General editors john baillie

0^ The allegorical interpretation of the Israelites’ despoiling the Egyptians (Ex. 12:35, 36) made it refer to the liberty of Christian thinkers in appropriating whatever was good and true from the pagan philosophers of the Greco-Roman world. This was a favorite theme of Clement of Alexandria and Origen and was quite explicitly developed in Origen’s Epistle to Gregory Thaumaturgus (ANF, IX, pp. 295, 296); cf. Augustine, On Christian Doctrine, II, 41-42.

0^ Cf. Acts 17:28.

0^ Cf. Rom. 1:25.

0^ Cf. Ps. 39:11.

0^ Some MSS. add “immo vero” (“yea, verily”), but not the best ones; cf. De Labriolle, op. cit., I, p. 162.

0^ Rom. 1:20.

0^ A locus classicus of the doctrine of the privative character of evil and the positive character of the good. This is a fundamental premise in Augustine’s metaphysics: it reappears in Bks. XII-XIII, in the Enchiridion, and elsewhere (see note, infra, [[p. 343 >> Page:343]]). This doctrine of the goodness of all creation is taken up into the scholastic metaphysics; cf. Confessions, Bks. XII-XIII, and Thomas Aquinas, Summa contra gentes, [[II: 45 >> SCG:SCG 2.45]].

0^ Ps. 148:7-12.

0^ Ps. 148:1-5.

0^ “The evil which overtakes us has its source in self-will, in the entry into the sphere of process and in the primal assertion of the desire for self-ownership” (Plotinus, Enneads, V, 1:1).

0^ “We have gone weighed down from beneath; the vision is frustrated” (Enneads, VI, 9:4).

0^ Rom. 1:20.

0^ The Plotinian Nous.

0^ This is an astonishingly candid and plain account of a Plotinian ecstasy, the pilgrimage of the soul from its absorption in things to its rapturous but momentary vision of the One; cf. especially the Sixth Ennead, 9:3-11, for very close parallels in thought and echoes of language. This is one of two ecstatic visions reported in the Confessions; the other is, of course, the last great moment with his mother at Ostia ([[Bk. IX, Ch. X, 23-25 >> Augustine:Conf. 9.10.23-25]]). One comes before the “conversion” in the Milanese garden ([[Bk. VIII, Ch. XII, 28-29 >> Augustine:Conf. 8.12.28-29]]); the other, after. They ought to be compared with particular interest in their similarities as well as their significant differences. Cf. also K.E. Kirk, The Vision of God (London, 1932), pp. 319346.

0^ 1 Tim. 2:5.

0^ Rom. 9:5.

0^ John 14:6.

0^ An interesting reminder that the Apollinarian heresy was condemned but not extinct.

0^ It is worth remembering that both Augustine and Alypius were catechumens and had presumably been receiving doctrinal instruction in preparation for their eventual baptism and full membership in the Catholic Church. That their ideas on the incarnation, at this stage, were in such confusion raises an interesting problem.

0^ Cf. Augustine’s The Christian Combat as an example of “the refutation of heretics.”

0^ Cf. 1 Cor. 11:19.

0^ Non peritus, sed periturus essem.

0^ Cf. 1 Cor. 3:11f.

0^ Rom. 7:22, 23.

0^ Rom. 7:24, 25.

0^ Cf. Prov. 8:22 and Col. 1:15. Augustine is here identifying the figure of Wisdom in Proverbs with the figure of the Logos in the Prologue to the Fourth Gospel. In the Arian controversy both these references to God’s Wisdom and Word as “created” caused great difficulty for the orthodox, for the Arians triumphantly appealed to them as proof that Jesus Christ was a “creature” of God. But Augustine was a Chalcedonian before Chalcedon, and there is no doubt that he is here quoting familiar Scrip­ture and filling it with the interpretation achieved by the long struggle of the Church to affirm the coeternity and consubstantiality of Jesus Christ and God the Father.

0^ Cf. Ps. 62:1, 2, 5, 6.

0^ Cf. Ps. 91:13.

0^ A figure that compares the dangers of the solitary traveler in a bandit-infested land and the safety of an imperial convoy on a main highway to the capital city.

0^ Cf. 1 Cor. 15:9.

0^ Ps. 35:10.

0^ Cf. Ps. 116:16, 17.

0^ Cf. Ps. 8:1.

0^ 1 Cor. 13:12.

0^ Matt. 19:12.

0^ Rom. 1:21.

0^ Job 28:28.

0^ Prov. 3:7.

0^ Rom. 1:22.

0^ Col. 2:8.

0^ Virgil, Aeneid, VIII, 698.

0^ Ps. 144:5.

0^ Luke 15:4.

0^ Cf. [[Luke, ch. 15 >> Lk 15]].

0^ 1 Cor. 1:27.

0^ A garbled reference to the story of the conversion of Sergius Paulus, pro­consul of Cyprus, in Acts 13:4-12.

0^ 2 Tim. 2:21.

0^ Gal. 5:17.

0^ The text here is a typical example of Augustine’s love of wordplay and assonance, as a conscious literary device: tuae caritati me dedere quam meae cupiditati cedere; sed illud placebat et vincebat, hoc libebat et vinciebat.

0^ Eph. 5:14.

0^ Rom. 7:22-25.

0^ The last obstacles that remained. His intellectual difficulties had been cleared away and the intention to become a Christian had become strong. But incontinence and immersion in his career were too firmly fixed in habit to be overcome by an act of conscious resolution.

0^ Trèves, an important imperial town on the Moselle; the emperor referred to here was probably Gratian. Cf. E.A. Freeman, “Augusta Trevororum,” in the British Quarterly Review (1875), 62, pp. 1-45.

0^ Agentes in rebus, government agents whose duties ranged from postal inspection and tax collection to espionage and secret police work. They were ubiquitous and generally dreaded by the populace; cf. J.S. Reid, “Reorganization of the Empire,” in Cambridge Medieval History, Vol. I, pp. 36-38.

0^ The inner circle of imperial advisers; usually rather informally appointed and usually with precarious tenure.

0^ Cf. Luke 14:28-33.

0^ Eph. 5:8.

0^ Cf. Ps. 34:5.

0^ Cf. Ps. 6:3; 79:8.

0^ This is the famous Tolle, lege; tolle, lege.

0^ Doubtless from Ponticianus, in their earlier conversation.

0^ Matt. 19:21.

0^ Rom. 13:13.

0^ Note the parallels here to the conversion of Anthony and the agentes in rebus.

0^ Rom. 14:1.

0^ Eph. 3:20.

0^ Ps. 116:16, 17.

0^ An imperial holiday season, from late August to the middle of October.

0^ Cf. Ps. 46:10.

0^ His subsequent baptism; see below, [[Ch. VI >> Augustine:Conf. 9.6]].

0^ Luke 14:14.

0^ Ps. 125:3.

0^ The heresy of Docetism, one of the earliest and most persistent of all Christological errors.

0^ Cf. Ps. 27:8.

0^ The group included Monica, Adeodatus (Augustine’s fifteen-year-old son), Navigius (Augustine’s brother), Rusticus and Fastidianus (relatives), Alypius, Trygetius, and Licentius (former pupils).

0^ A somewhat oblique acknowledgment of the fact that none of the Cassiciacum dialogues has any distinctive or substantial Christian content. This has often been pointed to as evidence that Augustine’s conversion thus far had brought him no farther than to a kind of Christian Platonism; cf. P. Alfaric, L’Évolution intellectuelle de Saint Augustin (Paris, 1918).

0^ The dialogues written during this stay at Cassiciacum: Contra Academicos, De beata vita, De ordine, Soliloquia. See, in this series, Vol. VI, pp. 17-63, for an English translation of the Soliloquies.

0^ Cf. Epistles [[II and III >> Augustine:Ep. 2-3]].

0^ A symbolic reference to the “cedars of Lebanon”; cf. Isa. 2:12-14; Ps. 29:5.

0^ There is perhaps a remote connection here with Luke 10:18-20.

0^ Ever since the time of Ignatius of Antioch who referred to the Eucharist as “the medicine of immortality,” this had been a popular metaphor to refer to the sacraments; cf. Ignatius, Ephesians [[20:2 >> af:IEph 20.2]].

0^ Here follows ([[8-11 >> Augustine:Conf. 9.4.8-9.4.11]]) a brief devotional commentary on Ps. 4.

0^ John 7:39.

0^ Idipsum--the oneness and immutability of God.

0^ Cf. v. 9.

0^ 1 Cor. 15:54.

0^ Concerning the Teacher; cf. Vol. VI of this series, pp. 64-101.

0^ This was apparently the first introduction into the West of antiphonal chanting, which was already widespread in the East. Ambrose brought it in; Gregory brought it to perfection.

0^ Cf. [[S. of Sol. 1:3, 4 >> Song 1.3-4]].

0^ Cf. Isa. 40:6; 1 Peter 1:24: “All flesh is grass.” See [[Bk. XI, Ch. II, 3 >> Augustine:Conf. 11.2.3]].

0^ Ecclus. 19:1.

0^ 1 Tim. 5:9.

0^ Phil. 3:13.

0^ Cf. 1 Cor. 2:9.

0^ Ps. 36:9.

0^ Idipsum.

0^ Cf. this report of a “Christian ecstasy” with the Plotinian ecstasy recounted in [[Bk. VII, Ch. XVII, 23 >> Augustine:Conf. 7.17.23]], above.

0^ Cf. Wis. 7:21-30; see especially [[v. 27 >> Wis 7.27]]: “And being but one, she [Wisdom] can do all things: and remaining in herself the same, she makes all things new.”

0^ Matt. 25:21.

0^ 1 Cor. 15:51.

0^ Navigius, who had joined them in Milan, but about whom Augustine is curiously silent save for the brief and unrevealing references in De beata vita, [[I, 6, to II, 7 >> Augustine:de beata vita 1.6-2.7]], and De ordine, [[I, 2-3 >> Augustine:De ordine 1.2-3]].

0^ A.D. 387.

0^ Nec omnino moriebatur. Is this an echo of Horace’s famous memorial ode, Exegi monumentum aere perennius … non omnis moriar? Cf. Odes, Book III, Ode XXX.

0^ 1 Tim. 1:5.

0^ Cf. this passage, as Augustine doubtless intended, with the story of his morbid and immoderate grief at the death of his boyhood friend, above, [[Bk. IV, Chs. IV, 9, to VII, 12 >> Augustine:Conf. 4.4-7]].

0^ Ps. 101:1.

0^ Ps. 68:5.

0^ Sir Tobie Matthew (adapted). For Augustine’s own analysis of the scansion and structure of this hymn, see De musica, [[VI, 2:2-3 >> Augustine:On Music 6.2.2-3]]; for a brief commentary on the Latin text, see A. S. Walpole, Early Latin Hymns (Cambridge, 1922), pp. 44-49.

0^ 1 Cor. 15:22.

0^ Matt. 5:22.

0^ 2 Cor. 10:17.

0^ Rom. 8:34.

0^ Cf. Matt. 6:12.

0^ Ps. 143:2.

0^ Matt. 5:7.

0^ Cf. Rom. 9:15.

0^ Ps. 119:108.

0^ Cf. 1 Cor. 13:12.

0^ Eph. 5:27.

0^ Ps. 51:6.

0^ John 3:21.

0^ 1 Cor. 2:11.

0^ 1 Cor. 13:7.

0^ Ps. 32:1.

0^ Ps. 144:7, 8.

0^ Cf. Rev. 8:3-5. “And the smoke of the incense with the prayers of the saints went up before God out of the angel’s hand” ([[v. 4 >> Rev 8.4]]).

0^ 1 Cor. 2:11.

0^ 1 Cor. 13:12.

0^ Isa. 58:10.

0^ Rom. 1:20.

0^ Cf. Rom. 9:15.

0^ One of the pre-Socratic “physiologers” who taught that αἰθήρ was the primary element in ἡ φύσις. Cf. Cicero’s On the Nature of the Gods (a likely source for Augustine’s knowledge of early Greek philosophy), I, 10: “After Anaximander comes Anaximenes, who taught that the air is God. …”

0^ An important text for Augustine’s conception of sensation and the relation of body and mind. Cf. On Music, [[VI, 5:10 >> Augustine:On Music 6.5.10]]; The Magnitude of the Soul, [[25:48 >> Augustine:quant. 25.48]]; On the Trinity, [[XII, 2:2 >> Augustine:De Trin. 12.2.2]]; see also F. Coplestone, A History of Philosophy (London, 1950), II, 51-60, and E. Gilson, Introduction à l’étude de Saint Augustin, pp. 74-87.

0^ Rom. 1:20.

0^ Reading videnti (with De Labriolle) instead of vident (as in Skutella).

0^ Ps. 32:9.

0^ The notion of the soul’s immediate self-knowledge is a basic conception in Augustine’s psychology and epistemology; cf. the refutation of skepticism, Si fallor, sum in On Free Will, [[II, 3:7 >> Augustine:lib. Arb. 2.3.7]]; see also the City of God, [[XI, 26 >> Augustine:City of God 11.26]].

0^ Again, the mind-body dualism typical of the Augustinian tradition. Cf. E. Gilson, The Spirit of Medieval Philosophy (Charles Scribner’s Sons, New York, 1940), pp. 173-188; and E. Gilson, The Philosophy of Saint Bonaventure (Sheed & Ward, New York, 1938), ch. XI.

0^ Luke 15:8.

0^ Cf. Isa. 55:3.

0^ Cf. the early dialogue “On the Happy Life” in Vol. I of The Fathers of the Church (New York, 1948).

0^ Gal. 5:17.

0^ Ps. 42:11.

0^ Cf. Enchiridion, [[VI, 19ff >> Augustine:Enchir. 19]].

0^ When he is known at all, God is known as the Self-evident. This is, of course, not a doctrine of innate ideas but rather of the necessity, and reality, of divine illumination as the dynamic source of all our knowledge of divine reality. Cf. Coplestone, op. cit., ch. IV, and Cushman, op. cit.

0^ Cf. Wis. 8:21.

0^ Cf. Enneads, VI, 9:4.

0^ 1 John 2:16.

0^ Eph. 3:20.

0^ 1 Cor. 15:54.

0^ Cf. Matt. 6:34.

0^ 1 Cor. 9:27.

0^ Cf. Luke 21:34.

0^ Cf. Wis. 8:21.

0^ Ecclus. 18:30.

0^ 1 Cor. 8:8.

0^ Phil. 4:11-13.

0^ Ps. 103:14.

0^ Cf. Gen. 3:19.

0^ Luke 15:24.

0^ Ecclus. 23:6.

0^ Titus 1:15.

0^ Rom. 14:20.

0^ 1 Tim. 4:4.

0^ 1 Cor. 8:8.

0^ Cf. Col. 2:16.

0^ Rom. 14:3.

0^ Luke 5:8.

0^ John 16:33.

0^ Cf. Ps. 139:16.

0^ Cf. the evidence for Augustine’s interest and proficiency in music in his essay De musica, written a decade earlier.

0^ Cf. 2 Cor. 5:2.

0^ Cf. [[Tobit, chs. 2 to 4 >> Tobit 2-4]].

0^ Gen. 27:1; cf. Augustine’s Sermon IV, 20:21f.

0^ Cf. [[Gen., ch. 48 >> Gen 48]].

0^ Again, Ambrose, Deus, creator omnium, an obvious favorite of Augustine’s. See above, [[Bk. IX, Ch. XII, 32 >> Augustine:Conf. 9.12.32]].

0^ Ps. 25:15.

0^ Ps. 121:4.

0^ Ps. 26:3.

0^ 1 John 2:16.

0^ Cf. Ps. 103:3-5.

0^ Cf. Matt. 11:30.

0^ 1 Peter 5:5.

0^ Cf. Ps. 18:7, 13.

0^ Cf. Isa. 14:12-14.

0^ Cf. Prov. 27:21.

0^ Cf. Ps. 19:12.

0^ Cf. Ps. 141:5.

0^ Ps. 109:22.

0^ Ps. 31:22.

0^ Cf. the parable of the Pharisee and the Publican, Luke 18:9-14.

0^ Cf. Eph. 2:2.

0^ 2 Cor. 11:14.

0^ Rom. 6:23.

0^ 1 Tim. 2:5.

0^ Cf. Rom. 8:32.

0^ Phil. 2:6-8.

0^ Cf. Ps. 88:5; see Ps. 87:6 (Vulgate).

0^ Ps. 103:3.

0^ Cf. Rom. 8:34.

0^ John 1:14.

0^ 2 Cor. 5:15.

0^ Ps. 119:18.

0^ Col. 2:3.

0^ Cf. Ps. 21:27 (Vulgate).

0^ In the very first sentence of

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