Now then, O my Helper, hadst Thou loosed me from those fetters:
and I sought "whence is evil," and found no way. But Thou sufferedst
me not by any fluctuations of thought to be carried away from the
Faith whereby I believed Thee both to be, and Thy substance to be
unchangeable, and that Thou hast a care of, and wouldest judge men,
and that in Christ, Thy Son, Our Lord, and the holy Scriptures,
which the authority of Thy Catholic Church pressed upon me, Thou hadst
set the way of man's salvation, to that life which is to be after this
death. These things being safe and immovably settled in my mind, I
sought anxiously "whence was evil?" What were the pangs of my
teeming heart, what groans, O my God! yet even there were Thine ears
open, and I knew it not; and when in silence I vehemently sought,
those silent contritions of my soul were strong cries unto Thy
mercy. Thou knewest what I suffered, and no man. For, what was that
which was thence through my tongue distilled into the ears of my
most familiar friends? Did the whole tumult of my soul, for which
neither time nor utterance sufficed, reach them? Yet went up the whole
to Thy hearing, all which I roared out from the groanings of my heart;
and my desire was before Thee, and the light of mine eyes was not with
me: for that was within, I without: nor was that confined to place,
but I was intent on things contained in place, but there found I no
resting-place, nor did they so receive me, that I could say, "It is
enough," "it is well": nor did they yet suffer me to turn back,
where it might be well enough with me.
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