Summa.
Confessions
Chapter 1. By Confession He Desires to Stimulate Towards God His Own Love and That of His Readers.
Lord, since you are eternal, do you not know what I am telling you? Do you see what happens in time only from a temporal perspective? Why then do I arrange so many accounts of events for you? Certainly not so that you might learn them through me. Rather, I stir up my devotion toward you. I stir up the devotion of those who read these things. We all say together:"Great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised."I have said this before. I will say it again. I do this out of love for your love. We pray, yet Truth itself says:"Your Father knows what you need before you ask him."Therefore we lay bare our hearts before you. We confess to you our miseries and your mercies upon us. You will free us completely because you have begun this work. We will stop being wretched in ourselves. We will be blessed in you. You have called us to be poor in spirit. You have called us to be gentle and mourning. You have called us to hunger and thirst for righteousness. You have called us to be merciful and pure in heart and peacemaking. Look, I have told you many things that I could tell you. I have told you what I wanted to tell you. You first desired that I should confess to you, Lord my God. You are good. Your mercy endures forever.
Chapter 2. He Begs of God that Through the Holy Scriptures He May Be Led to Truth.
When will my tongue and pen ever be enough to declare all your encouragements? When will they be enough to proclaim all your terrors and consolations and guidances by which you have led me to preach the word and dispense your sacrament to your people? Even if I could declare these things in order, the drops of time are precious to me. Long ago I burned to meditate on your law. I burned to confess to you in that law both my knowledge and my ignorance. I wanted to confess the first moments of your illumination. I wanted to confess the remnants of my darkness. I will continue until strength devours weakness. I do not want the hours to flow away into other things. These are the hours I find free from the necessities of restoring the body. These hours are free from the concentration of the mind. They are free from the servitude we owe to people and from the servitude we do not owe but still pay.
My Lord and God, listen to my prayer. Let your mercy hear what I desire. This burning in me is not for myself alone. It wants to serve brotherly love. You see in my heart that this is true. I will sacrifice to you the service of my thoughts and words. Give me what I may offer you. I am needy and poor. You are rich toward all who call upon you. You care for us without worry. Cut away from my lips all rashness and all lies, inside and out. Let your Scriptures be my pure delight. May I not be deceived by them. May I not deceive others through them. Lord, pay attention and have mercy. My Lord and God, you are light for the blind and strength for the weak. You are also light for those who see and strength for the strong. Pay attention to my soul. Hear me crying from the depths. If your ears are not present even in the depths, where will we go? To whom will we cry out? The day is yours and the night is yours. At your nod the moments fly by. Grant us time from this for our meditations into the hidden things of your law. Do not close it against those who knock. You did not want so many pages of dark secrets written for nothing. Those forests have their deer. The deer take refuge in them and recover. They walk and feed. They lie down and chew their cud. O Lord, complete me and reveal these things to me. Look, your voice is my joy. Your voice is above the abundance of pleasures. Give me what I love. I do love. You gave me this love. Do not abandon your gifts. Do not despise your grass that thirsts. I will confess to you whatever I find in your Books. I will hear the voice of praise and drink you in. I will consider the wonders of your law from the beginning when you made heaven and earth all the way to the eternal kingdom of your holy city with you.
Lord, have mercy on me and hear my desire. I believe my longing does not spring from earthly things. It does not come from gold and silver and precious stones. It does not arise from fine clothing or honors and power or the pleasures of the flesh. Nor does it stem from the necessities of the body and this life of our pilgrimage. All these things are given to us when we seek your kingdom and righteousness. Look, Lord my God, and see where my desire comes from. The wicked have told me of their delights, but they are nothing like your law, O Lord. See, this is where my desire springs from. Look, Father, gaze upon me and see and approve. May it please you in your mercy that I find grace before you. Open the inner depths of your words to me as I knock. I beg you through our Lord Jesus Christ your Son. He is the man of your right hand, the Son of Man whom you established for yourself as mediator between you and us. Through him you sought us when we were not seeking you. You sought us so that we might seek you. He is your Word through whom you made all things, including me. He is your Only Begotten through whom you called the believing people into adoption, including me. Through him I beg you. He sits at your right hand and intercedes for us. In him are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. These treasures I seek in your books. Moses wrote of him. This is what he says. This is what Truth says.
Chapter 3. He Begins from the Creation of the World — Not Understanding the Hebrew Text.
I will listen and understand how you made heaven and earth in the beginning. Moses wrote this down. He wrote it and departed. He passed from here to you through you. He is not before me now. If he were here, I would hold onto him. I would ask him questions. I would beg him through you to explain these things to me. I would offer the ears of my body to the sounds bursting from his mouth. If he spoke in Hebrew, he would strike my understanding in vain. Nothing from his words would touch my mind. But if he spoke in Latin, I would know what he was saying. Yet how would I know whether he was telling the truth? Even if I knew this, would I really know it from him? No. Deep within me, within the dwelling place of thought, Truth would speak without Hebrew or Greek or Latin or foreign words. Truth would speak without the organs of mouth and tongue. Truth would speak without the noise of syllables. Truth would say"He speaks truly."Then I would immediately say with certainty and confidence to that man of yours"You speak truly."Since I cannot question Moses, I ask you instead. You filled him when he spoke these true things. Truth, I ask you. My God, I ask you to forgive my sins. You gave your servant the power to speak these words. Now give me the power to understand them.
Chapter 4. Heaven and Earth Cry Out that They Have Been Created by God.
Look at heaven and earth. They cry out that they are created things. They change and they vary. But whatever has not been made and yet exists has nothing in it that was not there before. That is what it means to change and vary. They also cry out that they did not make themselves."This is why we exist,"they say."We exist because we were made. We did not exist before we came to be. We could not have made ourselves."The voice of those who speak is the evidence itself. Therefore you made them, Lord. You are beautiful, so they are beautiful. You are good, so they are good. You exist, so they exist. Yet they are not beautiful as you are beautiful. They are not good as you are good. They do not exist as you exist, their creator. Compared to you, they are not beautiful. They are not good. They do not exist. We know these things. Thanks to you. Our knowledge compared to your knowledge is ignorance.
Chapter 5. God Created the World Not from Any Certain Matter, But in His Own Word.
But how did you make heaven and earth? What was the mechanism of such a vast operation as yours? You did not work like a human craftsman who shapes one body from another body. The craftsman's soul has the power to impose whatever form it sees with its inner eye. But where would this power come from unless you had made the soul? The craftsman imposes form on something that already exists and already has being. He works with clay or stone or wood or gold or any such material. But where would these materials come from unless you had established them? You made the craftsman's body. You made the mind that commands his limbs. You made the material from which he makes something. You made the skill by which he grasps his art and sees inwardly what he will make outwardly. You made the bodily sense that serves as interpreter. Through this sense he transfers from mind to material what he makes. Through this sense he reports back to his mind what has been made. Then the mind consults the truth that presides within it to judge whether the work is good. All these things praise you as creator of all. But how do you make them? How did you make heaven and earth, O God? Certainly you did not make heaven and earth in heaven or on earth. You did not make them in the air or in the waters since these too belong to heaven and earth. You did not make the whole world within the world because there was no place for it to be made before it was made. You held nothing in your hand from which to make heaven and earth. For where would you get something you had not made from which to make something else? What exists except because you exist? Therefore you spoke and they were made. In your word you made them.
Chapter 6. He Did Not, However, Create It by a Sounding and Passing Word.
But how did you speak? Was it in the way that the voice came from the cloud saying"This is my beloved son"? That voice was performed and completed. It began and ended. The syllables sounded and passed away. The second came after the first. The third came after the second. And so on in order until the last came after all the others. Silence came after the last. From this it is clear and evident that the movement of a creature expressed that voice. The movement itself was temporal and served your eternal will. These words made in time were announced by the outer ear to the prudent mind. The inner ear of that mind is positioned toward your eternal Word. But the mind compared these words sounding in time with your eternal Word in silence. It said"This is different. This is far different. These words are far below me. They do not truly exist because they flee and pass away. But the Word of my Lord remains above me forever."So if you spoke with sounding and passing words to make heaven and earth happen, and you did make heaven and earth this way, then there was already a bodily creature before heaven and earth. Through its temporal movements that temporal voice would run its course. But there was no body before heaven and earth. Or if there was one, you certainly had made it without a passing voice. You would use it to make the passing voice by which you would say"Let heaven and earth come to be."Whatever that thing was from which such a voice would come, unless it had been made by you, it would not exist at all. So by what word from you was the body made from which these words would come?
Chapter 7. By His Co-Eternal Word He Speaks, and All Things are Done.
You call us to understand the Word. God with you who is God. This Word is spoken eternally. In this Word all things are spoken eternally. What was being spoken never ends so that something else can be said to complete everything. Instead all things are spoken at once and eternally. Otherwise there would already be time and change. There would be no true eternity. There would be no true immortality. I know this, my God. I give thanks. I know this and I confess it to you, Lord. Anyone who is not ungrateful to certain truth knows this with me and blesses you. We know this, Lord. We know it. To the extent that anything is not what it was and is what it was not, to that same extent it dies and is born. Therefore nothing of your Word passes away or takes its place. Your Word is truly immortal and eternal. Through the Word that is co-eternal with you, you speak all things that you speak simultaneously and eternally. Whatever you say to be made comes into being. You create in no other way than by speaking. Yet not all things that you make by speaking come into being simultaneously and eternally.
Chapter 8. That Word Itself is the Beginning of All Things, in the Which We are Instructed as to Evangelical Truth.
Why is this so, I ask you, Lord my God? I see it somehow. But I do not know how to express it. I know only this: everything that begins to exist and ceases to exist begins at the moment and ceases at the moment when eternal reason recognizes that it should begin or should cease. In that eternal reason nothing begins and nothing ceases. That eternal reason is your Word. It is also the Beginning because it speaks to us. In the Gospel it spoke through flesh in this way. This sounded outwardly in human ears so that people might believe. It sounded so they might seek inwardly. It sounded so they might find the Word in eternal truth where the one good Teacher teaches all disciples. There I hear your voice, Lord, telling me that he who teaches us is the one who speaks to us. Anyone who does not teach us is not speaking to us, even if he speaks. Who teaches us except unchanging truth? Even when we are warned through changeable creation, we are led to unchanging truth. There we truly learn when we stand and hear him. There we rejoice with joy because of the bridegroom's voice. We return to the source of our being. Therefore the Word is the Beginning. If it did not remain, there would be nowhere for us to return when we wander astray. When we return from error, we return by knowing. For us to know, he teaches us because he is the Beginning and speaks to us.
Chapter 9. Wisdom and the Beginning.
In this Beginning you made heaven and earth, O God, in your Word, in your Son, in your Power, in your Wisdom, in your Truth, speaking in a wondrous way and creating in a wondrous way. Who can understand this? Who can tell it? What is this light that shines through to me and strikes my heart without wounding it? I shudder and I burn. I shudder because I am unlike him. I burn because I am like him. It is Wisdom, Wisdom itself, that shines through to me, splitting apart my cloud. But that cloud covers me again when I fall away from Wisdom, blinded by the darkness and burden of my punishments. My strength has been so weakened by poverty that I cannot bear my own good. This will be so until you, Lord, who have been merciful to all my wrongdoings, also heal all my sicknesses. For you will redeem my life from corruption and crown me with loving-kindness and mercy. You will satisfy my desire with good things. My youth will be renewed like the eagle's. We have been saved by hope. We wait patiently for your promises. Let whoever can hear you speaking within listen. I will cry out confidently from your oracle:"How magnificent are your works, O Lord! You have made all things in Wisdom!"And that Wisdom is the Beginning. In that Beginning you made heaven and earth.
Chapter 10. The Rashness of Those Who Inquire What God Did Before He Created Heaven and Earth.
Look how full of their antiquated ideas are those who ask us:"What was God doing before he made heaven and earth?"They say:"If he was idle and not working on anything, why didn't he continue that way forever, just as he had always refrained from work in the past?"They continue:"If any new movement arose in God, and a new will to create a creature he had never created before, how can this still be true eternity when a will arises that did not exist before?"They argue:"God's will is not a creature, but exists before creation. Nothing would be created unless the creator's will came first."They conclude:"Therefore his will belongs to God's very substance."Their logic continues:"If something arose in God's substance that was not there before, then that substance cannot truly be called eternal."But they ask:"If God's will was everlasting for creation to exist, why isn't creation everlasting too?"
Chapter 11. They Who Ask This Have Not as Yet Known the Eternity of God, Which is Exempt from the Relation of Time.
Those who speak this way do not yet understand you, O Wisdom of God, light of minds. They do not yet understand how things happen through you and in you. They try to taste eternal things. But their hearts still flutter about in the past and future movements of things. Their hearts are still empty. Who will hold that heart and fix it in place so that it stands still for a little while? Who will help it catch a little of the splendor of eternity that always stands? Who will help it compare eternity with times that never stand still? Then it would see that eternity cannot be compared to time. It would see that a long time becomes long only from many passing movements that cannot be stretched out all at once. But nothing passes away in eternity. Everything is present there. No time is ever completely present. It would see all the past being pushed out by the future. It would see all the future following from the past. It would see all past and future being created and flowing out from what is always present. Who will hold the human heart so that it stands still and sees this truth? How does eternity, standing still, speak both future and past times when eternity is neither future nor past? Can my hand accomplish this? Can the hand of my mouth accomplish such a great thing through words?
Chapter 12. What God Did Before the Creation of the World.
Listen. I respond to the one who asks,"What was God doing before he made heaven and earth?"I do not respond with what someone is said to have answered as a joke to dodge the force of the question."He was preparing hell for those who pry into deep matters,"the person said. It is one thing to see truth. It is another thing to laugh at questions. I do not give this answer. I would rather respond,"I do not know"about what I do not know. This is better than giving an answer that mocks the one who asked a profound question and praises the one who gave a false response. But I say this to you, our God, creator of every creature. If by the name"heaven and earth"every creature is understood, then I boldly say this."Before God made heaven and earth, he was not making anything. If he was making something, what was he making except a creature?"I wish I knew everything I want to know usefully as clearly as I know this one thing. No creature was being made before any creature was made.
Chapter 13. Before the Times Created by God, Times Were Not.
But if anyone's restless mind wanders through images of past times and marvels that you, almighty God, creator and sustainer of all things, maker of heaven and earth, rested from such great work for countless ages before you made it, let him wake up and pay attention. He marvels at something false. From where could countless ages have passed by that you yourself had not made, since you are the author and founder of all ages? What times could there have been that were not established by you? How could they have passed by if they had never existed? Since you are the creator of all times, if there was any time before you made heaven and earth, why is it said that you rested from work? You had made that very time itself. Times could not have passed by before you made times. But if there was no time before heaven and earth, why does anyone ask what you were doing then? There was no"then"where there was no time.
You do not come before times by being in time. Otherwise you would not come before all times. But you come before all past things by the height of your eternally present majesty. You rise above all future things because they are still to come. When they arrive they will be past. But you remain the same. Your years do not fail. Your years neither go nor come. Our years both go and come so that all may arrive. All your years stand together because they stand still. The departing ones are not shut out by the arriving ones because they do not pass away. But all our years will exist only when none of them exist anymore. Your years are one day. Your day is not daily but today. Your today does not yield to tomorrow. It does not follow yesterday either. Your today is eternity. Therefore you gave birth to your co-eternal Son when you said"Today I have begotten you."You made all times. You exist before all times. There was no time when time did not exist.
Chapter 14. Neither Time Past Nor Future, But the Present Only, Really is.
You have never been without creative activity because you created time itself. No periods of time share eternity with you because you remain constant. If those periods remained constant they would not be time. What is time? Who can explain this easily and briefly? Who can grasp this concept well enough to put it into words? Yet what do we mention more familiarly and knowingly in our speech than time? We certainly understand when we speak of it. We also understand when we hear another person speak of it. What then is time? If no one asks me I know. If I want to explain it to someone who asks I do not know. Yet I confidently say that I know this much. If nothing passed away there would be no past time. If nothing were approaching there would be no future time. If nothing existed there would be no present time. How do those two times exist—past and future—when the past no longer exists and the future does not yet exist? But if the present were always present and never passed into the past it would no longer be time but eternity. If the present becomes time precisely because it passes into the past then how do we say that this thing exists when its reason for existing is that it will not exist? We cannot truly say that time exists except insofar as it tends toward non-existence.
Chapter 15. There is Only a Moment of Present Time.
And yet we say long time and short time. We never say this except about the past or the future. We call past time long when we speak of a hundred years ago. We likewise call future time long when we speak of a hundred years from now. We call past time short when we speak of ten days ago. We call future time short when we speak of ten days from now. But how can something be long or short when it does not exist? The past no longer exists. The future does not yet exist. Therefore we should not say"It is long."Instead we should say about the past"It was long."We should say about the future"It will be long."My Lord, my light, will not your truth mock humanity even here? When was past time long? Was it long when it had already become past? Or was it long when it was still present? It could only be long when there was something that could be long. But once past, it no longer existed. Therefore it could not be long since it did not exist at all. So we should not say"Past time was long."We will find nothing that was long once it became past and ceased to exist. Instead we should say"That present time was long."When it was present, it was long. It had not yet passed away into nonexistence. Therefore there was something that could be long. But after it passed away, it immediately stopped being long because it stopped existing.
Let us examine this question, O human soul: can the present time be long? You have been given the power to sense delays and measure them. What will you answer me? Can a hundred present years constitute a long time? First consider whether a hundred years can actually be present. If the first of those years is happening, then that year is present. But the other ninety-nine are future. Therefore they do not yet exist. If the second year is happening, then one year has already passed. One year is present. The rest are future. We could place any middle year of this hundred-year span in the present. The years before it will be past. The years after it will be future. Therefore a hundred years cannot be present. Consider at least whether the single year that is happening can itself be present. If the first month of that year is happening, the other months are future. If the second month is happening, then the first has already passed. The remaining months do not yet exist. Therefore the year that is happening is not entirely present. If it is not entirely present, then it is not a present year. A year consists of twelve months. Whichever single month is happening is present. The other months are either past or future. Yet even the month that is happening is not present. Only one day is present. If it is the first day, the other days are future. If it is the last day, the other days are past. If it is any day in the middle, it stands between past days and future days.
Look at this present time that we alone found worthy to call long. It has shrunk to barely the span of a single day. But let us examine even this day. Not even one whole day is present. The day is filled out by all twenty-four hours of night and day. The first hour has all the others as future. The last hour has them as past. Any hour in between has some hours as past before it and some hours as future after it. Even that single hour is driven along by fleeting particles. Whatever part of it has flown away is past. Whatever remains is future. If any stretch of time can be understood that cannot be divided into parts—even the tiniest moments—that alone is what we should call present. Yet this present rushes so swiftly from future into past that it lasts no time at all. If it did last, it would be divided into past and future. But the present has no duration. Where then is the time that we call long? Is it in the future? We certainly do not say"It is long"because what would be long does not yet exist. Instead we say"It will be long."When will it be long then? If it is still future at that point, it will not be long. What would be long will not yet exist. But if it will be long when it begins to exist—when it stops being future and becomes present so that something can exist to be long—then the present time itself cries out in the words above that it cannot be long.
Chapter 16. Time Can Only Be Perceived or Measured While It is Passing.
And yet, Lord, we feel the intervals of time. We compare them with each other. We say some are longer and others are shorter. We even measure how much shorter or longer one time is than another. We answer that this time is double or triple. That time is simple. Or this time equals that time. But we measure times as they pass by sensing them as we measure. Who can measure past times that no longer exist? Who can measure future times that do not yet exist? Unless someone dares to say they can measure what does not exist. So when time is passing, it can be felt and measured. But when it has passed, it cannot be measured because it no longer exists.
Chapter 17. Nevertheless There is Time Past and Future.
I ask, Father, I do not assert. My God, guide me and rule me. Who is there that would tell me there are not three times, as we children learned and as we taught children—past, present, and future—but only the present, because those other two do not exist? Or do they also exist, but proceed from some hidden place when the future becomes present? And do they retreat into some hidden place when the present becomes past? For where did those who sang of future things see them, if they do not yet exist? What does not exist cannot be seen. And those who tell of past things surely would not tell of them if they did not perceive them in their minds. If these things were nothing at all, they could not be perceived at all. Therefore both future and past exist.
Chapter 18. Past and Future Times Cannot Be Thought of But as Present.
Let me stop searching any further, Lord. Let my hope remain steady. Let my purpose stay untroubled. If future and past things truly exist, I want to know where they are. Even if I cannot yet grasp this fully, I know one thing for certain. Wherever these things exist, they are not there as future or past things. They exist there as present things. If they were future in that place, they would not yet be there. If they were past in that place, they would no longer be there. Therefore, wherever these things are, whatever they are, they exist only as present realities. When we tell true stories about the past, we do not pull forth from memory the actual things that have passed away. We pull forth words formed from images of those things. Those images were fixed in the mind like footprints when the experiences passed through our senses. My childhood no longer exists. It belongs to past time, which no longer exists. But when I remember and speak of childhood, I observe its image in present time. The image still lives in my memory. I wonder if the same principle applies to predicting future things. Do images of things that do not yet exist somehow present themselves to us as already existing? I confess, my God, I do not know. But I do know this much clearly. We often think through our future actions beforehand. That planning happens in the present moment. But the action we are planning does not yet exist, because it is still future. When we begin that action and start doing what we planned, then the action will exist. At that moment it will no longer be future but present.
However mysterious the secret foreknowledge of future things may be, only what exists can be seen. What already exists is not future but present. When people claim to see future events, they do not see the actual things that do not yet exist. They see instead the causes or perhaps the signs of those future things. These causes and signs already exist. Therefore they are not future but present to those who observe them. From these present realities, future events are conceived in the mind and predicted. These mental conceptions already exist. Those who make predictions observe these conceptions as present realities within themselves. Let me offer an example from the countless array of such phenomena. I observe the dawn and announce that the sun will rise. What I observe is present. What I announce is future. The sun itself is not future since it already exists. But its rising has not yet occurred. Yet I could not predict even this rising unless I imagined it in my mind as I do now while speaking of it. But the dawn I see in the sky is not the sunrise itself, though it precedes the sunrise. Nor is my mental image of the sunrise the actual event. These two present things are perceived so that the future event may be predicted. Therefore future things do not yet exist. If they do not yet exist, they do not exist at all. If they do not exist, they cannot possibly be seen. But they can be predicted from present things that already exist and are visible.
Chapter 19. We are Ignorant in What Manner God Teaches Future Things.
You are the ruler of all you have created. What is the way you teach souls about things that are yet to come? You taught your prophets. What is this way you teach the future to one for whom nothing is future? Or rather, do you teach present things about future events? What does not exist certainly cannot be taught. This way is far too distant from my sight. It is too strong for me. I cannot reach it. But I will be able to reach it through you when you give it. You are the sweet light of my hidden eyes.
Chapter 20. In What Manner Time May Properly Be Designated.
What is now clear and evident is this. Future things do not exist. Past things do not exist. We should not properly say that there are three times: past, present, and future. Perhaps we should say instead that there are three times: the present of past things, the present of present things, and the present of future things. These three exist in the soul. I see them nowhere else. The present of past things is memory. The present of present things is direct observation. The present of future things is expectation. If we are allowed to speak this way, then I see three times. I admit there are three. Let people also say that there are three times: past, present, and future. Custom misuses language this way. Let them speak like this. I do not care. I do not resist. I do not criticize. But they must understand what they are saying. They must know that what is future does not yet exist. They must know that what is past no longer exists. We speak properly about few things. We speak improperly about most things. But our meaning is still recognized.
Chapter 21. How Time May Be Measured.
I said a little while ago that we measure passing time so that we can say this period is twice as long as that one, or this equals that, and whatever else we can report about portions of time through measurement. Therefore, as I was saying, we measure time as it passes. And if someone asks me"How do you know?"I would answer"I know because we do measure it. We cannot measure things that do not exist. Past and future do not exist. But how do we measure present time when it has no duration? Therefore it is measured as it passes. But once it has passed, it is not measured because there is nothing left to measure. But from where and through what and to where does it pass when we measure it? From where, if not from the future? Through what, if not through the present? To where, if not into the past? Therefore from that which does not yet exist, through that which lacks duration, into that which no longer exists. But what do we measure except time in some span? We do not speak of single, double, triple, and equal unless we mean spans of time. In what span then do we measure passing time? Do we measure it in the future from which it passes? But we do not measure what does not yet exist. Do we measure it in the present through which it passes? But we do not measure what has no span. Do we measure it in the past into which it passes? But we do not measure what no longer exists.
Chapter 22. He Prays God that He Would Explain This Most Entangled Enigma.
My soul burned to understand this most complex riddle. Do not close these mysteries to my desire, good Lord God my Father. Through Christ I beg you, do not shut out my longing for these things both familiar and hidden. Let me penetrate them. Let them shine clear in the light of your mercy, Lord. Who else can I question about these matters? To whom can I confess my ignorance more fruitfully than to you? My studies do not trouble you. They burn intensely for your Scriptures. Give me what I love. I do love, and this love you have given me. Give, Father, you who truly know how to give good gifts to your children. Give, because I have undertaken to know, and the work lies before me until you open it. Through Christ I beg. In the name of him who is Holy of Holies, let no one drown me out. I believed, and therefore I speak. This is my hope. For this I live, that I may contemplate the delight of the Lord. Behold, you have made my days old. They pass away. How they pass, I do not know. We say"time and time, times and times."How long did he speak this? How long did he do this? And how long have I not seen that thing? This syllable takes twice as long as that simple short one. We say these things. We hear these things. We are understood and we understand. They are most obvious and most familiar. Yet the same things lie too deeply hidden. Their discovery is always new.
Chapter 23. That Time is a Certain Extension.
I heard from a learned man that the movements of the sun and moon and stars are time itself. I did not agree. Why shouldn't the movements of all bodies be time instead? If the lights of heaven stopped but a potter's wheel kept turning, would there be no time by which we could measure its rotations? Would we not say that it moves at equal intervals? Or if it moved sometimes slower and sometimes faster, would we not say that some rotations last longer and others shorter? And when we said this, would we not be speaking in time? Would there not be long syllables and short syllables in our words because some sound for a longer time and others for a shorter time? God, grant people the ability to see in small things the universal principles that govern both small and great things. The stars and lights of heaven exist for signs and seasons and years and days. This is true. But I would not say that one rotation of that little wooden wheel makes a day. Yet the learned man should not therefore say that it is not time at all.
I long to understand the force and nature of time. We use time to measure the movements of bodies. We say that one movement lasts twice as long as another. I have a question about how we define a day. A day means more than just the sun's presence above the earth. That definition would make day different from night. Instead, a day includes the sun's complete circuit from east to east. When we say"So many days have passed,"we count the nights too. The nights are not separate from the days. So a day is completed by the sun's movement and circuit from east to east. But I wonder: Is the day the movement itself? Is it the duration that the movement takes? Or is it both? Consider the first option. Suppose the day were just the movement. Then we would still have a day even if the sun completed its course in one hour's time. Consider the second option. Suppose the day were just the duration. Then we would not have a day if the time from one sunrise to the next lasted only one hour. The sun would have to circle twenty-four times to complete a day. Consider the third option. Suppose the day were both movement and duration. Then we could not call it a day if the sun completed its full revolution in one hour's space. We also could not call it a day if the sun stopped moving but the same amount of time passed that the sun usually takes to complete its circuit from morning to morning. So I will not ask what we call a day. Instead I will ask what time itself is. We use time to measure the sun's circuit. We might say the circuit was completed in half the usual time. Or we might say it was completed in twelve hours' time. We compare the two periods and call one simple and the other double. This would be true even if sometimes the sun circled from east to east in the simple period and sometimes in the double period. Let no one tell me that the movements of heavenly bodies are time itself. Once someone prayed and the sun stood still so he could finish a victorious battle. The sun stood still but time kept moving. That fight was waged and finished in its own span of time. The span was sufficient for the task. I see that time is a kind of stretching out. But do I really see this or do I only seem to see it? You will show me, Light and Truth.
Chapter 24. That Time is Not a Motion of a Body Which We Measure by Time.
You want me to approve if someone says that time is the motion of a body? You do not want this. I understand that no body moves except in time. That is what you say. But I do not understand that the motion of a body itself is time. That is not what you say. When a body moves, I measure by time how long it moves. I measure from when it begins to move until it stops. If I did not see when it began and it continues moving so that I do not see when it stops, I cannot measure it. I can only measure from when I begin to see until I stop seeing. If I watch for a long time, I report only that the time is long. I do not report how much time it is. When we say"how much,"we speak by comparison. We say things like"this much as that much"or"this is double that"and other things in this manner. But suppose we can mark the distances of places. We mark where the moving body comes from and where it goes. Or we mark its parts if it moves like on a lathe. Then we can say how much time there is. We measure from when the motion of the body or its part was completed from that place to this place. The motion of a body is one thing. What we use to measure how long it lasts is another thing. Who does not sense which of these should rather be called time? Sometimes a body moves in different ways. Sometimes it stands still. We measure not only its motion by time but also its stillness. We say"it stood still as long as it moved"or"it stood still double or triple the time it moved."We say other things that our measurement has grasped or estimated, as is commonly said, more or less. Therefore time is not the motion of a body.
Chapter 25. He Calls on God to Enlighten His Mind.
I confess to you, Lord, that I still do not know what time is. And again I confess to you, Lord, that I know I speak these words in time. I know that I have been speaking about time for a long while. And that very"long while"is long only because of time's passage. How then do I know this when I do not know what time is? Or perhaps I do not know how to express what I know? Woe is me—I do not even know what I do not know! Behold, my God, before you I do not lie. As I speak, so is my heart. You will light my lamp, Lord my God. You will illuminate my darkness.
Chapter 26. We Measure Longer Events by Shorter in Time.
Does not my soul confess to you in truthful confession that I measure time? So then my God, I measure, yet I do not know what I measure. I measure the movement of a body by time. But do I not also measure time itself? Could I measure how long a body's movement lasts and how long it takes to get from here to there unless I measured the time in which it moves? So from where do I measure time itself? Do we measure a longer time by a shorter time, just as we measure the space of a beam by the space of a cubit? We seem to measure the duration of a long syllable by the duration of a short syllable and call it double. So we measure the duration of poems by the duration of verses. We measure the duration of verses by the duration of feet. We measure the duration of feet by the duration of syllables. We measure the duration of long syllables by the duration of short ones. We do not measure on pages, for in that way we measure places, not times. We measure when voices pass by as we speak and we say,"It is a long poem because it is woven from so many verses. The verses are long because they consist of so many feet. The feet are long because they stretch through so many syllables. It is a long syllable because it is double compared to a short one."But no sure measure of time is grasped this way. It can happen that a shorter verse may sound through a greater span of time if it is pronounced more slowly than a longer verse pronounced more quickly. The same applies to a poem, to a foot, to a syllable. From this it seemed to me that time is nothing other than extension. But extension of what thing, I do not know. I wonder if it is not extension of the mind itself. What do I measure, I beg you my God, when I say either indefinitely,"This time is longer than that,"or even definitely,"This is double that"? I measure time, I know this. But I do not measure the future because it does not yet exist. I do not measure the present because it extends through no duration. I do not measure the past because it no longer exists. What then do I measure? Do I measure times as they pass by, not times that have passed? This is what I had said.
Chapter 27. Times are Measured in Proportion as They Pass by.
Press on, my soul, and pay close attention. God is our helper. He made us, and we did not make ourselves. Watch where truth begins to dawn. Consider this example. A voice from the body begins to sound. It sounds. It continues to sound. Now it stops. Silence has come. That voice is past. It is no longer a voice. Before it sounded, it was future. It could not be measured because it did not yet exist. Now it cannot be measured because it no longer exists. It could be measured when it was sounding. At that moment there was something that could be measured. But even then it did not stand still. It was moving and passing away. Could it be measured better for this reason? As it passed, it stretched across some span of time by which it could be measured. The present moment has no span. If it could be measured then, consider this. Another voice begins to sound. It still sounds in continuous tone without any break. Let us measure it while it sounds. When it stops sounding, it will be past. There will be nothing left to measure. Let us measure it clearly and say how long it is. But it still sounds. It cannot be measured except from its beginning when it started to sound to its end when it stops. We measure the interval itself from some beginning to some end. Therefore a voice that has not yet finished cannot be measured. We cannot say how long or short it is. We cannot say it equals another voice or is single or double compared to another or anything else. When it is finished, it will no longer exist. How then can it be measured? Yet we do measure time. We do not measure times that do not yet exist. We do not measure times that no longer exist. We do not measure times that stretch out without pause. We do not measure times that have no boundaries. We measure neither future times nor past times nor present times nor passing times. Yet we do measure time.
"God, creator of all things."This verse has eight syllables. It alternates between short and long syllables. There are four short syllables. The first, third, fifth, and seventh are simple compared to the four long ones. These are the second, fourth, sixth, and eighth. Each long syllable takes twice as much time as each short one. I pronounce it. I pronounce it again. This is exactly what my senses tell me clearly. My senses tell me clearly that I measure a long syllable by a short one. I perceive that the long one lasts twice as long. But when one sounds after the other—if the first is short and the second is long—how do I hold onto the short one? How do I apply it as a measure to the long one to discover that the long one lasts twice as long? The long syllable cannot begin to sound until the short one stops sounding. Do I measure the long syllable while it is present? I cannot measure it until it is finished. But when it is finished, it has become past. What then am I measuring? Where is the short syllable that I use to measure? Where is the long syllable that I measure? Both have sounded. Both have flown away. Both have passed. Both no longer exist. Yet I do measure. I answer confidently—as much as a trained sense can be trusted—that one syllable is simple and the other is double in duration. I cannot do this unless the syllables have passed and are finished. Therefore I do not measure the syllables themselves, which no longer exist. I measure something in my memory that remains fixed there.
In you, my soul, I measure time. Do not argue with me. What is more, do not argue with yourself through the turmoil of your emotions. In you, I say, I measure time. I measure the impression that passing things make upon you. When those things have passed by, the impression remains. I measure this present impression, not the things that passed by to create it. I measure the impression itself when I measure time. Therefore either impressions are time itself, or I do not measure time at all. What happens when we measure silence? We say that silence lasted as long as a voice did. Do we not stretch our thought to match the measure of the voice as if it were sounding? This way we can report something about the intervals of silence within the span of time. Even when voice and mouth have stopped, we complete songs in our thinking. We complete verses and every kind of speech. We complete whatever movements we choose. We report about spans of time - how long this is compared to that. We do this exactly as if we were speaking these things aloud. Suppose someone wants to produce a rather long sound. He decides beforehand through meditation how long it will be. This person has certainly spent a span of time in silence. He commits it to memory and begins to produce that sound which is sounding. He continues until it reaches the intended limit. Rather, it has sounded and it will sound. The part already completed has certainly sounded. The part that remains will sound. The process continues this way. Present attention transfers the future into the past. The future diminishes while the past grows. This continues until the consumption of the future makes everything past.
Chapter 28. Time in the Human Mind, Which Expects, Considers, and Remembers.
But how can the future shrink or be consumed when it does not yet exist? How can the past grow when it no longer exists? This happens only because three things exist in the mind that acts upon them. The mind expects. The mind attends. The mind remembers. What the mind expects passes through what it attends to and becomes what it remembers. Who can deny that future things do not yet exist? Yet expectation of future things already exists in the mind. Who can deny that past things no longer exist? Yet memory of past things still remains in the mind. Who can deny that present time lacks duration because it passes in an instant? Yet attention endures and makes what will come to pass continue toward absence. Therefore a long future time is not something that does not exist. A long future is a long expectation of the future. A long past time is not something that does not exist. A long past is a long memory of the past.
I am about to recite a song that I know. Before I begin, my entire expectation stretches forward. But when I have started, whatever portion I have plucked from it into the past stretches into my memory. The life of this action of mine is pulled in two directions. It stretches toward memory because of what I have said. It stretches toward expectation because of what I am about to say. Yet my present attention remains. Through this attention passes whatever was future so that it becomes past. The more the action proceeds and proceeds, the shorter expectation becomes and the longer memory grows. This continues until all expectation is consumed when that entire action finishes and passes completely into memory. What happens in the whole song also happens in each of its parts and in each of its syllables. This same thing happens in a longer action of which that song is perhaps a part. It happens in the entire life of a person whose parts are all human actions. It happens in the whole age of humanity whose parts are all human lives.
Chapter 29. That Human Life is a Distraction But that Through the Mercy of God He Was Intent on the Prize of His Heavenly Calling.
But since your mercy is better than life itself, look how my life is stretched out in distraction. Your right hand has lifted me up in my Lord the mediator. He is the Son of man between you who are one and us who are many. We are many through many things. Through him I may grasp that in which I have already been grasped. I gather myself from my former days. I follow the one thing. I forget what lies behind. I do not stretch toward things that are future and passing. I stretch toward what lies ahead. I am not pulled apart but extended forward. I do not follow according to distraction but according to focused intention. I press toward the prize of the high calling. There I will hear the voice of your praise. There I will gaze upon your delight. It will neither come nor pass away. But now my years pass in groaning. You are my comfort, Lord. You are my eternal Father. But I have been scattered into different times. I do not know their order. My thoughts are torn apart by tumultuous changes. The deepest parts of my soul are torn. This will continue until I flow together into you. I will be purified and made clear by the fire of your love.
Chapter 30. Again He Refutes the Empty Question, What Did God Before the Creation of the World?
I will stand firm and be strengthened in you, in my true form, through your truth. I will not tolerate the questions of people who thirst for more than they can grasp because of their diseased curiosity. They ask what God was doing before he made heaven and earth. They wonder what came into his mind to make him create something when he had never made anything before. Grant them, Lord, to think clearly about what they are saying. Let them discover that"never"cannot be spoken where time does not exist. When someone says"he never made anything,"what else does this mean except"he made nothing at no time"? Let them see that no time can exist without creation. Let them stop speaking such foolishness. Let them also stretch forward to what lies ahead. Let them understand that you are the eternal creator of all times, existing before all ages. No times are co-eternal with you. No creature is co-eternal with you, even if some creature exists beyond time.
Chapter 31. How the Knowledge of God Differs from that of Man.
Lord my God, what is that deep hidden place within you? How far have the consequences of my sins cast me away from it? Heal my eyes so I may rejoice together with your light. Certainly if there exists a mind endowed with such vast knowledge and foreknowledge that all past and future things are known to it as clearly as one familiar song is known to me, then that mind is beyond wonder. It inspires trembling awe. Nothing that has been accomplished escapes it. Nothing that remains of the ages to come is hidden from it. This is just as nothing escapes me when I sing that familiar song. I know what portion has passed from the beginning. I know what portion remains until the end. But far be it from you, creator of the universe and maker of souls and bodies, that you should know all future and past things in such a way. You are far beyond this. You are far more wonderful. You are far more mysterious. A singer's feelings change as he expects future notes and remembers past ones. A listener's emotions shift as the familiar song plays. His awareness stretches through time. But nothing like this happens to you, who are unchangeably eternal. You are truly the eternal creator of minds. Just as you knew heaven and earth in the beginning without any change in your knowledge, so you made heaven and earth in the beginning without any stretching out of your action. Let whoever understands give you praise. Let whoever does not understand give you praise. How exalted you are! The humble in heart are your dwelling place. You lift up the crushed. Those whose height you are can never fall.