Richardson—Augustine of Hippo qua Patriot. 35 
will bless the Lord, ’ who made the world. Utterly will I bless Him. 
Be it well according to the flesh, be it evil according to the flesh, 
‘ I will bless the Lord at all times: His praise shall continually be 
in my mouth! ’ . . . ‘ The Lord gave and the Lord hath taken 
away: as the Lord pleases, so is it done: blessed be the name of 
the Lord.’ And similarly with the other sermon: ‘‘The body 
of Peter, men are saying, lies in Kome; in Rome lies Paul’s body, 
in Rome the body of Lawrence, in Rome lie the bodies of other holy 
martyrs-—and Rome is wretched, Rome is devastated, afflicted, de¬ 
stroyed, burned. So numerous are death’s slaughters, by famine, 
by pestilence, by sword: where are the shrines [memoriae^ shrines, 
memories—an apparent play on words, quite Augustinian] of the 
Apostles? What sayest thou? Lo, this is what I said: Rome 
suffers so many evils, where are the shrines of the Apostles? They 
are there, but they are not in thee. Would they were in thee, 
whoever thou be who sayest such things, who art thus void of com¬ 
prehension, who, called by the Spirit, art wise after the flesh! 
. . . Be patient, the Lord wills it. . . . Behold the Lord, 
thy God, behold thy Head, the example of thy life; harken to thy 
Redeemer, thy Shepherd: ‘0 my Father, if it be possible, let this 
cup pass from me. ’ Consider Row He shows a human will and 
[yet] forthwith changes aversion to obedience—‘Nevertheless not 
as I will but as Thou wilt. Father.’ In such threnodies, at 
least, Augustine exhibits an emotion which is more than Neo- 
Platonic disinterestedness or monkish contempt! 
On occasion, moreover, this quietistic and ascetic mystic exhibits 
the most earnest interest in practical measures for the suppression 
of danger to the integrity of the state and of society, even to the 
extent of according public security definite precedence over the 
claims of private renunciation. In evidence is a letter to Count 
Boniface upbraiding this official for inefficiency in office. The 
count is reminded that he had inclined to enter the monastic life 
but had been dissuaded by the joint advice of Alypius and Au¬ 
gustine, who, instead, had recommended adherence to continency in 
private life, but a continued connection with civic and military 
affairs. Boniface is now not only compromising his spiritual wel¬ 
fare by a second marriage—and that, too, with a lady who has 
been an Arian heretic^—^but is proving recusant to his military 
trust. “But what shall I say,” complains Augustine, “of the 
“ Sermo CV. 
Sermo CCXCVI. 
