Augustine Of Hippo Quotes & Sayings

Man cannot believe unless he wishes to. — Augustine Of Hippo

Too late came I to love you, O Beauty both so ancient and so new! Too late came I to love you - and behold you were with me all the time ... — Augustine Of Hippo

He that is jealous is not in love. — Augustine Of Hippo

He who lives according to God ought to cherish towards evil men a perfect hatred, so that he shall neither hate the man because of his vice nor love the vice because of the man. — Augustine Of Hippo

They have only that power which the secret decree of the Almighty allots to them, in order that we may not set too great store by earthly prosperity, — Augustine Of Hippo

When men cannot communicate their thoughts to each other, simply because of difference of language, all the similarity of their common human nature is of no avail to unite them in fellowship. — Augustine Of Hippo

Da quod iubes et iube quod vis
Give what thou commandest and command what thou wilt — Augustine Of Hippo

Anyone who does not love Him Who made man has not learned to love man aright. — Augustine Of Hippo

Thy wilt carry us both when little, and even to grey hairs wilt thou carry us; for our firmness, when it is thou then it is firmness, and when it is ours, then it is infirmity. Our good lives always with Thee, from which when we are averted we are perverted. Let us now, O Lord, return, that we be not overturned. — Augustine Of Hippo

And if all could with one voice be asked whether they wished to be happy, there is no doubt they would all answer that they would. And this would not be possible unless the thing itself, which we call "happiness", were held in memory. — Augustine Of Hippo

Man's maker was made man that He, Ruler of the stars, might nurse at His mother's breast; that the Bread might hunger, the Fountain thirst, the Light sleep, the Way be tired on its journey; that Truth might be accused of false witnesses, the Teacher be beaten with whips, the Foundation be suspended on wood; that Strength might grow weak; that the Healer might be wounded; that Life might die. — Augustine Of Hippo

God has promised forgiveness to your repentance, but He has not promised tomorrow to your procrastination. — Augustine Of Hippo

Hence words are learnt; hence eloquence is to be attained, most necessary to persuade people to your way of thinking, and to unfold your opinions." So, in truth, we should never have understood these words, — Augustine Of Hippo

Music, that is the science or the sense of proper modulation, is likewise given by God's generosity to mortals having rational souls in order to lead them to higher things. — Augustine Of Hippo

If you understood him, it would not be God. — Augustine Of Hippo

Let us, on both sides, lay aside all arrogance. Let us not, on either side, claim that we have already discovered the truth. Let us seek it together as something which is known to neither of us. For then only may we seek it, lovingly and tranquilly, if there be no bold presumption that it is already discovered and possessed. — Augustine Of Hippo

Purity both of the body and the soul rests on the steadfastness of the will strengthened by God's grace, and cannot be forcibly taken from an unwilling person. — Augustine Of Hippo

am inclined rather to approve the practice of singing in church, although I do not offer an irrevocable opinion on it, so that through the pleasure afforded the ears the weaker mind may rise to feelings of devotion. However, when it so happens that I am moved more by the singing than by what is sung, I confess that I have sinned, in — Augustine Of Hippo

Sorrow is permitted human beings, but it is not to be desired if we would be like You, Lord God. For You, who love souls far more purely than we and feel a perfect pity for others, are wounded, yet without sorrow. How can we be like You in this? — Augustine Of Hippo

That joy is to know You as You are. This is the happy life, to rejoice in You, of You, and for You. This is the happy life, and there is no other. — Augustine Of Hippo

And yet, will we ever come to an end of discussion and talk if we think we must always reply to replies? For replies come from those who either cannot understand what is said to them, or are so stubborn and contentious that they refuse to give in even if they do understand. — Augustine Of Hippo

For often we wickedly blind ourselves to the occasions of teaching and admonishing them, sometimes even of reprimanding and chiding them, either because we shrink from the labor or are ashamed to offend them, or because we fear to lose good friendships, — Augustine Of Hippo

The Greeks think they justly honor players, because they worship the gods who demand plays; the Romans, on the other hand, do not suffer an actor to disgrace by his name his own plebeian tribe, far less the senatorial order. And the whole of this discussion may be summed up in the following syllogism. The Greeks give us the major premise: If such gods are to be worshiped, then certainly such men may be honored. The Romans add the minor: But such men must by no means be honoured. The Christians draw the conclusion: Therefore such gods must by no means be worshiped. — Augustine Of Hippo

Whither do I call Thee, since I am in Thee? or whence canst Thou enter into — Augustine Of Hippo

For this reason no intelligent student of history could doubt that Cain could have founded not only some sort of a city but even a large one, at a time when the lives of mortals were prolonged to so great an age. But — Augustine Of Hippo

Yet when it happens to me that the music moves me more than the subject of the song, I confess myself to commit a sin deserving punishment, and then I would prefer not to have heard the singer. — Augustine Of Hippo

For a prohibition always increases an illicit desire so long as the love of and joy in holiness is too weak to conquer the inclination to sin ... — Augustine Of Hippo

I was in misery, and misery is the state of every soul overcome by friendship with mortal things and lacerated when they are lost. Then the soul becomes aware of the misery which is its actual condition even before it loses them. — Augustine Of Hippo

Your wishes are bad, when you desire that one whom you hate or fear should be in such a condition that you can conquer him. — Augustine Of Hippo

Ah, God, my God, what wretchedness I suffered in that world, and how I trifled with!
-St. Augustine on school — Augustine Of Hippo

What great good, then, we are to expect and hope from participating in his divinity, when even his distress calms us and his weakness strengthens us. — Augustine Of Hippo

So when someone happens to consult the pages of a poet whose verses and intention are concerned with a quite different subject, in a wonderful way a verse often emerges appropriate to the decision under discussion. — Augustine Of Hippo

The dominion of good men is profitable, not so much for themselves as for human affairs. But the dominion of bad men is hurtful chiefly to themselves who rule, for they destroy their own souls by greater licence in wickedness; — Augustine Of Hippo

What do I love when I love my God? — Augustine Of Hippo

Our hearts were made for You, O Lord, and they are restless until they rest in you." -St. Augustine of Hippo — Augustine Of Hippo

For no one ought to consider anything as his own, except perhaps what is false. All truth is of Him who says, "I am the truth." [1715] For what have we that we did not receive? and if we have received it, why do we glory, as if we had not received it? [1716] — Augustine Of Hippo

O Lord my God, tell me what you are to me. Say to my soul, I am your salvation. Say it so that I can hear it. My heart is listening, Lord; open the ears of my heard and say to my soul, I am your salvation. Let me run toward this voice and seize hold of you. Do not hide your face from me: let me die so that I may see it, for not to see it would be death to me indeed. — Augustine Of Hippo

He who alone was free among he dead, for he was free to lay down his life and free to take it up again, was for us both Victor and Victim in your sight, and it was because he was he Victim that he was also the Victor. In your sight he was both Preist and Sacrifice, and it was because he was the Sacrifice that he was also the Preist. By being your Son, yet serving you, he freed us from servitude and made us your sons. Rightly do I place in my firm hope that you will cure all my ills through him who sits at your right hand and pleads for us: otherwise I should despair. For my ills are many and great, many and great indeed; but your medicine is greater still. — Augustine Of Hippo

Thus it is that love is not without hope, hope is not without love, and neither hope nor love are without faith. — Augustine Of Hippo

I will plant my feet on that step where my parents put me as a child, until self-evident truth comes to light. — Augustine Of Hippo

My questioning was my attentive spirit,
and their reply, their beauty. — Augustine Of Hippo

This is my reply to anyone who asks: 'What was God doing before he made heaven and earth?' My reply is not that which someone is said to have given as a joke to evade the force of the question. He said: 'He was preparing hells for people who inquire into profundities.' It is one thing to laugh, another to see the point at issue, and this reply I reject. I would have preferred him to answer 'I am ignorant of what I do not know' rather than reply so as to ridicule someone who has asked a deep question and to win approval for an answer which is a mistake. — Augustine Of Hippo

Da mihi castitatem et continentiam, sed noli modo (Give me chastity and continence, but not just yet)! — Augustine Of Hippo

It is my faith that calls to you, Lord, the faith which you gave me and made to live in me through the merits of your Son, who became man, and through the ministry of your preacher. — Augustine Of Hippo

This disease of curiosity. — Augustine Of Hippo

Hence, you see your faith, you see your doubt, you see your desire and will to learn, and when you are induced by divine authority to believe what you do not see, you see at one that you believe these things; you analyze and discern all this. — Augustine Of Hippo

Thus the quarrel that arose between Remus and Romulus demonstrated the division of the earthly city against itself; while the conflict between Cain and Abel displayed the hostility between the two cities themselves, the City of God and the city of men. Thus — Augustine Of Hippo

Place your hopes in the man from whom you do not inherit — Augustine Of Hippo

I was inflamed to love, and seek, and obtain, and hold, and embrace, not some sect, but wisdom itself-whatever it was. — Augustine Of Hippo

Amidst these offences of foulness and violence, and so many iniquities, are sins of men, who are on the whole making proficiency; which by those that judge rightly, are, after the rule of perfection, discommended, yet the persons commended, upon hope of future fruit, as in the green blade of growing corn. — Augustine Of Hippo

What you want to ignite in others must first burn in yourself — Augustine Of Hippo

Lord Jesus, don't let me lie when I say that I love you ... and protect me, for today I could betray you. — Augustine Of Hippo

To spare the conquered, and beat down the proud. — Augustine Of Hippo

But my sin was this, that I looked for pleasure, beauty, and truth not in [God] but in myself and his other creatures — Augustine Of Hippo

Hence to be happy is nothing but not to be in need, that is, to be wise. But if you seek what wisdom is, reason has already explained and declared this as far as presently possible. For wisdom is nothing but the measure of the soul, that is, that by which the mind is liberated so that it neither runs over into too much nor falls short of fullness. For there is a running over into luxuries, tyrannies, acts of pride, and other such things whereby the souls of unrestrained and unhappy men think they get for themselves pleasure and power. But there is a falling short of fullness through baseness, fear, sorrow, passion, and other things, of whatever kind, whereby unhappy men even admit that they are unhappy. — Augustine Of Hippo

I do not know where I came from..For I do not remember. — Augustine Of Hippo

For dismissed by You from Paradise, and having taken my journey into a far country, I cannot by myself return, unless Thou meetest the wanderer: for my return has throughout the whole tract of this world's time waited for Your mercy. — Augustine Of Hippo

The reader of these reflections of mine on the Trinity should bear in mind that my pen is on the watch against the sophistries of those who scorn the starting-point of faith, and allow themselves to be deceived through an unseasonable and misguided love of reason. — Augustine Of Hippo

Indeed we also work, but we are only collaborating with God who works, for his mercy has gone before us. It has gone before us so that we may be healed, and follows us so that once healed, we may be given life; it goes before us so that we may be called, and follows us so that we may be glorified; it goes before us so that we may live devoutly, and follows us so that we may always live with God: for without him we can do nothing. — Augustine Of Hippo

Nothing being less accordant with the nature of God than to cast off the government of the world, leaving it to chance, and so to wink at the crimes of men that they may wanton with impunity in evil courses; it follows, that every man who indulges in security, after extinguishing all fear of divine judgment, virtually denies that there is a God. — Augustine Of Hippo

The earthly city glories in itself, the Heavenly City glories in the Lord. — Augustine Of Hippo

But I was immobilized - less by another's static imposition than by my own static will. For the enemy had in thrall my power to choose, which he had used to make a chain for binding me. From bad choices an urge arises; and the urge, yielded to, becomes a compulsion; and the compulsion, unresisted, becomes a slavery - each link in this process connected with the others, which is why I call it a chain - and that chain had a tyrannical grip around me. The new will I felt stirring in me, a will to 'give you free worship' and enjoy what I yearned for, my God, my only reliable happiness, could not break away from the will made strong by long dominance. Two wills were mine, old and new, of the flesh, of the spirit, each warring on the other, and between their dissonances was my soul disintegrating. — Augustine Of Hippo

This, therefore, is the complete satisfaction of souls, that is, the happy life: to know precisely and perfectly Him through whom you are led into the truth, the nature of the truth you enjoy, and the bond that connects you with the Supreme Measure! These three show to those who understand the one God, the one Substance, excluding the variety of all vain and superstitious images. — Augustine Of Hippo

But where could I find such pleasure in you, Lord - except in you, who teaches us by sorrow, who wound us to heal us, and kill us so that we may not die apart from you. — Augustine Of Hippo

Every where the greater joy is ushered in by the greater pain. — Augustine Of Hippo

Let kings estimate their prosperity, not by the righteousness, but by the servility of their subjects. Let the provinces stand loyal to the kings, not as moral guides, but as lords of their possessions and purveyors of their pleasures; not with a hearty reverence, but a crooked and servile fear. Let the laws take cognizance rather of the injury done to another man's property, than of that done to one's own person. — Augustine Of Hippo

For instantly, as the sentence ended, there was infused in my heart something like the light of full certainty and all the gloom of doubt vanished away. — Augustine Of Hippo

Belatedly I loved thee, O Beauty so ancient and so new, belatedly I loved thee. For see, thou wast within and I was without, and I sought thee out there. Unlovely, I rushed heedlessly among the lovely things thou hast made. Thou wast with me, but I was not with thee. These things kept me far from thee; even though they were not at all unless they were in thee. Thou didst call and cry aloud, and didst force open my deafness. Thou didst gleam and shine, and didst chase away my blindness. Thou didst breathe fragrant odors and I drew in my breath; and now I pant for thee. I tasted, and now I hunger and thirst. Thou didst touch me, and I burned for thy peace. — Augustine Of Hippo

The world is a book, and he who does not travel reads only a page. — Augustine Of Hippo

When the will abandons what is above itself and turns to what is lower, it becomes evil - not because that is evil to which it turns, but because the turning itself is wicked. Therefore it is not an inferior thing which has made the will evil, but it is itself which has become so by wickedly and inordinately desiring an inferior thing. — Augustine Of Hippo

Those who ask 'What was God doing before he made heaven and earth?' are still steeped in error which they should have discarded. — Augustine Of Hippo

At one time in my infancy I also knew no Latin, and yet by listening I learnt it with no fear or pain at all, from my nurses caressing me, from people laughing over jokes, and from those who played games and were enjoying them. I learnt Latin without the threat of punishment from anyone forcing me to learn it. My own heart constrained me to bring its concepts to birth, which I could not have done unless I had learnt some words, not from formal teaching but by listening to people talking; and they in turn were the audience for my thoughts. This experience sufficiently illuminates the truth that free curiosity has greater power to stimulate learning than rigorous coercion. — Augustine Of Hippo

No one knows what he himself is made of, except his own spirit within him, yet there is still some part of him which remains hidden even from his own spirit; but you, Lord, know everything about a human being because you have made him ... Let me, then, confess what I know about myself, and confess too what I do not know, because what I know of myself I know only because you shed light on me, and what I do not know I shall remain ignorant about until my darkness becomes like bright noon before your face. — Augustine Of Hippo

Between temporal and eternal things there is this difference: a temporal thing is loved more before we have it, and it begins to grow worthless when we gain it, for it does not satisfy the soul, whose true and certain rest is eternity; but the eternal is more ardently loved when it is acquired than when it is merely desired. — Augustine Of Hippo

There are many going afar to marvel at the heights of mountains, the mighty waves of the sea, the long courses of great rivers, the vastness of the ocean, the movements of the stars, yet they leave themselves unnoticed! — Augustine Of Hippo

God. For they had not the insight to see that I might put the lessons which they forced me to learn to any other purpose than the satisfaction of man's insatiable desire for the poverty he calls wealth and the infamy he knows as fame. — Augustine Of Hippo

Faith is to believe what you do not yet see; the reward for this faith is to see what you believe. — Augustine Of Hippo

Have I not confessed against myself my transgressions unto Thee, and Thou, my God, hast forgiven the iniquity of my heart? — Augustine Of Hippo

266. "Faith is to believe what we do not see; and the reward of the faith is to see what we believe. — Augustine Of Hippo

Thou hast made us for thyself, O Lord, and our heart is restless until it finds its rest in thee. — Augustine Of Hippo

He who loves the coming of the Lord is not he who affirms that it is far off, nor is it he who says it is near, but rather he who, whether it be far off or near, awaits it with sincere faith, steadfast hope, and fervent love. — Augustine Of Hippo

Pray as though everything depends on God. And work as if everything depends on you. — Augustine Of Hippo

After saying all that, what have we said, my God, my life, my holy sweetness? What does anyone who speaks of you really say? Yet woe betide those who fail to speak, while the chatterboxes go on saying nothing. — Augustine Of Hippo

Humility raises us not by human arrogance but by divine grace. — Augustine Of Hippo

Augustine taught that true freedom is not choice or lack of constraint, but being what you are meant to be. Humans were created in the image of God. True freedom, then, is not found in moving away from that image but only in living it out. — Augustine Of Hippo

Salvator ambulado. (It is solved by walking.) — Augustine Of Hippo

Why are you relying on yourself, only to find yourself unreliable? — Augustine Of Hippo

Being taken away, then, what are kingdoms but great robberies? — Augustine Of Hippo

How can the past and future be, when the past no longer is, and the future is not yet? As for the present, if it were always present and never moved on to become the past, it would not be time, but eternity. — Augustine Of Hippo

A community is nothing else than a harmonious collection of individuals. — Augustine Of Hippo

These were Homer's fictions; he transfers things human to the gods. I could have wished him to transfer divine things to us." [173] But it would have been more true had he said: "These are, indeed, his fictions, but he attributed divine attributes to sinful men, that crimes might not be accounted crimes, and that whosoever committed any might appear to imitate the celestial gods and not abandoned men. — Augustine Of Hippo

It was pride that changed angels into devils; it is humility that makes men as angels. — Augustine Of Hippo

He who falls, falls by his own will; and he who stands, stands by God's will. — Augustine Of Hippo

If you have understood, then what you have understood is not God. — Augustine Of Hippo

This joy in God is not like any pleasure found in physical or intellectual satisfaction. Nor is it such as a friend experiences in the presence of a friend. But, if we are to use any such analogy, it is more like the eye rejoicing in light. — Augustine Of Hippo

When I then turned toward the scriptures, they appeared to me to be quite unworthy to be compared with the dignity of Tully. For my inflated pride was repelled by their style, nor could the sharpness of my wit penetrate their inner meaning. Truly they were of a sort to aid the growth of little ones, but I scorned to be a little one and, swollen with pride, I looked upon myself as fully grown. — Augustine Of Hippo

Habits, if not resisted, soon become necessity. — Augustine Of Hippo

Hope has two beautiful daughters; their names are Anger and Courage. Anger at the way things are, and Courage to see that they do not remain as they are. — Augustine Of Hippo

Reason judges in one way, custom in another. Reason judges by the light of truth, so that by right judgment it subjects lesser things to greater. Custom is often swayed by agreeable habits, so that it esteems as greater what truth reveals as lower. — Augustine Of Hippo

Find out how much God has given you and from it take what you need; the remainder is needed by others. — Augustine Of Hippo