Against the Academicians [Book 3] Conclusion

Augustine begins by pointing out that a man is in error when he follows the false path. Those who are in error are not necessarily sinners, but those in sin are in error. Augustine attacks the Academicians through the example of adultery--if found guilty he either was in error and sinned or error and sin are two different things because one didn't assent to the truth (or didn't assent to the adultery?): in other words, since I did not assent to anything I can't be in sin--Augustine calls this a monstrosity. In Academician-think then anything is permissible because they assent to nothing--without the assent they are not committing either an error or crime. The rest of the world would think this is absurd.

Augustine then appeals to Platonic thinking to critique the world of the Academicians. The intelligible world is where the truth resides, while the sensual world seems truthlike. In a soul that knows itself, the truth would reveal itself brightly [3.17].

SUMMARY and CONCLUSION

Augustine concludes that whatever human wisdom is he hasn't seen it yet since he is only 33. He concedes that the Academicians have held him up, but he's past that now and will listen to Christ. He will find truth using the Platonists. Alypius reports that he is happy to leave the dispute a happy man. Augustine then finishes by encouraging them to pick up Cicero's Academia to try and get Alypius to take up Augustine's place and defends his points against Cicero, too. The debate ends with a laugh and some relief that it was resolved so calmly.

Book 3 (continued) [21 November 380] Post-meal

They return from the meal to find Licentius composing poetry. During the meal, Licentius has got up to sing. Augustine wishes him well in his pursuit of poetics, but wishes he would spend more time on philosophy.

Augustine and Alypius get back into their argument again: does the wise man know that he knows wisdom? Alypius tries the "seems" trick again, but Augutine doesn't bite. So Alypius agrees that a wise man knows wisdom--by definition. Augustine then asks if "the wise man can be found?" [3.4.10]. If he can't be found then the debate is over, but if he can be found, all questions are settled (presumably not the "how?" however).

For Augustine what this means is that either wisdom can't be identified, and that it is nothing, or that reason, as configured in the human mind, can't detect wisdom. Alypius counters that this does not mean the whole project of the Academicians should be thrown out, their withholding of assent is still important.

Assent should not be given because someday the position one holds now can be proven false, argues Alypius. Augustine rebuts that Alypius has just proven his point that the Academicians are beat. Augustine asks--will the Academicians say you should not assent to the truth? No, they would say that the truth can be found (and if found, assented to). To find the truth, then, one must be guided by divine spirit (something Alypius said back in 3.5). Augustine returns to poetry and the image of Proteus. Proteus, in Virgil's Georgics, is a figure of truth. Proteus reminds us not to be deceived by false images nor deceived through the senses. Augustine is happy that they agree so much using Cicero's definition of frienship as "accord," he finishes by launching into a monologue.

AUGUSTINE'S MONOLOGUE

Augustine first critiques the pomposity of the Academicians.

He then moves on to critique the idea that we can't know anything by suggesting that even if we are uncertain, we still know something.

Augustine then argues that even though the Academicians argue that perception is misleading we are not wrong when we identify what we see as world. So, what seems so to us is world. Augustine argues here for a kind of univocity in that even if we are asleep or insane we are both of these things in world. The world gives us information mediated by laws--so seeing a bent bar in the water is truth because the water effects the bar and gives us certain kinds of visual information--it seems bent. If it appeared straight, we would say this is false (though what Augustine is not exactly explaining is how we know that the visual trick of the water's refracting powers is truth to begin with). Augustine calls these things that interfere as ""intervening causes"--so seeing things refracted is not "wrong" because we know about intervening causes. In other words, it doesn't seem right, but it is because of these intervening causes. Truth is external to our biases.

The senses, then, give us kinds of truth. But, Augustine asks what do they contribute to our search for truth? Augustine argues that individual senses will always give pleasure or displeasure to the individual but the highest good will still be found with the mind.

Augustine then defends dialectics in finding truth. A man can't be happy and sad. If there is one sun, then, there can't be two. The same soul couldn't not die and be immortal. Augustine returns to the problem of the Academicians and perception as it relates to wisdom. A simplified version would run: if a wise man identified something as wisdom, why would he say no to it? A wise man is assenting to more than "mere opinion" [3.14]. Wisdom isn't nothing.

Augustine goes on to argue that someone who assents to nothing, does nothing. This is a similar argument in Dante's Inferno with the Neutrals. These people did nothing in life, they stood still. In death, they are wanted neither by Heaven nor Hell and condemned to always be in motion--stung by wasps and flies, following a blank banner. For Dante, it would have been better if they would have chosen Hell than to have done nothing in life. Dante laments that there are so many. For Augustine, as well, this constant deferring of assent is as good as standing still. One must assent as part of the search for wisdom.

I'll conclude with Against the Academicians in the next post.

Against the Academicians Book 3 [21 November 380]

I have been away from the blog for a bit; I got inundated with papers. The teaching life.

Book 3 is the longest and final book, so I am going to divide this into two, especially as there is a break for a meal about half way through the dialogue.

Augustine reports that they have come to the baths because the weather is inclement. [I love these comments because the life of the mind is so affected and entangled with the world--I feel like Augustine is making a nod to this.] He begins the discussion by appealing to search "wholeheartedly" for the truth.

The problem, he reiterates, is that the Academicians hold that the truth is so hidden that the wise-man only holds on to what is "truth-like."

They then move into a discussion of fortune. Is fortune necessary in the pursuit of wisdom? If I am unfortunate (and the examples of being blind or death are provided) would I pursue wisdom or could one? Alypius slips away and argues that if he did not have the fortune of life,  he would not care for wisdom. At face value, this seems obvious, if one were dead, caring about anything is a moot point. Augustine uses this as a spring-board to argue for the difference between the seeker of wisdom (the philosopher) and the wise (one who holds wisdom). Fortune wouldn't necessarily get in the way of the seeker or the owner of wisdom. Because wisdom is greater than fortune.

Augustine then posits these 4 points: 1) there is no difference between seeker and owner except for the act of possession itself; 2) nobody can possess wisdom if they haven't learned (so, wisdom is a something, not a nothing); 3) anyone who knows nothing; learns nothing; and 4) nobody can know a falsehood. This last point is a sticky one for me--of course one can know something false. But, I think what they are advocating here is that wisdom would be something outside of the knower themselves--human error does not make something false, if it is true (or real?)

Alypius objects on the grounds of "possession;" he wants to advocate for "seeming" to. Augustine gets irritated with these semantics--to seem, he says, would indeed indicate some kind of possession. If he seems to know, then there is a something, not a nothing.

Alypius tries to pursue the gray area. He insists there is a difference between "it seems to him that he knows" and "he knows." As well, he argues, there is a difference between wisdom connected with the truth and truth itself.

Augustine, perhaps with his back to the wall here, introduces a convenient noon day meal. They adjourn and return. Book 3 has no breaks, so in the next blog I will pick up with the post-meal discussion.

Against the Academicians Book 2 [20 November 386]

We're closing in on the end. After this discussion, Augustine will race ahead to a conclusion in his long Book 3. But for now...

This dialogue takes place under a tree. I am always fascinated with this concept. In various medieval Breton Lais being under a tree is a recipe for disaster. In Sir Orfeo, for example, Heurodotus loses her mind when the Fairy King appears as she is relaxing with her ladies under a tree. Is another world revealed to us under trees? Can trees drive us mad? Do they contain too much truth? If yes, then what a perfect place to be faced with a transcendent truth.

The discussion returns to the problem of "what can incite us to act without assent" is called "truthlike" or "plausible." What this means is do we do somethings even though they may not be true or even think that we really know it even though we are not sure. For example, if someone asks "will the sun rise tomorrow?" even though we do not know it for sure, based on past practice of the sun, we may still say yes.  So this is truthlike, because it is based on uncertainty--we claim a level of knowledge even though we may not know for sure.

Now, Licentius troubles this definition on the grounds of correlation. He knows, for example, that the trees next to them are not going to change to silver in the next moment (which may be true, but if Licentius would take in larger and larger amounts of time, this could happen--he needs to read his Quentin_Meillassoux or some quantum mechanics). Anyway, this kind of thinking is something we might still call "truthlike." So, for Licentius truthlike contains a certain amount of certainty.

The rest of this debate is between Alypius and Augustine who discuss whether the whole issue of a search for plausibility is even important enough to argue over! Something to note about Alypius is that when he is backed into a corner, he wants to argue that Augustine is just resorting to semantics. He does this repeatedly. It is also of note that Alypius was Augustine oldest and longest friend. I like the strain of friendship that runs through this dialogue: these matters are important, but it is also important to maintain friendship. These disagreements are not so important to sacrifice friendship over. This reminds me of the pleasant afternoons I would spend with my undergraduate friends, a full pot of coffee at the ready, discussing all matter of things. Maybe even cutting class. It is amazing how graduate school then turns people against each other. I see too often how friendships are destroyed because of disagreements over things we, with Alypius, might call semantics....even as we rise higher and higher in the ranks. Alypius and Augustine serves as a more ideal model.

But, actually what they are worried about is arguing with those who may not understand. In other words, how does one argue with an interlocutor without including them in the terms of the debate. Alypius has a created a situation where Licentius and Trygetius are in the background as he and Augustine are the primary debaters. And, this even changes further when Augustine starts to monologue. This is a great pedagogical sidebar. How do we inform students enough to even have the debate? They often appear in the middle of these ages old discussions, and if we are good and caring teachers, we include them in these debates, educate them about "semantics," but all too often so many of us are guilty (me included) of wanting to forge ahead. Haven't we done this already? But, it is important to slow down, to be patient. I feel this has become a theme of my semester: slow down, slow down, slow down. There is a certain level of marination, if you will, so that you can let ideas seep into your pores.

Structurally, this final debate of Book 2 leads us into Book 3 with a sense of better parameters. If we side with the Academicians we can search for truth, but it will always be provisional, truth-like. A final truth can never be found. Augustine is arguing then, that truth can be found and assent can be given. The question remains: how?

Against the Academicians Book 2 [19 November 386]

Augustine reports that the group has taken a week off to read the Aeneid (2nd, 3rd, and 4th books). Licentius is distracted by poetry and Augustine has to talk him down (if only my students...). Alypius returns asking for an overview of the Academicians.

Augustine writes (or monologues again) that the Academicians believed that everything was uncertain. To assent to something uncertain is to be in error. The truth comes to the mind by way of signs that can only come from the thing itself and no other. The Academicians use this definition to support the idea that truth can't be found at all. The problem that the Academicians pose for living is if nothing is certain, and you assent to nothing, you will do nothing. To escape this problem the Academicians introduce the term "truthlike" to use as a guide. A great human, then, is one who can withhold assent. Augustine leans heavily on Cicero in the definition. Although, Augustine is being critical, he is telegraphing a little...we know that truth, for Augustine, is not something sensually found. This parallels the Academician position. The senses or the information the senses receive are tricky--this anticipates modern phenomenological skepticism in terms of our limited senses of the light spectrum or even the theological problem of false believers--something Piers Plowman explores in the first Passus) and can't be trusted. The problem is the Academicians use this kind of thinking to withhold decision making (though they do search for the truth--it is just too hidden). Augustine will presumably deviate from their outcomes.

Augustine's mother hustles them off to lunch at this point. (I like these domestic break-ins; it somehow humanizes Augustine's text).

Augustine goes on to distinguish between the Old and New Academicians. The Old Academicians (O.A.) are marked by their belief that they could avoid error as long as they were not hasty to assent. The New Academicians (N.A.) believe in things that are "truthlike" though they make no claim to know the truth itself. So, for Augustine the shades of difference lie in the claim of either not being able to find the truth and withholding as much as possible (O.A.) and those merely following the specter of the truth (N.A.).

Augustine then turns on Licentius. Licentius apologizes for connecting the happy life with the search for the truth. Licentius seems to side with the New Academicians--the view of the Academicians is plausible, thus, truthlike (oh, how Augustine baits his interlocutors).

So, Augustine sets forth this question: if a man unacquainted with your father were to see your brother and assert that he is like your father, won't he seem to you to be crazy or simple-minded? The issue in this question is about perception and plausibility. Licentius retorts that if they had heard by hearsay of this similarity, this would not be an outrageous assertion. Augustine then tries a counterexample in which a boy shows up, the interlocutor says he looks like his father, admits he doesn't know the father--everyone would then think this assertion is absurd. These examples are to illustrate that the Academicians should be laughed at because this is like their version of "truthlike," they make no claim to the truth, only a simulacrum. And, apparently, a simulacrum based, at best, on speculation. Like the diviner, there is a great risk in being wrong (for example, the brother might looks like the father, but, then again, he may not).

Finally, Trygetius returns! He thinks Augustine's example is facetious. The Academicians arrive at being truthlike through reasoning, not speculation. Augustine, of course rebuts, how can anything be like something you do not know?

Alypius returns and Trygetius and Licentius ask him to take over the debate. Augustine has indicated that Alypius makes him nervous (maybe because he is a better debated?) but Augustine relaunches the debate and makes it bigger. Augustine is concerned that the way of the Academicians has prevented him from seeking the truth. Augustine resets the debate: the position of the Academicians is that it is plausible the truth cannot be found, while Augustine thinks it is possible that it can be.

Alypius agrees to continue in this fashion if Augustine agrees that this debate is more than a semantic argument over "plausibility" and "truthlike." Augustine agrees to this and as the sun is setting they agree to continue the next day.

Against the Academicians, Book 2 [Dedicatory Introduction]

This second introduction is quite long, though this post will be a bit short. Augustine begins with a lamentation over the method of the Academicians and worries over how few people actually have knowledge. People do not posses knowledge for a number of reasons--laziness, ease of access to knowledge, upheaval of life--these are the same problems students face today, of course. He concludes with the problem of people holding on to false truth, comfortable with not searching further.

It's worth taking a time-out here and reflecting: even though Augustine is leading the reader to the idea of the knowledge of God, any kind of knowledge or search for knowledge is difficult. With Augustine, I too worry about knowledge seeking. I'm comfortable enough in my post-modern position to recognize truth with a capital T is illusory; I'm much more comfortable with truths (plural). But, I do find, even in the academy, this problem of complacency and holding onto familiar (albiet wrong-headed) knowledge. When you have reached a certain point in one's academic career, there is the seduction of a line of thinking: I made it, I know it, the end. This takes many forms.

Sidebar: For example, I was walking to my office this week and a few of my colleagues were talking about the Ray Rice/Janay Rice situation in the hallway. I walked into a "she married him, didn't she?"-type argument, as if this explained away Ray Rice's actions. Normally, I would have ignored this, but there were too many stories out there via the #WhyIStayed movement on Twitter. These stories, of course, are a type of knowledge, a form of knowledge one of my friend's brought to my attention through her own brave post on social media. As kindly as possible, I informed them about the movement and concluded with a "isn't abuse a more complex issue than blaming the abused?" kind of question.

My point (as well as Augutine's) here is blindspots, of course, but also this kind of thinking, of not taking into account, searching deeper, relying on familiar frameworks (as in, she married him, so we can explain away this particular case of domestic abuse, we now no longer have to worry about it) is so comfortable even to a group of people--academics--where you would expect a little more understanding, a little more complexity. Even in this space, the holding onto false truth is evident. In the pedagogical space, it is perhaps easier to work with these issues--disabusing holds on false knowledge and uprooting complacency is the foundation of the work we do in the classroom. How much harder it is to do this with one's peers.

Sidebar concluded.

Let's wrap up this dedication. Augustine moves on to discuss his concern over Romanius again (remember, Romanius is who this dialogue is for) and Romanius' inability to come to knowledge because his mind is wrapped up in domestic matters (this is a similar concern in Thomas More's Utopia where he complains in his opening letter to Peter Giles that he can never get enough work done because of all the things he needs to take care of at home--if only one had time to think more, right?). In philosophy, Augustine says, Romanius will be moved out of anxiety (not quite to existentialism yet, eh, Augustine?). Knowledge, the search for knowledge, allows one to be happy. This is an interesting move on Augustine's part considering the connection between happiness and wisdom will be critiqued in the next dialogue.

The dedication concludes with a commendatory section on how much Romanius helped Augustine in Augustine's youth: advancing his mind, taking care of him. Romanius, though, has fallen away with this particular care of philosophy--a philosophical via--to be more easily seduced by false beauty in the form of his villa, orchards, banquets, and "performing troupes." The play is always the thing, isn't it? For Augustine, then, only the pursuit of knowledge is worth happiness. The search for truth in philosophy is beautiful, but beauty is not to be found in objects. So, maybe, Augustine is pushing a kind of transcendental aesthetics? We'll see.

Against the Academicians, Third Dialogue [12, Nov. 386]

Augustine tries to mediate (maybe, soothe some ego?) by offering up Cicero's definition of wisdom: "the knowledge of human and divine matters" (from the Tusculan Disputationes). Licentius immediately seizes on this definition by asking why we don't call him wise the disreputable man who frequents prostitutes even though he gives good advice? (One may ask, really, Licentius, that's the best example you have?)

What follows is a series of exempla in which Albicerius (our prostitute-goer) gives so-called wise answers. The question threaded throughout: did he have knowledge in these situations and what is knowledge, anyway? Augustine interjects by defining knowledge as a process (!). Take that Licentius. Knowledge, says Augustine, is not merely in the matter apprehended; it is also in the way they are apprehended "in such a way that nobody should be in error about it or vacillate when pressed by opponents"--so for Augustine it is both the matter and the how one got there. Augustine dismisses Albicerius, not only because of his prostitute-going, but because sometimes he was wrong. He is wrong because he is seer. Now, this seems to come out of nowhere--first, he is attacking Albicerius since his answers feel like luck, and, then, it's because of the profession. Augustine has no time for this type of cheap conjurer of tricks. (but maybe Augustine is mistaken?) As well, the definitional discussion continues on what exactly "human matters" of knowledge even are.  In this play-by-play then, Augustine has moved from defining knowledge, hearing out an example of someone who is perceived as having knowledge, and then, undercutting those examples by suggesting that what Albicerius is producing is not knowledge, he's just lucky, and on top of that he is a seer and frequenter of brothels. The notes report that we do not know who Albicerius was, but we can gather that since this dialogue (verging on monologue, really) has spent so much time on Albicerius that he must have been a bit of a celebrity and someone Augustine really wants to take down.

For Augustine, then, knowledge is not facts (how many farms, who wrote a poem)--he would be ultra-dismissive of the people claiming smarts at any trivia-night across the country. Knowledge is what knows value: the light of prudence, the splendor of moderation, the strength of courage, the sanctity of justice. These are the examples he provides. So wisdom is a kind of discernment of the value of values, the ephemeral qualities of a virtue.

Rote memorization is not knowledge, then. (This makes me think of The Wizard of Oz. The Wizard tells the Scarecrow: "Why, anybody can have a brain. That's a very mediocre commodity. Every pusillanimous creature that crawls on the Earth or slinks through slimy seas has a brain. Back where I come from, we have universities, seats of great learning, where men go to become great thinkers. And when they come out, they think deep thoughts and with no more brains than you have. But they have one thing you haven't got: a diploma." Ha!) Augustine stops for a moment to consider bee-knowledge: watching a bee flit from flower to flower exhibits a "sagacity" beyond human comprehension. There are other types of knowledge out there, he admits. Humans can't or do not think with bee-thoughts (we might ask, with Augustine and contemporary animal theorists, how might we enact bee-knowledge or can we? Considering problems of bee-colony collapse, it might be worth a think).

Augustine then passes on to defining divine matters. Divine matters are not reached through the senses (something he posited in the early dedication). He dismisses Albicerius as a diviner who looks at stars and thinks they tell him of divine things. But, of course, this is apprehending with sensual knowledge, not intellectual knowledge (a distinction Augustine is making, one I'm not sure I agree with). And this is truly why Albicerius is not a good example of someone who is wise. The intellectual search is the only way to reach divine matters.

More debate occurs on whether Albicerius is wise--short answer: no. And we have further refinement of our definition of wisdom, as well. Licentius puts forth: wisodm is not only knowlegde, but the search for knowledge that is relevant to a happy life. That which embraces knowledge belongs to God, the search belongs to humans. God is happy in the former (as a spiritual embodiment of knowledge?) while humans are in the latter. This seems to come out of left field (we haven't seen happiness in awhile, for one)--because this seems to be the most explicit reference to God, yet. As well, by extension, if we embrace knowledge, have we become God (like God, god-like, gods??)

What follows in the dialogue, then, is a summary put forth by Augustine of the moves we've been discussing here. Licentius has landed where Augustine wanted, it would seem, and the dialogue on truth, knowledge, and wisdom is, purportedly, going to be left behind. Where has Trygetius gone to? (maybe off to get the beer).

The key discussion in these three debates is the emphasis on the search. Like a dialogue itself, the art of conversation is revelatory. Although, in the end Licentius has named God as the destination, knowledge is something found through wisdom--and this finding-through-wisdom is happy life. The threads are connecting here. Part of this happiness is tranquility. The path of wisdom causes a tranquil mind; tranquility leads to happiness (or maybe even equated with it). 

Second Dialogue [11 November 386]

In the previous dialogue, Licentius was stymied as to how to define "error." Today's debate returns to the concept with Licentius pointing out that error is the "approval of a falsehood as truth" [1.4.11]. In this way he can still defend the process of truth since it is only error when you have arrived, in this case erroneously--the process of finding is still a good since one is still not wrong unless one has identified something that is, in truth, error. The emphasis for him is still the search.

The dialogue then shifts into a semantic argument about the word "always." In this case, as "always" is connected with how much time one must invest in the search for truth. The example provided here is if you set out on a journey and you never arrive but you still maintain the journey you would not necessarily ever fall out of journeying (or no one would ever accuse you of such a thing). But, of course, you will eventually die. Always is irrelevant, in a certain way, because of the very finite nature of any search for truth. Thus, it is good enough to know that the journey is happening or the search for truth is happening even if every second of your day is not taken up with searching for the truth.

It took me awhile to make the connection between this argument over "always" and the next shift that occurs--the problem of a "way of life" as it pertains to wisdom. For Trygetius, "wisdom is the right way that leads to the truth" [1.5.14]. So, wisdom and truth are two different things. Wisdom is a path, while truth is the destination (for Trygetius, at least). In this way Trygetius has played into Licentius' definitional trap--by calling the search (wisdom) and connecting wisdom to truth and further connecting wisdom to happiness then the search itself is all that is required to be happy. So they reach a bit of an impasse here at the second dialogue. Wisdom is a kind of life, one in which you seek out truth, but on the way, knowing that you are seeking out truth, you are happy. In this way, always is merely an accidental quality of the path you are on. It is the one who is not searching, is not taking a path of wisdom, is not even knowing there is such a path, that is unhappy, lost, etc. Always is lost on them.

Augustine ends here. Trygetius is upset about falling into the trap. But, because it is too dark to transcribe, Augustine leaves us for another day.

Against the Academicians (Dedication/First Debate)

Against the Academicians (ca. 386) is written as a debate between Licentius and Trygetius with Augustine as mediator and scribe. The debate is initially centered around truth, but as in all good dialogues other qualities become attached.

In the dedication to Romanius, Augustine invokes "that divine element in you" [1.1.3] that has been lulled to sleep by the world. Thee idea here is to awaken that element--to find out how it has been numbed and how to wake it up (indicated by the idea that Providence already dealt Romanius a "reversal" that has numbed him). So the dialogue is a kind of stimulant for Romanius.

Part of the lulling of Romanius is the worship of the things only understood by the senses. This is limiting. Nothing detected by the senses can be truly good. So, as we will see truth, the pursuit of truth, may be something that is not performed through sensual work. With the dedication Augustine has set us up with two problems: 1) the recovery of the divine within (something already always there) and 2) the senses' easy attachment to the world that keeps this divine element asleep.

To get at these matters, the debate or dialogue begins with a discussion of truth. The debate between L and T has to do with if truth needs to known, or, as it is phrased "is there any doubt that we should know the truth?" [1.2.5]. This question is quickly parsed to be connected to happiness, as in, if I did not know the truth could I be happy? (or, another way to think this question: is truth even necessary if I can be happy without it?) My easy reaction to this is that, of course, we can be happy without truth. The 'truth hurts' is a very living catch-phrase. Why even connect these? It would seem the truth causes immense pain more often than it may soothe.  In medieval mystical thought the concept of 'unknowing' is central to understanding God--the apophaticism of Pseudo-Dionysus the Areopagite, and later the author of The Cloud of Unknowing, find bliss in the act of unknowing. The darkness of unknowing is a kind of joy as one leaves behind mortal constraints on knowledge. Possibly truth is this moment of unknowing for them. But in this debate, happiness and truth are quickly linked.

The conversation shifts again, though, they attack the process of finding truth. In other words, they debate process vs. destination. Licentius (and Augustine, being an impartial mediator here) argues for process--this argument hinges on these moves: 1) happiness is finding truth; 2) the truth lines up with happiness; 3) without truth there is not happiness. Licentius' point is controversial because, for him, the search for truth implies, of course, there is no truth, yet. The person searching is happy--whether that truth is found. Just knowing it may be out there is enough. Trygetius, on the other hand, is of the mind that a person is only happy when the truth is found, not in the act.

For Trygetius, as well, perfection of a person relies on the truth. The person in process of finding the truth is not perfect since they are still looking. Licentius dismisses the idea of perfection--no one will ever be perfect, but the happy person is the one on the quest for truth. For Licentius, the important factor in being human is the seeking of truth--anyone who does not put their whole energies into it is not living up to their "perfection" or their being-human. As I'm working this through, I can feel Augustine playing me--Licentius makes so much sense--and I am anticipating Trygetius being the more correct one. But, as for now, Licentius makes more sense to me.

This first debate ends (as they retire to the baths) with the problem of error. Who is in error? Is it the one who never finds or the one searching (so as not to be in error)? Error becomes an intrinsic quality (one is always in error until one finds truth--Trygetius) or an accidental quality (it is the price one pays for going on the search--Licentius). Error is picked up in the next debate, since, until one figures out what error is, one will be unable to move toward truth.

The Rules

This first post seems appropriate as someone who inspired a monastic rule. And, in the spirit of that rule, I won't be too rigid. I'm using this blog as a running commentary, reading blog, link-node, on the works of Augustine of Hippo. I've read works by Augustine (Confessions, City of God, etc), but I wanted a place to keep a running exegesis or gloss (maybe some thoughts on the differences of those words in a later post) on his work. So, I will eschew the personal on this blog and use it for academic purposes--though the personal, of course, will, of course, come in to this. My interest in Augustine stems from my work in medieval mysticism and theology. His fingerprints are everywhere in that field--thinking about time, sexuality, faith, teaching, etc. So, I will be working with primary sources and supplementing with some secondary works (especially if readers have strong recommendations). Feel free to post questions, thoughts critiques, as I work through the oeuvre, as Michelangelo allegedly said in the end, "ancora imparo." I'm going to begin with one of Augustine's early works--something I am working with right now--Against the Academicians. I'll move into the other, more well-known, works later.