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- 26 The Confessions of S. Augustine.
of spices, and precious ointments. And that I might cleave the faster in the midst of it, the invisible enemy trod me down, and seduced me, for that I was easy to be seduced. Neither did the mother of my flesh (who had now “fled out of the midst of Babylon” [Jer. li. 6], yet went more slowly in the skirts thereof), as she advised me to chastity, so heed what she had heard of me from her husband, as to restrain within the bounds of married love (if it could not be pared away to the quick), what she felt to be pestilent at present, and for the future dangerous. She heeded not this, for she feared, lest my prospects might be embarrassed by the clog of a wife. Not that prospect of the world to come, which my mother reposed in Thee; but the prospect of learning, which both my parents were too desirous I should attain; my father, because of Thee he thought little or nothing, and of me but vain conceits; but my mother, because she accounted that those usual courses of learning would not only be no hindrance, but even some help towards attaining Thee in time to come. For thus I conjecture, recalling, as well as I may, the dispositions of my parents. The reins, meantime, were slackened to me, beyond the due measure of severity, so that I might sport, yea, even unto dissoluteness, in all sorts of passions. And in all was a mist shutting out from me, O my God, the brightness of Thy truth; and mine iniquity “stood out as with fatness” (Ps. lxxiii. 7).
## CHAPTER IV.
*He joins his companions in an act of theft; tempted not by want, but by a certain loathing of righteousness.*
THEFT is punished by Thy law, O Lord, and the law written in the hearts of men, which iniquity itself does not blot out. For what thief will abide a thief? not even a rich thief, one driven to steal by want. Yet I wanted to thieve, and did it, though compelled by no want nor poverty, but through a loathing of righteousness and a surfeit of iniquity. For I stole that, of which I had plenty, and much better. Nor did I want to enjoy what I sought by my theft, but the theft and sin itself. A pear tree there was
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