The Confessions of Saint Augustine (Outler)/Book I/Chapter VII


 * He proves that even Infancy is prone to sin.

Hear, O God. Alas, for man's sins! So saith man, and Thou hast pity on him; since Thou hast made him, but madest not the sin in him. Who remindeth me of the sin of my infancy? for in Thy sight none is "clean from sin," not even the infant whose life on earth is but a day. Who remindeth me? doth not each little infant, in who I see what I remember not about myself? But in what did I then sin? was it that wailing I longed for the breast? for should I now so long, not for the breast, but for food convenient for my age, most justly should I be laughed at and blamed. What I then did was deserving of blame; but since I could not understand any who might blame, neither custom nor reason allowed me to be blamed. For with our growth we uproot and cast away such habits. Now no man when he prunes knowingly casts away what is good. Or was it then good, even for a while, to cry for what, if given, would hurt? bitterly to resent, that persons free, and its own elders, yea its own parents, served it not? that many besides, wiser than it, obeyed not the nod of its pleasure? to strive to strike and hurt with all its might, because its biddings were not obeyed, which had been obeyed to its peril? In the weakness then of baby limbs, not in its will, lies its innocence. Myself have seen and known jealousy even in a babe; it could not yet speak, but pale, and with bitter expression it would eye its foster-brother. Who knows not this? Mothers and nurses tell you, that they abate these things by I know not what remedies. Perhaps that too is innocence, when the fountain of milk is flowing in generous abundance, not to endure any to share it, though in extremest need, and whose very life as yet depends thereon. We bear gently with all this, not as being no or slight evils, but because they will disappear by lapse of time. For though you now excuse them, the very same tempers are utterly intolerable when found in persons of maturer age.

Thou, then, O Lord my God, who gavest life to this my infancy, and a body, which thus as we see Thou hast furnished with senses, compacted with limbs, made shapely in form, and, for its general good and safety, hast implanted in it all the powers of life, Thou commandest me to praise Thee in these things, to confess unto Thee, and "to sing praises to Thy name, O most highest" (Ps. xcii. 1). For Thou art God, Almighty and Good, even hadst Thou done only this, which none could do but Thou alone, from Whom is the mode of being of all things; who out of Thy own fairness makest things fair; and orderest all things by Thy law. This age then, Lord, whereof I have no remembrance, which I take on others' word, and guess from other infants that I have passed, true though that guess be, I am yet loth to count in this life of mine which I live in this world. For in that it reaches back to the shadows of forgetfulness, it is like to that which I spent in my mother's womb. But if "I was shapen in wickedness, and in sin did my mother conceive me" (Ps. li. 7), where, I beseech Thee, O my God, where, Lord, or when, was I Thy servant guiltless? But, lo! that period I pass by; and what have I now to do with that, of which I can recall no vestiges?