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| In the Country He Gives His Attention to Literature, and Explains the Fourth Psalm in Connection with the Happy Conversion of Alypius. He is Troubled with Toothache.
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Chapter IV.—In the Country He
Gives His Attention to Literature, and Explains the Fourth Psalm in
Connection with the Happy Conversion of Alypius. He is Troubled
with Toothache.
7. And the day arrived on which, in very deed,
I was to be released from the Professorship of Rhetoric, from which
in intention I had been already released. And done it was; and Thou
didst deliver my tongue whence Thou hadst already delivered my
heart; and full of joy I blessed Thee for it, and retired with all
mine to the villa.712
What I accomplished here in
writing, which was now wholly devoted to Thy service, though still,
in this pause as it were, panting from the school of pride, my
books testify,713
| 713 These books are (Con. Acad. i. 4) his three
disputations Against the Academics, his De Vita
Beata, begun (ibid. 6) “Idibus Novembris die ejus
natali;” and (Retract. i. 3) his two books De
Ordine. | —those in
which I disputed with my friends, and those with myself alone714
| 714 That is, his two books of Soliloquies. In
his Retractations, i. 4, sec 1, he tells us that in these
books he held an argument,—me interrogans, mihique respondens,
tanquam duo essemus, ratio et ego. | before Thee;
and what with the absent Nebridius, my letters715
| 715 Several of these letters to Nebridius will be found
in the two vols. of Letters in this series. | testify. And when can I find time
to recount all Thy great benefits which Thou bestowedst upon us at
that time, especially as I am hasting on to still greater mercies?
For my memory calls upon me, and pleasant it is to me, O Lord, to
confess unto Thee, by what inward goads Thou didst subdue me, and
how Thou didst make me low, bringing down the mountains and hills
of my imaginations, and didst straighten my crookedness, and smooth
my rough ways;716
and by what
means Thou also didst subdue that brother of my heart, Alypius,
unto the name of Thy only-begotten, our Lord and Saviour Jesus
Christ, which he at first refused to have inserted in our writings.
For he rather desired that they should savour of the “cedars”
of the schools, which the Lord hath now broken down,717
than of the
wholesome herbs of the Church, hostile to serpents.
8. What utterances sent I up unto Thee, my
God, when I read the Psalms of David,718
| 718 Reference may with advantage be made to Archbishop
Trench’s Hulsean Lectures (1845), who in his third lect.,
on “The Manifoldness of Scripture,” adverts to this very
passage, and shows in an interesting way how the Psalms have ever
been to the saints of God, as Luther said, “a Bible in little,”
affording satisfaction to their needs in every kind of trial,
emergency, and experience. | those faithful songs and sounds of
devotion which exclude all swelling of spirit, when new to Thy true
love, at rest in the villa with Alypius, a catechumen like myself,
my mother cleaving unto us,—in woman’s garb truly, but with a
man’s faith, with the peacefulness of age, full of motherly love
and Christian piety! What utterances used I to send up unto Thee in
those Psalms, and how was I inflamed towards Thee by them, and
burned to rehearse them, if it were possible, throughout the whole world,
against the pride of the human race! And yet they are sung
throughout the whole world, and none can hide himself from Thy
heat.719
With what
vehement and bitter sorrow was I indignant at the Manichæans; whom
yet again I pitied, for that they were ignorant of those
sacraments, those medicaments, and were mad against the antidote
which might have made them sane! I wished that they had been
somewhere near me then, and, without my being aware of their
presence, could have beheld my face, and heard my words, when I
read the fourth Psalm in that time of my leisure,—how that Psalm
wrought upon me. When I called upon Thee, Thou didst hear me, O God
of my righteousness; Thou hast enlarged me when I was in distress;
have mercy upon me, and hear my prayer.720
Oh that they might have heard what
I uttered on these words, without my knowing whether they heard or
no, lest they should think that I spake it because of them! For, of
a truth, neither should I have said the same things, nor in the way
I said them, if I had perceived that I was heard and seen by them;
and had I spoken them, they would not so have received them as when
I spake by and for myself before Thee, out of the private feelings
of my soul.
9. I alternately quaked with fear, and warmed
with hope, and with rejoicing in Thy mercy, O Father. And all these
passed forth, both by mine eyes and voice, when Thy good Spirit,
turning unto us, said, O ye sons of men, how long will ye be slow
of heart? “How long will ye love vanity, and seek after
leasing?”721
For I had
loved vanity, and sought after leasing. And Thou, O Lord, hadst
already magnified Thy Holy One, raising Him from the dead, and
setting Him at Thy right hand,722
whence from on high He should send
His promise,723
the
Paraclete, “the Spirit of Truth.”724
And He had already sent Him,725
but I knew
it not; He had sent Him, because He was now magnified, rising again
from the dead, and ascending into heaven. For till then “the Holy
Ghost was not yet given, because that Jesus was not yet
glorified.”726
And the
prophet cries out, How long will ye be slow of heart? How long will
ye love vanity, and seek after leasing? Know this, that the Lord
hath magnified His Holy One. He cries out, “How long?” He cries
out, “Know this,” and I, so long ignorant, “loved vanity, and
sought after leasing.” And therefore I heard and trembled,
because these words were spoken unto such as I remembered that I
myself had been. For in those phantasms which I once held for
truths was there “vanity” and “leasing.” And I spake many
things loudly and earnestly, in the sorrow of my remembrance,
which, would that they who yet “love vanity and seek after
leasing” had heard! They would perchance have been troubled, and
have vomited it forth, and Thou wouldest hear them when they cried
unto Thee;727
for by a
true728
| 728 See v. 16, note, above. | death in the
flesh He died for us, who now maketh intercession for us729
with
Thee.
10. I read further, “Be ye angry, and sin
not.”730
And how was
I moved, O my God, who had now learned to “be angry” with
myself for the things past, so that in the future I might not sin!
Yea, to be justly angry; for that it was not another nature of the
race of darkness731
| 731 See iv. 26, note, above. | which sinned
for me, as they affirm it to be who are not angry with themselves,
and who treasure up to themselves wrath against the day of wrath,
and of the revelation of Thy righteous judgment.732
Nor were my good things733
now without,
nor were they sought after with eyes of flesh in that sun;734
| 734 See v. 12, note, above. | for they
that would have joy from without easily sink into oblivion, and are
wasted upon those things which are seen and temporal, and in their
starving thoughts do lick their very shadows. Oh, if only they were
wearied out with their fasting, and said, “Who will show us any
good?”735
And we would
answer, and they hear, O Lord. The light of Thy countenance is
lifted up upon us.736
For we are not that Light, which
lighteth every man,737
but we are enlightened by Thee,
that we, who were sometimes darkness, may be light in Thee.738
Oh that they
could behold the internal Eternal,739
| 739 Internum æternum, but some mss. read internum lumen æternum. | which having tasted I gnashed my
teeth that I could not show It to them, while they brought me their
heart in their eyes, roaming abroad from Thee, and said, “Who
will show us any good?” But there, where I was angry with myself
in my chamber, where I was inwardly pricked, where I had offered my
“sacrifice,” slaying my old man, and beginning the resolution
of a new life, putting my trust in Thee,740
—there hadst Thou begun to grow
sweet unto me, and to “put gladness in
my heart.”741
And I cried out as I read this
outwardly, and felt it inwardly. Nor would I be increased742
| 742 That is, lest they should distract him from the
true riches. For, as he says in his exposition of the fourth Psalm,
“Cum dedita temporalibus voluptatibus anima semper exardescit
cupiditate, nec satiari potest.” He knew that the prosperity of
the soul (3 John 2)
might be injuriously affected by the prosperity of the body; and
disregarding the lower life (βίος) and
its “worldly goods,” he pressed on to increase the treasure he
had within,—the true life (ζωή) which
he had received from God. See also Enarr. in Ps. xxxviii.
6. | with worldly
goods, wasting time and being wasted by time; whereas I possessed
in Thy eternal simplicity other corn, and wine, and oil.743
11. And with a loud cry from my heart, I
called out in the following verse, “Oh, in peace!” and “the
self-same!”744
Oh, what
said he, “I will lay me down and sleep!”745
| 745 Ps. iv. 8;
in his comment whereon, Augustin applies this passage as above. | For who shall hinder us, when
“shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is
swallowed up in victory?”746
And Thou art in the highest degree
“the self-same,” who changest not; and in Thee is the rest
which forgetteth all labour, for there is no other beside Thee, nor
ought we to seek after those many other things which are not what
Thou art; but Thou, Lord, only makest me to dwell in hope.747
These things
I read, and was inflamed; but discovered not what to do with those
deaf and dead, of whom I had been a pestilent member,—a bitter
and a blind declaimer against the writings be-honied with the honey
of heaven and luminous with Thine own light; and I was consumed on
account of the enemies of this Scripture.
12. When shall I call to mind all that took
place in those holidays? Yet neither have I forgotten, nor will I
be silent about the severity of Thy scourge, and the amazing
quickness of Thy mercy.748
| 748 Compare the beautiful Talmudical legend quoted by
Jeremy Taylor (Works, viii. 397, Eden’s ed.), that of the
two archangels, Gabriel and Michael, Gabriel has two wings that he
may “fly swiftly” (Dan. ix. 21) to bring the message of
peace, while Michael has but one, that he may labour in his flight
when he comes forth on his ministries of justice. | Thou didst at that time torture me
with toothache;749
| 749 In his Soliloquies (see note, sec. 7,
above), he refers in i. 21 to this period. He there tells us that
his pain was so great that it prevented his learning anything
afresh, and only permitted him to revolve in his mind what he had
already learnt. Compare De Quincey’s description of the agonies
he had to endure from tooth ache in his Confessions of an Opium
Eater. | and when it
had become so exceeding great that I was not able to speak, it came
into my heart to urge all my friends who were present to pray for
me to Thee, the God of all manner of health. And I wrote it down on
wax,750
| 750 That is, on the waxen tablet used by the ancients.
The iron stilus, or pencil, used for writing, was pointed at
one end and flattened at the other—the flattened circular end
being used to erase the writing by smoothing down the wax. Hence
vertere stilum signifies to put out or
correct. See sec. 19, below. | and gave it
to them to read. Presently, as with submissive desire we bowed our
knees, that pain departed. But what pain? Or how did it depart? I
confess to being much afraid, my Lord my God, seeing that from my
earliest years I had not experienced such pain. And Thy purposes
were profoundly impressed upon me; and, rejoicing in faith, I
praised Thy name. And that faith suffered me not to be at rest in
regard to my past sins, which were not yet forgiven me by Thy
baptism.
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