§1Opitulante dei misericordia disruptis et derelictis Manichaeorum laqueis tandem catholicae gremio restitutum libet considerare nunc saltem ac deplorare illam miseriam meam.
With the help of God's mercy, having broken and abandoned the snares of the Manichaeans and at last restored to the bosom of the Catholic Church, I desire now at least to consider and deplore that misery of mine.
multa enim erant, quae facere debui, ne tam facile ac diebus paucis religionis uerissimae semina mihi a pueritia salubriter insita errore uel fraude falsorum fallaciumue hominum effossa ex animo pellerentur.
For there were many things which I ought to have done, so that the seeds of the truest religion, wholesomely implanted in me from my boyhood, might not be dug up and driven from my mind so easily and in a few days by the error or fraud of false or deceitful men.
nam primo animarum illa duo genera, quibus ita singulas naturas propriasque tribuerunt, ut alterum de ipsa dei esse substantia, alterius uero deum ne conditorem quidem uelint accipi.
For first, concerning those two kinds of souls, to which they assigned such distinct and proper natures that they would have one accepted as being of the very substance of God, but would not have God accepted even as the creator of the other.
si mecum sobrie diligenterque considerassem mente in deum subplici et pia, fortasse mihi satagenti adparuisset nullam esse qualemlibet uitam, quae non eo ipso, quo uita est et in quantum omnino uita est, ad summum uitae fontem principiumque pertineat: quod nihil aliud quam summum et solum et uerum deum possumus confiteri.
If I had soberly and diligently considered this within myself with a suppliant and pious mind toward God, perhaps it would have appeared to me in my striving that there is no life of any kind which, by the very fact that it is life and insofar as it is life at all, does not belong to the supreme fountain and principle of life: which we can confess to be nothing else than the supreme and sole and true God.
quapropter illas animas, quae a Manichaeis uocantur malae, aut carere uita et animas non esse neque quicquam uelle seu nolle. adpetere uel fugere, aut si uiuerent, ut et animae esse possent et aliquid tale agere, quale illi opinarentur nullo modo eas nisi uita uiuere;
Wherefore, those souls which are called evil by the Manichaeans must either lack life and not be souls at all, nor have any willing or unwilling, seeking or fleeing; or if they lived, so that they could both be souls and perform some such action as those men imagined, they could in no way live except by life.
ac si Christum dixisse constaret, ut constat: ego sum uita. nihil esse causae, cur non omnes animas, cum animae nisi uiuendo esse non possint. per Christum, id est per uitam creatas et conditas fateremur.
And if it were established that Christ said, as indeed it is: "I am the life," there would be no reason why we should not confess that all souls, since they cannot exist as souls except by living, were created and established through Christ, that is, through life.
§2Quod si tempore illo quaestionem de ipsa uita et de participatione uitae mea cogitatio ferre ac sustinere non posset — quae profecto magna est et multum serenae disputationis inter doctissimos indigens — illud dispicere fortasse ualuissem, quod omni homini sese sine studio partium bene consideranti manifestissime adparet omne, quod scire et nosse dicimur aut sensu corporis aut intellegentia nos habere conprehensum.
But if at that time my thought could not bear and sustain the question concerning life itself and the participation in life — which indeed is a great question and stands in need of much calm discussion among the most learned — perhaps I would have been able to discern that which appears most clearly to every person who considers themselves well without partisan zeal: that everything we are said to know and understand, we hold comprehended either by the sense of the body or by the intellect.
sensus autem corporis etiam uulgo quinque numerari: uisum, auditum, odoratum.
Now, the senses of the body are commonly numbered as five: sight, hearing, smell, taste, and touch.
gustatum atque tactum: quibus omnibus intellegentiam longe alteque praestare et excellere, quis mihi non uel ingratus inpiusque concederet? quo constituto atque firmato illud consequi, ut cuncta, quae tactu et uisu uel quolibet alio modo corporaliter sentirentur. tanto essent inferiora his, quae intellegendo adsequeremur. quanto ipsos sensus intellegentiae cedere uideremus.
Who would not grant me, unless ungrateful and impious, that the intellect far and deeply surpasses and excels all of these? This being established and confirmed, it follows that all things which are perceived corporally by touch, sight, or any other way, are inferior to those things which we attain by understanding, to the same degree that we see the senses themselves yield to the intellect.
quamobrem cum omnis uita et ob hoc omnis anima nullo corporis sensu, sed solo intellectu percipi queat, sol autem iste atque luna omnisque lux. quae mortalibus his oculis cernitur, ab ipsis quoque Manichaeis uero et bono deo tribuenda esse dicatur: summam esse dementiam id praedicare pertinere ad deum, quod per corpus intuemur, quod uero non solum animo. sed ipsa sublimitate animi, mente scilicet atque intellegentia caperemus, id est uitam, qualiscumque illa diceretur. tamen uitam eodem deo: auctore priuandam et uiduandam putare.
Wherefore, since all life, and for this reason every soul, can be perceived by no sense of the body but by the intellect alone, whereas that sun and moon and all the light which is discerned by these mortal eyes is said, even by the Manichaeans themselves, to be attributed to the true and good God: it is the greatest madness to preach that what we behold through the body belongs to God, but to think that what we grasp not only with the soul, but with the very height of the soul, namely, the mind and intellect—that is, life, of whatever kind it may be said to be—is nevertheless to be deprived and widowed of that same God as its author.
num enim quid sit uiuere quamque secretum ab omni corporis sensu quamque omnino incorporeum, si me ipsum inuocato deo interrogarem, respondere non possim? aut non illi quoque fateantur non solum uiuere illas, quas detestantur animas, sed etiam inmortaliter uiuere? quodque a Christo dictum est: dimitte mortuos sepelire mortuos suos, non de omnino non uiuentibus, sed de peccantibus dictum, quae inmortalis animae sola mors est scribente Paulo: mortua est uidua, quae in deliciis uiuit; simul enim et mortuam esse dixit et uiuere.
For if, having invoked God, I should ask myself what it is to live, and how secret it is from all bodily sense and how entirely incorporeal, would I not be able to answer? Or would they not also confess that those souls which they detest not only live, but also live immortally? And that which was said by Christ, "Let the dead bury their dead," was spoken not of those who do not live at all, but of sinners, which is the only death of an immortal soul, as Paul writes: "The widow who lives in pleasures is dead"; for he said at the same time that she is dead and that she lives.
quare non ego quanto decoloratius uiuat peccatrix anima, sed illud ipsum tantum, quod uiuit adtenderem.
Why, then, did I not attend, not to how discoloredly a sinful soul lives, but to that very fact alone, that it lives?
quod si percipere nisi intellegendo non possem, credo, ueniret in mentem tanto esse quamlibet animam luci, quam per hos sentimus oculos, praeferendam, quanto intellegentiam ipsis oculis praeferremus.
And if I could not perceive this except by understanding, I believe it would have come to my mind that any soul whatsoever is to be preferred to the light which we feel through these eyes, to the same degree that we would prefer the intellect to the eyes themselves.
Lucem autem illam illi quoque a patre Christi esse confirmant: egone tandem, quod ab eo esset quaecumque anima, dubitarem? ego uero non modo de anima, sed de quouis etiam corpore, quin ab ipso esset, nihil omnino ne tum quidem homo scilicet illius inperitiae atque illius aetatis ambigerem, si forma quid esset quidue formatum, quid species et quid indutum specie, deinde quid horum cui causa esset, pie cauteque cogitarem.
Moreover, they also confirm that that light is from the Father of Christ: would I then doubt that any soul whatsoever was from Him? Indeed, not only concerning the soul, but even concerning any body, that it was from Him, I would have had no doubt at all, even then as a man of that ignorance and that age, if I had piously and cautiously considered what form is, what is formed, what species is, and what is clothed with species, and then which of these is the cause of which.