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| How Augustin Writes in Answer to a Favor Asked by a Deacon of Carthage.
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Chapter 1.—How Augustin Writes in Answer to a Favor
Asked by a Deacon of Carthage.
1. You have requested me, brother
Deogratias, to send you in writing something which might be of
service to you in the matter of catechising the uninstructed. For
you have informed me that in Carthage, where you hold the position
of a deacon, persons, who have to be taught the Christian faith
from its very rudiments, are frequently brought to you by reason of
your enjoying the reputation of possessing a rich gift in
catechising, due at once to an intimate acquaintance with the
faith, and to an attractive method of discourse;1332
| 1332 Reading et doctrina fidei et
suavitate sermonis, instead of which, however, et
doctrinam…suavitatem, etc. also occurs, = possessing
at once a rich gift in catechising, and an intimate acquaintance
with the faith, and an attractive method of discourse, [or,
sweetness of language]. | but that you almost always find
yourself in a difficulty as to the manner in which a suitable
declaration is to be made of the precise doctrine, the belief of
which constitutes us Christians: regarding the point at which our
statement of the same ought to commence, and the limit to which it
should be allowed to proceed: and with respect to the question
whether, when our narration is concluded, we ought to make use of
any kind of exhortation, or simply specify those precepts in the
observance of which the person to whom we are discoursing may know
the Christian life and profession to be maintained.1333
| 1333 Reading retineri as in the
mss. Some editions give retinere =
know how to maintain the Christian life and profession. | At the
same time, you have made the confession and complaint that it has
often befallen you that in the course of a lengthened and languid
address you have become profitless and distasteful even to
yourself, not to speak of the learner whom you have been
endeavoring to instruct by your utterance, and the other parties
who have been present as hearers; and that you have been
constrained by these straits to put upon me the constraint of that
love which I owe to you, so that I may not feel it a burdensome
thing among all my engagements to write you something on this
subject.
2. As for myself then, if, in the
exercise of those capacities which through the bounty of our Lord I
am enabled to present, the same Lord requires me to offer any
manner of aid to those whom He has made brethren to me, I feel
constrained not only by that love and service which is due from me
to you on the terms of familiar friendship, but also by that which
I owe universally to my mother the Church, by no means to refuse
the task, but rather to take it up with a prompt and devoted
willingness. For the more extensively I desire to see the treasure
of the Lord1334
distributed, the more does it become my duty, if I ascertain that
the stewards, who are my fellow-servants, find any difficulty in
laying it out, to do all that lies in my power to the end that they
may be able to accomplish easily and expeditiously what they
sedulously and earnestly aim at.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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