{"id":"01KJR8Q69YHVN3K0A7CT99NBPB","cid":"bafkreifep5zmce4hd7nr6u2vd2cngkeqxakppeuoi2d64u7kfhfb2chevu","type":"text_chunk","properties":{"char_end":50308,"char_start":42394,"chunk_index":6,"chunk_total":89,"estimated_tokens":1979,"source_file_key":"confessions","text":"rushing of my own tide, forsaking Thee, and exceeded all Thy limits; yet\r\nI escaped not Thy scourges. For what mortal can? For Thou wert ever with\r\nme mercifully rigorous, and besprinkling with most bitter alloy all my\r\nunlawful pleasures: that I might seek pleasures without alloy. But where\r\nto find such, I could not discover, save in Thee, O Lord, who teachest\r\nby sorrow, and woundest us, to heal; and killest us, lest we die from\r\nThee. Where was I, and how far was I exiled from the delights of Thy\r\nhouse, in that sixteenth year of the age of my flesh, when the madness\r\nof lust (to which human shamelessness giveth free licence, though\r\nunlicensed by Thy laws) took the rule over me, and I resigned myself\r\nwholly to it? My friends meanwhile took no care by marriage to save my\r\nfall; their only care was that I should learn to speak excellently, and\r\nbe a persuasive orator.\r\n\r\nFor that year were my studies intermitted: whilst after my return from\r\nMadaura (a neighbour city, whither I had journeyed to learn grammar and\r\nrhetoric), the expenses for a further journey to Carthage were being\r\nprovided for me; and that rather by the resolution than the means of my\r\nfather, who was but a poor freeman of Thagaste. To whom tell I this? not\r\nto Thee, my God; but before Thee to mine own kind, even to that small\r\nportion of mankind as may light upon these writings of mine. And to what\r\npurpose? that whosoever reads this, may think out of what depths we are\r\nto cry unto Thee. For what is nearer to Thine ears than a confessing\r\nheart, and a life of faith? Who did not extol my father, for that beyond\r\nthe ability of his means, he would furnish his son with all necessaries\r\nfor a far journey for his studies' sake? For many far abler citizens\r\ndid no such thing for their children. But yet this same father had no\r\nconcern how I grew towards Thee, or how chaste I were; so that I were\r\nbut copious in speech, however barren I were to Thy culture, O God, who\r\nart the only true and good Lord of Thy field, my heart.\r\n\r\nBut while in that my sixteenth year I lived with my parents, leaving all\r\nschool for a while (a season of idleness being interposed through the\r\nnarrowness of my parents' fortunes), the briers of unclean desires grew\r\nrank over my head, and there was no hand to root them out. When that my\r\nfather saw me at the baths, now growing towards manhood, and endued\r\nwith a restless youthfulness, he, as already hence anticipating his\r\ndescendants, gladly told it to my mother; rejoicing in that tumult of\r\nthe senses wherein the world forgetteth Thee its Creator, and becometh\r\nenamoured of Thy creature, instead of Thyself, through the fumes of that\r\ninvisible wine of its self-will, turning aside and bowing down to the\r\nvery basest things. But in my mother's breast Thou hadst already begun\r\nThy temple, and the foundation of Thy holy habitation, whereas my\r\nfather was as yet but a Catechumen, and that but recently. She then was\r\nstartled with a holy fear and trembling; and though I was not as yet\r\nbaptised, feared for me those crooked ways in which they walk who turn\r\ntheir back to Thee, and not their face.\r\n\r\nWoe is me! and dare I say that Thou heldest Thy peace, O my God, while I\r\nwandered further from Thee? Didst Thou then indeed hold Thy peace to me?\r\nAnd whose but Thine were these words which by my mother, Thy faithful\r\none, Thou sangest in my ears? Nothing whereof sunk into my heart, so as\r\nto do it. For she wished, and I remember in private with great anxiety\r\nwarned me, \"not to commit fornication; but especially never to defile\r\nanother man's wife.\" These seemed to me womanish advices, which I should\r\nblush to obey. But they were Thine, and I knew it not: and I thought\r\nThou wert silent and that it was she who spake; by whom Thou wert not\r\nsilent unto me; and in her wast despised by me, her son, the son of Thy\r\nhandmaid, Thy servant. But I knew it not; and ran headlong with such\r\nblindness, that amongst my equals I was ashamed of a less shamelessness,\r\nwhen I heard them boast of their flagitiousness, yea, and the more\r\nboasting, the more they were degraded: and I took pleasure, not only in\r\nthe pleasure of the deed, but in the praise. What is worthy of dispraise\r\nbut vice? But I made myself worse than I was, that I might not be\r\ndispraised; and when in any thing I had not sinned as the abandoned\r\nones, I would say that I had done what I had not done, that I might not\r\nseem contemptible in proportion as I was innocent; or of less account,\r\nthe more chaste.\r\n\r\nBehold with what companions I walked the streets of Babylon, and\r\nwallowed in the mire thereof, as if in a bed of spices and precious\r\nointments. And that I might cleave the faster to its very centre, the\r\ninvisible enemy trod me down, and seduced me, for that I was easy to be\r\nseduced. Neither did the mother of my flesh (who had now fled out of\r\nthe centre of Babylon, yet went more slowly in the skirts thereof as\r\nshe advised me to chastity, so heed what she had heard of me from her\r\nhusband, as to restrain within the bounds of conjugal affection, if it\r\ncould not be pared away to the quick) what she felt to be pestilent\r\nat present and for the future dangerous. She heeded not this, for she\r\nfeared lest a wife should prove a clog and hindrance to my hopes. Not\r\nthose hopes of the world to come, which my mother reposed in Thee; but\r\nthe hope of learning, which both my parents were too desirous I should\r\nattain; my father, because he had next to no thought of Thee, and of\r\nme but vain conceits; my mother, because she accounted that those\r\nusual courses of learning would not only be no hindrance, but even some\r\nfurtherance towards attaining Thee. For thus I conjecture, recalling, as\r\nwell as I may, the disposition of my parents. The reins, meantime, were\r\nslackened to me, beyond all temper of due severity, to spend my time in\r\nsport, yea, even unto dissoluteness in whatsoever I affected. And in all\r\nwas a mist, intercepting from me, O my God, the brightness of Thy truth;\r\nand mine iniquity burst out as from very fatness.\r\n\r\nTheft is punished by Thy law, O Lord, and the law written in the hearts\r\nof men, which iniquity itself effaces not. For what thief will abide a\r\nthief? not even a rich thief, one stealing through want. Yet I lusted to\r\nthieve, and did it, compelled by no hunger, nor poverty, but through a\r\ncloyedness of well-doing, and a pamperedness of iniquity. For I stole\r\nthat, of which I had enough, and much better. Nor cared I to enjoy what\r\nI stole, but joyed in the theft and sin itself. A pear tree there was\r\nnear our vineyard, laden with fruit, tempting neither for colour nor\r\ntaste. To shake and rob this, some lewd young fellows of us went, late\r\none night (having according to our pestilent custom prolonged our sports\r\nin the streets till then), and took huge loads, not for our eating, but\r\nto fling to the very hogs, having only tasted them. And this, but to\r\ndo what we liked only, because it was misliked. Behold my heart, O\r\nGod, behold my heart, which Thou hadst pity upon in the bottom of the\r\nbottomless pit. Now, behold, let my heart tell Thee what it sought\r\nthere, that I should be gratuitously evil, having no temptation to ill,\r\nbut the ill itself. It was foul, and I loved it; I loved to perish,\r\nI loved mine own fault, not that for which I was faulty, but my fault\r\nitself. Foul soul, falling from Thy firmament to utter destruction; not\r\nseeking aught through the shame, but the shame itself!\r\n\r\nFor there is an attractiveness in beautiful bodies, in gold and silver,\r\nand all things; and in bodily touch, sympathy hath much influence, and\r\neach other sense hath his proper object answerably tempered. Worldy\r\nhonour hath also its grace, and the power of overcoming, and of mastery;\r\nwhence springs also the thirst of revenge. But yet, to obtain all these,\r\nwe may not depart from Thee, O Lord, nor decline from Thy law."},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KJR8NK5DAD726FMQ6JCHGZ5R","peer_label":"confessions","peer_type":"text","predicate":"derived_from"},{"peer":"01KJR8M0JHPZXCPKJ34HTYXSWW","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KJR8RPQ9SKEPEPA0ENEEP7VB","peer_label":"augustine narrator","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"person","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T21:55:26.199Z"}},{"peer":"01KJR8R5M8VXDW8Z6YHQTCPK14","peer_label":"god","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"divine_being","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T21:55:26.199Z"}},{"peer":"01KJR8R647R7GTK9VSWS6T3W9W","peer_label":"thagaste","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"city","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T21:55:26.199Z"}},{"peer":"01KJR8R6AJ4HSDN1TJ34CHPH7J","peer_label":"carthage","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"city","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T21:55:26.199Z"}},{"peer":"01KJR8RQ13RKNDMQKZAPQ1YRK7","peer_label":"catechumen","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"religious_status","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T21:55:26.199Z"}},{"peer":"01KJR8RXDJHR5VBHCW1JBDDNFX","peer_label":"augustines mother","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"person","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T21:55:26.199Z"}},{"peer":"01KJR8RXAC3K0QFQ7P37BNQDEA","peer_label":"augustines parents","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"group_of_people","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T21:55:26.199Z"}},{"peer":"01KJR8RXK3RJ3MQSAA5DZNKT7Z","peer_label":"madaura","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"city","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T21:55:26.199Z"}},{"peer":"01KJR8RXMV65Z3C42BT8BBN32J","peer_label":"theft","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"act_of_sin","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T21:55:26.199Z"}},{"peer":"01KJR8RXSMFY3DFR4CTT9C578R","peer_label":"confessions writings","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"literary_work","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T21:55:26.199Z"}},{"peer":"01KJR8RXK9B0708X17R3H8DK3Q","peer_label":"augustines father","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"person","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T21:55:26.199Z"}},{"peer":"01KJR8RY92F1QJAW7YZMJJSM6G","peer_label":"pear tree","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"plant","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T21:55:26.199Z"}},{"peer":"01KJR8RYDKEFWFGPYDH51CBNVC","peer_label":"mothers warnings against fornication","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"advice_concept","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T21:55:26.199Z"}},{"peer":"01KJR8RY1BK0Q9WTD23FHSA4DH","peer_label":"augustines companions youth","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"group_of_people","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T21:55:26.199Z"}},{"peer":"01KJR8RYD5WEDHRP02FZRC1MBY","peer_label":"gods law","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"divine_principle","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T21:55:26.199Z"}},{"peer":"01KJR8RYA2W3SPVBQ3YZKYFBV7","peer_label":"babylon metaphorical","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"metaphorical_place","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T21:55:26.199Z"}},{"peer":"01KJR8RYZR8HBNWN2SJX8PHVN4","peer_label":"grammar and rhetoric","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"academic_subjects","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T21:55:26.199Z"}},{"peer":"01KJR8RYY0236NFXW5X649XX53","peer_label":"persuasive orator augustines goal","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"aspiration_concept","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T21:55:26.199Z"}},{"peer":"01KJR8RZ6VXPYYRCTS3X3N446M","peer_label":"gratuitously evil acts","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"concept","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T21:55:26.199Z"}},{"peer":"01KJR8RYH7NM1YRXJBRF08PPNC","peer_label":"lust","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"concept","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T21:55:26.199Z"}},{"peer":"01KJR8RZ6XQXTRFJ4BTG8HT8GJ","peer_label":"hope of learning","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"aspiration_concept","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T21:55:26.199Z"}}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-03-02T21:54:24.702Z","ts":"2026-03-02T21:55:27.527Z","edited_by":{"method":"system","user_id":"01KJ60XQBHJ0GBGTP9X8HXAPPM"}}