Confessions of St. Augustine · of Hippo Augustine
CONFESSIONS OF ST. AUGUSTINE BOOK I
6. Narrow is the mansion of my soul; enlarge Thou it, that Thou mayest enter in. It is ruinous; repair Thou it. It has that within which must offend Thine eyes; I confess and know it. But who shall cleanse it? or to whom should I cry, save Thee?... (vi) 7. Yet suffer me to speak unto Thy mercy, me, _dust and ashes_. Yet suffer me to speak, since I speak to Thy mercy, and not to scornful man. Thou too, perhaps, despisest me, yet wilt Thou _return and have compassion_ upon me.... (He gives a detailed account of his infancy and boyhood, placing particular emphasis on the natural benefits derived from God, and laying repentant stress on the sins of which he was guilty. “As a boy I had already heard of an eternal life, promised us through the humility of the Lord our God stooping to our pride.” But he was rebellious against the commands of his elders, nevertheless. He was forced to study the classics, to become acquainted therein with men who boasted of and were praised for their dissolution. “These are indeed his [Homer’s] fictions; but attributing a divine nature to wicked men that crimes might be no longer crimes, and whoso commits them might seem to imitate not abandoned men, but the celestial gods [that is, the gods, passionate and sensual, have been dismissed by some as merely ‘fictions’ of Homer].”) Footnote 1: The preacher who influenced Augustine’s conversion and baptized him. (see Introduction).
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