{"id":"01KJR8Q6HNCBVYKYRBGC1HY1SH","cid":"bafkreibjhvkb3yf6blabnyamuerovp64ufk4olep2kpncqfbwp3pxcnybm","type":"text_chunk","properties":{"char_end":499402,"char_start":491403,"chunk_index":69,"chunk_total":89,"estimated_tokens":2000,"source_file_key":"confessions","text":"sooner could I imagine that not to be at all, which should be deprived\r\nof all form, than conceive a thing betwixt form and nothing, neither\r\nformed, nor nothing, a formless almost nothing. So my mind gave over to\r\nquestion thereupon with my spirit, it being filled with the images of\r\nformed bodies, and changing and varying them, as it willed; and I bent\r\nmyself to the bodies themselves, and looked more deeply into their\r\nchangeableness, by which they cease to be what they have been, and begin\r\nto be what they were not; and this same shifting from form to form, I\r\nsuspected to be through a certain formless state, not through a mere\r\nnothing; yet this I longed to know, not to suspect only.-If then my\r\nvoice and pen would confess unto Thee the whole, whatsoever knots Thou\r\ndidst open for me in this question, what reader would hold out to take\r\nin the whole? Nor shall my heart for all this cease to give Thee honour,\r\nand a song of praise, for those things which it is not able to express.\r\nFor the changeableness of changeable things, is itself capable of all\r\nthose forms, into which these changeable things are changed. And this\r\nchangeableness, what is it? Is it soul? Is it body? Is it that which\r\nconstituteth soul or body? Might one say, \"a nothing something\", an\r\n\"is, is not,\" I would say, this were it: and yet in some way was it even\r\nthen, as being capable of receiving these visible and compound figures.\r\n\r\nBut whence had it this degree of being, but from Thee, from Whom are all\r\nthings, so far forth as they are? But so much the further from Thee, as\r\nthe unliker Thee; for it is not farness of place. Thou therefore,\r\nLord, Who art not one in one place, and otherwise in another, but the\r\nSelf-same, and the Self-same, and the Self-same, Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord\r\nGod Almighty, didst in the Beginning, which is of Thee, in Thy Wisdom,\r\nwhich was born of Thine own Substance, create something, and that out of\r\nnothing. For Thou createdst heaven and earth; not out of Thyself, for so\r\nshould they have been equal to Thine Only Begotten Son, and thereby to\r\nThee also; whereas no way were it right that aught should be equal to\r\nThee, which was not of Thee. And aught else besides Thee was there not,\r\nwhereof Thou mightest create them, O God, One Trinity, and Trine Unity;\r\nand therefore out of nothing didst Thou create heaven and earth; a great\r\nthing, and a small thing; for Thou art Almighty and Good, to make all\r\nthings good, even the great heaven, and the petty earth. Thou wert, and\r\nnothing was there besides, out of which Thou createdst heaven and earth;\r\nthings of two sorts; one near Thee, the other near to nothing; one to\r\nwhich Thou alone shouldest be superior; the other, to which nothing\r\nshould be inferior.\r\n\r\nBut that heaven of heavens was for Thyself, O Lord; but the earth which\r\nThou gavest to the sons of men, to be seen and felt, was not such as we\r\nnow see and feel. For it was invisible, without form, and there was a\r\ndeep, upon which there was no light; or, darkness was above the deep,\r\nthat is, more than in the deep. Because this deep of waters, visible\r\nnow, hath even in his depths, a light proper for its nature; perceivable\r\nin whatever degree unto the fishes, and creeping things in the bottom\r\nof it. But that whole deep was almost nothing, because hitherto it\r\nwas altogether without form; yet there was already that which could be\r\nformed. For Thou, Lord, madest the world of a matter without form, which\r\nout of nothing, Thou madest next to nothing, thereof to make those\r\ngreat things, which we sons of men wonder at. For very wonderful is this\r\ncorporeal heaven; of which firmament between water and water, the second\r\nday, after the creation of light, Thou saidst, Let it be made, and it\r\nwas made. Which firmament Thou calledst heaven; the heaven, that is, to\r\nthis earth and sea, which Thou madest the third day, by giving a visible\r\nfigure to the formless matter, which Thou madest before all days. For\r\nalready hadst Thou made both an heaven, before all days; but that was\r\nthe heaven of this heaven; because In the beginning Thou hadst made\r\nheaven and earth. But this same earth which Thou madest was formless\r\nmatter, because it was invisible and without form, and darkness was\r\nupon the deep, of which invisible earth and without form, of which\r\nformlessness, of which almost nothing, Thou mightest make all these\r\nthings of which this changeable world consists, but subsists not; whose\r\nvery changeableness appears therein, that times can be observed and\r\nnumbered in it. For times are made by the alterations of things, while\r\nthe figures, the matter whereof is the invisible earth aforesaid, are\r\nvaried and turned.\r\n\r\nAnd therefore the Spirit, the Teacher of Thy servant, when It recounts\r\nThee to have In the Beginning created heaven and earth, speaks nothing\r\nof times, nothing of days. For verily that heaven of heavens which\r\nThou createdst in the Beginning, is some intellectual creature, which,\r\nalthough no ways coeternal unto Thee, the Trinity, yet partaketh of\r\nThy eternity, and doth through the sweetness of that most happy\r\ncontemplation of Thyself, strongly restrain its own changeableness; and\r\nwithout any fall since its first creation, cleaving close unto Thee, is\r\nplaced beyond all the rolling vicissitude of times. Yea, neither is this\r\nvery formlessness of the earth, invisible, and without form, numbered\r\namong the days. For where no figure nor order is, there does nothing\r\ncome, or go; and where this is not, there plainly are no days, nor any\r\nvicissitude of spaces of times.\r\n\r\nO let the Light, the Truth, the Light of my heart, not mine own\r\ndarkness, speak unto me. I fell off into that, and became darkened; but\r\neven thence, even thence I loved Thee. I went astray, and remembered\r\nThee. I heard Thy voice behind me, calling to me to return, and scarcely\r\nheard it, through the tumultuousness of the enemies of peace. And now,\r\nbehold, I return in distress and panting after Thy fountain. Let no man\r\nforbid me! of this will I drink, and so live. Let me not be mine own\r\nlife; from myself I lived ill, death was I to myself; and I revive in\r\nThee. Do Thou speak unto me, do Thou discourse unto me. I have believed\r\nThy Books, and their words be most full of mystery.\r\n\r\nAlready Thou hast told me with a strong voice, O Lord, in my inner ear,\r\nthat Thou art eternal, Who only hast immortality; since Thou canst not\r\nbe changed as to figure or motion, nor is Thy will altered by times:\r\nseeing no will which varies is immortal. This is in Thy sight clear to\r\nme, and let it be more and more cleared to me, I beseech Thee; and in\r\nthe manifestation thereof, let me with sobriety abide under Thy wings.\r\nThou hast told me also with a strong voice, O Lord, in my inner ear,\r\nthat Thou hast made all natures and substances, which are not what\r\nThyself is, and yet are; and that only is not from Thee, which is not,\r\nand the motion of the will from Thee who art, unto that which in a less\r\ndegree is, because such motion is transgression and sin; and that no\r\nman's sin doth either hurt Thee, or disturb the order of Thy government,\r\nfirst or last. This is in Thy sight clear unto me, and let it be\r\nmore and more cleared to me, I beseech Thee: and in the manifestation\r\nthereof, let me with sobriety abide under Thy wings.\r\n\r\nThou hast told me also with a strong voice, in my inner ear, that\r\nneither is that creature coeternal unto Thyself, whose happiness\r\nThou only art, and which with a most persevering purity, drawing its\r\nnourishment from Thee, doth in no place and at no time put forth its\r\nnatural mutability; and, Thyself being ever present with it, unto Whom\r\nwith its whole affection it keeps itself, having neither future to\r\nexpect, nor conveying into the past what it remembereth, is neither\r\naltered by any change, nor distracted into any times. O blessed\r\ncreature, if such there be, for cleaving unto Thy Blessedness; blest in\r\nThee, its eternal Inhabitant and its Enlightener!"},"relationships":[{"peer":"01KJR8NK5DAD726FMQ6JCHGZ5R","peer_label":"confessions","peer_type":"text","predicate":"derived_from"},{"peer":"01KJR8M0JHPZXCPKJ34HTYXSWW","peer_type":"collection","predicate":"collection"},{"peer":"01KJR8R5M8VXDW8Z6YHQTCPK14","peer_label":"god","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"divine_being","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T21:56:23.174Z"}},{"peer":"01KJR8RBRNY6A8BA7KMBBK49P2","peer_label":"narrator augustine","predicate":"extracted_entity","properties":{"entity_type":"person","extracted_at":"2026-03-02T21:56:23.174Z"}},{"peer":"01KJR8RZY8PEAASSX7ANWV3SQX","peer_label":"beginning of 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