, tells them that I am not lying in what I confess about myself. And it is this love in them that believes me.
Chapter 5
For what kind of readers my confession is written?
But what good do they expect of this? Will they share my joy when they hear how close I have come to you by your grace? Will they pray for me, when they hear how I am held back by my own weight?
To such people I want to reveal myself. For it is a great good, O Lord my God, that many give thanks to you because of us and many pray you for us. Let a brotherly mind love in me what you teach us to love and regret in me what you teach us to regret.
Let it be the heart of a brother, not of an outsider, not one of those aliens, whose mouth speaks idle speech while their right hand does evil 1.
Let it be the heart of a brother, who rejoices, if he approves something in me and grieves, if he disapproves something in me. And, whether he approves or disapproves me, he is loving me.
To such people I want to reveal myself. They will be relieved by what is good and sigh by what is bad. The good is your work and your grace, the bad is my fault and your judgments. They will be relieved by the first and grieved by the last. And from their brotherly hearts this will rise up as incense for you.
But you, O Lord, who takes delight in this smell of your holy temple, have mercy on me in your great mercy.2 You who never abandons what you have started, perfect what is imperfect in me.
1Ps. 143:7; 2 Ps. 50:3.
Chapter 6
This confession is a service to all who share the same belief
So, when I go on to confess, no longer about what I was, but what I am now, the benefit is this: that I pronounce it not only in my heart before you with quiet joy full of trembling and silent grief full of hope, but also before the ears of all believers, who share my joy and my mortality. They are my fellow citizens and fellow travelers on this pilgrimage, whether they go before me or after me or accompany me on my way. They are your servants, my brothers, who you have chosen to your children. They are my masters, who you commanded me to serve, as I want to live with you and out of you.
This Word of you would have little meaning for
me, as it was only spoken in words and was not shown before in deeds. That's
why I want to do your service with words and deeds, but under the protection of
your wings. For the peril would be too great if my soul is not submitted to you
under your wings. You know my weakness.
I am a little child, but my father ever lives and
he is the protector I need. For he who gave birth to me and he who protects me
are one and the same. You are all the good I have. You are the almighty, who
are with me even before I am with you.
To those people who you command me to serve I
will reveal not who I was, but who I am and still am. But I speak no judgment
about myself.1
May they listen to me in this spirit.
11 Cor. 4:3
Chapter 7
You need Gods help to know yourself
It is you, Lord, who judge me. Even though nobody can know what's going on in man except the spirit of man that is within him1, yet there is something in man which is not known even by the spirit of man that is within him. But you, O Lord, know all about him, because you made him
Although I despise myself in front of you and consider myself as dust and ashes, still there is one thing I know of you which I do not know about myself. It is true, we now see as in a hazy mirror full of mystery, but not yet face to face.2 And therefore, as long as I travel far away from you, I am more aware of myself than of you.
Yet I know that you cannot be affected by any force, while I do not know which temptations I can resist or not. And my hope is in the knowledge that you are faithful and do not allow us to be tempted more than we can bear. But with the temptation you give us also the way to withstand.3
I shall therefore confess what I know of myself and what I do not know. For even what I know of myself, I know by your light. And what I do not know of myself, I do not know until the time that my darkness is as noonday4 , when I behold you.
11Cor.2:11 ; 21Cor.13:12 ;3 1Cor.1
Chapter 8
I love God with great conviction. But who is He?
Without a doubt and with a great conviction, I love You, Lord. Your word pierced my heart and from that moment I got in love with you.
But also heaven and earth and all that they
contain tell me from all sides to love you. And they don’t stop to tell it
to all mankind, so there is no excuse for anyone not to love you.1
But more powerful you will have mercy on whom you
are merciful and show pity on whom you have pity.2 Otherwise
heaven and earth would proclaim your praises to deaf ears.
But what do I love when I love you?
Not the beauty of a body,
not the charm of a moment,
not the brilliance of the light, so pleasant to
my eyes,
not the sweet sounds of songs in various tones,
not the gentle smell of flowers, balms and
perfumes,
not manna and honey,
not the embrace of attractive limbs
All this I do not love when I love my God.
And yet there is a light, a sound, a smell,
a food, an embrace, I love,
when I love my God.
But a light, a sound, a smell,
a food, an embrace of my inner man,
where in my soul shines a light that cannot
contain any space,
where sounds a tone that does not fade away in
time,
where is a gentle smell that is never blown away,
where I taste a food that never diminishes the
appetite,
where I know an embrace that exceeds every
satisfaction.
That I love when I love my God.
Chapter 9
Heaven and earth refer to God as their Maker
But what is the God I love?
I asked the earth. And it said: I am not. And
everything on this earth gave me the same answer.
I asked the sea and its depths and the creatures
that lived in it. And they answered: We are not your God. Seek above
us.
I asked the winds that blow. And all the
skies with all its inhabitants told me: Anaximenes is wrong. We are not
God.
I asked the sky, the sun, the moon and the stars.
They said: We too are not the God you seek.
And I said to all the beings that surround my
senses: Tell me about my God, who you are not. Tell me something about
him. And with a loud voice they cried: He made us.
My questioning was my attention to them. And their answer was their beauty
Then I turned to myself and asked: Who are you?
And I replied: a man. I have a body
and a soul. The one is the outer, the other the inner part.
Which of these two should I question to find my
God? With my body I had already searched him, as far as the rays of my eyes
went as messengers through heaven and earth. But of those two the inner part is
superior. For it was the inner part of me, to which all the messengers of my
body reported. It had the direction and judged the answers of heaven and earth
and everything in it, when they declared: We are not God and, He
made us. The inner part of man knows this through the outer
part. I, the inner man, my mind, knows this by the senses of my body.
I asked the whole mass of the universe about my
God and the answer was: I am not God. He has made me.
Chapter 10
Why does not anyone interpret the beauty of the universe in the same way?
This beauty of the universe should be evident for all those who have good senses. Why does it not speak for everyone the same language? The animals, from small to large, see it, but cannot question about it. They have no reason to judge what their senses report. But men can put questions, so that they by all what is made can see and understand God’s invisible Being1. But their love for the material things make them dependent and therefore they are unable to judge.
Moreover, created things only give answers to
those who interrogate and evaluate them. They speak always the same language,
that of their beauty. When the one only sees their beauty and the other,
by seeing it, also put questions, it appears no different to the one than to
the other. But although they have the same appearance, their beauty is
silent for the one and speaks to the other. Or rather, it speaks to all,
but only they understand it, who compare its voice, coming from the outside,
with the truth within themselves.
And the truth tells me: Your God is neither
heaven nor earth, nor any other physical being. Their nature tells us
this. For to anyone who sees it all material nature is less in the parts
than in the whole.
But you, my soul, are, if I may say so, of a
higher order. For you animate the matter of my body and gives it life. No
single body can do this to another body. But your God is for you the life of
your life.
1Rom.1: 20
Chapter 11
To know God you have to leave the sensory world and turn into your soul1
What do I love when I love my God?
Who is he who rises above the top of my soul?
Through the soul I will ascend to him.
I will go beyond the power by which I am bonded
with my body and fill its frame with life. It is not by that power that I
find my God. Otherwise the horse and the mule, which have no
understanding, could find him too1, because their bodies have life
by the same power.
But there is another power, by which I not only
give live to my body, but also can perceive with my senses. My Lord gave me
this faculty, when he ordered my eyes to see and not to hear and my ears to
hear and not to see. Likewise to each of the other senses he gave their own
place and function. And I, who am one mind, I feed my senses with these
different functions.
But I have to go beyond this power as well,
because I have this in common with the horse and mule. They also perceive
by their body.
1Ps.32, 9
Chapter 12
The investigation of memory
I will go beyond this natural ability of mine and rise step by step to him who made me. And so I come the fields and spacious palaces of memory, where are the treasures of countless images, which have been conveyed by the perception of many things.
There are also stored the images which are formed
by our thinking, by which we increase or diminish or in some way change what
our senses have perceived. And it also contains whatever else that has
been stored and maintained, as far as they not have been sunk and buried in
oblivion.
When I am in this storehouse of memory, I ask to
produce the images that I want.
Some come forth immediately, others take longer
time, as if they have to be pulled up from more hidden places. Some emerge
in swarms, especially when I am looking for something quite
different. They crowd in front of me as if to say: Surely we are what
you want? And with my inner hand I wipe them away from the face of my
memory, until what I want clears up and emerges out of its dark hiding place.
Others finally appear, when I call them, smoothly
and in perfect order. They come and give place for those memories which
follow. And when they leave, they return to their place, ready to emerge
again when I want them. That is exactly what happens when I recite something by
heart.
Chapter 13
Our memory contains all sensory images
In this memory are preserved all the perceptions, separately and by category, according to their way of entry. So the light and all colors and shapes are entered by the eyes, sounds by the ears, all the smells by the nose, by the mouth every taste. Finally the sense of touch, which is all over the body, and perceives all that is hard or soft, hot or cold, rough or smooth, heavy or light, whether inside or outside our body.
All this sensations are saved in the memory in
this vast storehouse with its secret and indescribable cavities to be recalled
and pulled out, when needed. Each enters the memory by its own gateway and is
put on its own place. But the objects themselves do not enter, but only the
images of what we perceive, which are there available, so that our mind can
recall them, when we think.
Who can say how these images are formed, even
though we know by which senses this images are recorded and stored in our
memory? For even in darkness and in silence I can, if I wish, reproduce colors
from my memory and distinguish between white and black or any other color. And
no sound invades to disturb my visual images.
Yet also the sounds are present in my memory,
although they are stored separately. For I can call them too when I wish and
they are immediately available. And even if my tongue does not move and my
throat gives no sound, I can sing as much as I wish. And when I recall this
rich reserve of the sounds, which entered my memory through my ears, the images
of the colors, which are not less present in my memory, do not interfere and
disturb them.
In the same way I can recall at will what other
senses have brought in my memory and stored there. I distinguish between the
scent of lilies and violets without smelling, between honey and sweet wine,
between smooth things and rough ones without tasting or touching, simply by
using my memory.
Chapter 14
Our memory contains also the material of our thinking and doing
All this I do inside me, in the vast hall of my memory. There are the sky, the earth and the sea with everything I have perceived with my senses, except those things I have forgotten.
There I meet myself as well. I remember who I am,
what I did and when and where, and in what mood I was when I did it. There are
also all the events I remember, whether I experienced them myself or heard it
from others. From the same resource too I can compare images of events with others
I have experienced, or found acceptable on basis of my experience. I combine
them with images of
the past and from there I think about what I will
do in the future and have to expect. And all this I think again as present.
When I say to myself in this vast recess of my
mind, full of those many images: I will do this and that, the image
of what I will do is immediately present. I can say to myself: Let this
or that happen, May God prevent this or that, and at the moment
I say this, the images of all I say jump from the same treasury of my memory.
And I could say nothing, if their images were not there.
Chapter15
Our memory contains profundities that surpass our understanding
This power of memory is great, my God, extremely great. It is an vast and endless sanctuary. Who has plumbed its bottom?
This faculty I possess. It belongs to my nature,
and yet I cannot grasp the totality of what I am. When the mind is too narrow
to contain itself entirely, what is that part of it which it cannot grasp? Could
it be outside and not inside itself? Why can the mind not grasp it? This
question fills me with great wonder. It bewilders me.
Yet men are going out to gaze in wonder the high
mountain peaks, the mighty waves of the sea, the broad courses of the rivers,
the vastness of the ocean, the circuits of the stars. But they leave
themselves. They are even not amazed at the thought that I could talk about all
these things without seeing them with my eyes.
But I could not even speak of the mountains, the
waves, the rivers, the stars, (which I have seen), or the ocean, (which I know
only by hearsay), unless I could see them in my memory with the same large size
as if I saw them outside me. And yet I have not absorbed them in me by seeing
them with my eyes. They are not bodily in me, but their images. And I know by
which bodily sense each of them is imprinted in my mind.
Chapter 16
Our memory contains also our competences
But these are not the only treasures in the vast space of my memory. It also contains everything I have learned of the liberal sciences and not has been forgotten. This knowledge is stored much more inward, at a place which is not really a place. And it are not the images, but this capacities themselves, which I carry in me. For what literature is, how to debate, how many different questions there are- all my knowledge about these matters is stored in my memory.
But this capacities are there not as images,
which I hold in my memory while I leave the thing itself outside.
They are not like a voice which leaves a
impression in our ears, so that you can recall the sound, even when it is no
longer there.
They are not like a fragrance that passes by the
wind and evaporates, and in passing by stimulates our sense of smell, so we can
remember it later on.
They are not like food, which keeps its taste in
our memory, although it has already lost its taste in our stomach.
They are not like something we feel with our
sense of touch, which our memory can still recall, even when the contact is
over.
In all these cases, none of those things
themselves are in the memory. But only their images are here recorded with
amazing speed and stored in a wonderful kind of compartments, where memory can
recall them in a amazing way.
Chapter 17
Our memory contains also our innate notions
On the other hand, when I am told that there are three kinds of questions: Whether a thing is, What it is, and of What sort it is, I retain the images of the sounds of which these words are composed. I know that the sounds themselves are gone in the air and exist no more. But the ideas, indicated by these sounds have not reached me by any of my senses and I did not see them anywhere else than in my mind. Not their images are in my memory, but the ideas themselves.
How did they get in? Let them tell me, if they
can.
For, I run along all the entries of my body, but
do not find any by which they have entered. My eyes tell me: If they have
color, we should have reported them. My ears say: If they make sound, we should
have noticed them. My nose says: If they have any smell, they should have
passed by us. The sense of taste says: If they have no taste, you should not
ask me. Touch also says: If they have no physical body, I have not touched
them, and if I did not touch them, I have nothing to report.
How did these concepts enter into my memory? I
really do not know. For when I learned these things, I relied not on the mind
of another. In my own mind I have recognized them and confirmed them as true. I
entrusted them to my mind as a place of storage from which I could produce them
if I wanted.
So they were already there, even before I had
learnt them, but not in my memory. Where were they? Why I instantly recognized
them, when they were mentioned, by saying: Yes, that is true? It
must have been, that they were already in my memory, but so hidden and buried
in remote cavities, that I might not have been able to think of them, if
someone not incited me to dug them out.
Chapter 18
Our memory contains also the material of our thinking, although in a scatered way
We came to the conclusion that in learning such concepts we do not receive them in our mind as images by sensory experience, but that we see them in our mind as they really are without the help of images.
Thinking is nothing else than gather together
concepts which are in our memory in a dispersed and disordered way. By giving
them our attention, we make sure that these concepts, which lay hidden,
scattered and neglected in the memory, are placed so to say ready to hand. So
that, once we are familiar with them, they become easily accessible to our
mind,.
My memory contains a large number of these
concepts, things I have already discovered and, as I mentioned, are ready to
hand. Things of which is said that we have learned them and know them.
If I would stop to pay attention to them for a
certain time, they sink and slip away in more remote hiding places of my
memory. Then I have to think them out again as if they were new and draw them
out the same place as before, for in another place they cannot be. Once again
they have to be brought together so that they can be known. This means that
they should be collected from their scattered state.
Hence the relationship between the Latin word for collecting (cogo) and thinking (cogito), as it is the case with ago and agito, and facio and factito. But the word cogito is entirely claimed for the human mind, so it is only used for what is thought i.e. collected in the mind, but not what is collected elsewhere.
Chapter 19
Our memory contains also abstract notions
The memory also contains the innumerable
principles and laws of numbers and dimensions. None of them has been impressed
in our minds by our sensory experience. They have no color, no sound and no
smell. You cannot taste or touch them.
When they are discussed, I hear the sound of the
words which signify them, but the sound of the words and these concepts are two
different things. The sound of the words vary in Greek and in Latin, but these
concepts are neither Greek nor Latin.
I have seen lines that were drawn by craftsmen,
as thin as the threads of a spider web. But the principle of the line is
different. It is not the image of the lines I have seen. We recognize them
inside ourselves, without reference to any material object.
I have also experience with the numbers we use
for counting things by all my bodily senses, but the principle of these numbers
is different. It is not the image of the things we count, but something which
has definitely its own existence.
Who does not see that, may laugh at what I am
saying. But let me pity him who laughs at me.
Chapter 20
We are also able to remember our remembering
All these ideas I hold in my memory. I remember also the way I have learned them. And my memory holds also the many false objections put forward to these ideas. Even if these objections are false, yet my memory of them is not false. I also remember that I distinguish between the true and false objections against them. But the memory of this distinction which I make now, is different from memories of this distinction which I made in the past, every time I thought about this matter.
I remember also that I did understand this
questions more often. And I store in my memory what I distinguish and
understand at this moment, so that I later on shall remember that I did
understand this question now.
So I remember that I remembered. And when I later
on shall remember what I remembered today, it is by the power of memory.
Chapter 21
Our memory contains also our feelings
My memory also contains my feelings. They are not in the same way in the mind as when I have experienced them, but in a very different way that is in correspondence with the process of memory. For when I remember a happy moment, I don’t need to be happy and I don’t need to be sad, when I remember a sad moment from the past. I can recall moments of fear without any fear, and think of my former desires without any desire. Sometimes, on the contrary, I remember my past sadness with a happy feeling and my happiness with a sad feeling.
This is not surprising when it concerns the
feelings of the body. Body and mind are different. And it would not be strange
that I remember with joy a bodily pain that is gone away. But in the present
case, memory and mind are one and the same. We even call the memory the mind,
for when we tell another to remember something, we say: See that you
keep this in mind. And when we forget something, we say: It was not
in my mind, it slipped out of my mind.
When this is the case, how can it be that, when I
remember my past sadness with joy, there is joy in my mind and sadness in my
memory? And how can it be that my mind is happy because of that joy and my
memory not sad when it remembers that sadness? Does memory not be a part of the
mind? Who would dare to say that?
Without doubt memory is something like the
stomach of the mind and joy and sadness are like sweet and bitter food. When
this food is committed to memory, it is as it were transferred to the stomach,
where it can remain, but has no taste anymore. This comparison is rather
ridiculous, but any resemblance is there anyway.
Chapter 22
Our memory is the stomach of our mind
But when I say that there are four kinds of emotion: desire, joy, fear and sadness, I call them in my mind from my memory. All I can discuss about them, whether it is their classification, their species or their definition, I get it from that source. And yet I am not touched by those emotions when I call them from my memory. Before I recalled them to discuss them, they were already there. Otherwise I would not be able to remember them.
Perhaps these emotions are brought forward from
the memory by the act of recollecting like food is brought from the stomach in
the process of rumination. But why then in the mouth of my thinking, when I
discuss, that is remember them, is not the sweet taste of joy or the bitterness
of sorrow? Maybe the comparison does not fit here, because surely the two are
not wholly alike.
Who would even want to talk about such feelings,
when every time we mention sadness or fear, we were forced to be sad or
anxious? Yet we could not speak of them at all unless we found in our memory
not only the sound of their names but also the notions of those feelings
themselves. For we have not received these notions through any gateway of our
body. Our mind has experienced those feelings within itself and entrusted them
to memory. Or possibly the memory retained them itself without any act of the
mind.
Chapter 23
To what extent works our memory with images?
Whether these processes takes place by images or not is difficult to say.
I can mention a stone or
the sun when these things themselves are not present to my
senses, but their images are available in my memory.
I can mention physical pain,
but as long as I do not feel it, the pain itself is not present to me.
Yet if an image of pain were not present in my memory, I should not know what I
was talking about. And in a discussion I should not be able to distinguish pain
from pleasure.
I can mention physical health, when
I'm in good condition. This shape is present in me. But if no picture
of it is in my memory, I could not remember what the sound of this word
meant. And sick people could not know what was meant, when the word health
was mentioned, unless its image had not been retained in their memory, even
when that condition no longer exists.
I can mention the numbers, by
which we count things. And see, in my memory are not their images present but
the numbers themselves. I can mention the image of the sun .
Then this image too is in my memory. But I recall not the image of the image,
but the image itself.
I can mention memory and I recognize
where I speak about. Where else will I recognize it except in my memory itself?
Surely we cannot in fairness assume that the memory is present to itself by
means of its image and not directly to itself?
Chapter 24
How is forgetting present in our memory?
What then, if I mention forgetfulness? I recognize here too the meaning of the word. But how would I recognize it without remembering it? I'm not talking about the sound of the word, but the reality to which the word refers. If I had forgotten this, that sound had no meaning and I was unable to recognize what it implied.
When I remember my remembering, my memory is
present to itself. But when I remember my forgetfulness, there are two things
present: my memory by which I remember and my forgetfulness which I remember.
Yet what is forgetting more than loss of memory?
How can it be present in my memory, while, when forgetting is present I am
unable to remember? Everything we remember must be present in memory, because
when we hear the word forgetfulness, we can never know what it means, if we are
unable to remember it. So forgetfulness must be present in our memory.
Therefore, it is there so that we will not forget, but when it is there, we
forget.
Should we then conclude that, when we remember
forgetfulness, it is not itself present in our memory, but only through its
image? Because if forgetfulness itself is in our memory, would not be the
result that we forget rather than remember?
Who will resolve this problem? Who can understand
how this works?
Chapter 25
The presence of forgetting in our memory remains a mystery
I am laboring hard on this subject, my Lord, and the field of my labor is my own self. I have become for myself a soil that costs many difficulties and much sweat1. For I am not examining the spaces of heaven, nor am I measuring the distance of the stars or seeking the balance of the earth. I am examining myself, my memory, my mind.
It is not surprising that whatever I am not is
distant from me. But what is nearer to me than myself? And yet I do not
understand the power of my memory, when without it I could not even speak about
myself. What should I say, now I am sure that I remember my forgetting? Should
I say that what I remember is not in my memory? Or say that forgetting is in my
memory to prevent me from forgetting? Both assumptions are equally absurd.
What about a third possibility? To say that my
memory holds the image of my forgetting and not my forgetting itself. But how
can I say this, because, if the image of something is imprinted in the memory,
the thing itself must first necessarily have been present to imprint its image?
For that is de way I remember Carthage and all
the places where I have been. In the same way I remember all the faces that I
have seen and everything that the senses have reported to me. That is also how
I remember my health or the sickness of my body. When they were present, my
memory took all the images of these things. And those images remained so that I
could see them and remember them, even when these things were absent.
Therefore, if my memory contains the image of my
forgetting and not my forgetting itself, then it must have been present at some
time, so that memory could capture its image. But when it was present, how dit
it inscribe its image in my memory, as it deletes by its presence everything
that there already was recorded? And yet I am in some way, how incomprehensible
and inexplicable it is, sure that I remember my forgetting, even though
forgetting erases everything we remember.
1 Gen.3:
17
Chapter 26
Our memory is a endless miraculous capacity, but need we not look outside our memory to find God?
The power of memory is great, my God, awe-inspiring and unfathomable in its endless multiplicity. And this is my mind, this is myself. Who am I, my God? What is my nature? A life that is varying, of many forms and beyond measure.
See the countless fields, caves and caverns of my
memory. They are in innumerable ways full with innumerable things. Some are
there by their images, like all material objects. Some are there by themselves
like sciences and arts. Others, like our emotions, in the form of certain ideas
or impressions, which are still present, even though our mind does not feel
them. For whatever is in the memory must also be in the mind. I run through all
this things and fly from one to another. And I go through them as far as I can,
and I find no end. So great is the power of memory. So great is the power of
life in man, mortal though he is.
My God, you are my true life, what shall I do? I shall go further than this power in me, which we call memory, so that I reach you, my sweet Light. What do you say to me? You are always above me and I will rise in my mind upwards to you. I will pass this power in me, which we call memory, in my desire to touch you where you can be touched and embrace you where you can be embraced.
For beasts and birds also have memory. Otherwise they could not find their lairs and their nests or the many other things that are part of their habitual life. In fact they could not have habits at all without their memory. So I will rise above my memory to touch him who set me apart from the four-footed animals and has given me more wisdom than the birds of the sky.
As I rise above my memory, where can I find you, my true and safe Sweetness, where can I find you? If I find you outside my memory, I have no memory of you. And how can I find you without a memory of you.
Chapter 27
We have always a memory of what we are looking for
The woman who had lost her drachma, searched for it with a lamp1. She would never have found it without some memory of it. Otherwise, when it was found, how would she know it was the one she had lost? I remember that I have searched many lost things and have found them. Therefore I know that, when I was looking for something and people asked me: Is this it? or Is that it?, I would always answer: No, until they showed me the thing I wanted.
I could not find something that I had lost
without any memory of it, even when it was showed to me, because I could not
recognize it. That is always what happens, when we look for something what is
lost and find it.
If anything vanishes from sight but not from the
memory, such as a visible object, its image is retained in us and we look for
it until we see it again And when it is found, we recognize it by the image
that we have in us.
We do not say that we have found what was lost
unless we recognize it and we cannot recognize it unless we remember it. It was
only lost from our sight, but not from our memory.
1 Luke. 15.8
Chapter 28
In our searching is always something present of what we have forgotten
What, if the memory itself loses something? This happens for example when we have forgotten something and try to remember it. Where else can we find it than in the memory itself? And if the memory presents us something else, we reject it, until the thing which we wanted is presented. And when it is presented, we say: That's it. But we could not say that without recognizing it, and we could not recognize it without remembering it. But that we had forgotten it, is a fact.
Or could it be that it not entirely disappeared
from our memory, but a part of it remained and helped to find the other part?
And may be that our memory realized that it could not function as usual,
because something was cut off. And feeling crippled by the loss of the part to
which it was accustomed, kept demanding that this missing part should come
back?
This happens, when we see or think of a person
whom we know and whose name has escaped us. We try to remember his name, but
every name that occurs to our mind does not suit him, because we are not
accustomed to connect it with him. Thus we reject all names, until the good one
comes up, which fully corresponds with the familiar image of that person.
Where else does that name come from than from our
memory itself? Because, even when someone else prompts us, it comes from our
memory. Because we do not accept it as a new piece of knowledge, but we confirm
by our memory that it is the right name.
If that name was completely erased from our mind,
we could not remember it, even with the help of another. For we have not
completely forgotten, when we think that we have something forgotten. If we had
completely forgotten it, we should no longer be able to search for what was
lost.
Chapter 29
Our searching for God is searching for a happy life
How then do I look for you, O Lord? When I look for You, my God, I am looking for the happy life. I want to look for You, so that my soul may live. For it is my soul that gives life to my body and it is You who give life to my soul.
How then do I seek this happy life? For I do not
possess it, until I can say: I am satisfied; this it is. But then I have to say
which way my quest proceeds. Am I looking for it in memory, as though I had
forgotten, but still remember that I had forgotten? Or am I looking by the
drive to learn a life that is quite unknown, whether I have never known it or
had it so forgotten that I do not remember that I forgot it?
Is the happy life not what all desire and nobody
does not desire? Where did they learn about it, if this desire is so common?
Where did they see it, that they love it so much? Certainly, we have it in us,
but how I do not know. Some people are happy because they actually possess it,
others are happy in the hope for it. Their happiness is of a lesser degree than
the happiness of those who actually possess it, but their happiness is of an
higher degree than of those who do not possess it, nor hope for it.
Yet even those people must possess happiness in
in some way, otherwise they would not long for it. And that they long for it is
without any doubt. In some way they have learnt what it is and therefore they
have a certain notion of it. And my problem is to discover whether this notion
is in the memory or not, because if it is there, then we were once happy. It
may be that we were all happy individually or that we were all happy in the man
Adam, who was the first to sin, in whom we all died,1 and from
whom we all descend in misery But I will not go into this question
now.
My question is whether happiness is in the
memory. For we would not love, it if we did not know what it is. We hear the
word and we all admit that it is where we are looking for. And it's not just
the sound of the word by which we are attracted. When a Greek will hear this
word in Latin, it does not appeal to him because he does not know what has been
said. But he is attracted to it, as soon as he hears the word in Greek. So
happiness is neither Greek nor Latin, because all people yearn to obtain it,
whether they speak Greek or Latin or any other language.
Therefore everyone knows it. And if they were
asked whether they wish to be happy, without any doubt all would answer that
they do. But that is only the case if happiness itself, to which this word
refers is found in their memory.
1Kor.15, 22
Chapter 30
In what way is the happy life present in our memory?
But in what way is happiness present in our memory? Is it in the same way as Carthage, when we have seen that city? No, for happiness cannot be seen with the eyes , it is not a physical object.
Is it in our memory like we remember numbers?.
No., for when you know the numbers, you do not seek to obtain them further. We
know what happiness is and love it. But we also seek to possess it, because we
want to be happy.
Is happiness in our memory as the art of
eloquence? No, for many people know what is meant by the word eloquence without
being themselves eloquent. And many also desire to be eloquent too. That proves
that they have some knowledge of it. However, it is by their senses that they
have noticed that others were eloquent and therefore they get pleasure in it
and desire to be eloquent themselves. Of course they would have no pleasure in
it without any inner knowledge, and they would not want to be eloquent without
any pleasure. But there is a difference with the happy life. We have no
physical perception of the happy life in others
Is happiness then present in our memory in the
same way as when we remember joy? Yes, perhaps it is. Even when I am sad I can
remember joy, just as I can remember happiness, when I am unhappy. Yet never I
have seen my joy with my physical senses, or heard, smelled, tasted or touched
it. But it was something I experienced in my mind., when I was joyful. And the
notion of it stuck in my memory, so that I can always recall it, sometimes with
aversion, sometimes with longing, depending on the different things of which I
remember that they gave me joy. For I was sometimes overwhelmed with joy in
shameful acts and when I remember them now I feel disgust and detest it.
But other times I had joy in good and honorable
things and I remember them with longing, even though they are now no more
within the bounds of possibility. And therefore I am sad when I remember joy of
long ago.
Chapter 31
A notion of a happy life do we find in our memory
Where and when have I experienced my happy life, so that I can remember it and love it and long for it?
Not just I alone, or a small group, but we all
want to be happy. If we did not know so surely what it was, we should not
desire it so certainly.
But what does this mean? If two men were asked
whether they want to join the army, it is quite possible that one says yes and
another no. But if you ask them whether they want to be happy, they will both
immediately and without any hesitation answer that they want it. When one wants
to join the army and the other not, they have the same intention that is to be
happy. Is it then the case that everyone finds his joy in different ways?
Even so, they all agree that they want to be
happy, just as they would all agree, if asked, that they desire joy. And this
joy they call happiness. Even though they search it in different ways, they all
have the same goal, that is joy. No one can say that he has no experience of
joy. And this is why he finds the happy life in the memory and recognizes it as
soon as he hears these words.
Chapter 32
Our true happiness we find in God
O Lord, far be it from the heart of your servant who confesses to you, far be it from me to think that I am happy with any joy whatever. For there is a joy that is not given to those do not love you, but only to those who love you for your own sake. You yourself are their joy.
And this is the true happy life: to rejoice in
you and for you and because of you. This is the true happiness and there is no
other. Those who believe that happiness is found elsewhere, pursue a different
kind of joy and not the true one. Yet their pursuit is aimed at some image of
that true joy.
Chapter 33
Why does not want everyone this true happiness
It is not certain then that all men want to be happy, because there are some who do not find in you their source of joy. And because enjoying you is the true happy life, they do not really want it
Or should we rather say that all men desire it,
but, because the desires of the flesh compete with the desires of the spirit1,
they do not do what they wish and fall back to what they are able to do and are
content with it, since their will is not sufficient enough to enable them to do
it?
For if I ask them whether they prefer to find joy
in truth or in falsehood, they do not hesitate to say that they prefer the
truth, just as they prefer happiness. True happiness is indeed joy in the
truth. This means joy in you, my God, who are the Truth, my true Light, to whom
I look for my salvation. This is the happiness that all desire. This happy life
everyone wants. Joy in the truth everyone wants.
I have known many people who wished to deceive,
but none that wished to be deceived. Where did they find the notion of
happiness unless it was where they found the truth? For they love the truth,
since they do not want to be deceived. And when they love happiness, which is
the same as joy in the truth, they must also love the truth. But
they could not love it, if there was not any notion of it in their memory.
Why then do they have no joy in this? Why are
they not happy? It is because they are more concerned with other matters. And
this gives them more misery than this weak awareness of the truth brings them
happiness.
There is still a faint glow of light among men.
Let them walk, let them walk, for fear that darkness comes over them 2
1 Gal. 5:17; 2 John.12:35
Chapter 34
Why remains truth hidden for many people?
Why does truth engender hatred? Why does. your man meet hostility, when he proclaims the truth, even if men love happiness, which is simply find joy of the truth?
The reason can only be that man’s love for truth
is such, that those who love anything else than the truth, pretend that it is
the truth. And because they do not want to be mistaken, they do not want to
admit that they are wrong. And that is why they hate the truth for the sake of
what they regard as their truth.
Men love the truth if it gives them shine, but
they hate it as it puts them wrong2. And because they don’t
want to be deceived themselves, they want to deceive others. They love the
truth, when it reveals itself, but hate it as it reveals their faults.
Therefore the truth gives them the retribution they deserve, by revealing their
truth against their will, while truth itself remains hidden from them.
Thus, even thus, is the human mind. So blind,
languid, shameful and dishonorable, that it wishes to be hidden, but does not
wish that anything is hidden from it. It achieves just the opposite: it does
not remain hidden from the truth, but the truth remains hidden from it.
Yet even in this miserable state it would rather
find joy in true than in false things. One day it shall be happy if it, not
distracted by any trouble, will rejoice in the truth, the sole Truth, by which
all things are true.
2 John. 3:20
Chapter 35
God is indeed present in our memory
See how I explored the vast spaces of my memory in search for you, my Lord. And I have not found you outside it. For I have nothing found about you except what I remember, since the time I learned of you. And never since then I have forgotten you.
And where I found the truth, I found my God who is Truth itself. And since I
did know this truth, I have never forgotten it. From the time I learned of you,
you stay in my memory. And it is there that I find you, when I think of you and
enjoy you. These are my holy delights which you have given me in your mercy,
having regard to my poverty.
Chapter 36
Is there a place where God stays in our memory?
But where in my memory are you staying, my Lord?
Where do you stay there? What kind of resting place have you made for yourself?
What kind of sanctuary have you built for yourself?
You have granted my memory the favor to stay
there, but I ask myself in what part you stay.
When I tried to think of you, I went beyond those
parts of the memory which I have in common with the animals, because I did not
find you between the images of material things.
So I came to that part of my memory where my
emotions are stored, but I did not find you. And I entered into the seat of my
mind itself, which is too in my memory -because the mind can remember itself- ,
but you were not there .For you are not the image of a material thing, nor an
emotion of a living being, like happiness or sadness, desire or fear,
remembering or forgetting, or any other feeling.
Likewise, you are not the mind itself, for you
are the Lord and God of the mind. All these things are subject to change, but
you remain immutable above all things. And yet, you have deigned to live in my
memory since the time I got to know you.
Why do I ask in what place of my memory you stay,
as if there really are separate places? You certainly live there, because I
remember you ever since I got to know you, and I find you there when I think of
you.
Chapter 37
God has no place. He is the Truth who is present everywhere
Where then did I find you so that I could know you? .For you were not in my memory, before I got to know you.
Where then did I find you, so that I could know
you, if not in you above me? Yet there is no place, whether we come to you or
go back from you, there is no place.
O Truth, you watches everywhere for all who
counsel you. And you reply at the same time to all who ask counsel of you, even
if they are consulting you on different things.
The answer you give is clear, but not all hear it
clearly. All ask you for what they want, but the answer they hear is not always
what they want.
Your best servant is he who not so much expects
to hear from you what he wants as to want what he shall hear from you.
Chapter 38
Gods overwhelming presence has seduced me
Late have I loved you,
Beauty so ancient and so new,
late have I loved you.
See, you were within me and I was in the world outside,
and I sought you there.
And in my de-formed state
I threw myself on the well-formed things,
which you have made.
You were with me, but I was not with you.
And these beautiful things. kept me far from you
and yet, if they had not their existence in you,
they had no existence at all.
You called me and cried loud to me,
and broke my deafness.
You shone over me your radiant light
and dispelled my blindness.
You have tempted me with your fragrance;
I inhaled it and sigh for you.
I have tasted you,
and now I hunger and thirst for you.
You have touched me,
and I burn with longing for your peace.
Chapter 39
Is human life on earth not one long, unbroken period of trial?
When at last I will be joined with you with all my being, there will be for me no more hardship and pain. And my life will be the true life, entirely full of you. You lift up all those who are full of you. But because I am still not entirely full of you, I am a burden to myself.
The joys in my life, over which I should have
sorrow, struggle with the sorrows, over which I should have joy. And which side
will gain the victory, I do not know.
Have mercy on me, Lord, in my misery.
My sorrows that are evil struggle with joys that
are good. And which side will gain the victory, I do not know.
Have mercy on me, Lord, in my misery.
See, I do not hide my wounds from you. You are
the physician I am sick. You are merciful, I need your mercy. Is not human life
on earth a trial?1
For who longs for misery and trouble? You command
us to endure them, not to love them. No man loves what he must endure, even
though he likes that he is able to endure. And though he is happy that he can
endure, yet he would prefer that he had nothing to endure.
In adversity I desire prosperity and when I live
in prosperity, I fear adversity. Is there any middle between both states, where
the human life is not a trial?
Miserable is the prosperity of this world, not
once but twice: because of fear of adversity and the fear that happiness will
not last.
Miserable is the adversity of this world, not
once or twice, but three times, because of the constant desire for prosperity,
the harshness of the adversity and the threat that our endurance may break.
Is the human
life on earth not one long, unbroken period of trial?
1 Job. 7:1
Chapter 40
God, give me continence
There is no hope for me except in your great mercy. Give me what you command and command me what you will.
You ask us to control our sensory desires. A
certain writer has said: When I knew that nobody can control himself except by
God’s gift, it was wisdom to recognize whence this gift came.1
It is indeed by continence, that we are gathered
and brought back to the unity, from which we floated away by losing ourselves
in multiplicity.
He loves you less, who besides you loves
something else that he does not love for your sake.
Love who always burns and never dies
Love, my God, set me on fire.
You command me to be continent.
Give me what you command
And command me what you will.
1 Wisd. 8,21