of Hippo, Saint Augustine · Public domain edition · 123 cards · 34 chapters
Augustine’s Confessions traces his life from infancy through conversion, arguing that the human heart is restless until it rests in God and that even small sins reveal disordered love. The deck covers his early education, the pear theft, his mother’s counsel, and his reflections on memory and motive.
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Chapter 1 · Question
According to Augustine, why is the human heart restless?
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Chapter 1 · Answer
Augustine opens by declaring that God made humans for Himself, and therefore "our heart is restless, until it repose in Thee." The restlessness is not incidental but built into human nature as a particle of God's creation; only resting in God resolves it. He frames this as the reason man, though mortal and a witness of sin, still would praise God.
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BOOK I (part 1)3 cards
According to Augustine, why is the human heart restless?
Augustine opens by declaring that God made humans for Himself, and therefore "our heart is restless, until it repose in Thee." The restlessness is not incidental but built into human nature as a particle of God's creation; only resting in God resolves it. He frames this as the reason man, though mortal and a witness of sin, still would praise God.
Chapter 1
How does Augustine describe the sinfulness of infancy?
Augustine argues that even infants are not pure from sin, citing a baby turning pale with envy at its foster-brother sharing the milk. He says the weakness of infant limbs, not the will, is what passes for innocence, and that the same tempers tolerated in infants are intolerable in adults. He notes these habits are later rooted out and cast away as years increase.
Chapter 1
What does Augustine say about his knowledge of his own infancy?
Augustine admits he does not remember his infancy and must take it on others' word, guessing from observing other infants that he passed through it. He compares this to his time in his mother's womb, also hidden in the shadows of forgetfulness. He says he is loath to count that age in the life he lives in this world, though he praises God for it.
Chapter 1
BOOK I (part 2)4 cards
Why was Augustine's baptism deferred after his childhood illness?
Augustine recalls that when he was near death from a stomach ailment, he eagerly sought baptism, and his mother prepared to arrange it. He recovered suddenly, and the cleansing was deferred because it was believed that sins committed after baptism would bring greater and more perilous guilt. Augustine questions whether this deferral was for his good.
Chapter 2
Why did Augustine hate studying Greek but love Latin?
Augustine says he did not fully know why he hated Greek, which he studied as a boy, while he loved Latin. He attributes the difficulty to the foreign tongue: he understood not one word, and was driven to learn by cruel threats and punishments. Latin, by contrast, he learned as an infant without fear or suffering, through mere observation and conversation.
Chapter 2
What did Augustine learn from pagan poetry, and what did he think of it?
Augustine says he wept over Dido's death while ignoring his own spiritual death, and was grieved when forbidden to read such tales. He argues that reading and writing were far better studies than poetic fictions, and that the vileness in the stories was committed with less shame because of them. He does not blame the words themselves but the "wine of error" drunk through them.
Chapter 2
How does Augustine compare free curiosity with enforced learning?
Augustine says he learned Latin without punishment because his heart urged him to express his thoughts, learning words from those who talked with him. He concludes that free curiosity has more force in learning than frightful enforcement. Yet he also says enforcement restrained his freedom through God's laws, tempering a wholesome bitter that recalls us to God from deadly pleasure.
Chapter 2
BOOK I (part 3)2 cards
What does Augustine ask God to do with the gifts God has given him?
Augustine gives thanks to God for His gifts and asks God to preserve them to him. He reasons that if God preserves them, he himself will be preserved, and the things God has given him will be enlarged and perfected. He adds that he himself will be with God, since even his very existence is something God has given him.
Chapter 3
How does Augustine connect God's gifts with his own existence?
Augustine treats existence itself as a gift from God, saying 'even to be Thou hast given me.' Because of this, he asks God to preserve the gifts already given, trusting that they will then be enlarged and perfected. He concludes that he himself will be with God, tying his hope of presence with God to God's preserving work.
Chapter 3
BOOK II4 cards
Why does Augustine say he stole the pears, and what did he enjoy in the theft?
Augustine insists he was compelled by no hunger or poverty, since he had better fruit of his own. He stole only to enjoy the theft and sin itself, flinging the pears to the hogs after tasting them. He concludes that what sweetened the fruit was not its beauty but the sin, and that he loved his own fault rather than the thing for which he was faulty.
Chapter 4
What advice did Augustine's mother give him, and how did he receive it?
She warned him with great anxiety in private not to commit fornication, and especially never to defile another man's wife. Augustine dismissed these as womanish advices he would blush to obey, thinking God was silent and it was merely she who spoke. He later recognizes that God was not silent to him, but spoke through her, and was despised in her.
Chapter 4
How does Augustine describe his motive for boasting of sins he had not committed?
He says he ran headlong with such blindness that among his equals he was ashamed of a lesser shamelessness when he heard them boast. He took pleasure not only in the deed but in the praise, and made himself worse than he was so as not to be dispraised, claiming sins he had not done lest he seem contemptible in proportion as he was innocent.
Chapter 4
What does Augustine argue is the cause of every crime, and how does he use Catiline as an example?
He argues that when we ask why a crime was done, we do not believe it unless some desire for lower goods or fear of losing them appears. Even the man called gratuitously cruel acted lest idleness grow on him, to gain honours and riches. So not even Catiline loved his own villainies, but something else for whose sake he did them.
Chapter 4
BOOK III4 cards
Why did Augustine say he loved to love in Carthage?
Augustine describes arriving in Carthage as a cauldron of unholy loves: he did not yet love anyone but loved to love, hating himself for wanting not. He sought something to love, was in love with loving, and hated safety and a way without snares. He calls this a famine of inward food, God, yet he had no longing for incorruptible sustenance.
Chapter 5
Why does Augustine call theatrical grief a miserable madness?
Augustine asks why people desire to be made sad by tragic plays they would not themselves suffer. The spectator grieves over feigned passions but is not called on to relieve, only to grieve, and applauds the actor more the more he grieves. Augustine calls this a miserable madness and says he then loved to grieve, seeking out what to grieve at.
Chapter 5
What effect did Cicero's Hortensius have on Augustine?
Augustine says reading Cicero's Hortensius, an exhortation to philosophy, altered his affections, turned his prayers to God, and made every vain hope worthless. He burned with desire for an immortality of wisdom and was inflamed to love and seek wisdom itself, not a sect. What checked him was that the name of Christ was not in it, a name he had drunk in with his mother's milk.
Chapter 5
Why did Augustine initially reject the Scriptures?
Augustine resolved to read the holy Scriptures but found them lowly in access and veiled with mysteries, not understood by the proud. He judged them unworthy compared to Cicero's stateliness, and his swelling pride shrank from their lowliness. He says they would grow up in a little one, but he disdained to be a little one and, swollen with pride, took himself to be a great one.
Chapter 5
BOOK IV4 cards
What double life did Augustine say he and his friends lived during those nine years?
From his nineteenth to his twenty-eighth year, Augustine says they lived "seduced and seducing, deceived and deceiving": openly through the liberal sciences, secretly through a false-named religion. He describes being proud in one sphere and superstitious in the other, everywhere vain, and says he followed these things with friends whom he also deceived.
Chapter 6
Why did the physician advise Augustine to abandon astrology, and how did he explain accurate predictions?
The physician said he had studied astrology early intending to live by it, but found it utterly false and would not delude people for a living. He explained true predictions by the force of chance diffused through things, comparing them to a randomly opened poet's verse that oddly fits the moment. Augustine, however, was not yet persuaded to abandon it.
Chapter 6
What happened to Augustine's closest friend, and how did the friend respond to Augustine's jesting about baptism?
His friend of one year fell gravely ill with fever and was baptized while unconscious. When he recovered, Augustine jested about the baptism, but the friend shrank from him as from an enemy and warned him to stop such talk if he wished to remain friends. A few days later, in Augustine's absence, the fever returned and the friend died.
Chapter 6
How does Augustine describe his grief after his friend's death, and what does he conclude about friendship with perishable things?
Augustine says his heart was utterly darkened and everything he beheld was death; his homeland and father's house became torment, and he became a riddle to himself. He concludes that every soul bound by friendship of perishable things is wretched, torn asunder when it loses them, and that he loved his own wretched life more than his friend.
Chapter 6
BOOK V4 cards
Why did Augustine find the philosophers more convincing than the Manichees?
Augustine compared the philosophers' teachings with the Manichees' long fables and found the former more probable. Yet he notes the philosophers could only judge this lower world and could not find its Lord, since God is not found by the proud but draws near to the contrite in heart.
Chapter 7
What did Augustine discover about Faustus's learning when he finally met him?
Faustus arrived in Carthage as a celebrated Manichaean bishop, but Augustine found him pleasing in speech and fluent, yet saying the same things as the rest. When they spoke privately, Augustine found him utterly ignorant of the liberal sciences, save grammar, and that only in an ordinary way.
Chapter 7
What lesson did Augustine learn about eloquence and truth?
Augustine says God taught him that nothing should seem true because eloquently spoken, nor false because the language is crude, nor true because rudely delivered, nor false because rich in language. Wisdom and folly are like wholesome and unwholesome food, and adorned or unadorned phrases are like courtly or country vessels.
Chapter 7
How does Augustine compare the believer with the skilled astronomer?
Augustine argues the believer who possesses the world by cleaving to God is in a better state than one who can measure the heavens and number the stars yet neglects God. Knowing created things does not make one happier; only knowing God, glorifying Him, and being thankful does.
Chapter 7
BOOK VI (part 2)4 cards
How did Alypius's obsession with the Circus begin to be cured?
While teaching, Augustine happened to use a likeness from the Circensian races, mocking those enslaved by that madness. He did not intend to cure Alypius, but Alypius took it as aimed at himself, was offended at himself rather than Augustine, and loved him more fervently. He burst out of that pit, shook off the filth of the Circus, and never returned.
Chapter 9
What happened to Alypius at the gladiator games despite his resolve?
Alypius detested spectacles, but acquaintances dragged him into the Amphitheatre, and he vowed to keep his mind and eyes away. When a fighter fell and the crowd roared, curiosity overcame him and he opened his eyes. Seeing the blood, he was delighted with the guilty fight, more wounded in soul than the fallen man in body, and carried the madness home.
Chapter 9
Why does Augustine say Alypius was once arrested for theft?
While studying at Carthage, Alypius was seized by market officers who found him alone holding a hatchet the real thief had dropped. Augustine deems God permitted this so Alypius would learn not to condemn anyone rashly on credulous suspicion. An architect recognized him, the thief's slave confessed, and Alypius went away better instructed.
Chapter 9
What did Augustine, Alypius, and Nebridius share at Milan?
The three were like indigent mouths sighing out their wants to God. Nebridius had left his estate, house, and mother near Carthage to live with Augustine in ardent search for truth. All three wavered about what course of life to take, found darkness when they looked to the end, and groaned "How long shall these things be?" without forsaking their worldly affairs.
Chapter 9
BOOK VI (part 3)4 cards
Why did Augustine and his friends abandon their plan to live together in a shared household?
The friends planned to pool their resources into one household, with two annual officers providing necessities. But when they considered whether the wives some already had and others hoped for would permit this, the plan fell apart. Augustine says many thoughts were in their hearts, but God's counsel stands forever, and God derided their counsel while preparing His own.
Chapter 10
What happened to Augustine's concubine, and how did he respond?
His concubine was torn from his side as a hindrance to his marriage, and his heart was torn and wounded. She returned to Africa, vowing never to know another man, leaving their son with him. Augustine, unable to imitate her, procured another woman—not a wife—because he was a slave to lust rather than a lover of marriage, keeping the disease of his soul alive.
Chapter 10
What kept Augustine from fully embracing Epicurus's view?
In disputes with Alypius and Nebridius about good and evil, Augustine held that Epicurus had won the palm in his mind—had he not believed that after death the soul remains and there are places of requital according to deserts, which Epicurus denied. He also asked why perpetual bodily pleasure without fear of loss wouldn't make one happy, not seeing the misery in that blindness.
Chapter 10
What does Augustine identify as a misery within his imagined happiness of endless pleasure?
He asked why, if immortal and living in perpetual bodily pleasure without fear of losing it, one should not be happy. He says he did not know the great misery involved: being sunk and blinded, he could not discern the light of excellence and beauty to be embraced for its own sake, seen by the inner man. Nor could he be happy without friends.
Chapter 10
BOOK VII (part 1)4 cards
What did Augustine believe about God's nature, and what did he still fail to understand?
Augustine firmly believed God is incorruptible, uninjurable, and unchangeable, preferring the incorruptible to the corruptible. Yet he could not clearly understand the cause of evil, and he insisted it must be sought without making the immutable God mutable, lest he become the evil he sought.
Chapter 11
How did Augustine imagine God's relation to space, and why was this false?
He conceived God as infinite, penetrating and filling all things like light through air, so all things are bounded in God and God bounded nowhere. He later saw this was false: it would mean a larger body contains more of God, so an elephant would hold more of God than a sparrow.
Chapter 11
What argument of Nebridius did Augustine use against the Manichees?
Nebridius asked what the nation of darkness could have done to God had He refused to fight it. If it could hurt Him, He is subject to injury and corruption; if not, there was no reason to fight. Either way the Manichean claim collapses into blasphemy.
Chapter 11
What did Augustine identify as the cause of evil, and what problem remained?
He strained to see that free will causes our doing ill and God's just judgment causes our suffering ill, but could not clearly discern it. He was sure his own will caused his sin, yet still asked who planted the bitter plant in him if God is wholly good.
Chapter 11
BOOK VII (part 2)3 cards
What did Augustine read in the Platonist books, and what did he find missing?
He read there, in substance though not the same words, that the Word was with God and was God, that all things were made by Him, and that the Word was not made flesh. He did not read there that the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us, nor that Christ emptied Himself, became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross, and was exalted.
Chapter 12
How did Augustine resolve the question of whence evil comes?
He concluded that evil is not a substance, for if it were a substance it would be good—either incorruptible (a chief good) or corruptible, and only good things can be corrupted. Since corruption diminishes good and total loss of good means ceasing to be, whatever is, is good; God made all things good, and what seems evil in parts harmonizes with the whole.
Chapter 12
What did Augustine perceive about created things when he entered into his inward self?
Guided by God, he beheld with the eye of his soul, above his mind, the Light Unchangeable—not ordinary light nor a brighter version of it, but other far beyond. He perceived created things neither altogether are nor altogether are not: they are because from God, but are not what God is, for only what remains unchangeably truly is.
Chapter 12
BOOK VII (part 3)4 cards
What did Augustine initially think Christ was, lacking grasp of 'The Word was made flesh'?
Augustine conceived of Christ only as a man of excellent wisdom whom no one could equal, wonderfully born of a Virgin and attaining great authority as an example of despising temporal things for immortality. He could not even imagine what mystery lay in 'The Word was made flesh,' though he knew from Scripture that Christ ate, drank, slept, rejoiced, and sorrowed.
Chapter 13
What error did Alypius hold about Christ's soul, and how was it corrected?
Alypius imagined Catholics believed God was so clothed with flesh that besides God and flesh there was no soul at all in Christ, denying Him a human mind. Persuaded the recorded actions required a rational creature, he moved slowly toward the faith. Later, learning this was the error of the Apollinarian heretics, he rejoiced and conformed to the Catholic Faith.
Chapter 13
What did the Platonist books give Augustine, and what did they lack?
From the Platonists Augustine learned to search for incorporeal truth and saw God's invisible things understood by what is made: that God is, infinite yet not diffused in space, ever the same, and all things are from Him. Yet he was too unsure to enjoy God, and the books lacked the way in Christ, humility, grace, confession, and the tears of a contrite heart.
Chapter 13
Why did God will Augustine to fall upon the Platonist books before studying Scripture?
Augustine believes God willed him to fall upon those books first so it would be imprinted on his memory how he was affected by them. Then, once tamed through Scripture and healed, he might discern presumption from confession, and the difference between seeing where to go yet not the way, and the way that leads to dwell in the beatific country.
Chapter 13
BOOK VIII (part 1)4 cards
Why did Augustine go to Simplicianus, and what did he seek?
Augustine went to Simplicianus, whom he saw as a good servant of God, aged and experienced in following God's ways. Augustine wanted to lay out his anxieties and ask which way was fittest for someone in his case to walk in God's paths. He was displeased with his secular life and found it a grievous burden, yet he was still enthralled by the love of woman.
Chapter 14
What did Victorinus say about being a Christian before his public profession?
Victorinus privately told Simplicianus he was already a Christian. Simplicianus replied he would not count him among Christians unless he saw him in the Church of Christ. Victorinus joked, 'Do walls then make Christians?' He repeated this often, fearing to offend his proud pagan friends, until reading and reflection gave him firmness and he chose to be baptized.
Chapter 14
How did Victorinus make his profession of faith at Rome, and why?
At Rome, those approaching grace professed the faith from an elevated place before all the faithful. Presbyters offered Victorinus a more private profession, since he seemed likely to be alarmed by bashfulness. He chose instead to profess his salvation before the holy multitude, reasoning that he had publicly professed rhetoric, which was not salvation, so he should not dread the meek flock when pronouncing God's word.
Chapter 14
What does Augustine argue about joy and pain, and what examples does he give?
The author argues that greater joy is ushered in by greater pain. He cites the commander who triumphs only after fighting, sailors who rejoice more after fearing shipwreck, joy at a sick friend's recovery exceeding the joy of former health, hunger and thirst making eating pleasant, and the prodigal son who was dead and lives again. He ties this to rejoicing over one penitent more than ninety-nine just.
Chapter 14
BOOK VIII (part 2)4 cards
What book did Pontitianus find on the gaming table, and why did he react with joy?
Pontitianus found the Apostle Paul on a table used for a game. He had expected some of the books Augustine used in teaching, so he smiled and looked at Augustine with joy and wonder at suddenly finding this book, and this only, before Augustine's eyes. He was a baptized Christian who often prayed in church.
Chapter 15
What did the two imperial agents in the garden at Triers decide after reading the life of Antony?
Reading a little book on Antony's life, one agent kindled at it, reflected on abandoning secular service, and told his friend their court hopes were brittle and perilous. He resolved to serve God at once; the other chose to cleave to him. Both were affianced, and their brides, hearing of it, dedicated their virginity to God.
Chapter 15
How does Augustine describe the mind commanding itself to will, and what does he conclude about two wills?
Augustine asks why the mind commands the body and is obeyed instantly, yet commands itself to will and is resisted. He concludes it does not command entirely because it does not will entirely: were the will entire, it would not need to command. So there are two wills, each incomplete, and this is a disease of the mind borne down by custom, not two minds, one good and one evil.
Chapter 15
What prayer of Augustine's does he recall from his early youth, and what did he fear?
Augustine recalls begging chastity and continency of God with the words "Give me chastity and continency, only not yet." He feared God would hear too soon and cure him of the disease of concupiscence, which he wished to have satisfied rather than extinguished. He notes some twelve years had passed since reading Cicero's Hortensius stirred him to love wisdom.
Chapter 15
BOOK VIII (part 3)4 cards
What did the childlike voice Augustine heard chant, and how did he interpret it?
From a neighboring house he heard a voice, as of a boy or girl, chanting and repeating "Take up and read." He could not recall children singing such words in play, so he checked his tears and interpreted it as a command from God to open the book and read the first chapter he found. He recalled Antony, who was converted by a Gospel reading applied to himself.
Chapter 16
What passage did Augustine read, and what effect did it have?
He opened the Apostle and read in silence the first section his eyes fell on: not in rioting and drunkenness, not in chambering and wantonness, not in strife and envying, but put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make not provision for the flesh. He read no further, needing no more, for instantly a light of serenity infused his heart and all darkness of doubt vanished.
Chapter 16
How did Alypius respond to Augustine's reading, and what did he apply to himself?
Alypius asked to see what Augustine had read, then looked further than Augustine had and found what followed: "him that is weak in the faith, receive." He applied this to himself and disclosed it to Augustine. By this admonition he was strengthened and, by a good resolution matching his character, joined Augustine without turbulent delay.
Chapter 16
How did Augustine's mother react to his conversion, and what did she perceive God had given her?
They went to his mother, told her, and related how it happened in order. She leaped for joy, triumphed, and blessed God, who is able to do above what we ask or think. She perceived God had given her more for Augustine than she used to beg in her sorrowful groanings: he now sought neither wife nor any hope of this world, and her mourning was turned into joy.
Chapter 16
BOOK IX (part 1)3 cards
Why did Augustine delay leaving his rhetoric professorship until the vintage vacation?
Augustine resolved not to tear himself away tumultuously but to withdraw gently, waiting the few remaining days until the Vacation of the Vintage. He feared that quitting before the vacation, which was near, would look like ostentation and give onlookers occasion to say he wished to appear a great one, and that their good would be evil spoken of.
Chapter 17
How does Augustine describe the differing situations of Verecundus and Nebridius at the time of his conversion?
Verecundus, not yet a Christian but married to a believer, was held back by bonds and would not become a Christian on any terms but those he could not meet; he sorrowed at being severed from them but lent them his country-house. Nebridius, also not yet a Christian and holding that Christ's flesh was a phantom, emerged from that error, believed as they did, and was a most ardent searcher of truth.
Chapter 17
How did Augustine's reading of the Psalms affect him at the villa, and what did he wish for the Manichees?
Reading David's Psalms, he was kindled toward God and on fire to rehearse them through the whole world against the pride of mankind. He was angered with bitter sorrow at the Manichees and pitied them, for they knew not those Sacraments and medicines and were mad against the antidote. Reading the fourth Psalm, he wished they could observe him without his knowing, lest he seem to speak for their sakes.
Chapter 17
BOOK IX (part 2)4 cards
Why were hymns and psalms first instituted in the Church of Milan?
According to the chapter, Ambrose was being persecuted by Justina, mother of the Emperor Valentinian, in favor of her Arian heresy, and devout people kept watch in the church ready to die with their bishop. Then it was first instituted, after the manner of the Eastern Churches, that hymns and psalms be sung, lest the people grow faint through the tedium of sorrow. Augustine says the custom was retained from that day and followed by nearly all congregations worldwide.
Chapter 18
How did Augustine's mother Monica overcome her youthful habit of sipping wine?
She began sipping a little wine from the cask as a sober maiden obeying her parents, not from desire of drink but from youthful exuberance, and by daily small additions fell into a habit of drinking nearly full cups. A maid-servant, angered in a quarrel, taunted her bitterly as a wine-bibber. Stung to the quick, she saw the foulness of her fault and instantly condemned and forsook it. Augustine says God used the unhealthiness of one soul to heal another.
Chapter 18
What practice did Monica teach wives for handling angry husbands?
Monica endured her husband Patricius's anger and infidelity without quarreling over her bed, and learned not to resist an angry husband in deed or even in word. Only when he was calm would she explain her actions if he had taken offense. She advised other wives to regard the marriage writings as indentures making them servants, so they should not set themselves against their lords. Those who observed this found good; those who did not found no relief.
Chapter 18
What happened during the shared vision at Ostia between Augustine and Monica?
Standing alone at a window overlooking the garden at Ostia, they discoursed sweetly, forgetting things behind and reaching toward things before, inquiring what the eternal life of the saints would be. They raised themselves by degrees through all bodily things, past the heaven with sun, moon, and stars, and came to their own minds and went beyond them. The chapter breaks off mid-sentence, so the vision's full conclusion is not given in this excerpt.
Chapter 18
BOOK IX (part 3)4 cards
Why did Monnica not fear dying far from her own city?
She told Augustine that nothing is far from God, and she did not fear that at the end of the world He would fail to recognize where to raise her up. Her confidence rested on God's universal knowledge rather than on burial in her homeland, and she later asked only to be remembered at God's altar.
Chapter 19
How did Augustine describe his grief at his mother's death?
He says a fresh wound came from the sudden wrench of that sweet custom of living together, and that the life made one of hers and his was rent asunder. He closed her eyes while a mighty sorrow flowed into his heart, yet his mind forcibly held back tears, so he was torn between grief and restraint.
Chapter 19
Why did Augustine weep only after his mother's burial?
He suppressed tears during the funeral and prayers, believing lamentation unfitting since she was neither unhappy nor altogether dead. Alone in bed he recalled Ambrose's verses on sleep restoring the heart, then gave way to tears as much as they desired, finding rest in them because they were shed in God's ears, not scornful human ones.
Chapter 19
What did Augustine ask God concerning his mother's sins?
Laying aside her good deeds, he begged God to forgive whatever sins she contracted since the water of salvation, asking mercy to be exalted above justice. He trusted she had already been heard, and asked that readers of the Confessions remember Monnica and Patricius at God's altar, so her last request might be fulfilled through many prayers.
Chapter 19
BOOK X (part 1)4 cards
Why does Augustine confess what he now is, not only what he has been?
Augustine says the confessions of past sins already stir hearts to hope in mercy. But he also confesses what he now is so that brotherly readers may rejoice at his progress, grieve over his failings, and pray for him. He calls this no mean fruit: many may give thanks to God on his behalf and many may entreat God for him.
Chapter 20
What does Augustine mean by confessing silently yet not silently?
Augustine says his confession is silent in sound but cries aloud in affection. He utters nothing right to men that God has not first heard from him, nor does God hear anything from him that God has not first said to him. So confession is inward displeasure with oneself when evil, and refusal to ascribe holiness to oneself when good.
Chapter 20
How does creation answer Augustine when he asks it about God?
Augustine asks earth, sea, air, heavens, sun, moon, and stars whether they are God. Each answers that it is not He, and together they cry that He made them. He notes that animals see these things but cannot ask, since no reason judges their senses; only humans can compare the outer voice with the truth within.
Chapter 20
What does Augustine love when he loves God, and how does he ascend to Him?
Augustine denies loving bodily beauty, harmony, light, melody, fragrance, food, or fleshly embrace. He loves an inner light, melody, fragrance, food, and embracement that space, time, breath, eating, and satiety cannot take away. He ascends past the life that animates his body and past the senses, which beasts also share, rising by degrees to God.
Chapter 20
BOOK X (part 2)4 cards
How does Augustine say learning works for things not received through the senses?
The author argues that learning such things is not taking in images through the senses but perceiving them within by themselves, without images. It is, he says, by conception to receive them, and by marking to take heed that what memory held randomly and unarranged be laid up at hand in the same memory where before they lay unknown, scattered and neglected, so they readily occur to the familiarised mind.
Chapter 21
Why does Augustine derive 'cogitation' from cogo, and what does it mean?
He notes that cogo (collect) and cogito (re-collect) relate as ago to agito and facio to factito. The mind has appropriated the word so that not what is collected anyhow, but what is recollected, i.e. brought together in the mind, is properly said to be cogitated or thought upon. Things buried in memory must be drawn together again from their dispersion to be known.
Chapter 21
What puzzle does Augustine raise about remembering forgetfulness?
He asks how forgetfulness, the privation of memory, can be present so that he remembers it, since when present he cannot remember. If we remember it, it is retained by memory; yet if present by itself it would cause forgetting, not remembering. He concludes it must be held by its image, though that too is puzzling, since forgetfulness by its presence effaces what it finds noted.
Chapter 21
How does Augustine describe the mind's relation to past emotions in memory?
He says memory contains the mind's affections differently from how the mind feels them: he remembers having rejoiced without rejoicing, recollects past sorrow without sorrow, reviews past fear without fear, and sometimes remembers past sorrow with joy and joy with sorrow. He calls memory the belly of the mind, where joy and sadness are stored like food but cannot taste.
Chapter 21
BOOK X (part 3)4 cards
According to Augustine, how do all people know the happy life if they have not seen it?
Augustine argues all people desire the happy life, and this universal desire proves some knowledge of it is retained in the memory. Yet it is not remembered like Carthage (seen by the eye) or numbers (fully possessed), since the happy life is not a body and is still sought. He compares it to joy, which he experienced in the mind and recalls from memory.
Chapter 22
What does Augustine finally identify as the happy life, and who truly desires it?
Augustine concludes the happy life is joy in the truth, which is joying in God, the Truth. He argues that all desire joy in truth, since no one wishes to be deceived, yet many are not happy because other things more strongly draw them toward misery. He therefore qualifies that those who do not wish to rejoice in God do not truly desire the happy life.
Chapter 22
Why does Augustine say people love truth when it enlightens but hate it when it reproves?
Augustine argues people love truth when it reveals things to them, because they do not wish to be deceived, but hate it when it exposes their own faults. They want their loved things to be true and refuse to be convinced otherwise. So truth repays them: it makes them manifest against their will while remaining hidden from them.
Chapter 22
Where does Augustine search for God in his memory, and where does he conclude God dwells?
Augustine passes beyond the parts of memory shared with beasts, the images of corporeal things, the affections of the mind, and the mind itself, finding God in none of these, since God is unchangeable while all these change. He concludes God dwells in his memory since he learned God, yet God is not contained in a place; he found God in God above himself.
Chapter 22
BOOK X (part 4)4 cards
How does Augustine describe his struggle with the temptation of food and drink?
Augustine says he strives daily against concupiscence in eating and drinking, but unlike concubinage, this temptation cannot be cut off once for all. The bridle of the throat must be held between slackness and stiffness. He fears not uncleanness of meat but the uncleanness of lusting, and asks God to give what He commands and command what He wills.
Chapter 23
What distinction does Augustine draw between pleasure and curiosity in the senses?
Augustine argues pleasure seeks objects that are beautiful, melodious, fragrant, savoury, or soft, while curiosity seeks the contrary for trial's sake—not to suffer annoyance but out of lust for testing and knowing. He calls this the lust of the eyes, since sight is chiefly used for knowledge, and notes people flock to mangled corpses to be made sad and pale.
Chapter 23
How does Augustine view music and singing in church?
Augustine says the delights of the ear had entangled him, but God freed him. He finds he can rest in sweet melodies yet disengage when he wills. He fluctuates between peril of pleasure and approved wholesomeness, leaning toward approving church singing so weaker minds may rise to devotion through delight of the ears—but confesses sin when moved more by the voice than the words.
Chapter 23
What does Augustine say about the temptation of the eyes and outward beauty?
Augustine says the eyes love fair forms and bright colours, and the light entwines itself so strongly that its sudden withdrawal causes longing. He resists these seductions, lifting his invisible eyes to God to pluck his feet from snares. He also notes men add countless ornaments beyond necessary use, following what they make while forsaking their Maker.
Chapter 23
BOOK X (part 5)4 cards
What three kinds of temptation does Augustine examine in this chapter?
Augustine examines the threefold concupiscence: the pleasures of the flesh, idle curiosity, and the love of praise. He says he can partly test himself on the first two by seeing how he fares without them, but the temptation of praise is hardest to discern because he cannot know how he would react unless praise is actually absent.
Chapter 24
Why does Augustine find the temptation of praise so hard to diagnose?
He explains that other temptations can be tested by removing the object and observing his reaction, but praise cannot be tested that way: to be without praise he would have to live so badly that everyone detests him, which he calls madness. So he remains uncertain whether he is delighted by praise for truth's sake or for his own sake.
Chapter 24
What does Augustine identify as the defect of the false mediator?
A true mediator between God and man must have something like God and something like man. The devil, the deceitful mediator, shares sin with men and falsely claims immortality with God, but since the wages of sin is death, he is condemned to death with men. Christ Jesus, the true Mediator, is mortal with men and just with God.
Chapter 24
How does Augustine describe Christ's role as Mediator in this chapter?
Augustine says the true Mediator, the Man Christ Jesus, appeared between mortal sinners and the immortal just One: mortal with men, just with God. As Man He is Mediator, but as the Word He is not in the middle, because He is equal to God and one God with God. By His righteousness He makes void the death of sinners made righteous.
Chapter 24
BOOK XI (part 1)4 cards
Why does Augustine lay so many things before God in confession, if God already knows them?
Augustine says he does not confess so that God may learn anything through him, since the Father already knows what we need before we ask. Rather, he writes to stir up his own devotion and his readers' devotion toward God, so that all may say, "Great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised." He describes this as laying open our affections, confessing our miseries and God's mercies, for love of God's love.
Chapter 25
Why can Augustine not simply ask Moses whether Moses spoke the truth?
Moses has passed from this life to God and is no longer present before Augustine. Even if Moses were present and spoke Hebrew, the sounds would strike Augustine's senses in vain and not touch his mind; if Moses spoke Latin, Augustine would understand the words but still could not know from Moses himself whether he spoke truth. So Augustine asks the Truth itself, who spoke through Moses, to let him understand.
Chapter 25
How does Augustine argue that God did not make heaven and earth as a human craftsman works?
A human artificer forms one body from another already existing, like clay, stone, wood, or gold, working according to a form seen in his mind. Augustine argues God made the matter, the craftsman's body, the mind, the senses, and the art itself. God did not make the world in some place, since no place existed before it, nor did He hold any uncreated thing in His hand to make it from.
Chapter 25
According to Augustine, how is God's Word spoken, and how does that differ from a voice sounding in time?
Augustine argues God's Word is spoken eternally, not successively: what is spoken is not one thing concluded so the next may be spoken, but all things together and eternally. A voice from a cloud passes by, its syllables sounding and passing away in order, expressed by the motion of a creature. The eternal Word abides, truly immortal, and in it God says all that He says at once.
Chapter 25
BOOK XI (part 2)4 cards
What is Augustine's famous dilemma about the nature of time?
Augustine asks "What then is time?" and admits that if no one asks him, he knows, but if he tries to explain it to a questioner, he does not know. He still affirms that if nothing passed away, there would be no past time, and if nothing were coming, no future time.
Chapter 26
How does Augustine argue that the present cannot be long?
He reasons that a hundred years cannot be present, since all but the current year are past or future. The current year reduces to one month, the month to one day, the day to one hour, and the hour flies away in particles. Only an indivisible instant is truly present, and it has no space.
Chapter 26
Where does Augustine locate past and future times if they do not exist?
He concludes that past and future are not elsewhere but in the soul: the present of things past is memory, the present of things present is sight, and the present of things future is expectation. So there are three times in the soul, though people improperly speak of past, present, and future.
Chapter 26
Why does Augustine reject the idea that heavenly motions constitute time?
He recalls hearing a learned man say the motions of sun, moon, and stars constitute time, and he did not assent. He asks why the motions of all bodies would not equally be times, and whether, if the heavenly lights ceased but a potter's wheel turned, there would be no time to measure its revolutions.
Chapter 26
BOOK XI (part 3)4 cards
What does Augustine conclude time fundamentally is, and where does he locate its measurement?
Augustine argues time is not the motion of a body but a "protraction" or "distention" of the mind itself. He measures times in his mind, not in the passing things: the impression that things as they pass cause in the mind remains after they are gone, and this present impression is what he measures. Thus either this is time, or he does not measure times.
Chapter 27
How does Augustine use the threefold present of expectation, consideration, and memory to explain time?
The mind does three things: it expects, it considers, and it remembers. Things to come are not yet, yet there is expectation of them; past things no longer are, yet there is memory of them; the present has no space, yet consideration continues. So a long future is a long expectation, and a long past is a long memory.
Chapter 27
How does Augustine answer those who ask what God did before He made heaven and earth?
Augustine tells such questioners to consider that "never" cannot be predicated where time is not. Time cannot exist without created being, so asking what God did "before" creation presupposes a time that did not exist. He argues God is before all times as the eternal Creator of all times, and no times are coeternal with Him.
Chapter 27
How does Augustine contrast God's eternal knowledge with human knowledge of a Psalm being sung?
A person singing a known Psalm has senses divided between memory of words past and expectation of words to come. Augustine says nothing like this happens to God: God knows all things past and to come far more wonderfully and mysteriously, without any variety of His knowledge, just as He made heaven and earth without any distraction of His action.
Chapter 27
BOOK XII (part 1)4 cards
What does Augustine mean by the 'heaven of heavens' that is the Lord's?
Augustine describes the heaven of heavens as an intellectual creature, not coeternal with God but partaking of His eternity. Through the sweetness of contemplating God it restrains its own changeableness, cleaving to Him without any fall since creation, and so is placed beyond the rolling vicissitude of times. He also calls it God's house, one pure mind at peace, the city of holy spirits in heavenly places.
Chapter 28
How does Augustine explain darkness upon the deep before creation?
Augustine argues darkness is simply the absence of light, as silence is the absence of sound. Where light was not, there was darkness upon the deep. He identifies the earth as invisible and without form, a formless matter, almost nothing, yet already capable of being formed—matter from which God made the visible world.
Chapter 28
What did Augustine struggle to conceive regarding utterly formless matter?
Augustine confesses he could not conceive matter absolutely without form. His mind, filled with images of formed bodies, kept presenting foul and horrible forms out of order. He found he could sooner imagine a thing not to exist at all than conceive something between form and nothing—a formless almost nothing. He says he longed to know this, not merely suspect it.
Chapter 28
From what did God create heaven and earth, and why not from Himself?
Augustine says God created heaven and earth out of nothing, not out of Himself. Had they been made from His own substance they would be equal to the Only Begotten Son and thereby to God, which is not right for anything not of Him. Since nothing else existed besides God, He made both the great heaven and the petty earth from nothing, being Almighty and Good.
Chapter 28
BOOK XII (part 2)3 cards
How does Augustine distinguish created wisdom from the Wisdom that creates?
Augustine distinguishes the uncreated Wisdom, coeternal with the Father and equal to Him, from a created wisdom: the intellectual nature which, though created, is also called wisdom because by contemplating the light it is light. He compares the difference to that between the Righteousness which justifies and the righteousness made by justification, noting that we too are called God's righteousness.
Chapter 29
Why is the heavenly Jerusalem not coeternal with God despite having no time before it?
Augustine says this spiritual house, the chaste city of God, is eternal in the heavens and fixed by a law it shall not pass, yet it is not coeternal with God because it was made and so is not without beginning. No time existed before it, since it was created before all things and precedes the creature of time, but God's eternity is prior to it as its Creator.
Chapter 29
What are some of the true meanings Augustine lists for 'In the beginning God made heaven and earth'?
Augustine catalogs several true readings: that God made the intelligible and sensible creature in His coeternal Word; that He made the whole corporeal world with its known creatures; that He made the formless matter of spiritual and corporeal creatures; that He made the formless matter of corporeal things; and that in the very beginning of creating He made formless matter containing both. He refuses to strive about words.
Chapter 29
BOOK XII (part 3)4 cards
Why does Augustine refuse to claim he knows Moses' intended meaning in Genesis?
Augustine says he can see in God's truth that certain readings are true, but he cannot see inside Moses' mind to know which reading Moses actually intended. He insists that whatever Moses saw, he saw truly and expressed aptly. Therefore he will not rashly affirm which meaning Moses principally intended, since Scripture's words can yield many true meanings.
Chapter 30
What does Augustine identify as the root of the gainsayer's error about Moses' meaning?
Augustine says such people love their own opinion not because it is true but because it is theirs. He argues this rashness comes from overboldness and vanity rather than knowledge or insight. Truth belongs to all who love it, so claiming it as private property drives a person from what is common (truth) to what is his own (a lie).
Chapter 30
How does Augustine use the analogy of a fountain to describe Moses' words?
Augustine compares Moses' brief language to a fountain in a narrow compass that supplies more streams over larger spaces than any single stream derived from it. So from a scantling of words, streams of clear truth overflow, and each person draws out such truth as he can—one this meaning, another that—by larger circumlocutions of discourse.
Chapter 30
What four senses of 'before' does Augustine distinguish, and which are hard to grasp?
Augustine lists before by eternity (God before all things), by time (flower before fruit), by choice (fruit before flower), and by original (sound before tune). He says the first and last are understood with extreme difficulty, while the two middle ones are easy. Formless matter precedes formed things by original, not by time, since forms give rise to time.
Chapter 30
BOOK XIII (part 1)4 cards
Why does Augustine say Scripture mentions the Spirit only after heaven, formless earth, and darkness?
Augustine argues the Spirit could not be described as "borne above" unless that over which He is borne were first mentioned, since He is not borne above the Father or the Son, nor over nothing. So the formless creation is described first, then the Spirit who is borne above it, conveying His supereminent love.
Chapter 31
How does Augustine use the analogy of physical weight to explain love and rest?
Augustine argues each body is urged by its own weight toward its own place: fire upward, stone downward, oil above water. Out of order they are restless; restored, they rest. He concludes "my weight is my love" — love carries the soul wherever it is borne, and the Gift of the Spirit lifts us upward to peace.
Chapter 31
What three things in himself does Augustine offer as a faint image of the Trinity?
Augustine proposes To Be, to Know, and to Will: he is, knows, and wills; he knows himself to be and to will, and wills to be and to know. He insists these are far other than the Trinity, a mere practice ground, since God Is, Knows, and Wills unchangeably.
Chapter 31
What does Augustine mean by saying the spiritual creature's life is not the same as living wisely?
Augustine argues that as a body can exist without being beautiful, a created spirit can live without living wisely; otherwise it would be wise unchangeably. Its happy life comes only by turning to and cleaving to the unchangeable Light, owing life and blessedness to grace, not to mere existence.
Chapter 31
BOOK XIII (part 2)1 cards
How does Augustine distinguish the angels' knowledge above the firmament from human reading of Scripture?
Augustine says the supercelestial angels have no need to gaze up at the firmament or read to know God's Word. They always behold God's face and read without syllables in time what His eternal will wills; they read, choose, and love, and their book is never closed. Humans below, by contrast, gaze up and learn God's mercy through Scripture announcing in time.
Chapter 32
BOOK XIII (part 3)4 cards
In Augustine's allegory, what does God's blessing 'increase and multiply' signify when applied to man and aquatic creatures?
Augustine argues the blessing was given only to the offspring of waters and to man, not to plants or beasts. He takes it to grant a power both to express one understanding in many ways and to understand one obscure expression in many ways: corporeal signs multiply like the waters, while mental conceptions multiply like human generations, replenishing sea and earth.
Chapter 33
According to Augustine, over what did man made in God's image receive dominion, and over what did he not?
Augustine says man received dominion over the fishes of the sea, the fowls of the air, all cattle, all the earth, and every creeping thing. He did not receive dominion over the lights of heaven, the hidden heaven, day and night, or the gathering of the waters which is the sea. This dominion he exercises by the understanding of his mind.
Chapter 33
Why does Augustine say the spiritual man judges all things yet is not judged, and what may he not judge?
The spiritual man judges by approving what is right and disallowing what is amiss in sacraments, signs, and the lives of the faithful, exercising power of correction. But he may not judge the spiritual knowledge shining in the firmament, nor God's Book itself, even where obscure; he submits his understanding to it. Nor does he judge those outside, whose future is unknown.
Chapter 33
How does Augustine explain the plural 'Let us make man' followed by the singular 'God made man'?
Augustine argues the plural points to the Trinity and the singular to the one God: 'Let us make man after our image' is followed by 'God made man after the image of God.' He says man renewed in mind and made spiritual needs no human director to follow after his kind, but by God's direction discerns the Trinity of the Unity and the Unity of the Trinity.
Chapter 33
BOOK XIII (part 4)4 cards
How does God's Word relate to time, according to the answer Augustine receives?
Augustine hears God explain that Scripture speaks in time, but time has no relation to God's Word, because the Word exists in equal eternity with God. As what believers see through the Spirit is seen by God, and what they speak by the Spirit is spoken by God, so when they see things in time, God sees them not in time.
Chapter 34
What error does Augustine attribute to those who dislike God's works?
Augustine says certain people claim many of God's works were made under necessity, or from matter not God's own, gathered from elsewhere—as if God built the universe from conquered enemies. Others say a hostile mind and contrary nature, not God, produced lower creatures. Augustine calls them frenzied, because they do not see God's works by God's Spirit.
Chapter 34
What distinction does Augustine draw between three ways of judging created things good?
Augustine distinguishes: thinking something good is actually evil (as the forenamed do); seeing a good thing as good while preferring to enjoy it rather than God; and seeing it as good in such a way that God sees it good in the person, so God is loved in what He made—possible only by the Holy Spirit given to us.
Chapter 34
What does the seventh day without evening signify for Augustine?
The created order, having finished its courses, will pass away, since it had morning and evening. But the seventh day has no evening or setting, because God sanctified it to everlasting continuance. Augustine takes this to prefigure that believers, after their good works—which are God's gift—will rest in God in the Sabbath of eternal life.
Chapter 34
Source and licence
Text used: Project Gutenberg eBook #3296 (Public domain in the United States). Generated from the full text; cards paraphrase the source.
Version: Public domain edition. Retrieved 2026-10-22. Cards reviewed 2026-10-22.
These cards paraphrase the text for study. They are not a substitute for reading the book, and they do not reproduce long passages.
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