St. Augustine
3Quod si in natura humana talis vita non cadit, cur aliquando evenit ista securitas? Cur tanto evenit crebrius, quanto quisque in mentis penetralibus adorat deum? Cur in actu etiam humano plerumque ista tranquillitas manet, si ex illo adyto ad agendum quisque procedat? Cur interdum et cum loquimur, mortem non formidamus, cum autem non loquimur, etiam cupimus? Tibi dico, non enim hoc cuilibet dicerem, tibi, inquam, dico, cuius itinera in superna bene novi, tune, cum expertus saepe sis, quam dulce vivat, cum amori corporeo animus moritur, negabis tandem totam hominis vitam posse intrepidam fieri, ut rite sapiens nominetur? Aut hanc affectionem, ad quam1 ratio nititur, tibi accidisse umquam, nisi cum in intimis tuis ageres, asserere audebis? Quae cum ita sint, restare unum vides, ut tu quoque in commune consulas, quo vivamus simul. Quid enim cum matre agendum sit, quam certe frater Victor non deserit, tu multo melius calles quam ego. Alia scribere, ne te ab ista cogitatione averterem, nolui.
1Non haec epistula sic inopiam chartae indicat, ut membranas saltem abundare testetur? Tabellas eburneas, quas habeo, avunculo tuo cum litteris misi. Tu enim huic pelliculae facilius ignosces, quia differri
Letters of St. Augustine
But if human nature does not admit of such a3 life, why does that calmness of spirit ever befall us? Why does it befall us more frequently in proportion as each man worships God in the secret places of his mind? Why even amid ordinary mortal concerns does that peace, as a rule, linger on, when one goes forth from that inner shrine to do his part? Why is it that sometimes, even in conversation, death has no terrors for us, and, when conversation is stilled, it even allures us? I say to you (and I would not say it to everyone)—I say to you, knowing well, as I do, your journeyings to the upper world, will you, after frequent experience of the sweet life the soul lives when it dies to bodily affections, deny that a man’s whole life can at length become so exempt from fear that he may rightly be called wise? Or will you venture to maintain that that state of mind, towards which reason strives, has ever befallen you, save when you were communing with your own heart? This being so, you see this one thing only remains for you—to consider for our mutual advantage how we may live together. You know much better than I do what is to be done with your mother; in any case your brother Victor is not leaving her. I write no more, for fear of diverting you from consideration of that problem.
Does this letter not show that, if we are short of1 papyrus, we have at least abundance of parchment? The ivory tablets I possess I have sent to your uncle with a letter; you will the more easily forgive this