Ebook Studies in the Confessions of St. Augustine

The following "Studies" contain the substance of a series of lectures delivered at Keble College during Hilary term, 1919, in accordance with the terms of the "Pringle Stuart" Trust. I make no attempt to deal minutely or exhaustively with the Confessions; but certain aspects of that wonderful work are selected for comment, with a view to estimating the significance of St. Augustine, not as a pioneer in theology but as a leader of religion.

What has given the Confessions their place in the devotional literature of the world is the fact that they touch the heights and depths of a true religious experience. Their writer, sensitive as he was to the various intellectual influences of his time, yet set before himself, as the dominant aim of his life, the knowledge of God. The book may be of service to us, in our endeavour to probe the roots of that prevalent unrest and dis satisfaction which partly prompt, and partly hinder, the task of "reconstruction." Under Augustine's guidance we may learn to take into account more seriously the reality of evil; the presence of sin, and its pervasive power, in human life; the barrenness of any system of thought, political or intellectual, which ignores man's need of God in every sphere of his personal or social activity. And the chief lesson of the Confessions may perhaps be expressed in aphorisms taken from two writers, to both of whom the Church is greatly indebted:

"The 'spirit of Mysticism is the true and essential Christianity" (R. C. Moberly).

"Mysticism means for us the immediacy and reality of God in us" (W. P. Du Bose).