{"id":"01KJR8Q6CN4BYYBSRKYP0H1C66","cid":"bafkreiaiclq7w25atfdneu3uxndzxag7n5ze5by6yev67mzrgn6m2vu36q","type":"text_chunk","properties":{"char_end":249577,"char_start":241673,"chunk_index":34,"chunk_total":89,"estimated_tokens":1976,"source_file_key":"confessions","text":"I conceived of all: and with a sounder judgment I apprehended that the\r\nthings above were better than these below, but altogether better than\r\nthose above by themselves.\r\n\r\nThere is no soundness in them, whom aught of Thy creation displeaseth:\r\nas neither in me, when much which Thou hast made, displeased me. And\r\nbecause my soul durst not be displeased at my God, it would fain not\r\naccount that Thine, which displeased it. Hence it had gone into the\r\nopinion of two substances, and had no rest, but talked idly. And\r\nreturning thence, it had made to itself a God, through infinite measures\r\nof all space; and thought it to be Thee, and placed it in its heart;\r\nand had again become the temple of its own idol, to Thee abominable. But\r\nafter Thou hadst soothed my head, unknown to me, and closed mine eyes\r\nthat they should not behold vanity, I ceased somewhat of my former self,\r\nand my frenzy was lulled to sleep; and I awoke in Thee, and saw Thee\r\ninfinite, but in another way, and this sight was not derived from the\r\nflesh.\r\n\r\nAnd I looked back on other things; and I saw that they owed their being\r\nto Thee; and were all bounded in Thee: but in a different way; not as\r\nbeing in space; but because Thou containest all things in Thine hand\r\nin Thy Truth; and all things are true so far as they nor is there any\r\nfalsehood, unless when that is thought to be, which is not. And I saw\r\nthat all things did harmonise, not with their places only, but with\r\ntheir seasons. And that Thou, who only art Eternal, didst not begin to\r\nwork after innumerable spaces of times spent; for that all spaces of\r\ntimes, both which have passed, and which shall pass, neither go nor\r\ncome, but through Thee, working and abiding.\r\n\r\nAnd I perceived and found it nothing strange, that bread which is\r\npleasant to a healthy palate is loathsome to one distempered: and to\r\nsore eyes light is offensive, which to the sound is delightful. And Thy\r\nrighteousness displeaseth the wicked; much more the viper and reptiles,\r\nwhich Thou hast created good, fitting in with the inferior portions of\r\nThy Creation, with which the very wicked also fit in; and that the more,\r\nby how much they be unlike Thee; but with the superior creatures, by how\r\nmuch they become more like to Thee. And I enquired what iniquity was,\r\nand found it to be no substance, but the perversion of the will, turned\r\naside from Thee, O God, the Supreme, towards these lower things, and\r\ncasting out its bowels, and puffed up outwardly.\r\n\r\nAnd I wondered that I now loved Thee, and no phantasm for Thee. And\r\nyet did I not press on to enjoy my God; but was borne up to Thee by Thy\r\nbeauty, and soon borne down from Thee by mine own weight, sinking with\r\nsorrow into these inferior things. This weight was carnal custom. Yet\r\ndwelt there with me a remembrance of Thee; nor did I any way doubt that\r\nthere was One to whom I might cleave, but that I was not yet such as to\r\ncleave to Thee: for that the body which is corrupted presseth down the\r\nsoul, and the earthly tabernacle weigheth down the mind that museth upon\r\nmany things. And most certain I was, that Thy invisible works from the\r\ncreation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things\r\nthat are made, even Thy eternal power and Godhead. For examining whence\r\nit was that I admired the beauty of bodies celestial or terrestrial;\r\nand what aided me in judging soundly on things mutable, and pronouncing,\r\n\"This ought to be thus, this not\"; examining, I say, whence it was that\r\nI so judged, seeing I did so judge, I had found the unchangeable and\r\ntrue Eternity of Truth above my changeable mind. And thus by degrees\r\nI passed from bodies to the soul, which through the bodily senses\r\nperceives; and thence to its inward faculty, to which the bodily senses\r\nrepresent things external, whitherto reach the faculties of beasts; and\r\nthence again to the reasoning faculty, to which what is received from\r\nthe senses of the body, is referred to be judged. Which finding\r\nitself also to be in me a thing variable, raised itself up to its\r\nown understanding, and drew away my thoughts from the power of habit,\r\nwithdrawing itself from those troops of contradictory phantasms; that so\r\nit might find what that light was whereby it was bedewed, when, without\r\nall doubting, it cried out, \"That the unchangeable was to be preferred\r\nto the changeable\"; whence also it knew That Unchangeable, which, unless\r\nit had in some way known, it had had no sure ground to prefer it to the\r\nchangeable. And thus with the flash of one trembling glance it arrived\r\nat THAT WHICH IS. And then I saw Thy invisible things understood by\r\nthe things which are made. But I could not fix my gaze thereon; and my\r\ninfirmity being struck back, I was thrown again on my wonted habits,\r\ncarrying along with me only a loving memory thereof, and a longing for\r\nwhat I had, as it were, perceived the odour of, but was not yet able to\r\nfeed on.\r\n\r\nThen I sought a way of obtaining strength sufficient to enjoy Thee; and\r\nfound it not, until I embraced that Mediator betwixt God and men, the\r\nMan Christ Jesus, who is over all, God blessed for evermore, calling\r\nunto me, and saying, I am the way, the truth, and the life, and mingling\r\nthat food which I was unable to receive, with our flesh. For, the Word\r\nwas made flesh, that Thy wisdom, whereby Thou createdst all things,\r\nmight provide milk for our infant state. For I did not hold to my Lord\r\nJesus Christ, I, humbled, to the Humble; nor knew I yet whereto His\r\ninfirmity would guide us. For Thy Word, the Eternal Truth, far above the\r\nhigher parts of Thy Creation, raises up the subdued unto Itself: but\r\nin this lower world built for Itself a lowly habitation of our clay,\r\nwhereby to abase from themselves such as would be subdued, and bring\r\nthem over to Himself; allaying their swelling, and fomenting their love;\r\nto the end they might go on no further in self-confidence, but rather\r\nconsent to become weak, seeing before their feet the Divinity weak by\r\ntaking our coats of skin; and wearied, might cast themselves down upon\r\nIt, and It rising, might lift them up.\r\n\r\nBut I thought otherwise; conceiving only of my Lord Christ as of a man\r\nof excellent wisdom, whom no one could be equalled unto; especially,\r\nfor that being wonderfully born of a Virgin, He seemed, in conformity\r\ntherewith, through the Divine care for us, to have attained that great\r\neminence of authority, for an ensample of despising things temporal for\r\nthe obtaining of immortality. But what mystery there lay in \"The Word\r\nwas made flesh,\" I could not even imagine. Only I had learnt out of what\r\nis delivered to us in writing of Him that He did eat, and drink, sleep,\r\nwalk, rejoiced in spirit, was sorrowful, discoursed; that flesh did not\r\ncleave by itself unto Thy Word, but with the human soul and mind. All\r\nknow this who know the unchangeableness of Thy Word, which I now knew,\r\nas far as I could, nor did I at all doubt thereof. For, now to move the\r\nlimbs of the body by will, now not, now to be moved by some affection,\r\nnow not, now to deliver wise sayings through human signs, now to keep\r\nsilence, belong to soul and mind subject to variation. And should these\r\nthings be falsely written of Him, all the rest also would risk the\r\ncharge, nor would there remain in those books any saving faith for\r\nmankind. Since then they were written truly, I acknowledged a perfect\r\nman to be in Christ; not the body of a man only, nor, with the body, a\r\nsensitive soul without a rational, but very man; whom, not only as being\r\na form of Truth, but for a certain great excellence of human nature and\r\na more perfect participation of wisdom, I judged to be preferred before\r\nothers. But Alypius imagined the Catholics to believe God to be so\r\nclothed with flesh, that besides God and flesh, there was no soul at all\r\nin Christ, and did not think that a human mind was ascribed to Him."},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KJR8NK5DAD726FMQ6JCHGZ5R","peer_label":"confessions","peer_type":"text","predicate":"derived_from"},{"peer":"01KJR8M0JHPZXCPKJ34HTYXSWW","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KJR8RENT5GDAEZJJBSSVRRWR","peer_label":"truth","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"concept","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T21:55:27.177Z"}},{"peer":"01KJR8RPPKYW47TDNV7M0J1MEJ","peer_label":"augustine","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"person","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T21:55:27.177Z"}},{"peer":"01KJR8R5M8VXDW8Z6YHQTCPK14","peer_label":"god","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"divine_being","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T21:55:27.177Z"}},{"peer":"01KJR8RM469XEEVHNJNEGV2NDW","peer_label":"alypius","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"person","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T21:55:27.177Z"}},{"peer":"01KJR8RYDFANERP2XGT177BWF9","peer_label":"jesus christ","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"divine_person","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T21:55:27.177Z"}},{"peer":"01KJR8RY8F32RR6P8N7ZT6KZEW","peer_label":"the unchangeable","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"concept","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T21:55:27.177Z"}},{"peer":"01KJR8RYE078NFXSY0QMSG1Y4Y","peer_label":"manichaeism","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"religious_philosophy","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T21:55:27.177Z"}},{"peer":"01KJR8RYKA5VZ5A0B52616J8XJ","peer_label":"carnal custom","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"concept","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T21:55:27.177Z"}},{"peer":"01KJR8RYCFKF52A4PAHXPK78DV","peer_label":"iniquity","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"concept","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T21:55:27.177Z"}},{"peer":"01KJR8RZ10H7VN827S08FN6ZKZ","peer_label":"catholics","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"religious_group","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T21:55:27.177Z"}},{"peer":"01KJR8RZ4W3KXV7E8SYCSH1WXC","peer_label":"the word made flesh","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"theological_concept","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T21:55:27.177Z"}},{"peer":"01KJR8RYDCPWKBQCYG77HPYN4M","peer_label":"soul human","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"human_faculty","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T21:55:27.177Z"}},{"peer":"01KJR8RZ6PV9THZ96K6X9XRTDF","peer_label":"perversion of the will","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"entity","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T21:55:27.177Z"}},{"peer":"01KJR8RZ5ZFKDXCA570E0YSX1R","peer_label":"human nature of christ","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"theological_concept","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T21:55:27.177Z"}},{"peer":"01KJR8RZFENA9199XCBP2E626X","peer_label":"mediator betwixt god and men","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"entity","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T21:55:27.177Z"}},{"peer":"01KJR8RZ3Z3A5W7AK9HFB3HPRJ","peer_label":"reasoning faculty","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"human_faculty","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T21:55:27.177Z"}},{"peer":"01KJR8RZRMK4RKXCWCQNMCWS5B","peer_label":"i am the way the truth and the life","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"entity","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T21:55:27.177Z"}},{"peer":"01KJR8RZZ9VC3NVTXATYJ8Z602","peer_label":"christ lacked human soul","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"entity","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T21:55:27.177Z"}},{"peer":"01KJR8RZZ8F882V8SM0NNFNJDB","peer_label":"gods wisdom","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"entity","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T21:55:27.177Z"}},{"peer":"01KJR8RZZPCMJJG7AGV6YDZG9V","peer_label":"human mind ascribed to christ","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"entity","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T21:55:27.177Z"}}],"ver":2,"created_at":"2026-03-02T21:54:24.789Z","ts":"2026-03-02T21:55:28.360Z","edited_by":{"method":"system","user_id":"01KJ60XQBHJ0GBGTP9X8HXAPPM"}}