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Confessiones

Caput 6

Ego vero, domine, si totum confitear tibi ore meo et calamo meo, quidquid de ista materia docuisti me, cuius antea nomen audiens et non intellegens narrantibus mihi eis, qui non intellegerent, eam cum speciebus innumeris et variis cogitabam, et ideo non eam cogitabam; foedas et horribiles formas perturbatis ordinibus volvebat animus, sed formas tamen, et informe appellebam; non quod careret forma, sed quod talem haberet, ut, si appareret, insolitum et incongruum aversaretur sensum meus et conturbaretur infirmitas hominis; verum autem illud quod cogitabam non privatione omnis formae, sed conparatione formosiorum erat informe, et suadebat vera ratio, ut omnis formae qualescumque reliquias omnino detraherem, si vellem prorsus informe cogitare, et non poteram; citius enim non esse censebam, quod omni forma privaretur, quam cogitabam quiddam inter formam et nihil, nec formatum nec nihil, imforme prope nihil; et cessavit mens mea interrogare hinc spiritum meum, plenum imaginibus formatorum corporum et eas pro arbitrio mutantem atque variantem, et intendi in ipsa corpora eorumque mutabilitatem altius inspexi, qua desinunt esse quod fuerant et incipiunt esse quod non erant, eundemque transitum de forma in formam per informe quiddam fieri suspicatus sum, non per omnino nihil: sed nosse cupiebam, non suspicari: -- et si totum tibi confiteatur vox et stilus meus, quidquid de ista quaestione enodasti mihi, quid legentium capere durabit? nec ideo tamen cessabit cor meum tibi dare honorem et canticum laudis de his, quae dictare non sufficit. mutabilitas enim rerum mutabilium ipsa capax est formarum omnium, in quas mutantur res mutabiles. et haec quid est? numquid animus? numquid corpus? numquid species animi vel corporis? si dici posset nihil aliquid et est non est hoc eam dicerem; et tamen iam utcumque erat, ut species caperet istas visibiles et compositas.

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The Confessions of St. Augustin In Thirteen Books

Chapter VI.--He Confesses that at One Time He Himself Thought Erroneously of Matter.

6. But were I, O Lord, by my mouth and by my pen to confess unto Thee the whole, whatever Thou hast taught me concerning that matter, the name of which hearing beforehand, and not understanding (they who could not understand it telling me of it), I conceived ¹ it as having innumerable and varied forms. And therefore did I not conceive it; my mind revolved in disturbed order foul and horrible "forms," but yet "forms;" and I called it formless, not that it lacked form, but because it had such as, did it appear, my mind would turn from, as unwonted and incongruous, and at which human weakness would be disturbed. But even that which I did conceive was formless, not by the privation of all form, but in comparison of more beautiful forms; and true reason persuaded me that I ought altogether to remove from it all remnants of any form whatever, if I wished to conceive matter wholly without form; and I could not. For sooner could I imagine that that which should be deprived of all form was not at all, than conceive anything between form and nothing,--neither formed, nor nothing, formless, nearly nothing. And my mind hence ceased to question my spirit, filled (as it was) with the images of formed bodies, and changing and varying them according to its will; and I applied myself to the bodies themselves, and looked more deeply into their mutability, by which they cease to be what they had been, and begin to be what they were not; and this same transit from form unto form I have looked upon to be through some formless condition, not through a very nothing; but I desired to know, not to guess. And if my voice and my pen should confess the whole unto Thee, whatsoever knots Thou hast untied for me concerning this question, who of my readers would endure to take in the whole? Nor yet, therefore, shall my heart cease to give Thee honour, and a song of praise, for those things which it is not able to express. For the mutability of mutable things is itself capable of all those forms into which mutable things are changed. And this mutability, what is it? Is it soul? Is it body? Is it the outer appearance of soul or body? Could it be said, "Nothing were something," and "That which is, is not," I would say that this were it; and yet in some manner was it already, since it could receive these visible and compound shapes.