Order of Saint Augustine

“ Augustine is speaking there of that peace which is between one man and another, and he says that this peace is concord, not indeed any kind of concord, but that which is well ordered, through one man agreeing with another in respect of something befitting to both of them. For if one man concord with another, not of his own accord, but through being forced, as it were, by the fear of some evil that besets him, such concord is not really peace, because the order of each concordant is not observed, but is disturbed by some fear-inspiring cause. ”

“ For since the "Dominations" appoint and order what belongs to the Divine ministrations, the orders subject to them are arranged according to the disposition of those things in which the Divine ministrations are effected. Still, as Augustine says (De Trin. iii) , "bodies are ruled in a certain order; the inferior by the superior; and all of them by the spiritual creature, and the bad spirit by the good spirit." So the first order after the "Dominations" is called that of "Principalities," who rule even over good spirits; then the "Powers," who coerce the evil spirits ”

“ Thirdly, in order to give us an example: to teach us, to wit, how to overcome the temptations of the devil. Hence Augustine says (De Trin. iv) that Christ "allowed Himself to be tempted" by the devil, "that He might be our Mediator in overcoming temptations, not only by helping us, but also by giving us an example."
Fourthly, in order to fill us with confidence in His mercy. Hence it is written (Heb. 4:15) : "We have not a high-priest, who cannot have compassion on our infirmities, but one tempted in all things like as we are, without sin." ”

“ Augustine, though younger than he, was, after studying under Augustine at Milan, conspicuous at first as a magistrate in Rome. He abandoned that honour to follow his master into the Church. It is noteworthy that there is no mention of him as a saint in the ancient catalogues. ”

“ The privilege reserved to the Holy See by John XXII., creating Knights of the Order, was fully exercised by that Pope and his successors, for he himself established a sister Order—Ordine di Cristo—in Italy, with like privileges and customs; a broad white woollen mantle, and on the breast a red cross with a small silver cross upon it. Pope Paul V. in 1605 gave the Papal Knights the rule of St. Augustine; but in course of time the Order in Italy followed the course of the Portuguese branch, and became the honorary distinction like all modern "Orders." ”

“ Well, Augustin wanted his support, first of all, when he came as Imperial Commissioner to Carthage to bring the Donatists into line. Generally, we see only the good points of people who do us good turns. Besides, in order to propitiate the bishop, and the devout Court at Ravenna, the Tribune advertised his great zeal in favour of Catholicism. His first wife, a very pious woman whom he seems to have loved much, encouraged him in this. When she died, he was so overcome by despair that he took refuge in the extremest practices of religion—and in this, perhaps, he was quite sincere. ”

“ In his consecrated learning and passionate devotion to God, Augustine again reminds one of St. Paul. Truly could he say: ‘The zeal of thine house hath eaten me up’; and so was often pictured with upturned eye, with a pen in his left hand, and a burning heart in his right. He was a philosophical and theological genius of the first order, towering like a pyramid above his age, and looking down commandingly upon succeeding centuries. He had a mind uncommonly fertile and deep, bold and soaring; and with it, what is better, a heart full of Christian love and humility. ”

“ It would be a vain and useless labor for me to undertake to day to prove that Augustine is a great saint; there is nothing better known in the world, both among the learned and the ignorant; it is proclaimed by the dumb books in libraries, written by pens in the universities, spoken of by tongues in the pulpits; whenever the name of Augustine is mentioned you hear the great Augustine spoken of. So that one who has even a little knowledge of the Saint must, whenever he thinks of him, look on him as a great saint. ”

“ To him I was led by thee without my knowledge, that by him I might be led to thee in full knowledge. That man of God received me as a father would, and welcomed my coming as a good bishop should. And I began to love him, of course, not at the first as a teacher of the truth, for I had entirely despaired of finding that in thy Church--but as a friendly man. And I studiously listened to him--though not with the right motive--as he preached to the people. I was trying to discover whether his eloquence came up to his reputation, and whether it flowed fuller or thinner than others said it did. ”

“ Let the heretics therefore seek in the Catholic Church not what they have, but what they have not,—that is, the end of the commandment, without which many holy things may be possessed, but they cannot profit. "Now, the end of the commandment is [Pg 124] charity out of a pure heart, and of a good conscience, and of faith unfeigned." [312] Let them therefore hasten to the unity and truth of the Catholic Church, not that they may have the sacrament of washing, if they have been already bathed in it, although in heresy, but that they may have it to their health. ”

“ But Christ himself is the rock, not a mortal man. "Other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ,"--a truth reiterated even by Saint Augustine, the great and acknowledged theologian of the Catholic Church, although Augustine's views of sin and depravity are no more relished by the Roman Catholics of our day than the doctrines of Luther himself, who drew his theological system, like Calvin, from Augustine more than from any other man, except Saint Paul. ”

“ Among the few great names which have most signally emblazoned the pages of history, and whose fame and influence have not been limited to their own age, country, or people, that of Augustine, saint and bishop, stands out pre-eminently as worthy of all the encomiums bestowed upon him by serious students of men and their times. He has been and is regarded as the greatest and most celebrated of theologians, the father and master of preachers of the Divine Word, the peer of the rarest and most enlightened minds, whose soaring is above all time. ”

“ The remaining 43 years of Augustine's life were devoted to the service of the Church. He returned to Africa, was made presbyter in 301, and bishop of Hippo in 305, which latter office he held until his death. It was a period of political and theological unrest, for, while the barbarians pressed in upon the Empire, even sacking Rome itself, schism and heresy also threatened the Church. .Augustine threw himself into the theological conflict, not from inclination, hut from a sense of duty. With voice and pen he waged war, and usually he conquered. ”

“ In his natural endowments, so rich and finely blended, in his training and early experience, in the supernatural mode of his conversion, everything wrought together to give to men in the apostle Paul a man supremely fitted to be Christ’s ambassador to the Pagan world, and for all ages the “teacher of the Gentiles in faith and truth.” “A chosen vessel unto me,” said the Lord Jesus, “to bear my name.”
Such a gift to the world was St Augustine: a man of the most powerful intellect and will, master of the thought and life of his time. ”

“ Bishop Jansen of Ypres in Belgium had devoted his life to the study of Saint Augustine and to the elucidation of the doctrines of that great father of the church. Saint Augustine is the spiritual forefather of those who in religious thought are believers in determinism, in religious fatalism, with all the consequences which it involves, such as predestination and the doctrine of primitive sin which man is apparently endeavoring in vain to expiate. ”

“ In God’s searching presence, Augustine undertakes to plumb the depths of his memory to trace the mysterious pilgrimage of grace which his life has been--and to praise God for his constant and omnipotent grace. In a mood of sustained prayer, he recalls what he can of his infancy, his learning to speak, and his childhood experiences in school. He concludes with a paean of grateful praise to God.
Chapter I 1. “Great art thou, O Lord, and greatly to be praised; great is thy power, and infinite is thy wisdom.” ”

“ Probus, mentioned in Domesday Book, as subject to the discipline of St. Benedict. Such 60evidence as we possess tends to confirm the contrary opinion. What has been said of the order of St. Benedict applies with greater force to that of St. Augustine, the Black Canons, whose earliest foundation in England dates from A.D. 1108, that is, 22 years after Domesday Book was compiled. Cardinal Gasquet truly says the clergy of every large church, as being subject to rule, were called canons. The rule of St. Augustine was not introduced at Bodmin until the time of Bishop William Warelwast (1107-36) . ”

“ At last taking courage, he prepared himself for Baptism, and, to punish himself for his human respect, insisted on reading his profession of faith aloud before the whole congregation, instead of making it, as was usual, in private.
This courageous action of an old man made Augustine feel his own cowardice. He believed now that the Catholic Church was the true Church, and yet he could not face the thought of Baptism. He would have to give up so much. The Christian standard was high for a man who had spent his life in self-indulgence. ”

“ On the other side of the hill, near the Circus, Saint Augustine taught rhetoric for a living, though he knew no Greek and was perhaps no great Latin scholar either—still an unbeliever then, an astrologer and a follower after strange doctrines, one whom no man could have taken for a future bishop and Father of the Church, who was to be author of two hundred and thirty-two theological treatises, as well as of an exposition of the Psalms and the Gospels. ”

“ The high-church Episcopalian and the high-church Presbyterian equally insist on the divine authority for their respective institutions. The Catholics simply do the same, when they make Saint Peter the rock on which the supremacy of their Church is based. In the time of Augustine there was only one form of the visible Church,--there were no Protestants; and he naturally wished, like any bishop, to strengthen and establish its unity,--a government of bishops, of which the bishop of Rome was the acknowledged head. ”

“ Of the four great Fathers of the Church he was admittedly the greatest—more profound than Ambrose, his spiritual father, more original and systematic than Jerome, his correspondent, and intellectually far more distinguished than Gregory the Great, his pupil on the papal throne. The theological position and influence of Augustine may be said to be unrivalled. No single name has ever exercised such power over the Christian Church, and no one mind ever made so deep an impression upon Christian thought. ”

“ Betwixt whom and us, in this uncertainty of human knowledge, Thou only dividest; Thou, who provest our hearts, and callest the light, day, and the darkness, night. For who discerneth us, but Thou? And what have we, that we have not received of Thee? out of the same lump vessels are made unto honour, whereof others also are made unto dishonour. Or who, except Thou, our God, made for us that firmament of authority over us in Thy Divine Scripture? as it is said, For heaven shall be folded up like a scroll ”

“ Despite its awkward form, however, the Enchiridion is one of the most important of all of Augustine’s writings, for it is a conscious effort of the theological magistrate of the Western Church to stand on final ground of testimony to the Christian truth.
For his framework, Augustine chooses the Apostles’ Creed and the Lord’s Prayer. The treatise begins, naturally enough, with a discussion of God’s work in creation. Augustine makes a firm distinction between the comparatively unimportant knowledge of nature and the supremely important acknowledgment of the Creator of nature. ”

“ Augustine was furnished with letters of introduction to Ambrose, the Bishop, who had been brilliantly successful at the Bar in his youth, and was probably an old friend of Symmachus. He was of a noble Roman family, and famous alike for his great learning and peculiar charm of manner. He was famous also for his holiness of life, but this was of less interest to Augustine; it was Ambrose the orator with whom he desired to make acquaintance. ”

“ So Augustine also exhorts that "every one exercise toward himself severity, so that, being judged of himself, he shall not be judged of the Lord," as St. Paul says. 1 Cor. 11:31. Pope Leo surnamed the Great, said "The Mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, gave to those set over the churches the authority to assign to those who confess the doing of penance, and through the door of reconciliation to admit to the communion of the sacraments those who have been cleansed by a salutary satisfaction." ”

“ In 601 Augustine received his pall from Rome, died on the 26th of May, 605, and was buried in St. Augustine’s Abbey, near the high altar. He was not of the Benedictine order of monks, but followed the order of Pope Gregory in the cloister which he had founded in Canterbury. [13] In 602 he laid the foundation of his cathedral church in Canterbury. In 604 he ordained Mellitus, one of his companions, bishop of London; and Justus, another companion, bishop of Rochester. King Ethelbert granted them London and Rochester respectively as their episcopal sees. ”