The Conversion of Augustine by Romano Guardini

Author:Romano Guardini
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Barakaldo Books
Published: 2020-04-22T00:00:00+00:00

XII—Augustine’s “Paganism”

SENSES, INSTINCT, mind, religious vitality—these powers are embedded deep in Augustine, but not so that they from the very start sustain and fructify each other; rather they run side by side, frequently colliding and obstructing one another. Hence the primary theme of Augustinian becoming: that this powerful sensuousness be elevated to the realm of the spirit, there to be illuminated and transformed; that this intellect, likewise powerful but confused by shifting idealism and softened by aesthetic self-indulgence, direct itself earnestly to the real; that it discover the right relationship of existence to history; that it accept the humility of man’s estate, in other words, of his corporality, shouldering the tasks of a realistic code of ethics that has “perfection” and its accompanying happiness as its goal. All this, however, demands that the heart surrender itself utterly, and love become powerful enough to bring about the unity discussed above. Only then, in the process of this inner development, can the religious life, growing on experience, struggle, and pain, mature to genuine earnestness.

This is of decisive importance even for Augustine’s natural talents, above all, for his stature as a thinker. There are scholars, scientists, philosophers who “function” almost entirely intellectually. Up to a certain, far advanced point, their work is independent of the soul’s influence, as sketched above. No one would dream, for instance, of rooting the work of an Aristotle or a Kant deeper in the psychic processes just described than absolutely necessary to the earnestness of any genuine philosophy. With Plato it is already different. His work is incomparably more profoundly affected by personal circumstance. For him to a much larger extent, thought is a renewed testimony to existence through creatively exalted form. For this everything is required: mind, matter, soul, body, surroundings, and center—in short, the whole man as he emerges from the power of the liberated heart. How much more so with Augustine! His thinking is existential, not only in the sense that it is grounded in earnestness and passionate participation, not only because it aims at seizing and forming the fulness of reality, but in the last analysis precisely because the thinker sees and understands himself in his existence: himself in the world (world as setting for and stuff of his life); because he sees his own acts and existence as the process by which it becomes evident what this life is. Thus both the object and the moving force of his thought are directly dependent on his personal development.

Similarly, Augustine’s artistic stature is closely related to this development. Failure to recognize him as an artist, or the high calibre of his art also (and especially) when he plunges into the spiritual realm, is a failure to do him justice. Only the artist hurls his whole self into his art, taking with him the aesthetic-creative passion that is not permitted more immediate expression.{13} Augustine is a rhetorician, and not in the ambiguous sense which the word now so often suggests. He is an artist of the living word in its relation to the public of antiquity.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.