BAD EFFECTS OF A LONG HOLIDAY 35

who did not do so much for their children: yet this same father had no concern for my spiritual progress, nor for the purity of my life, so long as I became a cultivated speaker-however barren of Thy culture, O God, Who art the only true and good Lord of the ground of my heart.

But when in my sixteenth year I began to be at home, and had for a time an entire holiday—an interruption in my studies necessitated by my parents narrow means-the briers of lust grew rankly, and there was no hand to root them out. Nay, indeed, for my father, when he saw me at the baths, and knew that I was ripening into manhood, and invested with youthful energies, made gestures of joy, hoping that his name would be handed down to posterity, and with delight conversed thereupon with my mother; intoxicated with that joy, wherein the world forgets Thee, its Creator, and loves Thy creature instead of Thee— an intoxication brought about by the invisible wine of its perverse and grovelling inclinations. But in my mother's breast Thou hadst already begun Thy temple, and the foundation of Thy holy habitation: whereas my father was only a catechumen, and that but recently. Therefore she started with a pious fear and trembling; and although I was not yet baptized, feared lest I should fall into those crooked ways in which they walk who "turn their back to Thee, and not their face." I

Ah me! and dare I say, my God, that Thou didst hold Thy peace when I was wandering further and further from Thee! Is it so that Thou wert altogether silent? And whose then were those words

36 HE LAUGHS AT HIS MOTHER'S ADVICE

but Thine, which through my mother, Thy faithful one, Thou didst sing in my ears? none of them sank down into my heart then, that they might have effect. For she desired me, and I remember in private with what earnestness she warned me to keep myself from fornication, and even still more from adultery. I took it all as mere womanish advice, which I should be ashamed to obey. But it was Thine, and I knew it not; and I thought that Thou wert silent, and that she alone spoke to me-she, who was but Thy mouthpiece, in whom, when she was despised by her son, Thou wert despised by "the son of Thy handmaid, Thy servant." 1 But I did not realise it; and I rushed headlong with such blindness, that amongst my equals I was ashamed to be behindhand in wickedness, when I heard them boasting of their shameful actions, and glorying in them so much the more the viler they were, and I was disposed to do the same, not only for the pleasure of the deed but also for the sake of their praise. What is worthy of blame but vice? But I made myself out more vicious, that I might not be blamed; and when I had it not in my power to equal these abandoned ones, I feigned that I had done what I had not done, lest I should seem less honourable from being more innocent, and be accounted of less importance because I was more chaste.

Behold with what companions I used to pace the streets of Babylon, and I wallowed in the mire thereof, as if amid spices and precious ointments. And in the very midst of it, that I might cleave to it the tighter, the invisible enemy trod me down and seduced me, for I was ready for seduction. For 1 Ps. cxvi. 16.

EARTHLY HOPES

37

neither did she, the mother of my flesh-who had already "fled from the midst of Babylon" but tarried on its outskirts-as she warned me against immorality, so heed what her husband had told her concerning me, as to restrain within the boundaries of conjugal affection (if it could not be cut to the quick) what she felt was already most hateful and would become afterwards most dangerous. She did not recommend this course, for she was afraid lest a wife should turn out to be an obstacle and a clog to my hopes; not that hope of a future life which my mother had in Thee, but the hope of my advancement in learning, upon which both my parents were too intent: my father, because he thought hardly at all of Thee, and of me only in a vain way; my mother, however, because she, far from regarding the usual line of study as a hindrance to obtaining Thee, imagined it to be a help. For so I conjecture, recalling, as well as I can, what I knew of my parents. The reins, then, were loosened to such a degree, beyond the measure of due severity, that I might play, and gratify myself in various ways without restraint, from all of which, indeed, arose a mist hiding from me, O my God, the calm brightness of Thy Truth; and "my iniquity stood out, as it were, from fatness." 2

CHAPTER IV.

He commits a Theft in company with his

THY

Companions.

HY law certainly condemns theft, O Lord, the law too written in the hearts of men, which

Jer. li. 6.

2

Ps. lxxiii. 7.

38

HE STEALS PEARS

not even iniquity itself can efface. For what thief can endure another thief? not even a rich thief another who is brought to steal through want. Yet I resolved to commit a theft, and I committed it, compelled neither by want nor poverty, but through a loathing of honesty and a lust for iniquity. For I stole that of which I had already plenty, and much better: neither did I want to enjoy what I longed to steal, but to joy in the act of thieving and the sin. There was a pear-tree near our vineyard, laden with fruit, tempting neither for colour nor sweetness. To shake and rob this tree, we bad young fellows went, late one night, after we had been racketing according to our abominable habit in the streets till then; and we carried off great loads, not for a feast, for, having only just bitten them, we flung them to the pigs, and the only pleasure we had in this was that we were doing what we ought not. Behold my heart, O God, behold my heart, upon which Thou hadst mercy when in the depths of this bottomless pit. Now, behold let my heart tell Thee, what it then sought, that I should be wantonly wicked, when there was no attraction in the sin but the evil of it. It was foul, and I loved it; I loved to perish: I loved to be faulty, simply for the sake of being at fault, and not for any further cause. O base soul, leaping down from thy firmament into utter ruin; not seeking ought in disgraceful actions but the disgrace itself!

QUESTIONS HIS MOTIVES FOR STEALING 39

BUT

CHAPTER V.

That no one sins without a Motive.

UT there is a tempting appearance in beautiful bodies, in gold and silver, and the rest; and there are things which are very agreeable to our bodily touch. The other senses have in like manner objects which are adapted to their delight; also worldly honour, and the power of governing and overcoming have their attractions, whence also arises the thirst for revenge: and yet to obtain all these, we must not depart from Thee, O Lord, nor break Thy law. And life itself has its own charm, through a certain intrinsic comeliness, and a correspondence with all that is fair here below. Human friendship in like manner is delightful, as it knits together with a sweet tie many minds. account of all these things, and of others like them, sin is committed, when by some inordinate inclination towards goods of the lowest kind those which are better and highest are forsaken-Thyself, O Lord our God, and Thy Truth, and Thy Law. For these lowest things have some sort of gratification, but not like my God, Who made all things; for "in Him doth the righteous delight, and He is the joy of the upright in heart." I

On

When, then, we ask for what reason a crime was committed, it is not generally believed to have been committed at all, unless there appears to have been some desire of gaining goods of the lowest kind or a fear of losing them. For they are in themselves fair

1 Ps. lxiv. 10.