Your hand was that I was persuaded to move to Rome and teach there better what I taught in Carthage. I will not fail to confess to You what prompted me to make this move: the depth in which You hide and Your mercy, which is always with us, are worthy of reflection and praise.

I did not decide to go to Rome because my friends, who persuaded me, promised me more earnings and a more prominent place, although both of these attracted me at that time; the main and almost the only reason was the story that the young students behaved more calmly in Rome, that they were restrained by a strict and definite discipline, and that they did not dare to break into the premises of a strange teacher in a bold and disorderly manner: access to him in the school was generally open only with his permission. In Carthage, on the contrary, dissoluteness reigns among the students, which knows no restrainedness. They shamelessly break into the school and, as if maddened, violate the order established by the teacher for the benefit of learning. With amazing stupidity they inflict a thousand offenses, for which they should be punished according to the law, but custom takes them under its protection. They are all the more miserable because they do, as something permissible, actions that will never be permitted by Thy eternal law; they consider themselves to be completely unpunished, but they are punished by blindness to their own behavior; they will suffer incomparably worse than what they do. When I was studying, I did not want to belong to this crowd; having become a teacher, he was forced to endure it around him. That's why I wanted to go to a place where, according to the stories of all knowledgeable people, there was nothing like it. In fact, it was "Thou my hope and my portion in the land of the living" that prompted me, for the salvation of my soul, to change my place on earth: in Carthage Thou didst whip me in order to snatch me from there; in Rome he set baits to attract them – he acted through people who loved this life of death; here they committed madness, there they poured empty promises; to direct my steps, Thou hast secretly taken advantage of them and my corruption. Those who disturbed my peace were blinded by a vile frenzy; Those who called to others were wise in an earthly way. And I, who hated true suffering here, strove there – to imaginary happiness.

Thou knew, O Lord, why I left Carthage and went to Rome, but thou didst not give any sign of it either to me or to my mother, who wept bitterly over my departure and accompanied me all the way to the sea. She clung to me tightly, wishing either to bring me back or to go with me, but I deceived her into thinking that I wanted to stay with my friend until he sailed away with the wind up.

I lied to my mother – and such a mother! – and eluded her. And this Thou hast mercifully forgiven me, preserving me, full of filth and filth, from the waters of the sea, and bringing me to the water of Thy grace, having washed myself, I dried up the streams of my mother's tears, with which she daily watered the earth before Thee, weeping for me. She refused to return without me, and I had difficulty in persuading her to spend the night in the chapel of St. Cyprian, near our ship. And that night I secretly departed, but she stayed, praying and crying. What did she ask Thee, O Lord, for with such tears? That Thou shouldst not let me sail? But you, in the depths of Your counsels, hearing her main desire, did not care about what she asked then: that you may make of me what she always asked. The wind blew and filled our sails and hid from our eyes the shore, where in the morning, mad with pain, she filled Thy ears with complaints and moans, which Thou didst despise: Thou didst draw me to the voice of my passions to put an end to these passions, and she was whipped by the just lash of pain for her carnal anguish. She loved my presence like all mothers, only much more than many mothers, and did not know how much joy You were preparing for her by my absence. She did not know this, and therefore she wept and wailed, and in these torments the heritage of Eve was expressed in her: in lamentations she sought that which in lamentations she had begotten. And yet, after accusing me of deceit and cruelty, she again turned to prayers for me and returned to her usual life; I arrived in Rome.

And now a bodily illness overtook me with its whip; I was already going to hell, taking with me all the sins I had committed before Thee, before myself, and before others, a great and heavy link added to the fetters of original sin, by which "we all die in Adam." Thou hast not yet forgiven me anything in Christ, for he has not yet "abolished" on his cross the "enmity" which I had with Thee for my sins. Could this crucified ghost in whom I believed abolish it? As much as His bodily death seemed to me, so real was the death of my soul, and as real was His bodily death, so imaginary was the life of my soul, which did not believe in His death.

My fever grew heavier; I went away and went to perdition. Where would I have gone if I had gone then? Of course, according to Thy just order, only into fire and torment worthy of my works. And the mother did not know this, but prayed in her absence. But you, being present everywhere, heard her where she was, and took pity on me where I was: bodily health returned to me, still sick with my sacrilegious heart. I did not want to accept Your Baptism, even in such danger; I was a better boy when I demanded of my pious mother that she baptize me; I have already remembered this when I confessed to You. I grew up to my shame and, being a fool, laughed at Thy healing, but Thou didst not allow me, such a man, to die a double death. If such a wound had struck my mother's heart, she would never have recovered. I cannot express enough how much she loved me; she bore me in her soul with much greater anxiety than she once carried in her body.

I do not know how she could recover if, in the very depths of her love, she had been pierced by such a death of mine. Where were the fervent, so frequent, uninterrupted prayers? Only You. Would You, Lord of mercy, "despise the contrite and humble heart" of a pure humble widow, who diligently did almsgiving, willingly served Your servants, did not miss a single day so as not to offer sacrifice at Your altar; twice a day, in the morning and in the evening, she invariably came to Thy church, not for idle gossip and old woman's chatter, but to hear Thee in Thy words and to be heard by Thee in her prayers. Thus did Thy grace create her. Would You have despised her with tears, would You have pushed her away, and would You not have given her help, when she asked Thee not for gold and silver, not for temporal and transient goods, but for the salvation of her son's soul? No, Lord, no. You were here, you heard it, and you did everything as you had predestined. It is impossible that Thou shouldst deceive her in those visions and answers of Thee, some of which I have mentioned, and others I have not mentioned, and which she kept with a faithful heart, and, praying continually, presented to Thee as Thy own obligation. And Thou hast vouchsafed, "for Thy mercy endureth for ever," to those to whom Thou forgivest all their debts, to be a debtor, bound to keep Thy promises.

And so, Thou hast healed me of this illness and saved the son of Thy maidservant, while still only bodily, so that there would be someone to grant salvation more real and reliable.

In Rome, too, I came into contact with these "holy" deceived deceivers, and this time not only with the "hearers," among whom was the man in whose house I fell ill and recovered, but also with those whom they call the "elect."

Я отчаялся уже, однако, в том, что могу найти полезное в их лживом учении, которым решил удовольствоваться, если не найду ничего лучшего; небрежно и кое-как я за него держался.

У меня зародилась даже мысль, что наиболее разумными были философы, именуемые академиками, считавшие, что все подлежит сомнению и что истина человеку вообще недоступна.

Я не упускал случая подавить в моем хозяине чрезмерную доверчивость, с которой он, я видел, относился к сказкам, наполняющим манихейские книги. Я продолжал, однако, быть ближе к манихеям и дружнее с ними, чем с людьми, стоявшими вне этой ереси. Я не защищал ее уже с прежним пылом, и, однако, близость с манихеями (а много их укрывалось в Риме) делала меня ленивее на поиски другого, тем более, что я отчаялся, Господи неба и земли, Творец всего видимого и невидимого, найти в Церкви Твоей истину, от которой они меня отвратили: мне казалось великим позором верить, что Ты имел человеческую плоть и был заключен в пределы, ограниченные нашей телесной оболочкой. А так как, желая представить себе Бога моего, я не умел представить себе ничего иного, кроме телесной величины – мне и казалось, что ничего бестелесного вообще и не существует, – то это и было главной и, пожалуй, единственной причиной моего безысходного заблуждения.

Затем я считал, что в Твоем Писании невозможно защищать те части, на которые манихеи нападали. Иногда, правда, я хотел обсудить каждую в отдельности с кем-нибудь, кто был хорошо осведомлен в этих книгах, и узнать, что он по этому поводу думает. Меня еще в Карфагене поколебали рассуждения некоего Элпидия, открыто выступавшего против манихеев: его словам о Писании противостоять было трудно. Довод манихеев казался мне слабым тем более, что они неохотно доставали его из-под спуда перед всеми, а сообщали только нам втайне: они говорили, что Новый Завет подделан какими-то людьми, захотевшими привить к христианской вере иудейский закон, но сами не показывали ни одного подлинного текста. А я, думая об этих телесных громадах, словно пленник, задыхавшийся под их тяжестью, не мог перевести дух и вздохнуть чистым и прозрачным воздухом Твоей простой истины.

Я прилежно взялся за дело, ради которого я приехал: начал преподавать в Риме риторику и сперва собрал у себя дома несколько учеников, знакомство с которыми доставило мне и дальнейшую известность. И вот я узнаю, что в Риме бывает то, чего в Африке мне не доводилось испытывать: здесь, действительно, юные негодяи не ставили всего вверх дном – это я сам видел, – но мне рассказывали о другом: «Вдруг, чтобы не платить учителю, юноши начинают между собой сговариваться и толпой переходят к другому. Этим нарушителям слова дороги деньги; справедливость у них стоит дешево». Ненавидело таких сердце мое, хотя и не «совершенной ненавистью».