St. Augustine
potest; si autem non potest, quid se praecipitat de rarissimis aut inexpertis quasi definitam ferre sententiam, cum continua et cotidiana non solvat? Ego autem, quamvis quo modo fiant ista veluti corporea sine corpore, verbis prorsus explicare non possim, tamen sicut scio non ea corpore fieri, utinam sic scirem quo modo discernerentur, quae videntur aliquando per spiritum et per corpus videri putantur, quove modo distinguantur visa eorum, quos error vel impietas plerumque deludit, quando visis piorum atque sanctorum similia pleraque narrantur! Quorum exempla si commemorare voluissem, tempus mihi potius quam copia defuisset. Memor nostri in domini misericordia vegeteris, domine beatissime et venerabilis et desiderabilis frater.
1Si posses videre dolorem cordis mei et sollicitudinem pro salute tua, fortasse miserereris animae tuae placens deo in audiendo verbo non nostro, sed ipsius, nec eius scripturas sic in memoria tua figeres, ut contra eas cor clauderes. Displicet tibi quia
Letters of St. Augustine
him tell, if he can, but if he cannot, why is he so hasty to pronounce a kind of final judgement about experiences he has very seldom or not at all, when he cannot explain matters that occur each day and every day? Though, for my part, words fail me to explain how those semblances of material bodies without a real body come to be, yet, just as I know that they are not produced by the body, so I should wish to know how we can separate those things that are seen at times by the spirit and are thought to be seen by the body, or how we can distinguish the things seen by those who are often deluded by error or by impiety, when the majority of the visions they tell of bear a likeness to those seen by the good and the holy. If I had wanted to give examples of these, I should have been short of time rather than material. Remember me, my saintly lord and revered and longed for brother, and may the mercy of the Lord be your refreshment!
If you could see my heart-felt grief and anxiety for1 your salvation, you would perhaps “have pity on your own soul, doing what is pleasing unto God”b by giving ear to the injunction which is not ours, but His, and you would not impress His Scriptures on your memory only to close your heart against them. You
- aThis Donatus, a priest of the Donatist party, who had been compelled by law to join the Catholic Church and in his resistance had done himself bodily harm, is not further known. From § 7 it appears that he came from Mutugenna, which lay in the vicinity of Hippo. This letter is very instructive for Augustine’s arguments against toleration.
- bEcclus. xxx. 24.